It’s not such a good morning after all. After regaining access to the Internet, I have learned about the horrific explosions at both the Brussels airport and subway, killing at least 28. Given the recent capture of terrorist suspect Salah Abdeslam and arrest of four others, all in Belgium, this may be terrorist reprisal. It’s immensely saddening to think of the family and loved ones of those who were killed and wounded, surely asking themselves “Why us?”
Explosions kill 28 in Brussels
March 22, 2016 • 6:42 am
Islamic Terrorism is a Faith Based Initiative. -KIA
sub
BBC live report says 26 known dead and 136 injured.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-europe-35869266
I’m feeling very angry. “Revenge” for the capture and arrest of a mass-murderer by carrying out more murder. But then one doesn’t expect Islamic extremists to be capable of logic and reason.
My disappointment is the way this – a comparatively small number of people killed -takes away from consideration & reflection on much larger numbers killed in religious wars in poorer countries, like Nigeria, etc, & even more so from the really serious problems the world faces, namely climate change. That will kill far more people but it doesn’t affect most people viscerally, the way you & many others will feel about this. Of course they (ISIS & other Mohammedan extremists) don’t care about that, in a similar way to the extremist evangelicals, as they both want the end of the world (as we know it) to come to fulfil their ridiculous ‘prophecies’.
Perhaps we are undergoing an equivalent of sorts to the Thirty Years War – religious factions & political factions slogging it out, in a wider theatre?
Religion poisons everything.
Civilization spreads from the West outwards. So I think it is right to be more concerned about attacks in the West than in countries like Nigeria. As long as the West is engaged with its own survival, it will be unable to help Nigeria.
For the same reason (our civilization under existential threat), it is difficult to mobiliza people to act about climate change. Climate change does not kill Westerners and does not destroy their cultures, like Islamism does. Besides, policies addressing climate change have so far been so incredibly stupid that they have undermined the cause.
On the other hand, foreign powers (European, American, Asian) are involved there too, so one cannot totally wash one’s hands, even taken narrowly.
Some European forces are surely to blame for neglecting their duties. Terrorists are not spontaneously generated.
“So I think it is right to be more concerned about attacks in the West than in countries like Nigeria.”
Pardon me if I misunderstand you, but that sounds suspiciously like you’re saying Nigerians are lesser beings than Westerners.
I do not feel in any way entitled to place human beings in hierarchies of value (and I wouldn’t like being placed myself in such a hierarchy). However, I am ranking cultures, societies, governments. In this respect, Nigeria doesn’t fare well. I think news from such countries should be in the right dosage – enough to give information and, if needed, to mobilize international support such as in Amina Lawal’s case, but not too much, because “hyperinformation” would not be productive. I think it would only feed the very stereotypes you are against.
Just from curiosity, I checked what I have written on my blog about Nigeria.
2007: Commenting iatrogenic infections in Africa, I translated the account of a Bulgarian guest worker in Nigeria about systematic use of the same needle to immunize multiple patients.
2012, when our authorities refused residency permit to a Nigerian man, forcing his Bulgarian wife and their daughter to join him in Nigeria: “I was unhappy that the little girl, a EU citizen by birth, had to go to a place like Nigeria, the homeland of murder victim “Adam”, in order to be with her dad. Though in this case Nigeria turned out to be more civilized than Bulgaria – it allowed the foreign-born spouse to stay with the native partner…”
2013: In a post about Taliban murder of health workers, I mention the “2003-04 immunization boycott in northern Nigeria, led by religious and political leaders, who claimed that the oral polio vaccine could cause sterility. This boycott led to poliovirus not only rebounding in Nigeria, but also spreading to 15 African countries and to Indonesia.”
Feb. 2015: In a post titled “Abortions in Nigeria banned because women don’t want them”, the strongest condemnation: “Bad things are happening in Nigeria. The situation wasn’t very nice to begin with, but it became disastrous after the Islamist group Boko Haram… started its reign of terror in 2009, plunging, kidnapping, raping, killing and taking parts of the country under its control. I hadn’t written about this, first, because I don’t want and cannot cover every atrocity… and, second, because I have little sympathy to people who don’t even try to stand their ground. It is clear that Nigerians must defend their country, life and freedom while it is still possible, but… instead, we see protests of Nigerian army wives against sending their husbands to fight Boko Haram…”
Apr. 2015, writing about Muslim migrants on a boat who threw their Christian fellow passengers into the sea: “Thinking of the drowned Nigerians Christians, I suppose that some of them may have tried to emigrate exactly for this reason – to escape violent persecution by Muslims.”
It seems, the more we know about Nigeria, the less we like it.
Bad stuff all around.
Not only is there a decent chance that these attacks are a reprisal for the arrest of Salah Abdeslam, but Abdeslam was living in Molenbeek, Brussels for around 4 months since the Paris attacks, close to his family’s home. This seems to suggest that friends and/or family might have been sheltering him from the police.
Worse, after he was arrested, around 200 muslim youth from the area protested and attacked the police with stones and glass bottles. There are also reports that some people from the area praised him.
All this in the centre of Europe.
I’m about as liberal as they come, and I wish (in principle) that the entire earth were open for all of us to travel and work where we want to. We are all just human, after all.
But when I see the behaviour of recent (and not so recent) migrants, and even their children, I wonder what Europe is letting itself in for in the future.
This is an area where many liberals are holding their hands over their ears. There are so many people in EU that view the liberal demcracies as territories to be taken and over run with Sharia. And violence is considered fair game.
Often we as non theists rejoice in the loss of religion in Europe, but how long will secularism survive when 25% of the teenagers in France identify as Muslim? Even if they are peaceful, that is an overwhelmingly threatening voting block.
“How long will secularism survive when 25% of the teenagers in France identify as Muslim? Even if they are peaceful, that is an overwhelmingly threatening voting block.”
It must be stated that if a large number of immigrants from a particular culture do not assimilate, then the host nation has full right to limit their immigration to preserve itself and its culture even if the other culture is not a bad one. So, if a European country or the USA does not want to become Islamic, it is entitled to limit Muslim immigration even if we hadn’t the observation that Muslim immigration usually brings terror.
Yeah and about 10% of the US population has Irish grandparents or great-grandparents. Think of the catholic voting bloc! Doom! Gloom! This was considered a realistic threat to the nation in the 1850s.
France isn’t the US, but neither is it Egypt or Turkey where extremists get into office and start eliminating civil rights. I think once we start worrying about how religious groups might vote in western democratic elections, we’ve crossed the line from a concern about a real problem (religion-fueled extremist violence) into religious or cultural bias.
And what exactly is so wrong about “religious and cultural bias”? As a native of Western Europe I’m strongly biased in favour of Western European culture, and secularism in particular, and just as strongly biased against Islam, which I see as hostile to, and in key respects incompatible with, the culture that I belong to.
I don’t share your confidence that Europe’s ever-growing muslim population will not form itself into voting blocks with the long-term aim of eroding secularism and imposing its values on the rest of us. We see the first stages of the process already with the erosion of free speech, the never-ending litany of “grievances”, and the denunciation as “racist” of anyone who calls for limits on the number of muslim “refugees” allowed to settle in Europe.
+ 1
What??? The erosion of free speech is primarily driven by white middle class liberal westerners!! Hasn’t that been a lesson from the many many posts Jerry has put up about what’s going on on colleges campuses across the US?
