Multiculturalism is not achieved by denying religion, but by honoring all of them.

Today's Guardian has an article about an Italian headmaster who has banned Christmas carols from the schools winter concert.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/30/christmas-is-cancelled-italians-outraged-over-school-decision-to-ban-festivities

Last year evidentially, during the concert, a bunch of Muslim students were ordered by their parents not to sing the carols. They stood there silently while the other kids sang. Some of the Muslim parents went onto stage and pulled their kids out of the chorus. The Headmaster Marco Parma decided that it was not a good sight and decided to cancel the carols.

Mr. Parma is wrong. He wants a school that is multicultural. That is not what he is promoting, he is promoting segregation and a heckler's veto (Where a legitimate voice is stifled by a dissenter who creates a scene causing the former to be quieted by authorities to "Keep the Peace". )

In a multicultural world, every religion and every culture is celebrated by everyone. Music is an international language. The notes are the same if you are Catholic, Jewish, Muslim or a Sub Genius.
They tell a history, music can cause revolution (See VERDI and the Italian Unification) it soothes a child, it honors heroes. It can expose villains.

Stifling Religious music, teaches nothing but distrust. It causes dislike and hate. What's more, is in Italy, there is an official state religion, it is Roman Catholicism and that makes this kind of decision even more dangerous. It teaches majorities to dislike minorities, to fear that the acceptance of others means that the majority's culture no longer matters.

Now this isn't about making fun of another religion, It doesn't mean that participating in the music of another culture is accepting the ideals of the other culture. It means that one respects the culture of all people. That is what music does. It breeds acceptance. If you don't want to accept the views of others, then go off and be among your own. You may not learn anything, you may be disliked for your parochial attitudes but at least within your bubble you can be what you want to be.

What Parma fails to see, is that he has missed a teaching and a learning opportunity. He is a failure as an educator. He needs to stand down or be fired and let someone who gets it, teach it. Multiculturalism is inclusive, not exclusive. It adds it does not take away. If you do not want to participate, don't, but if you do, you may learn a thing or two about people you do not understand and they may learn about you.

More Lists From That Lawyer Dude: Ten Poignant Final Photos and Two Lists of Important Blawgs. On One You Can Vote For Your Favorites!

This is a quick hit. I was sent the link to this site after my blog roundup on Sunday. I love lists. I don't know why. While I was looking around, I saw this list of the last photo's taken of famous people. Though they did not know they would die soon after taking these pictures, there is a haunting aura about them as we know what is about to happen. I don't like to be maudlin, but I liked these portraits very much. What do you think? Have you thought about what you would like to do in your Final Photo?? I

Let me know what you think your's will look like in the Comments Section below.

While we are on the topic of Lists, Two Lists came out yesterday featuring the best of the law Blogs or BLAWGS.
One by E-Justice is called "The Top 50 Internet & Digital Law Blogs"

You will see some duplication with the "Top 100 Blogs of 2008" by the ABA Journal Law News Now. If you go on the site, you can vote for your favorites. I am following about 35 of those blogs in my RSS feed (I use Google Reader for law and news, and Opera Feeds for everything else.)

NEWSFLASH: Luciano Pavarotti, Italian Tenor, Is Dead at 71

The New York Times Reports that Maestro Luciano Pavarotti has died. With it, the heart of the opera world is broken and bereaved. As an American of Italian descent, an Opera lover and singer, and as a fan of Italian culture, I am more than sad. Another part of my history is gone.

I began hearing Maestro Pavarotti at a tender age. As he began to come of age as the world's pre-eminent post-World War tenor in the late 1960's and early 1970's his special brand of opera appeared on the Sunday Morning Italian American radio broadcasts and Shell Oil company sponsored Metropolitan Opera House Radio Performances that could be heard throughout my home. My mom and Dad would have breakfast to his and other great Italian-American singers, then dad would work around the house listening to the music these talented men and women made. Sunday was often the only day of the week we would even see my dad. If we wanted to be with him, and we always did, we learned to love Italian music.

Pavarotti, Roselli, Sinatra, Como, Prima, Butti, Connie Francis, all brought the different sounds of Italian music to my ears and home. Mind you I do not speak a word of real Italian. I understand some, and the more bastardized it is, the better I understand it. I know some of the Neapolitan dialect. But I can sing in the language. I can understand the great emotions that the music conjures up.

(If you never heard Luciano Pavarotti sing, click on this

In college, I had the opportunity to study opera. To sing with my first formal coach, and for a brief moment even pretend that I had sufficient talent to sing on the same stage as the Great Pavarotti. Alas, that was never to be. I was good, but he was great. I had a high B but my C was iffy and my D was usually bludgeoned into submission. I would never make it to the Met to perform. I did however go to see them work.

I new I could try cases someday. Maybe even argue in the SCOTUS or Der Hauge, but I would never know a 15 minute ovation in the Met, or La Scala. That is how NY said good by to Luciano Pavarotti. In his last performance, missing notes and in failing health, NY'ers didn't care. They had spent hundreds of dollars to hear what by would have been by all accounts a bad concert. Instead, we heard no errors, we heard the man of our opera youths, the man who made the art form real again. We loved him. And in his very human way, he loved us too.

Luciano Pavarotti, age 71, leading tenor for the NY Metropolitan Opera company has died, from pancreatic cancer complications. In my memory of my dad cutting wood and building homes and doing projects around my house, Pavarotti, just like my dad, will live forever.

Buona Notte Maestro.