Many years ago, during a trip to Tanna Island in Vanuatu, I was visited by a delegation of traditional elders who wanted me to help them with a serious social problem. Two Tannese women were living together in a sexual relationship, and the colonial authorities were refusing to intervene, saying that the women's sexual preferences were not their concern.
The male custodians of Tannese traditions viewed the women's actions as a fundamental threat to their way of life. "If they get away with this, all the other women will want to do the same, and our culture will fall apart", the elders said, providing a fascinating anthropological insight into men's beliefs about women.
I told them their fears that an irresistible wave of lesbianism was about to sweep the island were almost certainly unfounded. But in any case, there was nothing I could do about their problem, and I thought that the authorities had made the correct decision. The men soon left, probably grumbling on their way home about foolish Europeans and their culturally destructive attitudes.
However, the elders' anxieties were not entirely misplaced, because an unequal relationship between men and women was a basic principle of their culture. A great deal of traditional Tannese ritual and political life depended on men's control over women in marriage. The two indigenous lesbians may have chosen a rather radical way of asserting their autonomy, but women's equality and traditional Tannese culture were essentially incompatible.
It is not only in their treatment of women that exotic non-western societies may confound our cherished liberal principles. Their cultural attitudes towards justice, tolerance and human obligation often leave a great deal to be desired, making the attitudes held by members of the extreme right in our own society seem caring by comparison. And such attitudes are not just haphazard characteristics; they are usually part of the core values of these cultures.
The anthropologist Paul Bohannan has written about an appalling experience he had while carrying out research in a traditional West African society. One evening one of his local assistants returned from a swim in the river, and told Bohannan that he had just seen a stranger drown. When Bohannan asked his assistant whether anyone had tried to save the stranger, the man replied, "no, he was not one of our people".
"The importance of cultural diversity" has become one of the most fashionable mantras in contemporary Australia. Last February's Constitutional Convention agreed that the preamble to a new constitution should recognise our cultural diversity, and anyone who attempts to question the wisdom of this move is likely to be howled down by the people who see themselves as our moral guardians.
Certainly, a rigidly monocultural society would be stultifying, as well as being unrealisable in today's world. But as the Tannese and West African examples suggest -- and they are a very long way from the extremes that I could have presented -- if we want to live in a humane and equitable society, many expressions of "cultural diversity" should be actively discouraged.
This common sense observation is ignored in much of the current public discussion about cultural issues, thus playing into the hands of the bitter opponents of multiculturalism who fear we are going down a path which will lead to a nation of warring tribes. One of the reasons for this failure to admit the obvious is that the politicians, academics and others who set the terms of serious debate have developed an unreasonable horror of advocating anything that might be labelled "assimilationist".
In the decades following the Second World War the assimilation of minorities was promoted by "progressives" and international organisations as a desirable goal. Countries which attempted to prevent indigenous or immigrant minorities from assimilating were denounced as racist. Since the 1960s however, there has been a 180 degree turnaround.
"Assimilation" has rapidly become one of the great spectres of our time. Some school history textbooks now inform children that "assimilation" is "cultural genocide", and even people who do not wish to go quite this far are agreed that assimilation policies are "racist".
Yet at the same time, the very people who recoil at the idea of "assimilation" are themselves promoting assimilationist policies. They are just not honest enough to admit it.
Take AusAID, for instance. As the government agency responsible for our aid program to developing countries, it is one of the ways in which we try to convince the world that Australia is a "good international citizen". AusAID places a high priority on its Gender and Development policy which aims to promote women's equal participation and leadership in decision making at all levels, and to help eliminate discrimination against women.
This policy is based not only on Australia's commitment to universal human rights -- itself a very western notion -- but also on the recognition that any economic development programs which ignore the roles and responsibilities of women are unlikely to succeed. It is an admirable policy, and Australians should be proud of it. But to Tannese elders and other custodians of patriarchal cultures in the Third World it must be anathema, a demand that they assimilate to middle-class western values; even "cultural genocide".
And then there is the National Agenda for a Multicultural Australia, the sacred text of the multicultural lobby. This obliges all Australians to accept not only equality between men and women, but a more general social equality; together with tolerance, freedom of speech and religion, and the rule of law.
Again, these are wonderful objectives. But let us not pretend that they are shared by all the cultures now present in this country, or that they can be grafted on to these cultures without undermining some of their core values.
So the argument is not be whether we should be advocating assimilation. If we want a decent and harmonious society, there is simply no alternative. The real questions are how much assimilation we should require of minorities, and the best ways of promoting it.
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