I see such denunciations of immigration and the scare quotes around the word refugees from the right wing. Go back in the history of the US and you see it in practically every generation, targeting different groups. Germans. Irish. Italians. Chinese. Japanese. And you know what is common about all these immigrant scares? They all turn out to be wrong. All of them. There has been only one time in American history in which an incoming demographic group radically changed the government of the land through the force of violence and oppression. That was when the western Europeans you defend as superior did it to the natives. The only group that has behaved as badly as you fearmonger about is yours.
Right-wingers are free to express their opinions like all other people, at least until the blog host objects. And I don’t think labeling an opinion as “right-wing” is enough to prove it wrong.
Nobody questions the awful treatment of native Americans by European colonists. However, unless one subscribes to some particular religious views, it is difficult to see why the descendants of these colonists must atone for the sins of their ancestors by mass suicide.
You are writing as if Theo van Gogh and the Charlie Hebdo victims have never lived. They lived, expressed themselves and were murdered by Muslims acting in the name of Islam. Prof. Coyne has repeatedly blogged about Charlie Hebdo, not just about the authoritarian Left.
Lebanon, North Cyprus and Kosovo are clear examples of demographic changes related to Islam and their consequences. To me, to talk about Islamophobic “fearmongering” is to argue that nothing should be done about a known threat until it becomes so imminent that it is too late to do anything.
Of course they happened! The world definitely has a problem with violent muslim extremists. And they definitely draw their inspiration (or at least a whole lot of it) from their interpretation of Islam’s religious teachings. I’m just not seeing the rational connection between that fact and a conclusion like “ergo, we should let no muslims immigrate.” So, no two year olds? No seventy year old women? No muslim families fleeing ISIS? No rape victims? No muslim PhD Biologists from Mexico City? Religion is a crappy proxy measure of risk. Which is probably one of the reasons why we’ve never used it.
In a normal cause of events, 2-yr-olds grow up, and one must think who they will become. Every single terrorist has once been a cute 2-yr-old. If a person has a PhD in biology and still believes that Mohamed is God’s prophet and the Koran is God’s word, then he is beyond rescue and I would definitely try to keep him out of my country. Giving asylum to rape victims is good, but so far, European immigration policy to Muslims has been known not for saving rape victims but for producing them.
I’m with you eric. You can see from Torbjorn Larsson’s figures below that things aren’t as bad as they’re hyped up to be. Yes, it’s awful for all the families suffering right now. But, and I know this sounds insensitive, the numbers are statistically insignificant. That, of course, is why it’s called Terror.
You see the same thing in the US with everyone worrying about Muslims when the availability of guns is a much bigger problem. Most mass shootings by far are carried out by born and bred USians.
Guns take their toll from Americans but the nation has lived with the problematic gun violence for a long time and can continue to live. However, I think that Muslims, if allowed to reach a high proportion, will destroy American culture and reduce surviving non-Muslim Americans to pariahs, much like European-Americans did with native Americans.
The erosion of free speech in Europe has been going since 1989, when mobs of British muslims demanded the death of Salman Rushdie for writing a book they didn’t like. It has only gathered pace in recent years, taking in the murder of Theo Van Gogh, the Charlie Hebdo massacre, the Danish cartoon episode and the mind-numbing self-censorship that all these events spawned, whereby muslim extremists effectively impose their cultural taboos on majority non-muslim populations by the constant threat of lethal violence.
All the “immigrant scares” that Eric lists for the USA did turn out to be wrong, but the reason is that the Irish, Germans, Italians and the rest all migrated to America with the intention that they, and their descendants, would become Americans. Their aim was to learn English, integrate and join the mainstream of American society as soon as they could, in most cases maintaining no more than a sentimental or ceremonial attachment to the old country”. None of them dreamed of supplanting American culture, overturning its institutions and turning the USA into a replica of the place they’d left. A significant fraction of European muslims want to do exactly that, and are ready to use any means to achieve it.
At no point did I say that Western Europeans were “superior”. However, Western European culture is most certainly superior to Islamic culture, using any measure you care to name. As for the ill-treatment of Native Americans by European immigrants, yes it was terrible and deplorable. But it took place a very long time ago, and no European alive today bears any personal responsibility for it. In contrast, Europeans were murdered in cold blood by muslim extremists today, and they’re unlikely to be the last.
“Yes, it’s awful for all the families suffering right now. But, and I know this sounds insensitive, the numbers are statistically insignificant”. Yes, I agree it is shockingly insensitive. Please, Heather, do let us know how large the body count needs to be before we should consider these deaths “significant” enough to do something about it.
I’m angry enough about today’s events, and all that’s gone before, to vent a lot more spleen, but this is already a long post and I don’t want to hog the thread. I’ll leave it at that.
That’s some serious revisionist history you’ve got going there, Dave. A bunch of such groups wanted to import their own culture rather than integrate. Even today, we have Chinatowns and ‘little Italy’s. We have Orthodox Jewish communities. Boston has a much higher percent of people with a Scots-Irish background than other parts of the country because the Irish wanted to make their own communities. In the mid-late 1800s they created ethnically distinct neighborhoods and in some instances exercised an almost authoritarian, block-by-block political control over their own people to ensure Irish representatives in government favored their own communities. IOW they did exactly the opposite of what you claim, basically.
So no, I don’t see much difference between current Muslim immigrants and past groups of immigrants. Like with past immigrations, (IMO) the vast majority just want to come here, build a life, and live in peace. Also like past immigrations, many want to not integrate; they want to preserve parts of their home culture and form communities of like-minded individuals for comfort, political representation, and so on. And while this may be disruptive or upsetting to the established communities around them that do not share their culture (foreign restaurants! Different holidays! Nonenglish newspapers and street signs! I get the stink eye when I go to the wrong restaurant!), such hypothetical Muslim communities are not a threat to the nation any more than past Irish or Chinese communities were.
It is more than a religious block. It is a cultural difference. One where assimilation is possible with one group and not with the other, as it is stated explicitly that secularism is not compatible with Islam.
It is true, I think, that it was once debated as to whether the Irish could be considered white. Funny? As you say there have been historical problems, but don’t let that blind you to certain realities at present.
Meh. You got that from the populist web sites, I assume, it is a popular single data point, if that. It is a recent Ipsos survey, and I can’t get hold of the data to verify.
Never mind that it also says
“38.8% of French youths do not identify with a religion.
33.2% describe themselves as Christian.
25.5% call themselves Muslim.
1.6% identify as Jewish.
Only 40% of the young non-Muslim believers (and 22% of the Catholics) describe religion as “something important or very important” ;
But 83% of young Muslims agreed with that statement.”
[ http://www.frontpagemag.com/point/262168/14-french-teens-are-muslim-daniel-greenfield ]
So of the youth, something like 35 % see religion as important, while 40 % are openly secular.
Seems to me the Enlightenment works well, only 40 % of the muslim immigrants practice religion, making up 2 % of the population. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_France ]
Re Ipsos and phone polls, selection bias!?
My country (Bulgaria) has an old Muslim minority of roughly 10%, descendants of Ottoman colonizers and natives converted by them to Islam. Most of these Muslims are quite secular, many are atheists. They are peaceful. However, they are a community with some tendency to self-isolate. They have their own party, DPS (“Movement for Rights and Freedom”). They vote massively for this party, and in return, DPS supports Muslim-owned businesses at the expense of others, gives incompetent Muslims nice jobs in the public sector and manages subsidies for tobacco. DPS has formed a government twice (in 1993 and 2005), due to split of votes between the normal political parties. To my opinion, these were two of the three worst governmentя in recent Bulgarian history. I do not understand why countries that had not been burdened with Islam in their history and could observe the disastrous effects of this religion on other societies still decided to import it voluntarily. To me, it was a folly.
