Isn't it amusing how the press will cover a story, and so often, when it comes to anything having to do with "Islam, Responses To," fail to grasp the most important thing. The papers have been full, the last weeks, of various stories. In Afghanistan, it has been about the war in Marja, the war being conducted by the Marines with almost no useful help from the "Afghan Army" that everyone was so counting on, the Afghan Army that, just like the Iraqi Army, has had American training and money and weapons lavished upon it, and high hopes placed in it. But as one Marine said, at least the Afghans, disappointing as their performance has been, are not as utterly hopeless "as the Iraqis."
In Pakistan, we have learned that Ms. Siddiqui, the aider and abettor of Muslim terrorists who was tried and sentenced by the Americans, has become a national heroine, a cause celebre, the person everyone -- everyone -- supports against the perfidious Infidels, the Americans, the same perfidious Infidels who have spent tens of billions, perhaps hundreds of billions, on Pakistan, in both economic and military aid, over the past fifty years, while Pakistani generals have smiled, and flicked their imaginary fly-whisks, and put on a great show of Sandhurst-educated rectitude and straight-talking, even as they assured, one after the other, generations of American generals as to the true-blue steadfastness of that "staunch ally" of America, Pakistan.
And along the edges of the Marja offensive in Afghanistan, and stories about what is going on with the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Pakistan, comes another story, from seemingly far-off, quaint old teeny-tiny Europe. Europe! Where is it, anyway, this Europe we used to hear so much about? And why should it matter? I mean, who cares, anyway? What matters is that we are making things better, with our Army Of Social Workers, for all the people in Iraq, and Afghanistan, and Pakistan, and maybe Yemen too, and just possibly add Somalia to that lucky list, and who knows where else in the Muslim lands whose peoples have become so very near, and so very dear, to us, ever since 9/11/2001, and their well-being so very important to us (far more important than the well-being of impoverished Christians in sub-Saharan Africa, or South America, who get none of our largesse and concern and support).
And why is their well-being so important to us? Well, if Iraqis aren't happy, and Afghans aren't happy, and Pakistanis aren't happy, and Yemenis aren't happy, and Somalis aren't happy, then maybe some of those unhappy Iraqis and Afghans and Pakistanis and Yemenis and Somalis will turn to Al Qaeda, or some such, and then where will we be? So we've got to keep the wars-as-social-work going, we've got to make sure that while fighting these wars we don't do anything to antagonize any of the Muslim locals, don't fight the way we fought in World War II, for example, where the Europeans we were liberating, or the Filipinos for that matter, from the Nazi or Japanese yoke understood that war necessarily entailed civilian casualties, but did not turn on us or become our enemies. When the RAF bombed Copenhagen in 1944, and instead of hitting Gestapo headquarters hit a children's hospital, killing 88 children and four nuns, what did the Danish Resistance do? Did it denounce the RAF, and tell it to change its ways, and never to use bombs (as the Americans are hardly using planes and airpower in Afghanistan) because it might cause "civilian deaths that are always unacceptable"? No, of course not. The Danes said: "We know you are sorry, but keep on coming. Don't stop, keep it up."
That is because the Danes were on our side. But in Afghanistan, the corrupt Karzai is quick to attack the Americans for, ludicrously, the kind of accidents that always and everywhere occur, and occur especially if the enemy never wears uniforms, and insists on fighting with civilians all around, civilians even gathered up or held as hostages in order to make it harder for an opposing force determined to scrupulously try to avoid civilian casualties (the Americans in Afghanistan, the Israelis in Gaza) to perform as effectively, with as little threat to its own forces as possible. Should the lives of Afghan civilians be rated higher than those of American soldiers? Why? That scrupulousness means little or no use of air power, and firing only when one is absolutely one thousand percent sure there are no civilians who could be hurt, and if it means not firing on an enemy who has just fired on you (you saw him) because he has also just dropped his weapon and looks defiantly at you, daring you to fire on him and knowing you won't - well, that's all part of the Grand Strategy of Winning Muslim Hearts and Minds. And those hearts and minds obviously count for so much more than those of non-Muslims, and especially of those non-Muslims in Europe now struggling to deal with their grim recognition of the reality they have created for themselves by so foolishly, in a moment of civilisational heedlessness, admitting into their midst millions of Muslims who have bred and bred, and are still out-breeding, and by far, the native non-Muslims, and whose aggression and violence and outrageous demands for changes in the legal and political institutions of Europe grow and grow pari passu with the growth in the Muslim population, which is supported by, even made possible by, advanced Western medicine and family subsidies of every kind that Muslims in Europe have taken advantage of in every possible way, and then some.
But clearly Europe doesn't matter to American ruling elites any more, or at least not nearly as much as Iraq, and Afghanistan, and Pakistan, countries where we have poured in more money than was poured into all the many countries of Europe that were beneficiaries of the Marshall Plan.
