If there is no common culture, no common standards, then each group becomes an island; metaphorical sharks are perceived to cruise between the islands, so they have less and less to do with one another, and diversity becomes its opposite.

It is all about money ...

Cultural historian Jacques Barzun (2,3), in "From Dawn to Decadence," wrote:

...[T]he rapprochement between kings and the bourgeoisie led to an amalgam of chivalric ideas and mercantile rigor in material things that became the code of civilized manners for 300 years. This code improved the personality of both noble and commoner, making the one considerate instead of arrogant and the other dignified instead of obsequious. The code lasted about halfway into the 20th century.

Mercantile rigor has overpowered the chivalric ideas. Hence we are at sea, unmoored, drifting on a sea of trash.