"'I hope the Islamic world is grateful,' she adds. 'I doubt that it will be.'"
By Helena Smith in The Observer (thanks to herself):
It was the first visible sign of a cultural earthquake. Last week 8,000 books - the entire literary heritage of the British Council in Greece - were carted off to the English department of Athens University. Many of them are works by British hellenists, including poets such as Byron, or celebrate those who forged the bond between Britain and Greece.It is not just in Athens that the British Council is winding down. Across Europe, half a century of promoting British culture and values is slowly being wound down in favour of a huge increase in funding for activities in the Middle East and Muslim world.
It is a switch that has been greeted with horror by writers who had successfully campaigned to prevent the closure of the council's Athenian Library in 1997. That high-profile campaign prevented the council's European libraries being replaced with computerised 'informational centres' across the continent. But this time the British Council has been in no mood to back down - 2007 is not 1997, it says, despite mounting criticism over policies that have come to be seen as smacking of cultural imperialism and a catastrophic waste of UK taxpayers' money.
Instead, funding of EU countries is being reduced by £20 million - a tenth of the body's total government grant - which is being reallocated to the Middle East as the council attempts to bridge the 'widening gap of trust' between the UK and Muslim states.
Iraq, Afghanistan and Bangladesh are among 'high priority' regions that will also receive a 50 per cent boost in support for projects to steer Muslims away from extremism. And as the council's physical presence in Europe is cut back, public access buildings, some recently renovated at spectacular cost, will close.
[...]
'This whole policy is misconstrued from top to bottom,' complains Charles Arnold-Baker, author of The Companion to British History. 'We are going somewhere where we can't succeed and neglecting our friends in Europe who wish us well. The only people who are going to read our books in Beirut or Baghdad are converts already.'
Failure to endear hostile Arab populations will be exacerbated, opponents claim, not only by the logistics of maintaining branches in danger zones but by the success the policy will have in cutting off the next generation of Anglophiles in Europe. The Institut Français and Goethe-Institut are both expanding and replenishing libraries Europe-wide.
Speaking from her home in Dorset, Fay Weldon, a vociferous supporter of the earlier campaign to prevent the closure of the council's libraries, and an author who has long toured with the council, argues that women fiction writers will be especially hard hit because they will not be read in those closed patriarchal societies with tiny educated elites. 'I hope the Islamic world is grateful,' she adds. 'I doubt that it will be.'
'What do they hope to do? Win hearts and minds by sending in rappers to Saudi Arabia and the Middle East?' she asked. 'We're trying to impose our culture and values on the culture of countries that don't share them, in the extraordinary conviction that we are right.
'All of this feels like somebody's bright idea that has not been properly thought out,' says Weldon. 'The British Council should examine its own motives, attitudes and indeed cultural imperialism, because what they are doing is totally short-sighted.'
The assimilation of the west into Islam continues unabated.
Funny tehy should woo the muslim world. The financial industry does not see that part of the world as the market of the future.
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!
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Well, there are goods and others here. It is a mistake to withdraw from those who are friends, especially because they need all the support they can get right now. But by the same token, if the BC maintains the libraries they have in the Middle East, and do all they can to expand them and draw in new readership, that is a good thing, too. I had a correspondence with an individual, a former Muslim who had been forced as a child/young adolescent to return to Jordan because he had become too Americanized. About the only thing that helped him keep his sanity, he wrote, was the reading room maintained by the British Council at the Consulate. When he was old enough and able, he fled, and never looked back, literally forsaking his entire family.
Unfortunately, I have my doubts that the British Council means to "engage" in a fashion that involves defending the West first and foremost. However much I wish for successes such as the one I related, I fear the worst.
What's the Sci-Fi word for when aliens change a planet's climate to make it closer to their own? "Terraforming"? Seems like that's what Muslims are doing--molding the West into what they want it to be. And the West, far from resisting, is either standing passively (most Western countries) or ecstatically collaborating in the process (Netherlands, England). But Islam was created with a major flaw--it is violent. It's a virus in its original programming, and the more the religion spreads, the more the virus will assert itself.