Now, from Europe, or rather from the Netherlands, recently came news having to do with Afghanistan. And the news is this: Dutch government falls. That's what the Times tells you. That's what the Post tells you. But they don't go into details, other than to tell you that the second most important political party in the ruling coalition, one headed by the Christian Democrats of Balkenende, is the Labor Party, and the Labor Party insists that when the commitment for Dutch troops to be in Afghanistan ends this coming August, it should not be renewed, the Dutch soldiers should be removed.
So far, so unremarkable. Everything fits. Just as it is people "to the left" who "wanted us out of Iraq," and now "want us out of Afghanistan," the Labor Party, famously soft on Islam, and full of people who made life difficult for Pim Fortuyn and who may in their campaign of vilification have encouraged his murderer (he certainly thought they were creating a dangerous climate), is the Party now pulling out of the ruling coalition. And here are the Christian Democrats, with Mr. Balkenende at their head, stoutly supporting - so the American press would have it - the American-directed effort of NATO forces in Afghanistan.
But that's only part of the story. Mr. Balkenende is the leader of what the outspoken Geert Wilders describes as "the worst government in Dutch history." And the fall of the government leads now to new elections, and a chance for the Freedom Party to increase the number of its seats. Geert Wilders and his Freedom Party are not in the ruling coalition now, but stand to gain many seats, both in the municipal elections to be held in early March, and in the Parliamentary elections now fixed for June 9. We are used to a narrative, and in this narrative, in Europe as here, it is only those who are "tough" on Islam who support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with all their attendant expense and attention-getting. The American press doesn't tell you why one of the parties in the ruling coalition is pulling out, and they certainly don't tell you what that tells you about the Freedom Party of Geert Wilders. It simply is not mentioned. Our journalist, our editors, our columnists, our pundits, or think-tankers, are so very lazy, and so very incurious. They wait to hear from someone who fills them in. Okay, that's what I'll do right here for them. I'll fill them in.
The government of Bakenende - the "worst government in the history of the Netherlands" according to Geert Widers -- has been willing to send Dutch troops to Afghanistan and is perfectly willing to renew their mandate. In American terms, in General-Petraeus and My-Weekly-Standard terms, that makes Jan Peter Balkenende a swell fellow, a true-blue ally. But is he? He is willing to send 1500 Dutch troops to help in this Afghanistan business, for two reasons. One, it doesn't cost him very much to show that he's not "soft on Islam." Two, it is six thousand miles away, and has nothing to do with, in the end, what happens with Muslims in the Netherlands. The outcome in Afghanistan, whatever it may be, will have no effect on the power, and aggressive demands, and the expense of monitoring, and the threats to the physical security of non-Muslim Dutch citizens (most obviously Dutch Jews, but that is only because they are an obvious, and most seemingly vulnerable, target), and unsettlements of all kinds caused by the large-scale unchecked presence of Muslims in the Netherlands and the appeasement-minded response, so far, of many in the Dutch government.
The Huffington Post tells you that Geert Wilders is a "neo-fascist." Why? What does the writer in the Huffington Post know about the Freedom Party and Geert Wilders that permits him to get away with such a characterization? If anything, Geert Wilders is someone who cares deeply about the treatment of the Dutch elderly, and the Dutch poor. It is Jan Peter Balkenende who wants to raise the age of retirement, the age at which the Dutch can receive their version of Social Security. It is the "neo-fascist" (in Huffingtonpostlect) Geert Wilders who wants to keep the age of retirement at 60, because it is he who worries most about the Dutch elderly, the people who lived through the War and then the aftermath, the rebuilding, after the War, and lived through the time of scarcity. Wilders knows that, among its many drains on Dutch society, the Muslim population uses up enormous amounts of the resources provided by Dutch taxpayers for benefits that were intended to help support not those who suddenly appeared with plural wives who do not work, and vast numbers of children, and husbands who also work at a rate far lower than non-Muslims, and engage in criminal activities of every kind at far higher rates than any non-Muslim group, whether Dutch or other recent immigrants. This is something he, Geert Wilders, knows, and the Dutch do too, and it is not "neo-fascist" to note this, nor to be particularly solicitous for the Dutch aged.
This won't stop the newspapers from calling him and his Party "far-right." Extreme Droite. Ultraderechista. Und so weiter, endlessly, the papers, the radio, the television controlled and staffed by those who will do everything they can to prevent the matter of Islam from being subject to serious scrutiny, along with their own role in the criminal negligence all over the Western world that led to the arrival in Western Europe by so many Muslims, who have created a situation for the indigenes that is more and more unpleasant, difficult, expensive, physically dangerous.
No, in these newspaper accounts, and on radio and television, it is never simply "Geert Wilders and the Freedom Party." Or, if a placing adjective were deemed important, never the simple, and untendentious "Geert Wilders of the center-right Freedom Party," though "center-right" is exactly what, the Freedom Party is. Indeed, in some of its positions, such as the support for increased aid for the elderly and the lack of enthusiasm for Dutch military involvement in Afghanistan, it would by most detached observers to be seen as deserving the adjective "center-left." (Wilders knows that what happens in Iraq and Afghanistan will not, given the stated American and NATO goals, lessen the threat to Infidels in the real theatre of war - that in Western Europe - and constitutes a confusing and very expensive distraction.)