I understood the overall Muslim population of France is around 10%
Is 25% of teens population in the banlieues of the cities or city areas where they are more concentrated?
I doubt they are 25% of teenagers overall
Looked at the link Torbjorn. Streewth.
Anyway Ill stop being a hog on this site and stop on this topic.
Frontpage is not reliable source as Torbjorn indicated
CIA world fact book and other sites – average 8% Muslim population. Teens figures from other site obviously dodgy. Forty % not believing
” I wonder what Europe is letting itself in for in the future.”
For a bit of truth, good and hard.
I posted this article in a previous, similar thread, but I offer it again for those who haven’t seen it. The author addresses some of the complications that come with open borders and immigration policies and why receiving nations should probably be more concerned than they are with maintaining their own cultures.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/anthony-browne/folly-of-mass-immigration
Yes, it is a must-read.
I’d also give a link to another article, in the Atlantic (and when leftist media start to publish such stuff, things are serious!).
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/refugees/419976/
Maybe it is too strong, but I think that at least this deserves the attention of Americans:
“President Obama said at his November 16 press conference in Antalya, Turkey, “We also have to remember that many of these refugees are the victims of terrorism themselves—that’s what they’re fleeing.” Many of his hearers mentally amended the president’s words to a claim that the Syrian refugees are fleeing the terrorism of ISIS. But this president always speaks carefully, and that’s not what he said, even if he didn’t mind being misheard. Interviews with the refugees themselves confirm that most are fleeing the violence perpetrated by the Assad regime, not the deranged fanaticism of ISIS. While comparatively few Syrians—or Muslims anywhere—have any sympathy for ISIS ideology, the majority of Syrians espouse some form of Sunni fundamentalist religious belief, a fundamentalism that Western societies asked to open their doors are entitled to find disquieting.”
I had noted Obama’s weasel speech myself.
They have their logic and reason: “This is what happens when you attack us. If you don’t touch us, maybe we could decide to murder someone else.”
There were reports of how crowds menaced police when they were searching for this terrorist. Police were needing to fight off crowds of troublemakers who didn’t want them to find the terrorist. Sort of reminded me of Northern Ireland but in this case it is a ghetto of Islamists in a European city.
Reminds me of the attack in Copenhagen (only a Guard killed and the attacker but attacked several venues including a Jewish gathering). Hundreds of Muslim people turned out the next day to the funeral of the killer, would not condemn the act or say anything against him, and several people memorialising the spot where he was killed.
I would assume that it’s not “retaliation” but acceleration of an attack already planned. They probably expect more arrests, making it now or never for whatever attacks they had in the works.
It could be s bit of both. Plans in works for lots of attacks, timing chosen for effect.
True. Probably is a bit of both.
As sad as these attacks are, it might be a good thing if their hand was forced. An attack on their own time frame without pressure might have been even more deadly.
I had similar thoughts.
An attack like this takes months to plan, so it was almost certainly already scheduled to be committed.
At most the arrest of the last Charlie Hebdo suspect, would have made the planners move the attack to a slightly earlier date.
I agree. I’d go so far as to say that Salah Abdeslam may have helped plan it, and they needed to go ahead in case he betrayed them under questioning.
It has been a pattern of Islamist terrorists that while they encourage foot soldiers to become “martyrs,” the leaders never do. The fact that Abdeslam was protected and supported by so many despite failing to detonate his suicide vest in Paris might indicate he is someone of importance.
Working as I do right by Kings Cross, I always think it is only a matter of time before we have another nutter with some infernal device around here.
There are hundreds of returning ISIS – or as the BBC now says ‘so-called ISIS’ (which induces me to use a further acronym SCISIS!) god-botherers who may or may not pose a threat to the open society. No one seems to know how to treat them – lock them up at great expense, deport them (to where?), keep them under house arrest (if there is no crime is that just?)…
“deport them (to where?),”
Don’t you guys use Australia for that?
🙂 We used America for that before we used Australia!
Sorry, aboriginal Americans & Australians 🙁
there has been a crime: either membership of a terrorist organisation or/and aiding and abetting a terrorist organisation. Both punishable at law.
Yes, terrorists *are* spontaneously generated — by a culture, enforced by a religion, that glorifies conquest and terrorism. If you’ll look back through (real, not high-school) history, you’ll see that Arab/Muslim culture has been like that for the last 3000 years.
The only solution is to destroy that culture, and that will take a concerted world-wide effort.
–Leslie <
Yes, but nobody forced Belgium, France etc. to invite this religion.
I love the way in a Skynews article cites someone from Al-Azhar saying this attack is contrary to Islam which is inclusive. Al-Azhar where a “moderate” female cleric this year stated that raping non muslims captured in a so called justified war is fine because it “humiliates them” which is mentioned in Quran. Its reported by the Express but taken from Memri TV – the video in arabic included with translation in English.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/635942/Islam-Scholar-Saud-Saleh-Cairo-Slavery-Muslim-Women-Pagan-ISIS-Al-Azhar-University-Egypt.
Like I said the core of the big religions are completely obsessed with controlling sexuality – especially women and expanding their populations but I would argue Islam is especially resistant to change because of things mentioned earlier and it so needs to modernise itself for everyone’s sake probably most of all Muslims
In modern globalised world we have to accept some risks and I think its a tragedy for refugees and we should always take them but whilst having control of our borders and what is felt reasonable for longer term stability of our cultures and current economic well being of population as a whole.
And if you don’t believe this Sunny Hundal twitter site (Muslim journalist, critical of Islamism but says its chauvinism no more intractable abroad than say Hinduism.) on 23 Jan 2016 10:43AM stated “The Muslim Stern Facebook page has called on German authorities to ban alcohol claiming that Cologne women were responsible for their own attacks by comparing them to a naked antelope thrown in front of a lion” (he inserted screen shot in german)
“the group claimed ‘the government should ban the consumption of alcohol because it leads to traffic accidents, violence and rapes, and is extremely damaging to health. But for capitalist societies, this is too much to expect. So long as alcohol is not prohibited there will be no discernible decline in these cases’.”
I fear that the globalization of the world is too unilateral. None of us can go to Saudi Arabia to hold a seminar on secularism, but the Saudis are free to finance mosques throughout the West to spawn terrorism.
They’re not exactly free to – they (along with most countries) have signed a UN Security Council resolution to introduce laws etc to stop (among other things) the financing of terrorist groups. The problem is they (and several other gulf states) are not living up to their commitment very well.
By “free”, I meant that Western countries put no obstacles. The free market of ideas is a wonderful thing, but unfortunately it works about as well with Islam as the free market of goods works with addictive drugs.
I see your point. The problem as I see it is Western countries let Saudi Arabia get away with all sorts of atrocities without complaint because they’re a friend or ally, depending on the country. My own country (NZ) is one of the most liberal in the world (even prostitution is legal here), but our government sucks up to the Saudis too because we make a lot of money exporting to them.
Yes. The old “it’s your fault I raped / murdered you because” argument. These types of apologists are suffering from two ancient human traits that we can’t quite seem to completely get rid of. In-group out-group mania (similar to egomania) and low regard for human life including even their own.
