Return of the Tribes

The Weekly Standard published a piece by Ralph Peters that has an interesting take on the nature of tribalism, and its resistance to globalization—particularly with regard to Islam's ambitions to rule the world.

I never understood why people would identify with their race or ethnicity. It was just an accident of nature, an arbitrary compiling of genes. Why would it matter? Why would it make you particularly fond of others who shared that single genetic trait? There was a boy in my grammar school named Paul who was of Italian descent. He lived and breathed Italian-ness. I thought it was...well...weird.

My grandparents emmigrated from Italy, too. But it never occured to me to consider myself an "Italian". And it never occured to their son, my father, either (whose first language was, in fact, Italian, though he was born in California, because his parents spoke it at home). My dad was just an American Boy who joined the Navy, fought in WWII, (in which one of our enemies was Italy), married an American Girl whose grandparents came from Ireland, worked an American Union Job, and raised an unequivocally, un-hyphenated, American Family. Race and enthicity were simply not issues in my house. Being an American wasn't about that. It was a choice one made, a set of principles one adopted, a voluntary act of identity, a volitional collaboration, not a random genetic doom. It was the American Dream. America is different, and better than other cultures because of this great fact. Anyone can become an American. But BEING an American, because it isn't based on race or ethnicity, is the acceptance of a way of thinking, believing and seeing the world. You have to speak the language, accept the vision of the Founders, and the greatest political document in the history of mankind, the United States Constitution. You have to live and breathe it and be willing to die for it. If you don't, you aren't an American, even if you were born here. It's the only thing that defines a REAL American. There are no other criteria.*

So, naturally, I was always confused by the attitude of the racially-ethnically identified, who supported members of their own tribe, regardless of individual merit; who were Negroes, or Mexicans, or Greeks, first. I was shocked by the attitude of most blacks to the O.J. Simpson verdict. I simply could not understand how they could support an obvious murderer simply because he was black. And there was never a question that that was its basis. They shamelessly admitted it. Indeed, they celebrated it.

But now, as the PC crowd has made it fashionable to consider all Caucasians racists, bigots, greedy imperialists, soulless capitalists, lynchers, land thieves, culture destroyers, etc. I find myself, too, circling the wagons, identifying for the first time as a WHITE PERSON. Going Tribal.

And as non-Americans swarm into my land, demanding changes in my country to accomodate them, using languages I don't understand, praying to gods that are foreign and cruel, despising and criticizing America while demanding she welcome, support and protect them...

...I'm getting very defensive.

I can see—no, I can feel—the Tribal anger rising. My tribe, my land, my culture. I'm getting pissed, and so are those around me. Our tribe, our land, our culture. This might get ugly.

The Gunslinger
(It's a shame we can't just shoot the bastards now and avoid the rush.)

*If you want to displace our values, language and culture, you aren't an American. If you want to substitute religious law for the Constitution, you aren't an American. If you respect Marx, Che, Kofi Anan, Hugo Chavez or some Ayatollah more than George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, you're not an American. If you're a Collaborator**, you aren't a real American. If you believe Cindy Sheehan, Barbara Boxer, Michael Malloy, Al Franken, Nancy Pelosi, the Puffington, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry and Ned Lamont are credible and George W. Bush is a liar...you're just an idiot...but that's another story.

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