But since we are going to have to endure many examples of this Homeric epithet being affixed to Wilders and his Party, let's immunize ourselves in advance, shall we? Here goes:
Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Far-right Geert Wilders. Far-right Theo van Gogh. Far-right Pim Fortuyn. Far-right Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Far-right Magdi Allam. Far-right Oriana Fallaci. Far-right Robert Redeker. Far-right Maurice Dantec. Far-right Jacques Ellul. Far-right Henryk Broder. Far-right Pia Kjersgaard. Far-right Kurt Westergaard. Far-right Pat Condell. Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Far-right Winston Churchill. Far-right Andre Malraux. Far-right Alexis de Tocqueville. Far-right John Quincy Adams. Far-right John Wesley. Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Am I right? And am I, in this case, using these epithets to mock the way so much of the Western press mechanically uses them, very very very far from the far-right but -- both relatively and absolutely -- right?
In any case, I feel much better now, now that I've gotten that goddam "far-right" right out of my hair. You too, I suspect.
Now, where were we?
Yes, Geert Wilders, and the present Minister for European Affairs, a member of the Labor Party, a Mr. Timmermans. Timmermans is hysterically afraid, but is couching his hysteria in an ostentatious "reasonable and calm" tone, but one which reduces the justified fear, all over the Netherlands, all over Europe, all over the Infidel world, of Islam and those who take Islam to heart, as merely a matter of our psychic neediness, our requirement that we create, and then hate, the "Other." Timmermans simply refuses to look around the world, for if he did, he would see that this need to "create the Other" is not limited to the Western world. For some reason Buddhists who saw the Bamiyan Buddhas destroyed, who know what Islam meant for tens of thousands of Buddhist temples and stupas throughout Asia, who know what Muslims have done to Buddhists in Bangladesh (where some remain in the Chittagong Hills area), and to Buddhists in Southern Thailand, also in their fear of Islam apparently have had to create "the Other."
And Hindus, too, have had to create "the Other." For they have been on the receiving end of Muslim murderousness and terrorism, in Afghanistan (where the Taliban made them wear, as dhimmis, identifying garb "for their own protection"), and in Pakistan, and in Bangladesh (where Hindus have been beaten to death by Muslim crowds for the sin of having been in the vicinity of a mosque when Friday Prayers let out), and in Indian-held Kashmir, and in India itself, where Muslim terrorism has never let up, but only now is being recognized not as a mutation of Islam, but an inevitable part of Islam, when Muslims feel they can get away with it. For violence is the original method of Jihad, the one that Muhammad used, and the other instruments of Jihad - the Money Weapon, campaigns of Da'wa, and demographic conquest - were later additions to the Muslim armory. For more than a thousand years, violence - called qitaal - was the main weapon of Jihad. And those who have been on the receiving end of this, including many black Africans, and many Asians, would laugh at Frans Timmermans and his Eurocentric view of things - Eurocentric in the sense that matters, that he sees only what is happening in Europe, where he can construct a case against the local white West for reducing Muslim immigrants to "the Other." Passing strange, is it not, that he doesn't ask himself why so many other, but non-Muslim immigrants, are welcomed, and eventually integrated perfectly well into Dutch society? Don't they, too, qualify to be regarded as "the Other" by the Dutch, in Frans Timmermans' view? But they seem not to pose the same permanent, intractable problems as Muslims do. Might that have anything to do with the ideology of Islam? Or is Frans Timmermans, Man of the Left, as deeply respectful of something called, faute de mieux, a "religion" - as deeply respectful as was, in his day, George Bush? They would laugh even more bitterly in hearing Timmermans insist that the increasing dismay and distrust of the famously-tolerant Dutch for the Muslims in their midst is not based on reality, but only reflects the need of the Dutch, the need of the White West (fons et origo of everything that, in the view of the frans-timmermans of this world, needs to be changed) to create this "Other" and fill it with their own fears, their own baseless dread.
It is all so absurd. You can see for yourself the clever but vacuous Frans Timmerman at Youtube, where his message comes down to this: Who Are You Going To Believe, Me, Or Your Lying Eyes? Are you going to believe what you actually see, every day, if you live in Rotterdam or Amsterdam, or another Dutch city, or for that matter if you live in Malmo, or in Marseilles, or near the banlieues of Paris, or in Bradford or Leeds or a dozen other English cities? Are you going to believe what you read, with those same Lying Eyes, if what you read was written by a defector from the Army of Islam - say Wafa Sultan or Ayaan Hirsi Ali - or by a great Western scholar of Islam, and the greatest of all happens to have been a Dutchman, C. Snouck Hurgronje?
You think I'm being unfair to Frans Timmermans? Well, watch him in sly action, right here.