After each islamic, terrorist attack we hear about “moderate muslims” who say such attacks are contrary to islam, that islam is peace, that they utterly condemn it and all the rest of it.
Yet a few weeks later, hate preachers will be invited at mosques again, and it’s just counting down to the next attack. I don’t believe Al-Azhar’s condemnation is genuine. These guys don’t mean it.
One blogger sarcastically commented:
“The Presbyterians are at it again.”
“These guys don’t mean it.”
Called Taqqiya – lying for Allah. Perfectly permissible to do so in order to mislead the infidels concerning the real islam. See he koran and haditha.
Trumps poll numbers are going to go up slightly
Sigh. We can hope it’s only slightly.
That’s horrendous.
And having just arrived home only a couple of days ago from Belgium it really hits home!
I was a parent helper traveling along with my son on a school-organized trip. As we were touring around keeping track of a crowd of 14 year old students I tried to subdue my worry about terrorism. It looks like I had every right to worry!
Terrible for the people of Brussels.
🙀Glad you and kids are safely home.
Yes.
Or possibly a preplanned attack that just went forward without the captured people? Terrorist/revolutionary cells aren’t like dominoes; if you pick off a few, the others just keep operating for the most part.
In any event, a sad and terrible day for everyone touched by these events. My thoughts go out to the victims, their families, the people of Brussels, and to the innocent refuges who will likely catch a lot of blowback for it.
There was speculation on BBC this morning that the terrorists would not have been able to plan the attack this quickly if it were revenge for Salah Abdeslam so most likely, they were already planning something & they got antsy that Abdeslam was talking or that the authorities were closing in so they went ahead with the attack.
You sow what you reap, why do People think that Islam isn’t the problem? when it so obviously is !, you can’t have a rational conversation with these people, indeed they look on any attempt at compromise or negotiation as a weakness. The Q’uran is the last word of God . thats what they believe “Moderate or Otherwise” and therein lies the problem.
+ 1
Does McVeigh mean Christianity is the problem? While they don’t commit as many fatal terrorist attacks, the FBI has said pretty consistently for the past 5-10 years that conservative right-wing (Christian and Mormon) extremists are the bigger US problem. There’s more of them and there are more incidents of them opposing the government, compared to Muslims. So, is conservativism the problem?
How about Anders Breivik? Does his case mean Odinism is the problem?
Extreme religion is the problem. Religious fervour is much greater in the US than in Europe – for various historical reasons and maybe also from the role of lead power – like Britain used to be religious in 19C and early 20C. Europe just doesnt have the anti state extreme libertarian threat that the US has. I think thats the first, main reason for the time being anyway.
The second is likely that the US has small percentage of Muslims and their makeup is different. Europe has taken more because of Colonial wind up obligations, favouring refugees and migrants from former territories and because geographically it is easier to reach, particularly for refugees.
Relatively few muslims choose to apply for refugee status to the US, and the US is strict in its migration/refugee acceptance – it tends to get the more qualified who overall are more likely to be less rigid (except perhaps if they are Engineers who are a small fraction of professionals) e.g. The Engineers of Jihad)
PS I personally think the anti state thing is fed by American history and founding identity and its fervour in this also fuelled by its Christianity and ideological capitalism/individualism/frontier spirit nexus. Suspect the religion thing really helps to feed American exceptionalism and nationalism – partly rooted in American history as sanctuary for religious minorities – later migrants, then its war for independence against Brit state and independent settler ethos,on its rapid expansion after that across great new territory, its sheer size, rapid expansion and lack of feudalism allowing it to develop modern corporate structures and incorporate capitalism and individual competition into its national ethos. Its symbolised by the constitution and nationalism but religion gives it a big boost
Nationalism and ideology I suspect is strengthened where constitution utterly fragments power. US constitution is the only one in developed country that so divides power – firstly between executive and legislative – which permanently divided unlike even in France where the PM has to swap with President for exec power every year. Plus 49 states and super powerful senate with term 3 or is it 4 times longer than the congress whose super short terms weakens then plus the presidency 2 years out of 4 being in campaign mode weakens that too.
Sorry, paras 2 and three argue why Muslim terrorist threat ranked behind terrorism in America from non Muslim sources – mainly extreme right.
“Extreme religion is the problem.”
I blame radical Quakers.
Homegrown white Christian terrorists killed more Americans in the last decade than Islamic terrorists, and that’s why they are a bigger threat, according to the law enforcement. However, proportionally to the size of the ethnic groups in the US, a Muslim is more likely to commit a religiously-motivated attack than a Christian, although it’s still a tiny probability for either case.
??? Where did you get the statistics for that, please? The FBI’s Uniform Crime Statistics say nothing of the sort. In fact, the most common victims of religious “hate crimes” are Jewish.
I wasn’t talking about statistics on who are the victims of hate crimes, but about statistics on who commits terrorist acts.
The second one is here: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/06/25/us/tally-of-attacks-in-us-challenges-perceptions-of-top-terror-threat.html?referer=&_r=0
The stats cited don’t support your claim even in raw numbers, since you refer only to specifically Christian terrorism, but the deceptiveness goes beyond that. You omit the Americans killed overseas. You count all non-muslims in America as one group, and you ignore the relative sizes. (I’d bet teachers murdered more people than Ted Bundy, so teachers were a greater threat than Ted Bundy.)
To me, McVeigh was politically rather than religiously motivated and yes, his views are a problem. Breivik’s views are a problem. Christian terrorism against abortion facilities is a problem. And if the USA and Norway were routinely “exporting” these problems to other countries, I suppose the suffering countries would strongly condemn the culture breeding such phenomena and would restrict immigration.
You miss the point. You’re calling for a restriction on people x when it appears we have more risk from people y. So shouldn’t any rational restriction be more about y than it is about x?
Of course if we wanted to be really rational about restricting demographic groups based on risk, we’d just GPS-collar every male between the ages of 16-36. Being in that demographic group is a far stronger proxy indicator of potentially violent behavior than belonging to any particular, race or holding any particular religion or other ideology.
And that is another indication of how this anti-muslim immigration sentiment is nothing more than bias. Because the people holding it would rather use a really crappy proxy indicator of violence that targets an out-group than use a really good proxy indicator of violence that might strike uncomfortably close to their own families and group. Its much easier to stomach a rights restriction on a low-risk foreigner than a high-risk friend or child, eh?
I am still not getting your point. Of course, everybody knows that males aged 16-36 produce more crimes than other groups. When police are looking for a perpetrator, they are definitely biased toward this group, because this “bias” works. When I first started to roam the city on my own, my parents advised me, if lost, to ask about directions a female. Also, when preschool and kindergarten teachers are all female, nobody cries discrimination.
“It’s much easier to stomach a rights restriction on a low-risk foreigner than a high-risk friend or child, eh?”
I wonder how many times I have to write that permission to let another country, let alone immigration, is a privilege and not a right. I have seen enough visa forms and refusals to know it. I do not understand why visas can be denied to my compatriots at will but must be issued to unvetted people coming from hotbed of religious fanaticism and terror.
The problem I have with your argumentation is that the friend or child, or even a citizen-unfriend, is here anyway with all his risk, while a risk carried by a foreigner is pointless to take, even if it is low (and I claim it isn’t).
You cannot rationally defend an immigration policy that restricts immigration of Muslims more than it restricts immigration of males 16-36, because the latter group is per capita more risky than the former. If you’re arguing for restricting (immigration from) a lower risk population more than a higher risk population, that’s simply bias on your part.