The Council needs to listen to Baker and Weldon. They get it.
longtime lurker, I agree with you--it's hard to come up with an objection to making English literature available in Middle Eastern countries. In Cairo, at least when I was there, there are plenty of cultural centers (British, German, Dutch, etc) all of which have vibrant clientelle. If some Muslim who is in the process of doubting and re-evaluating his faith (and I've met a few) comes across some English-language books that lead him away from Islam once and for all (or at least towards a very blunt, non-flinching reformation of his faith), it would be a great thing. What does worry me is that instead of merely extending its cultural influence, England is surrendering it. Almost as if they WANT to become Muslim.
Lord Byron must be turning over in his grave. Were he to come back to life, I'm sure he would be ashamed to be British.
"Iraq, Afghanistan and Bangladesh are among 'high priority' regions that will also receive a 50 per cent boost in support for projects to steer Muslims away from extremism."
From what I read, the great literature is staying in Athens.
What's unclear is what will be sent to the Middle East.
If it's a library full of the British equivalents of Karen Armstrong, John Esposito and Jimmy Carter, this does not bode well.
I agree with some of these comments pointing out that there may be some merit in making more English literature available in the despotic nations of the Middle East. But to do this at the expense of the Greek office seems counterproductive, especially as Greeks include some of the most Anglophobic and anti-American people I have ever met. Most Greeks are woefully ignorant of the contribution Britain made to their independence and democracy, and this will not help improve the situation.
How though do we know that the British Council will stock books critical of Islam and Arab terrorism? Britain is one of the most flagrant appeasers of Islam in the Western world, and I fear that they are much more likely to stock Karen Armstrong than Robert Spencer.
It's a twisted thing involving perverted logic that makes good become bad and bad become good; where victory becomes an unacceptable option and abject defeat the vaunted goal.
What intellectual movement impelled this insanity? My vote would be for Marxism; would anyone care to nominate other candidates?
Said Fay Weldon:
'What do they hope to do? Win hearts and minds by sending in rappers to Saudi Arabia and the Middle East?' she asked. 'We're trying to impose our culture and values on the culture of countries that don't share them, in the extraordinary conviction that we are right.
Although I don't blame her for being disappointed, I have to take exception to this. Merely offering a glimpse of your culture to others isn't imposing anything. I assume the Middle Easterners are free to take it or leave it.
There is a lot that is right about Western culture.
Not really surprised at the jist of the article, it's just part of the seemingly ongoing social suicide going on in the UK. What struck me was the last quote by Fay Weldon; 'All of this feels like somebody's bright idea that has not been properly thought out,'
This is exactly how I feel the sucsessive Liberal and Parti Québécois governments (both left leaning, the first federal, the second provincial)have been formulating policy and running Canada for the past 20-30 years.
Home-grown or mostly borrowed left-wing "bright ideas", couched in high sounding social justice rhetoric, so any one questioning the logic can be quickly branded racist, homophobic, extreme right-wing etc, etc. and easily dismissed, with absolutely no consideration to their long term impact or any regard whatsoever for the tried and proven policies or methods of the past.
The worst offenders in Canada seem to be the Education, Immigration and Indian Affairs ministries. PC orthodoxy rules these ministries and anyone questioning the party line is an intolerant extremist. What a way to run a country!
Good luck, LondonBorn&Bred. You will need it. You are fighting lethargy and ignorance. Lemings. Ready to take a flying leap into a canyon of islam/chaos. I wonder why the Europeans are so ready to give up everything they are in order to appease the muslims. Do they not have a brain to use to see this is not the same thing as what happened previously? Even Hitler was only a small tidbit as to what the muslims will do. The muslims won't just pick on Jews, or the disabled - they like murdering Christians, Jews, and anyone who is not a muslim. Do they have a clue as to what is happening only a spit away from them in Eastern Europe (Bosnia/Kosovo)? I know that NATO just watched as muslims slaughtered the Christians over there, but did they really think that it was either ok, or that they might not be next?
They better be willing to give up their art (way too many nude women in those pics of theirs for the male muslim to be able to handle!), their music, their thinking they can be free and speak their minds anymore, and even the way they dress. They chose now to give money to muslims, but in the near future it will be a requirement of them as dhimmi and if they want to live - they better pay it. And even then they might die if they chose not to convert.