Go ahead. Let him be your psychoanalyst, telling you that you must "Confront Your Fears" and you must "embrace your fears" and stop, for god's sake stop, making up all these stories about Muslims that reflect only your deep and unhappy psychic need to create an "Other." Get over it. And note, please, that Islam is, top to bottom, and every which way including up, based on the strict division of the world between Believer and Unbeliever, Muslim and Infidel. And between the two there exists, Muslims are taught (in Qur'an, Hadith, and Sira), a state of permanent war (though not always of permanent warfare) between the two, until such time as Dar al-Islam expands and swallows up what remains of Dar al-Harb, and the whole world is gloriously submissive to Islam, and non-Muslims, those who may remain, are dhimmis, submissive to the rule of Muslims. In other words, Islam is based on the idea of "the Other."
Maybe you don't quite agree with the general view of all right-thinking people. Maybe you refuse to burn incense on the altar of various Idols of the Age, including those who simply invoke, and exploit, unopposed untouchable desiderata such as "Diversity" (unexamined, unanalysed, with no distinctions made as to the kind, the amount, the effect, of such "Diversity"). Maybe you think that there are a thousand reasons to worry about the large-scale Muslim presence in the tolerant, advanced, imperiled countries of Western Europe. Maybe you think that the Shari'a, in letter and spirit, flatly contradicts the principles that underlay the legal and political institutions that over the past four hundred years have been created in the Netherlands. Maybe you think that the Enlightenment, that had its beginnings not in France with Voltaire, Diderot, and d'Alembert, but much earlier, with Baruch Spinoza in the Netherlands, and which could never for one minute have occurred in lands where Islam dominates and Muslims rule, is worth defending. Maybe you think that art, that sculpture and the painting of living creatures that is forbidden in Islam, is worth protecting (Vermeer, Rembrandt, Hooch). Maybe you think that the free and skeptical inquiry that Islam discourages everywhere, and that is essential for the enterprise of science (and without science it will be impossible to ameliorate the mess we have made), needs to be protected. Maybe you cannot bear the collectivism of Islam, according to which individual Believers are not allowed to leave Islam because that would bring it, the Faith, into disrepute, and the true object of worship in Islam is Islam itself. Maybe you have learned something of what Muhammad said and did, and are horrified that Muslims regard Muhammad as the Perfect Man, al-insan al-kamil.
And if you are those things, you will have to support Geert Wilders and the Freedom Party. You may agree more on one matter with another party or another candidate, or on another matter with another party. You may agree with another party or candidate on everything, except on the meaning and menace of Islam, where you agree with Geert Wilders. And that means you have to ignore that preposterous epithet "far-right" and that absurd "xenophobia." You have to see through all the desperate attempts to blacken his name, including the latest transparent attempt to trick unwary voters into believing that they can retain their moral sense only by voting against Geert Wilders. This attempt consists of publicizing some twelve-year-old Dutch girl's sentimental screed about how "the Netherlands that Geert Wilders says he wants is not the Netherlands I recognize, because the Netherlands I recognize does not distinguish among people on the basis of their ideas, their religion, their race." Really? Are these quite the same thing? Are "ideas" the same as "religion" and "race"? If that "idea" is the idea of Nazism, or Soviet Communism, is it impermissible to wish to prevent the adherents of those ideas from taking over, especially if they come from outside, and settle without so much as a by-your-leave in one's own small and now imperiled country? Not so fast, please, with what is simply sentimental tosh when it comes from a twelve-year-child, but when it is deliberately exploited by adults who know exactly what they are doing, is not sentimental tosh but something far more sinister. Given what is at stake, you have to vote for the Freedom Party candidates. His party ran last week in two of nearly 400 districts, and came in first in Amere and second in the Hague. Now come the elections of June 9. If you are Dutch, reading this, you know whom to vote for. You can do no other. And if you are not Dutch, and did not know before whom the Dutch should vote for, and why, I hope that now, by this last phrase in the last sentence in the last paragraph, you too, know what they should do.
Quote:
The lavishing of training, money and weapons also comes from additional(IMO, not very carefully considered) sources too-
Top Gun? Kabul-style
Imagine a devout member, 'vetted by PC/MC' brass, taking the controls of these airborne gifts - soaring above our allied forces. Will we be babysitting them as well?
Readers Digest: Eric Bouvet photo & caption
Eric Bouvet didn't elaborate on how the French "trained to retreat" Afgan army which "doesn't know how to come back alive" identifies the enemy.
I am listening to Mr. Timmermans. He is living in an intellectual bubble. He should live a week with a Jewish family in a flat in Malmo and tell me not to be afraid of the "Other".
His creepy opening about how "fear can be fun", expounding on the thrills of essentially horror elements (a truism) ignores the in-world realities that Freddy Kruger really will kill you, that Dr. Lecter is on the ceiling, and that there is no escape when one blindly seeks the cask of Amontillado.
He is delusional.
On a side note, I like the format of this program. A host that introduces and allows a forum for uninterrupted speech. How refreshing in an American world of 10-second sound bites.