The “high risk” population we are seeking to exclude is terrorists. To the nearest approximation, virtually all terrorism in today’s world is carried out by muslims claiming to be acting in the name of their religion. A country with few or no muslims is far less at risk of a terrorist atrocity than a country that has many. That’s why eastern European nations such as Poland and Hungary are so determined not to repeat the disastrous mistakes made by France, Belgium, Sweden and the UK in admitting large numbers of muslims who proceed to act as a terrorist Fifth Column.
In this context, ‘bias’ in admission of prospective immigrants is the only sensible course of action. Looking at recent events, why would any country without muslims want to run the risk of letting them in? And why should any country already burdened with a muslim population want to dig itself a deeper grave by importing more?
BTW, the current migration wave in Europe has both traits: Muslim AND predominantly 16-45 male.
There are many people who think like you, or at least express such opinions. Muslims, at least, behave normally: they want to expand at the expense of others, like many human populations in history and prehistory and like all non-human populations. What I do not understand is why Westerners like you after every Islamist atrocity explain that there is nothing wrong with Muslim immigration and we are biased if we are against it. (Of course, we are biased; we want to live our way.)
Let me, then, put the matter in another way: Males 16-36 are an integral part of every human population. Without them, females of the same age group would be unhappy, and so would be the elderly and the children depending on this highly productive group. However, I know very few Westerners who think that something was missing in their countries before the current large-scale Muslim immigration. Actually, let me admit that I’d wish all Muslims in the world to become pro-Western atheists. Because of this imperialistic thinking of mine, I have some understanding to the Islamists who want all the world to become Muslim. However, I have no understanding to Westerners who want the world to become Muslim. So it is pointless to argue, we just want different things.
Timothy McVeigh?
One person.
A few abortion clinics, and?
From a population that is 70 percent Christian.
Your figures are skewed.
Brevik? One nutbag, again, from what percentage?
Really?
When, oh when, will the madness end?
Carl Kruse
When everyone in the world can see inside my mind palace: calm and balanced.
In about 4 billion years the Sun will expand and swallow the Earth. This is my baseline estimate for when the madness will stop.
It’s all so sickening…
As for the timing of these attacks, it is possible that the group involved had stepped up their timetable b/c they feared they would be captured soon, given the recent arrest of Abdeslam.
Yes, this seems very likely.
It was widely reported in the news media that Abdeslam was cooperating with the police after his arrest. I don’t know the original source of that statement but it seems like a disastrously ill-judged piece of information to release, whether true or not. It’s not hard to imagine that Abdeslam’s buddies were worried he’d turn them in, and decided to launch today’s attacks before the net closed on them. The fact that Abdeslam failed to blow himself up during the Paris attacks must have raised suspicions that his commitment to the cause was wavering.
Reblogged this on The Logical Place.
Most terrorist acts have to do with Salafism. In turn, Salafism has much to do with Islam. It is vain to state that terrorism has nothing to do with Islam.
Those who disagree should but asked:
“What in the world could Islam do or preach to have something to do with terrorism?”
“In what way would such Islam be different from the Islam we witness in our time?”
If there’s a silver lining to any of this, it’s the fact that terrorists are becoming less capable of pulling off large scale attacks. It is a progress of sorts, but death by 1000 paper cuts is still death. Just as the debacle in Iraq illustrated that traditional warfare is going to make no headway against extremist Islam, recent events show that we need new methods to prevent these atrocities from occurring.
Unfortunately, I’m not sure anyone has the answers (or if there are answers). The ones who have answers, such as Trump, only threaten to worsen the situation. His rhetoric readily serves as propaganda for ISIS to recruit more of the millions of Muslims who may support them ideologically but wouldn’t previously have taken steps to actually radicalize themselves. That doesn’t even begin to address the practicality of his plans working even if they were implemented. A wall in Mexico? Banning Muslims from entering the U.S.? How does this work? I’ve yet to see a coherent explanation of how you stop Muslims from entering without shutting down the borders altogether. A Muslim (or anyone else) aspiring to commit a terrorist act would readily lie to get into the country, an obvious point that seems to elude Trump and his supporters.
Trump is poking a stick at a rabid animal. Stupid.
What should be done with this rabid animal?
Well shhhh don’t tell the NRA, but the solution to the problem of not being able to determine intent is to limit capability. Also, IMO the longer-term strategic solution – which I think the US does a decent job at, even though we are by no means perfect – is to make peaceful “in the system” living more appealing to the radical’s children and grandchildren than the alternative of radicalism. Every generation will still have it’s bell curve tail of radicals, but that’s exactly what it will be – a statistically expected ‘tail’ of law-breakers, rather than a systemic group of them produced through multi-generational enclaves.
The problem with that approach to discussing terrorism is terrorist acts are still (thankfully) rare enough that the NRA can fall back on their usual talking points if a terrorist manages to commit another attack despite new legislation. They can’t do this when it comes to the overall increase in death rate due to wide availability of guns.
It’s a near certainty that there have already been as many gun deaths in America today (as of lunch time on the east coast) as there were deaths at the hands of terrorists in Belgium this morning, yet there is no sense of urgency regarding the former, while the entire world has rearranged its schedule over the latter. And the gun deaths will happen again tomorrow and the day after that, and the day after that…
I view the policies of people like Trump as the equivalent of dropping a nuke bomb on a city because there’s one house with a hornets’ nest. It is the epitome of understatements to say that our response to terrorist acts is highly disproportional to the threat they pose, both in terms of economic cost and personal safety risk.
I agree, and again the rarity of attacks is such that it will take a timescale on the order of decades to see the results play out, but if history tells us anything, changes like this happen over generations. The best thing we can do policy-wise is butt out of foreign affairs in the Middle East and address direct threats to our country as they come. Whether it is supplying the Taliban with the weapons they’d later use against us or dismantling what was a relatively stable (even if oppressive) regime Hussein had in place, which has opened the door for ISIS, we need to learn that nation building and military intervention is simply a failed experiment. We need to stop feeding the beast.
In fact, according to FBI statistics, the number of gun homicides — and all homicides in general — have dropped 50% in the last 20 years. This is the same period in which almost all of the states made concealed-carrying-of-weapons (CCW) permits easy to obtain, and gun-sales skyrocketed.
Also, the US is *not* the most violent country in the world, nor anywhere near it. According to the World Health Organization, the US has only the 107th highest homicide-rate in the world — and every last one of the countries ahead of it on the list has stricter gun-control laws if not outright bans.
These are facts — not theories nor data-manipultions.
The US has by far the highest gun death rate in the developed world. If you want to start celebrating because you have less gun deaths than a country at war it’s a bit sad really.
And correlation is not causation.
Sorry, my response got shoved down to the bottom at post #23.
“The best thing we can do policy-wise is butt out of foreign affairs in the Middle East… Nation building and military intervention is simply a failed experiment.”
It didn’t fail in Japan, didn’t fail in South Korea, didn’t fail in Yugoslavia and only partially failed in Germany.
It failed in Vietnam and in Muslim countries. I’d say, it fails when a superpower eroded by self-doubts and groundless, hyperactive self-criticism intervenes against fanatics who are never in doubt.
Non-intervention in Afghanistan led to Sept. 11. Maybe non-intervention is good for the USA right now, but it is killing Europe. And once Europe is gone, America will be under attack again.
“It didn’t fail in Japan. . . .”