I am really surprised that the art - both pics and architecture has been ok up to now. I have been wondering when it will be next on the muslim's 'hit list'. Maybe they are too concerned with getting themselves trained in jihad in Pakistan and Afhanistan, and coming back and beating up Jewish kids and raping European women for now to even think of the art.
"All of this feels like somebody's bright idea that has not been properly thought out,' says Weldon."
Alas, no. The British Council well knows what it's doing. It's been trying to "wind down" (i.e. destroy) its European presence for some years, just like the BBC World Service. The cultural cringe at work again.
Posted by: Provoslavni Lord Byron must be turning over in his grave. Were he to come back to life, I'm sure he would be ashamed to be British.
I think all our ancestors would be ashamed.
"... that women fiction writers will be especially hard hit.."
Not that one would worry too much about women fiction writers, whether in Europe or the ME.
What we all need instead is a dose of reality, on the double!
longtime lurker at August 7, 2007 8:15 AM
That sounds a lot like the experience of "evariste" from LGF (now running the blog Discarded Lies). He wrote this over four years ago:
Still, I'm of the opinion that we Infidels need to stick together. If various consulates and embassies want to maintain reading rooms accessible by the local public, that's great, but we should never put the Ummah above our own unity, as tenuous as that unity may be. Divide and Conquer is the islamic way to this day.
Tasty Beverage,
Thank you, I hadn't the time to look for his old posts at LGF, and this was the one that prompted our exchange. I thought it was the British Consulate, however. He had multiple posts on that thread, and taken as a whole, they are very enlightening and present a very thorough picture of the challenges a murtad faces. He was fortunate, he knew America and English and had a skill that was marketable. For the rest?
longtime lurker at August 7, 2007 11:40 AM
I know what you mean about searching comments at LGF (4 million +), but I bookmarked that one when he made it because it was so informative (and sad). As for the rest of the apostates in muslim lands? I feel sorry for them -- it must be like being the only sane person locked in an insane asylum in which the inmates are in charge, and having to behave like the rest of the crazies so you don't get killed. A nightmare. However, if you meant what of the the believing muslims having access to Western literature and media in Western consulates in their own countries, I have almost no confidence that the exposure will open their minds because they're too brainwashed from birth, and largely illiterate anyway. But I'm glad those materials are available for the few muslims that can seek it out.
Addendum -
The last line should read, "I'm glad those materials are available for the few questioning/borderline-apostate muslims that can seek it out.
TB,
I stopped reading comments at LGF, which could be very interesting, when CJ trashed the TANG memos. From 60-90 comments per thread to 300-500, who has the time? I saved Evariste's comments in Word file. From our later discussion it was clear he had said in that thread all he wanted to say about his past, so I let it drop. There is a book, regret I'm at work and don't have access, but a link has been posted on this site before, that was banned as racist by the Dutch government nearly twenty years ago, written by either an Iranian or Pakistani, that covers similar ground, and contends that the Dutch are just too gentle, too superior a people to understand the enemy they are facing (this, two decades ago!).
Finally, I can't recall where I came across it (possibly Ali Sina's site), a teenage girl in America, raised Muslim in name only, started to get religion and become a regular at the Mosque. The imam, 70 years old, noted her interest and enthusiam. He pulled her aside and told her, "It's all a lie. It's too late for me, but you can still get out. Get out while you can." She was floored by what he said, but she did get out.
longtime lurker at August 8, 2007 2:35 AM
That book is called De ondergang van Nederland (The Downfall of the Netherlands) by Mohammed Rasoel (you're correct, he's of Pakistani descent, and his name is a pseudonym). You can find the book here: http://www.childrenofmillennium.org/heroes/downfall.htm
It's a short book, I'd call it a tract, but very interesting reading. The only problem is that the translation at the site above isn't quite perfect, so you may have to skip past words occasionally. But if you've already read it and I'm just preaching to the choir, then nevermind!
And yes, after Charles blasted Rathergate onto the scene, the comments sections became too unwieldy for a lot of people, who still drop by from time to time but don't really hang out anymore -- like you said, who has the time? Nice talking to you, fellow infidel.