Dear Angelo Ting, It’s a good discussion to have and important one too , lets stay at the point of discussion that is -----| Onus is on the populous of the western host countries to be accommodative of various sets of beliefs of immigrants, like dietary restriction , restricting alcoholic consumptions, allowing less working hours for same pay, prayer spaces for those beliefs & rituals and other paraphernalia, If these belief based demands are provisioned , then the immigrants of those beliefs feel safe and remember the deeds of hosts fondly, for this remembrance, host countries should provision these changes which are by the way by their very nature are discriminative to the host countries. |------ This is the core argument right Angelo;, Let me try to bring in some perspective, before doing that, a Disclaimer please, I am an atheist and does not have any personal imaginary gods or faith beliefs, hence distant to all faith belief systems, you get a raw unbiased view, lets dig in . I wish to argue that currently immigrants are attacking the western hosts from all sides with their sheer stupidity, empathy and understanding needs to be from immigrants and definitely not from hosts. Here I explain…

History

Renaissance, starting in 14th century in the western world made a tremendous impact on human thought, it made a fantastic transition from middle ages to modernity, a variety of free thoughts shook the western world, the core intellectual basis of “Renaissance” is humanism, free thought, scientific inquiry. Every modern achievement in science, technology & humanism can be traced back to these tectonic events. Results were off course catastrophic to faith-based belief systems as it turned out that earth is not flat and also not the centre of the universe anymore. Shockingly, humans did evolve from apes. All holy books now looked comical & gibberish. Western belief systems however began to reconcile to multitude of scientific facts which fuelled scientific discourses in all branches of science and technology, a renewed interest in art & music also emerged. Net net western nations started dominating the human progress, faith-based engagements are relegated to just harmless pass times a far cry from dreaded Spanish inquisition. The western societies have now evolved into a fine liberal, fair, democratic, freedom seeking scientific temper driven societies. Every freedom seeking person wanted to be in those societies.

Immigrants

Coming to the Immigrants from south Asian, some African & middle eastern regions, they gained access to western education due to the colonial past and started immigrating to western world, while they had gone through the mechanics of curriculum of education, but their belief systems are untouched by scientific enquiry & critical thought. They were intact. However Immigrants strongly believed (and even now believe) that western societies are liberal, fair with personal freedoms forming their core ethos, they dreamt of escaping the absurdity and the futility of their belief systems, injustice, discrimination, inequality, corruption, poverty, lack of opportunities and a host of bad things from their home countries. When they arrive to the west and experience western societies a culture shock is inevitably happens. Culture shocks/interactions turn some immigrants into fine secularists/agnostics/humanists/atheists as their belief systems and values are constantly challenged every day. However, some identify huge loopholes to exploit without any sense of gratitude. They see complete lack of authoritativeness, and also extreme respect to personal freedoms, from these devious immigrant point of view , westerners appear as coward naive fools who are also incompetent & impotent. Instead of taking advantage of free thought & freedoms into developing into a refined being, they bring those failed beliefs which has failed their own countries to start with. and start aggressively implementing in the host countries , creating ugly & repulsive social identities for themselves, huddling & ghettoizing , making strange loud noises in the name of prayers, gathering in large numbers and inconveniencing others in the name of rituals , extracting concessions in the name of belief , exploiting social security benefits to the brim often at the cost of hosts, while wanting the same pay but work less and pass time in praying in working hours, ridiculously asking for prayer rooms at work places, Just see how nonsensical is this notion , if immigrants are Jews, Mormons, Jains ,Zoroastrians, Muslim, Hindu, Sikhs, Christians, Buddhists etc etc and each one wants a prayer room at the work, is not only ridiculous but impractical. Westerners are actually dumbfounded by the audacity of this stupidity; they just don’t know how to react. Now they are organising under far-right groups, through reluctantly to stop this relentless onslaught of stupidity. Immigrants with mala fide intentions don’t choose china for immigration, everybody knows why, because they don’t give a hoot to any belief systems, they choose western liberal societies, because they construe, kindness, gratitude, accommodation, fair play, freedom with weakness, incompetence, cowardness

What should Immigrants do then

Immigrants should try to be openly engage with the host cultures, they may have personal belief systems, but then, that should be strictly restricted to their homes. They need to engage in productive and social activities , volunteer, for example to go visit the elderly , spend time with veterans, teach any skill you have to westerners, donate generously to health & community causes, discuss and introduce your native performing arts , eastern philosophy ( not the blind faith BS), music , movies , poetry, mythology, stories , folk arts, handicrafts , eastern alternative practices , cuisine , fabrics, smells, colours physical & mental exercising concepts & ethos. Immigrants have such a rich treasures to offer to westerners. Celebrate life, happiness & also grieve with them in challenges. Take an empathetic step, you will be surprised to see 10 embracing steps towards you.

I could give one example which exemplifies the bondage and social contract between the immigrant & the host. Every year, Ghurkhas, the natives of the poor & hilly country Nepal aspire to immigrate to UK, that too in readiness to sacrifice their life to defend the host country. Ghurkhas, have their own belief systems but they strictly restrict it to their homes, they do not demand any special treatment whatsoever for themselves and always volunteer to be the tip of the host country’s spear. UK reciprocates by trusting them with their own existence by deploying them against their enemies. Singapore, does the same.

What Next

The relentless yearning to tell the world that my god/my belief/my rituals , no matter how stupid it looks to other person, but say it loudly that its better than yours has given rise to far right movements across the world , creating strong biases against all immigrants, while Ghurkhas’ put everything to stake to preserve the sanctity of social contracts , there by furthering aspirations of their subsequent generations of immigrants to host countries , where as some immigrant morons peddle medieval ideas shamelessly and earn the wrath of westerners thereby causing generational harm by robbing the future aspirations of our next generation of young immigrants who dream and yearn to immigrate to these fantastic places on earth which offer unlimited opportunities and freedom . These young potential immigrants are pained by this stupidity and see their dreams crushed for ever. Substantial number of the immigrants themselves are against some revolting concession seeking immigrants. Humanism is on the rise, there are 500 million agnostics and humanists who doesn’t give a hoot to any personal gods/Beliefs/rituals and this tribe is increasing. We have to reconcile with the fact there are billions in this world who doesn’t give a flying **** to a host of existing personal gods/faith-based beliefs, except of their owns. It will take few generations, but this stupidity will end someday. God willing 😊