We’ll never know if the U.S. would have intervened had the Japanese never attacked Pearl Harbor. (Though the U.S. was perfectly aware of, and declined to intervene in response to, Japanese aggression on the Asian mainland starting in Manchuria in 1931, IIRC my history. It also comes to my mind that there was no other major power positioned to intervene in the Philippines in 1899-1901 in response to the U.S.’s handling of what the U.S. spun as the Philippine “insurrection,” in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War.)
“It […] only partially failed in Germany.”
Are you refering to the establishment of West and East Germany?
No, I was refering to the current policy of Merkel which is against the wishes of a substantial part of Germans and is accompanied by media censorship. I think that, in a truly democratic country, such policy would lead to a non-confidence vote and early elections months ago, and in a semi-democratic country, it would lead to widespread riots and, again, early elections.
Sarcastic enough, but not very convincing. If modern-day-Germany is neither “truly democratic” (the term sounds pretty Communist to me) nor “semi-democratic”, what is it then? Feudalistic? Authoritarian? Totalitarian?
I agree with you on the point that a substantial number (at this point probably the majority) of Germans object to Merkel’s policy. Nevertheless, neither of the two scenarios you mention (no-confidence vote, widespread riots) is very realistic – for good reasons.
Merkel’s policy is in line with the left wing parties (Social Democrats, ex-Communists, Greens) which hold the majority in the Bundestag. So, no vote of no-confidence. Merkel’s leftist penchant is less surprising when you consider that she was socialised in various Communist party organisations. E.g. according to contemporary witnesses while working at the Academy of Sciences of the GDR she served as a “Secretary for Agitation and Propaganda” (files have “disappeared”). (What is surprising, indeed, is the fact that a majority in the CDU, formerly a Christian-Conservative party, still follows the course of its rather anomalous leader.)
As for “widespread” riots: Germany is a rather affluent society. Social benefits are higher even than in many other West European countries. So, as long as the living is (still) pretty good, why should people take to the streets in masses? Most people are simply too indolent (and most facebook users probably don’t even know that the government-funded task force which deletes their comments is headed by former Stasi collaborator A. Kahane).
I was not being deliberately sarcastic. I consider Germany authoritarian.
“Germany is a rather affluent society… So, as long as the living is (still) pretty good, why should people take to the streets in masses? Most people are simply too indolent.”
This resonates with what a commenter wrote on my blog:
“The reason society has no energy for self defense is in the comfortable life we have, this comfort reduces the need to be smart, vigilant, to work hard and to take risks. (Late Antiquity had the same problem). It looks like society always collapses when we start to live well.”
It seems true; and I wish I had learned it earlier.
It would be good if you have a blog in English (or at least in German).
I don’t think things were all that great in Late Antiquity. If you are referring to Ancient Rome, things had been going down the shitter for a while. Lots of wars, lots of monuments trying to show that Rome was mighty because they were sucking more at wars, the empire contracting and ultimately splitting basically setting itself up for the dark ages. The height of the empire had long set with Marcus Aurelius in 180 AD
The commenter was responding to a remark of mine: “After atheism settles, the society is no longer aggressive but it becomes very “old”, drained of energy even for self-defense, like in late Antiquity and in today’s Europe.”
Late Antiquity is an interesting time. I’d wish to know more about it. When I read Lucian, he sounds as if the Renaissance would come tomorrow. Instead, the elite and the youth of Rome chose to retire their brains and to embrace Christianity. No serious attempt to defend their culture. Scary. And of today’s analyses of that age, most amusing to me is the motif “Nothing to do with Christianity”. I don’t know, haven’t been there, but it parallels statements that this or that event today has nothing to do with another religion ;-).
The Roman Empire had along time to decline and it did so over centuries. I find it all sad but even the good times of Rome weren’t as good as our modern good times. There was slavery, no upward mobility of any substance, high crime and no real police force, no rights unless you were a citizen and you weren’t a citizen unless you were a member of a privileged family. The culture was probably ripe for the coming of Christianity with its appeal to the oppressed (much like some others Eastern mystery cults).
For me, I’m more of a beginnings person. I like Augustus because he was able to manipulate his way into becoming Rome’s first emperor and still managed to die in old age instead of being assassinated. He was probably a sociopath and he’s the ancient equivalent of Francis Underwood from House of Cards….like Francis, he even had his own writers working for him….in fact I thought immediately of Augustus and Virgil when Tom showed up in the White House on House of Cards. 🙂
@Maya Markov
“I consider Germany authoritarian.”
As for the time being: Elections in G. are free, fundamental rights are basically guaranteed and government is based on majorities in parliament – features rather atypical of authoritarian regimes.
“It would be good if you have a blog in English (or at least in German).”
If your remark refers to current German politics, you might want to try multi-author blog “Achse des Guten” (self-identifies as “liberal and pro-West”; good number of posts on political Islamism). Posts of V. Lengsfeld (former GDR dissident), M. Haferburg (nuclear physicist & journalist) and T. Rietzschel are of particular interest (IMO) as they regularly do the comparison between now and then (society & politics under Communism). http://www.achgut.com/
There’s also an English-language partner blog (mostly different authors; much fewer posts; focus on Near & Middle East):
http://axis-of-goodness.com/
On facebook censorship the blog by computer scientist H. Danisch (Berlin) might be a good option (down-to-earth style, discusses political, legal and technical aspects): http://www.danisch.de/blog/?s=facebook
Hope that helps.
I agree with foreign policy minimalism – though Russian and Chinese roles in the future hopefully won’t be a complicating factor. The Chinese have a base now on the coast of Baluchistan and Russia is friends with not only Assad but the Kurds (who have a vast and contiguous ethnic territory across various countries including Turkey, Iran and a little bit of Syria)
Re getting the Muslim community to liberalise with economic etc incentive – good luck to you – you need to do that first before you let the proportion reach something where they can really swing weight around in terms of disrupting the culture Re Britain alone Please look at links in Maajid Nawaz twitter sites or James Bloodworth or Imtiaz Shams or Nick Cohen or Jamie Palmer. Its still manageable in Britain. I can’t get over the general lack of the nature of islam just being so much more tribal as in geared to reproducing clan structures not geared to open government but ruled by dictatorships (again Patricia Crone “God’s Rule”) and ignorance of islamic scriptures the law books of the 4 schools including Hanifi that in numerous chapters actually prescribe continuous holy war against Non Muslim lands until the day of reckoning/gods judgement re afterlife. Not to mention all the anti unbeliever stuff in the Quran, Hadith. And all the delusions about the lovely Islamic empires – they were just as oppressive as any empires but we only listen to apologist accounts. Or even the relative liberalism of medieval Islam – that was parts of Islam at the height of its power – and the liberalism (e.g. alcohol and mixing of genders allowed) tend to be allowed in particular places at particular times. Even then women were still oppressed even the various famous medieval intellectuals thought they should be confined breeding stock and seldom allowed to work. Attitude to homosexuality mixed at times – particularly in Persian culture – but never accept to exclusion heterosexual marriage
PS I don’t think the US has a problem – its policies re immigration, its screening and its attraction of refugees is different to Europe. It tends to attract educated Muslims with some stake in liberalism and it doesnt allow a big proportion or periodically take huge intakes of Muslims that Europe done for reasons Ive already mentioned here on this topic
The USA has a problem, but it is still manageable. A large proportion of US Muslims are actually apostates seeking refuge from the repressive attitudes of their Muslim home nations. These “Muslims” are indeed liberals in the old sense of the world, and they represent the sort of immigrants who should be allowed regardless of their educational status. However, at the same time America has furnished herself very quickly with mosques (one next to Ground Zero), Muslim schools, Muslim women who wear headscarves, Muslim truck drivers who successfully sue when asked to transport beer, Muslim factory workers demanding prayer breaks etc. These telltale signs should trigger all alarms on. Not so long ago, Western Europe was the same. I have recently read in HuffPo an article that GOP is very stupid to stand anti-Muslim and so to alienate the fastest growing segment of voters. The author, as usual, did not see any problem with this fast growth.