"Only global governance can solve the problems..." "We will have to take action. Diversity is key to this. When Jack Sparrow jumps into the beastie's mouth (the Kraaken) it is counterintuitive...we need to have the force as politicians to face fear."
If there is one good thing that comes from the applauding audience, it would be that when they go home they say to their wives over their glasses as they're reading in bed, "Honey, have you heard about any trouble with Muslims in Malmo?" And she'll google it on her laptop as they sit together and perhaps, find this site and others.
I am always amazed by your knowlegde of various subjects Hugh, this time Holland. Tho one thing is incorrect: Wilders wants to keep retirement age at 65, not 60.
jan douwe,
Am I correct in assuming you are Dutch? What is the general sentiment on the street, at work, in schools about Muslims? If someone says, "Oh, we had to take a break because one-eighth of the class had to go off to pray." is there derision, is it generally accepted as a good thing? Is the general public ready to stand up for Dutch values and push back against being pushed? What about welfare? It must be maddening to the average taxpayer, truly.
Thank you.
I am Dutch yes. There is a very decisive view on the subject of islam, alot of ppl dont see it as a problem, and alot of ppl do see it as a problem. In general id say more and more ppl are seeing it as a problem (in polls Geert Wilders has the biggest party of the Netherlands). This sentiment is only growing, while the opposition is more openly claiming to be anti-Geert, or anti-PVV (Which is Wilders freedom party). They believe the problems with immigration, islam and safety on the street is all Geert Wilders' fault, because he makes foreigners feel unwelcome, stigmatized, and thus they are victims of our xenophobia.
But the election polls speak for themselves: PVV quite possibly will become the biggest party in the Netherlands.
Dear Hugh,
I always enjoy your writing, but how about saying a bit more about yourself? Compared to Robert, you seem a rather shadowy figure - though in this subject area I can understand why.
Rgds,
Y
Thank you. I guess I mean more on a personal level. Is there disdain or a "lower class" feeling about Muslims particularly, even if politically people stand up for them? We have a similar scenario in the United States, where the left, ostensibly the supporters of minorities and civil rights, have a very low expectation of minorities and treat their accomplishments with paternal condescension.
Why should I say "more about myself"? In my view, there is entirely too much attention given nowadays not to the logic, the coherence, the common sense, the felicity of expression, the wit, the knowledge, even the poetry, of this or that writer, while hypertrophied attention is given to the endless business of looking into the ethnic, racial, religious background and, bien entendu, sexual "orientation" (what a word) of the writer, whether what is written is poetry or prose, fiction or non-fiction. What counts is the work, the words on the page. The barbara-wawa prying interest is one of the deplorable things that characterizes this dismal age -- there are so many -- and that, in the classroom, gets in the way of the study of literature, rightly understood, and for that matter, gets in the way of much else. In the hideous future we are now so heedlessly constructing, the Age of No Privacy (And Get With The Program, You Holdouts, Or At Least Get Used To It), the greatest luxury of all will be to maintain a modicum of one's privacy. Even the billionaires will have trouble. Or perhaps people simply don't mind, perhaps they think it's just swell, perhaps it's a way to be a celebrity which for so many, is the great end of living. I beg to differ.
Jan Douwe:
Thank you for your correction as to the retirement age matter. I will correct it in the text.
In 2006 I posted a proposed naturalization test to be used in the Netherlands. It was, of course, slightly exaggerated for effect, in order to make a point about the possibility of integration of Muslims (as opposed to other, non-Muslim immigrants), given the indifference or hostility to all things outside of Islam (pre-Islamic and non-Islamic histories of lands and peoples conquered belonging, in the Muislim view, to one undifferentiated Jahiliyya). I also wanted, as one of the article's unstated goals, to shock Dutch readers into reminding them of what their own civilisational legacy, in which they have not a fee simple but merely a life estate, and therefore a duty to preserve and hand on that civilisational legacy, not through indifference or negligence or selfishness to let it be lost, consists.
You can find that piece among those listed here:
http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm?frm=2013&sec_id=2013
Simply scroll down, and then click on the one, from July, 2006, that is titled “Going Dutch.”
If Wilders does well in the Dutch elections and if the UK elections go badly, I may well "Go Dutch" and return to the land of my distant ancestors.
"Why should I say 'more about myself'? What counts is the work, the words on the page."
Unfortunately these days the words on the page seem to matter less than who wrote the words. Remember the big literary scandal in Australia in the 90's about the more or less biographical first work by a young aborigine woman, Wanda Koolmatrie, about growing up in white Australia. As long as it was believed to have been written by her, it was regarded as brilliant, the critics lavished praise on it, and it received Australia's top literary awards. But then it turned out to have been written by Leon Carmen, a 47-y-o white man, who had been unable to get his works published under his own name. The praise turned into scorn, and there were demands that the prizes be revoked.
The words on the pages didn't change, but the evaluation of their worth did.
