Diversity Equals Distrust, says Harvard Study

Prof. Robert Putnam has come to the right statistics in his research, but then through political correct Newthink, comes to the wrong conclusion:

The core message of the research was that, "in the presence of diversity, we hunker down", he said. "We act like turtles. The effect of diversity is worse than had been imagined. And it's not just that we don't trust people who are not like us. In diverse communities, we don't trust people who do look like us."

Prof Putnam found trust was lowest in Los Angeles, "the most diverse human habitation in human history", but his findings also held for rural South Dakota, where "diversity means inviting Swedes to a Norwegians' picnic".

When the data were adjusted for class, income and other factors, they showed that the more people of different races lived in the same community, the greater the loss of trust. "They don't trust the local mayor, they don't trust the local paper, they don't trust other people and they don't trust institutions," said Prof Putnam. "The only thing there's more of is protest marches and TV watching."

Actually, Putnam is wrong about Los Angeles being "the most diverse human habitation in human history," as recent stats show that Miami has the highest percentage of foreign-born inhabitants of any city in the world. And then this "social scientist" takes on a British ex-foreign minister Jack Straw on the veil, with the brain-defying thigh-slapper "What we shouldn't do is to say that they [immigrants] should be more like us. We should construct a new us."

Yeah, just allow them to set up sharia law as is being propounded in the UK, and cut off the hands of their own thieves. As is the case of most Harvard profs, Putnam wants to market his schtick to the left-loon fringe, which laps up multi-culti gibberish eagerly to fill that empty space called their lives.
The Belmont Club makes the following observation:

But if Putnam is correct, then one of the central tenets of multiculturalism — that it brings people together if they simply "respect" each others differences — immediately requires qualification. In fact, it becomes entirely conceivable that the multiculti program is actually the driver behind many of the tensions which are now rising in places like France, the Netherlands and the UK.

Respect goes both directions, and the Muslim inability to tolerate a Christian majority or significant minority in countries they co-habit [Lebanon comes to mind] means that somewhere down the road riots and insurgencies might be in store for more countries than France and the Netherlands. Already in Belgium, Ramadhan is causing civil distress that in turn provokes a right-wing reaction to the Muslim lawbreakers.

Putnam's shallow bromide "a new us" simply is not a fit solution to complex social and political issues.