I also think that, of all Muslims, the worst immigrants are those who are educated and fanatics at the same time.
We need to deal with the too many on the left who insist the West is the only source of evil in the world and imagine they would actually rather like to go back the the Middle ages … or something and who just can’t see the difference between Islam and other religions. Also need to encourage publicly funded media to stop interpreting its role as keeping everyone happy and united by ignoring the problem and not allowing criticism of Islam. Some religions may be just as chauvinist in other ways but none have the intensity or the combination of factors in Islam namely:
1) Aggressiveness Evangelism and belief in eternal reward or punishment solely on grounds of Islamic belief combined with explicit commands in Quran and even more explicit in Hadith and Sharia (go look at Hidayah guide to the Islamic laws or Guidance of the Traveller)that until the day of judgement the Islamic lands are to make CONTINUOUS war on non believers. Theres TEN chapters on it in the Hidaya in the section called Institutes. Whereas in the New Testament the Book of Revelation looks to the triumph of christianity at the end of times in a fantastic and mystical way through battles with mythical beings the Quran is explicit in quite a few places that Allah sent a “warner” and that all who have heard the message or know of it and don’t convert should be fought. and fight the unbelievers until the world is all for Allah etc. and tells Muslims (at the time Mohammeds little band) they must fight in war, even though they may not like it. Moreover the Sirat or chronicle of Mohammad’s life, and he is the ultimate role model, involves several massacres and in the last 9 years of his life, raids averaging one a month throughout.Whereas even devout Christians and Jews no longer believe in most of their scriptures, and view it as written by humans, Muslims do not. Moreover the nasty passages in the Old Testament are against peoples who no longer exist and there is no call to fight unbelievers per se
2) Rituals that are so comprehensive as to be brainwashing and hampering of activity. Pray 4 or 4.30 for up to an hour (in Muslim countries blasted out everywhere on loudspeakers so impossible to sleep through and everywhere throughout the country)Rituals for everything throughout the day. 4 more prayers and Ritual washing lots of other rituals. No alcohol and various dietary restrictions plus circumcision and (often) FGM. Men to pray at Mosque on Fridays. Ramadan for a month during all daylight hours no eating OR drinking and a different month every year so can’t mentally prepare for it and think of not much else but sticking to it – Islam as mental “submission” driving out all doubt. Encouraged to do other fasts too. All this stuff makes it clear whether you are believer to others.
3) Exclusiveness – Mohamed is the last prophet ever. The Quran is uncreated emanation of God that can’t be changed. People and animals are born Muslim its just a deformity that might make people change religion although from adolescence they are accountable to god and if they don’t “revert” back to Islam are condemned to eternal fire in the afterlife. According to Crone book the muslim is to forbid evil and encourage good meaning in Muslim lands he (usually) should sanction or punish those he sees breaking religious obligations as well as the law punishing this. Various Qurans prefixes (e.g. Dawood’s Penguin version) state that Christians and Jews were once Muslims – their prophets were Islamic prophets before Mohammed who gave them Islamic scriptures which they distorted to wilfully practise a non islamic religion. Numerous passages in the Quran only make sense with this interpretation. About 55% of the Quran condemns non muslims and apostates in various nasty ways. Conquered non muslims may be enslaved or ransomed or killed (or if becoming part of Muslim lands they become Dhimmi with second class status but their lives protected under Muslim law).
4) Also from the scriptures which in this follow key values of heartland Muslim areas at least outside the cities. Total control of individuals and obsession with maintaining clan structure not feudal one – through endless strictures about mate guarding women and ensuring purity of male lineage and being loyal to your relatives and accepting a hierarchy in them – and women being subordinate- Ive posted elsewhere on this site about religious penalties for not accepting this. Obsession with oaths that reinforce this. The only status women can get is by being “good” and getting old whereby they can boss around daughter in law who lives with them and nag son. Maintenance of tribe like structures in most of Muslim lands – especially in arid and semi arid heartlands
5) Total unification of religion and politics and tendency to authoritarian leadership. Related to 3 and necessitated by rapid military success of tribal Arabs – Expectation of total obedience to authority figures as religious duty – and ruler is expected to uphold islam and must be obeyed unless he is heretic – patricia crone is explicit about this in God’s Rule
6) Elaborate body of scripture determining every aspect of life – the Principles of Islamic Jurisprudence(Mahamad Kashim Kamali) state that the Quran is clear that all the sunnah (details Prophets life and all the hadiths) must be followed just as much as the Quran in order to interpret it (except where they appear to contradict it) and that there must be law based on these.
All these things emphasises lineage, authoritarian rule, maintenance tribal structure and oaths
Shia similar only they also have sayings and rulings of their past imams.
“I’ve yet to see a coherent explanation of how you stop Muslims from entering without shutting down the borders altogether.”
I suspect that you have never applied for a visa and do not know anyone who has. Visas are issued and refused on discretion. I got a lousy visitor visa only after I convinced the US embassy clerks that I was not quite as poor as I seemed. And my country is not a hotbed of extremism.
Hitchens in 2006 (on Youtube).
Why?
There are more salafist muslims in Europe than ever before. There is also a large and growing population of muslims in general, therefore it is much easier for the salafist thugs to hide within the moderate communities.
But these fanatics can and will be identified because their own madness will eventually overcome their caution and lead to their imprisonment or demise.
The problem is that Westerners are constantly conditioned to accept Islamist propaganda and activity as normal and to regard every Muslim fanatic as moderate right until he actually murders someone and, if possible, even later (cf. the Fort Hood shooting).
Islam is not moderate – Salafis may be more extreme than the schools but none of the Sunnis schools is really moderate. Moreover Shiism for the most part uses the same scriptures and has the same outlook – aggressive clan/tribal state with perpetual hostility to outside world and internally oppressive to women and authoritarian government tradition
– many Muslims in past don’t know their scriptures. It needs modernisation like most Christians and Jews ignore the majority of their scriptures as no longer valid
Sadly, it was only a matter of time when such an attack would occur in
Belgistan…
And that despite the fact that Belgium was able to earlier arrest Muslim lunatics such as Fouad Belkacem alias Abu Imram and Salah Abdeslam…
My son and I spent two wonderful weeks in Belgium about 10 years ago, including in a youth hostel in an almost totally Muslim neighborhood in Brussels. Everyone we met, asked directions from, said hi to were unbelievably nice, despite their feelings towards George Bush and knowing we were Americans(they were polite but confused about why America voted for him, but so were we). It is heartbreaking and disgusting that so much has changed so quickly. I have never felt so comfortable, so happy, so at home anywhere else in the world. I would have moved there in a heartbeat, though sadly today, I’m not so sure.
I doubt things have really changed so much. I often try to be polite to people whom I do not like. You do not know the true feelings and thoughts of your hosts.
If you’re interested in what France might look like after it elects an Islamic government, read Michel Houllebecq’s brilliant satire “Soumission” (Submission), which is as much about the complaisance of the West as about the aims of Islam.