Good article but,in my opinion, a little too long to make the
point.Mr. Wilders, again in my opinion, will win big in the
general election. The smear campaign against him is not going to work because what he says about islam is simple common sense and is easily understood by people with simple common sense.
"in my opinion, a little too long to make the
point."
Chacun a son gout.
Some might find de trop the long riff on "far-right." It goes like this:
"Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Far-right Geert Wilders. Far-right Theo van Gogh. Far-right Pim Fortuyn. Far-right Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Far-right Magdi Allam. Far-right Oriana Fallaci. Far-right Robert Redeker. Far-right Maurice Dantec. Far-right Jacques Ellul. Far-right Henryk Broder. Far-right Pia Kjersgaard. Far-right Kurt Westergaard. Far-right Pat Condell. Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Far-right Winston Churchill. Far-right Andre Malraux. Far-right Alexis de Tocqueville. Far-right John Quincy Adams. Far-right John Wesley. Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right, far-right.
Am I right? And am I, in this case, using these epithets to mock the way so much of the Western press mechanically uses them, very very very far from the far-right but -- both relatively and absolutely -- right?
In any case, I feel much better now, now that I've gotten that goddam "far-right" right out of my hair. You too, I suspect.
Now, where were we?"
Well, I could simply have said "the epithet 'far-right' is used to make up the reader's or listener's mind, to bully him into a view of Geert Wilders rather than present any evidence for that tendentious view." But would the point have been made in quite the same way? Would it have stuck in the brains of readers or listeners quite the same? No.
I consider that passage the the most important part of the whole piece, even though what it conveys was already conveyed, in the briefest way. And sound bites are not in my line, even if some find that they just "want the point to be made" (and what if there is not "one point" but a series of points? And what if one of those points is to make sure that all the other points are made through the deployment of facts and exercise of logic, that might take more than a "just the facts, ma'am" approach?
And then there is the little matter of expressing something more, rather than less, pleasingly, or even seductively. Most things require elucidation, and most elucidation, outside the hard sciences, requires curlicues.
Not being from Europe...who am i to comment but, the EU's unfinished business is to create it's constitution. For in the language of western thought and western reason, Sharia is by nature the definition of human rights violation.
huh, what an irony, to post this comment I had to click the "submit" button. Damn...this islam thing is everywhere!
To continue with the "words on the page" theme: in the Wilders case, what seems to matter is not the words on the page, but who's reading them! Thus Wilders can read from the Koran: "Kill the Jews", and that's "hate speech" and he's breaking the law. But dozens of imams can read from the Koran: "Kill the Jews", and that's o.k., it's freedom of religion.
The Afghans are courageous. They can run and shoot. But they don't know how to organize, take a position, defend it, or come back alive.
That last bit, about "not coming back alive", may not reflect simply a primitive ineptitude, as the source, Eric Bouvet, seems to imply (with all his trips to Afghanistan, I'd bet he's one of those who still can't see the Islam in the Afghans he has been documenting and analyzing, and likely has been repeatedly fooled into thinking that generous hospitality is the more important trait among them).
The seemingly reckless penchant of Afghan soldiers to fight the enemy and "not come back alive" may well reflect Islamic military tactics. One source is a famous hadith by Sahih Muslim, where it was said of Mohammed:
He returned to his friends and said: I greet you (a farewell greeting). Then he broke the sheath of his sword, threw it away, advanced with his (naked) sword towards the enemy and fought (them) with it until he was slain.
[Book 020, Number 4681]
That word translated as "advanced...towards the enemy" may well be the Arabic inghimass, which was one important style of military attack, meaning literally "plunging into", where the Muslim soldier plunged into the thick of the enemy in a frenzy of killing with the full expectation, and desire, to be killed in the process. One can read about Muslims doing this in the annals of Islamic history from Morocco in the 8th century to the Philippines in the 19th and 20th centuries.
The basic core tenet here is derived from Koran 9:111 -- the injunction to "kill and die in the path of Allah" and the clear implication that Paradise is guaranteed to the Muslim following this.
The Sahih Muslim hadith quoted above, in a previous sentence indicates this, where it claims that Mohammed also said: Surely, the gates of Paradise are under the shadows of the swords.
This impetuous military tactic is not suicide (intihariya), it is martyrdom (istishhadiya). When reading a modern Muslim expert on Islamic military martyrdom, Al-Tartusi (a Syrian expatriate living in London, according to MEMRI "considered to be a prominent theoretician of the Salafi jihadist trend in Islam") on this distinction, one gets the distinct impression that he is not on Islamic grounds objecting to the headlong plunge into enemy lines that will result in the Muslim soldier being killed as he valiantly kills the enemy -- he only objects to the soldier doing this in order to be killed, i.e., that suicide would be an ulterior motive for plunging into battle. The primary guiding motivation, for the representative of the Religion of Peace, should be killing, with one's consequent death being fully accepted but not primarily sought out.
Thus, for example, Al-Tartusi writes of:
...proofs and the texts calling for bravery and penetrating [iqtiham] and storming [inghimas] enemy lines - but this without being foolhardy - and [this is permitted] even if it leads to one's being killed by the enemy, so long as there is in one's storming [enemy lines] an overriding benefit to the jihad, to Islam, and to the Muslims.
