[Reckoner]

Originally Posted by Irenicus

Spoiler for same reason:

That isn't diversity so much as it is, well, population pulling weight, though.

It doesn't matter if it's Chinese immigrants or Civil War veterans who get to hold the hammer; if it's nailed, then it's nailed, and the pig irons will run.

Plus, America was quite xenophobic. The Irish, the Mormons, the Chinese, the Japanese, and of course the Mexicans*, among others, will attest to that. It was just a big enough place that xenophobia -- which is often synonymous with racism, despite being different concepts -- didn't ever have to express itself in mass killings and pogroms. That didn't stop the race riots, though.

Last I'll say on this, since it is a bit off-topic.

Spoiler:

The U.S. had a system in place for immigrants to come into the country fairly easily despite the certain spurts of anti-immigrant laws (That didn't last very long anyway) and political parties like the no-nothings. After the Civil War, we lost a huge labor force that was easily manageable and fairly cheap compared to hiring white folk. Fortunately due to groups like the Irish, we were able to still get a moderately cheap labor force.

In America there has been a trend of culture mixing, ever since the days of the revolution with the Germans. People seeking opportunity came here, because they were able to live their own group of people and work their communities up in social status. The Irish eventually became a people to be reckoned with, the Chinese eventually got situated as we can see today, and I would assume the same for the Mexicans today in California.

Yes we were a xenophobic nation, but we were still diverse. It is not like a European moving to Japan and then being unable to find a place to fit in. When immigrants came here, they could be with their own people and even just keep speaking their language. It was the kids who learned English and taught everyone else. Not only that, the factories offered plenty of labor.

Essentially our cultural diversity drew in our immigrants who would be our cheap labor, who would fuel our industrial revolution. The diversity allowed a comfortable environment for these immigrants to eventually get ingrained in our society. We still have immigrants coming today that are doing the jobs that no one wants to do.

There are many other things that the diversity helped us with, but I hope I gave you a picture of my viewpoint.