The madness will end when the majority of the citizens, at least, awaken from the Bourgeois-Liberal dream and realize that 80% of all Muslims are fundamentalists, fundamentalist Muslims are easily persuaded to become Jihadists, and Jihadists are a threat to everybody.
The quickest solution in Europe is to round up all the Muslims, give each of them a suit of clean white pilgrim clothes and $100 for the necessary bribes, send them all to Mecca — and don’t let them come back. Let the Saudis deal with them.
In America, it’s unconstitutional to bar anyone from immigration on account of their religion, but no law says we have to allow *any* immigration — at all. Stop all immigration for at least five years, seriously fortify our borders so as to stop illegal immigration, round up all the illegal immigrants who are already here, and send them back. Send the Spanish-speakers to Mexico, send the Chinese-speakers to Taiwan, the various Africans to Liberia, and the Arabic-speakers to… Mecca, again. By all means, let them take with them the goodies they got and the money they made here in goody-land; they’ll need a grubstake once they get to wherever they’re going. Also, give each of them a parting-gift: a sturdy revolver, a cleaning-kit for it, ten boxes of fitting ammunition, and an instruction book — profusely illustrated — in whatever language they speak, so that they can protect themselves and their property when they got to wherever they’re going. But in any case, take thorough biometric readings and send them to the Border Patrol computers to guarantee that those illegal immigrants never come back. I think we’ll see our violent-crime rate drop even further when our population is 12 million less.
–Leslie < Fish
While your suggestions seems to me pretty extreme (and I don’t think you are quite serious), I wonder about why it is “unconstitutional to bar anyone from immigration on account of their religion”. I have read it multiple times in different sources. So until recently, the USA routinely violated their Constitution and everyone was just fine with it. Anyway, why not amend the Constitution? It is not Gospel.
Because Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. 1st amendment.
And while I’m sure there are/were cases of religious discrimination in immigration offices – our civil servants are a long way from perfect – AFAIK we’ve never officially barred anyone from immigration due to religion. Ethnic origin and country of origin – yes. We’ve had a lot of nasty anti-ethnic immigration laws on our books in the past. But nothing AFAIK based on the religion of the applicant.
Also, I believe current immigration law sets the maximum at 700,000 per year. Which is pretty close to Leslie’s ‘none’ considering the size of the country; this is an immigration rate of 0.2%. Illegal immigration probably doubles that rate or a bit more (I believe it reached a maximum of about 1 million/year a few years ago), bringing US immigration to a whopping 0.4%.
Citing the passage is no argument. This is well settled law. Barring an immigrant neither establishes nor forbids a religion within the domain of the United States.
sub
Gun sales did indeed skyrocket, but largely to people who already own guns. The actual percentage of people who own guns is falling, and it is having access to a gun, not 2 guns, 3 guns, 5 guns, or 50 that presents the opportunity for murder or accidental death. In the last three decades, the number of households who own firearms has been nearly cut in half. Unless you’re suggesting there’s a higher overall risk from people running around with multiple guns, it seems you’re citing the wrong statistic there.
Also, as Heather points out, we are far behind the developed world in gun violence. I don’t consider strict gun control laws in a 3rd world country without the ability to enforce most laws in the first place to be an apt comparison. It’s like saying that the 2008-2010 recession wasn’t bad because our per capita income was well ahead of DR Congo. Your point about concealed carry is simply a non sequitur, as you would need to demonstrate concealed carry is actually reducing crime rates. (Homicide rates are at a half-century low in NYC and there are very strict gun controls here, as one counterexample to this idea.) It’s quite a bold statement to assert that homicides have dropped 50% because of the 3% of people who have concealed carry permits, especially considering many murders happen when both people either are or have the possibility of being armed (gang/drug violence) and a majority of the rest are committed by people the victim knew. Having a concealed weapon isn’t going to do you much good when your murderer takes you by surprise.
Those are good counterpoints to assertions I didn’t see anyone make. Where did I say the U.S. is the most violent country in the world?
If you look at First World countries that effectively enforce stricter controls than we have, the measures have been effective and yet they haven’t fallen prey to totalitarianism as the NRA likes to claim. Also, I am not for an outright ban of guns, but I am for controls along the lines of what Sam Harris proposes where getting a gun license is similar to getting a pilot’s license.
With the shock and horror and pursuit of answers I find the one that is grounded in me like my liver and heart is a one front annihilation of the existence of all religion.
It may not rid us of violence but it would put paid to this element of it. I have little eh.. faith in a political or military solutions though I concede it may be required. Enlightened scientist as political leaders for instance or any pandering to religion like it has some value to be retained apart from history.
These killers see no further than a black and white representation of the world we live in, no depth, understanding of how it really works and the thrill of learning how it does. It is a sad thing (yes, I’m putting the boot in) that when their light goes out they will never know they were wrong and these extreme actions were futile and have no basis in reality.
The universe really does not give a fuck about them but fellow travellers do, or would have.
I see that the response from Isis includes the term ‘Crusader’ nations.
Disingenuous.
Some on the left fall for this too, mentioning the crusades as yet another example of western nastiness, such that we deserve all we get.
But, the real crusades, especially initially were a response, a badly needed response, to the militaristic expansion of the Islamic empire and the subjugation of those conquered.
In the last month or so archaeologists discovered graves of Islamic soldiers with all their kit – in France from a decade or two after the death of the prophet. This was in Southern france – not near the borders with Spain in the Pyranees where Islamic coins and things and been discovered earlier but must further north in france proper. Theres a real obsession with making the Islamic conquests pretty and only focussing on western atrocities. Islamic Empire super pretty Western empire bad. Empires are bad full stop and orthodox Islam is actually committed to empire if you are honest, although only those who preach Caliphate (including Muslim Brotherhood) openly acknowledge this today, a global survey taken prior to rise of ISIS showed that most Muslims think that reestablishment of a Caliphate would be a good thing. They may have vague ideas about what a caliphate historically was and really mean sharia law but the two are the same – an empire ruled by a leader who upholds the religion to detriment other faiths. The Muslims began slave raiding in Africa way before the Europeans , and with Africans themselves captured and sold the slaves for the ghastly Atlantic trade. The Muslims had plantations of millions of slaves in East Africa in 19C After slavery was banned. 2 million members of coastal Western European communities captured and enslaved over 3 centuries by Barbary sailors sponsored by Tunisian and Algerian state of the time for use there. Spain and Portuguese fought 800 years to be rid of the Muslim rule. The Eastern Europeans did not have fun either and resisted for hundreds of years. Dhimmis Were second class citizens. Yes some slaves were used as senior administrators and palace guard – because the ruler and his clan needed a buffer from other clans – a buffer with absolutely no legitimacy to rule. We are talking about a tribal state here not a feudal state.
From looks of a number of BBC and other articles looks like Merkel has managed to strike a reasonable deal with Turkey re asylum. Take some – and regulate it.
Cant help but feel for them in this, but as mentioned we still need to manage the process. I can’t agree with any implications that borders don’t matter. Countries without borders aren’t countries – you can’t have a functional society without a territory that sustains it in the real world and my point is Islamic groups as a whole really are, as a whole much more resistant to integration than others – more so in Europe than in US because of current makeup. Denying that there are implications for Europe of this is just head in the sand and countries need to be able to say what is in the interests of overall well being of their populations further down the track and act on it in such an important area.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35819675
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35832035
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35761623