Al-Tartusi in his fatwa "against suicide bombing" goes on to try to draw a distinction between "storming [the enemy's ranks]..., and killing one's self, as in suicide attacks...":
- One who storms [enemy ranks] is killed by the enemy, whereas one who carries out a suicide attack kills himself, and so in this they are not equal.
Al-Tartusi is being a bit sophistically literal here. At the very least, he would have to present an argument that proves that the death resulting in attack has to be directly inflicted by an enemy.
That the one who storms enemy ranks will be killed is probable, but not certain, since many of those who storm the ranks of the enemy disperse their army and succeed in their mission without being killed. There is no better witness to this than the history of jihad in Islam. In contrast, someone who blows himself up in a suicide attack has killed himself for sure, and so in this they are not equal.
I guess Al-Tartusi then would congratulate the Mumbai jihadists, for the fine Islamic example they demonstrated in killing the enemy the old-fashioned way.
...one cannot say that [this is because] our forefathers did not have explosives at their disposal so as to be able to draw the analogy, since there was no shortage of ways of killing one's self, and they are plentiful in every time and place.
Al-Tartusi is ignoring the precise difference between modern explosives (and airplanes), and what was available to pre-modern Muslims. Pre-modern devices and weapons were not conducive to simultaneously inflicting casualties on an enemy and killing oneself -- whereas modern explosives are perfectly suited to the carrier of explosives doing so, and this gains advantage when a human carrier of explosives is more capable of effectively penetrating enemy lines -- i.e., crowded areas where Unbelievers (= Enemies) are gathered.
Al-Tartusi's main complaint with suicide-bombers is that they are not scrupulously following the stipulations in the Sunna (he also disingenuously tries to piggyback onto that a claim that suicide-bombings are not strategically effective, as well as the anxiety that they are bad for the image of Islam, and that they tend to foment discord among Muslims). And yet, he notes a fact that is "very discomfiting" -- namely, that over 90% of suicide attacks by Muslims are wanting in adhering to all the proper and necessary jots and tittles of the Sunna. Even if Al-Tartusi is correct about the Islamic unacceptability of suicide attacks, his own admission that over 90% of such attacks are not following his version of Islamic compliance shows that there is obviously a monstrous problem in Islamic education conducive to such a rampant culture of violence that is, of course, threatening us Infidels. If exploding Muslims aren't listening to Al-Tartusi, then what good is he?
It is up to us, whose lives and societies are increasingly endangered by all these supposed Misunderstanders of the Sunna, to put a stop to them, and this will necessarily involve various violent actions incurring collateral damage. Unlike the WW2 Danes mentioned in Hugh's post, we should not expect any Muslims to be on the right side of our self-defense, nor should we trust any who claim to be.
A most fascinating essay, Hugh.
BTW, I just listened to Timmermans video. Utterly vacuous.
To Yaffle:
I just got hell from my mother, who read my hot-headed instantaneous response, entirely disproportionate to your perfectly reasonable question and, what’s more, impolite given your kind expression of interest. There’s a subtext to this; I was at the time thinking about, and becoming more and more enraged, at what I most dislike about the academic study of literature as presently conducted in many American universities, and took the occasion to let fly on that and related matters. You were not my intended target, and I not only failed to recognize the inoffensive reasonableness of your request but I compounded the crime by being inexcusably uncivil.
In 2004, at JW, in response to a query from an Old-Sod “saoirse," I revealed that my regimen for staying in mental shape consisted of “Kundalini yoga, composing clerihews, Kripke S5 modal logic, and a stiff drink with dinner.” At least one of those things is true.
There’s little more to say, except that I hope you will accept the expression of my shame and chagrin. Otherwise I’m in big trouble.
Click on the following link, and explore.
http://staff.science.uva.nl/~fjseins/RembrandtCatalogue/index.html
*This* among many other things is what Geert Wilders is fighting for; and what will most assuredly be lost (and not merely lost, but destroyed, deliberately, perversely, in an ecstasy of hideous Mohammedan glee), if Europe is swallowed up by Islam.
Maybe the PVV should put this lady
http://amysbabies.files.wordpress.com/2008/02/vermeer-girl-with-a-pearl-earring1665.jpg
on their election posters.
Or perhaps this lady?
http://oilpaintingshop.com/rembrandt/19.jpg
@Winoceros
"Thank you. I guess I mean more on a personal level. Is there disdain or a "lower class" feeling about Muslims particularly, even if politically people stand up for them? We have a similar scenario in the United States, where the left, ostensibly the supporters of minorities and civil rights, have a very low expectation of minorities and treat their accomplishments with paternal condescension."
