"Our world is no longer made up of self-contained homogenous societies living apart from one another. Men and women from a wide variety of traditions have been torn from their original
homes and have settled in foreign, even hostile, environments, where they have to live side by side and adapt to one another. Friction between them is inevitable... everything must be done to re-create the social fabric and allow the people living in this [situation] to gain confidence and recognition through peaceful activities.
For this purpose, it is indispensable to speak truthfully. This means not giving into fantasies, but not shying away from looking the facts in the face. Politically correct discourse is responsible for a great deal of hypocrisy and ignorance. Having said this, one also must be careful not to attack the wrong target, and mistake the awkward defense of outcasts and the poor for the enemy. On the pretext of avoiding the politically correct there is a danger of lapsing into the politically abject. And we have nothing to gain from this."
Tzvedan Todorov, from an interview in Critical Inquiry Magazine
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