Reflections of a stormy petrel

I think that true respect for other cultures must mean that one takes them seriously -- which implies that one must judge them, because they are constellations of philosophies and customs acting in the same world that one lives in oneself. The assumption underlying completely nonjudgmental multiculturalism is that one's own culture is so utterly dominant that other cultures are safely quaint and removed from the levers of real power -- and that is indeed deep contempt.