There is a feeling that they are lower class, poorly educated as they mostly come from gettos in our cities. They get special treatment to make things 'equal'. They are pampered, and ppl are increasingly getting fed up with that. For example, Moroccan women got subsidies for going to amusement parcs, or violent muslim youths that behaved good for some time got free vacations to NYC, or Morocco, or a sailing trip (in which they actually destroyed the boat they were guests on). Or they were allowed to make more errors in exams than native Dutch children, in order to give them the same chances in society... Then there is the positive discrimination which must ensure that a certain percentage of them become head of police, or police, etc. This does not solely count for muslims but in all practicality, it is about the muslims as almost all other immigrant groups integrate perfectly well (apart from Antilians). Besides that, to tackle high muslim youth crime rates, there are soft policies like 'street coaches' or 'neighbourhood fathers', who are often somewhat older ex-convict bodybuilders, who go out and talk to the gangs roaming the streets as their appearance would grant them some respect, but which turns out not be working very well. And if the crime continues, then they are helped into getting a job. So they get jobs even more easily than others who simply behave normally.
The PVV has come up with the idea to send "street-commandos" onto the streets, which would be capable of dealing with any issues and not fall back to avoid escalation (as the police does). And the PVV has made a big deal about headscarves. But its hard to come up with real solutions when the origin of the problems in society is not yet recognized by any other parties.
"I just got hell from my mother"...or maybe you just sobered up.
p.s. In any case, I agree with you.
It is high time now...
It is the time now to deport
all Muhammadan Muslim to their
their countries of origin....
Forget about human rights, be like
the China..kick them out..no second
though..China thinking is very simple
if you think you like to follow other
people way of life then migrated one
way visa/out....nobody in china will hold
you back...if one create trouble then they
will be punished..jail or death by hanging or
injection..full stop....no big deal...period..
enough...is....enough......
from http://theownersmanual.net
Do not cherish hatred in your heart.
“You shall not hate your brother in your heart.” (Leviticus 19:17)
Could it be that the rabbis actually got one right?
This is apparently a no-brainer, the converse of “You shall love your neighbor as you do yourself.”
But look at what follows: it almost sounds like a contradiction:
“You shall surely rebuke your neighbor, and not bear sin because of him.”
In light of this close contextual connection,
we shouldn’t automatically assume Moses has moved on to a different subject.
Actually, I believe the second phrase defines what it is to “hate your brother.”
And the truth that emerges if we make this connection has stunning relevance for us today:
we are not to be tolerant of false teaching,
but are rather to “rebuke” those in error—to neglect this correction is to hate our brother.
Remember the rabbinical mitzvah that said Do not stand by idly when a human life is in danger?
This is the practical outworking of the principal: if your brother is in spiritual error,
if he espouses doctrines that Yahweh’s Word says will kill him in the end,
then to withhold rebuke and admonition is to hate him.
By tolerating his heresy, you are sending him to hell,
like indulging a diabetic’s sweet tooth.
What does it mean to “bear” sin? The Hebrew word is nasa, meaning to lift, or carry.
It is “used in reference to the bearing of guilt or punishment for sin”
leading to the “representative or substitutionary bearing of one person’s guilt by another.”
Yahweh did not want false teaching tolerated in Israel because the guilt—and thus
the punishment—incurred would eventually be borne by the entire nation.
He would have spared them that pain. He would spare us that pain.
This ought to shed new light on Yahshua’s confirmation of the principle
that loving Yahweh and our fellow man is the path to life.
“One day an expert in religious law stood up to test Jesus by asking him this question:
‘Teacher, what must I do to receive eternal life?’
Jesus replied,
‘What does the law of Moses say? How do you read it?’
The man answered,
‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart,
all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind.’
And, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
‘Right!’ Jesus told him.
‘Do this and you will live!’” (Luke 10:25-28 NLT)
Friends don’t let friends fall prey to false teaching.
Yahshua spoke of such people:
“Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep,
but are really wolves that will tear you apart.”
While appearing to be pious and godly, they are really dangerous and destructive.
“You can detect them by the way they act, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit.
You don’t pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles.
A healthy tree produces good fruit, and an unhealthy tree produces bad fruit.
A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit.
So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire.
Yes, the way to identify a tree or a person is by the kind of fruit that is produced.” (Matthew 7:15-20 NLT)
And what is this fruit? A “good tree” produces love,
further defined by Paul as “joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”
The apostle puts two and two together and observes, “Against such things there is no law.” (Galatians 5:22-23)
The fruit of “bad trees” is defined in the same passage as “adultery,
fornication, uncleanness, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred,
contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies,
envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like.” (Galatians 5:19-21)
my conclusion:
As people of the Holy Book we should love our neighbor as ourselves,
so the unhealthy tree here is not the people following the bad doctrine,
but is the bad doctrine itself. That is what we have to fight.
We have to help the muslims to warn them for the hate speech of Muhammed.
It is out religious duty to tell our neighbour that he strayed from the righteous path.
This is part of loving our neigbour as ourself.
The commandment of loving our neighbour as ourselves is equal important as the commantment
of You must love the Lord your God with all your heart,
all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind. It is the CORE of the Jewish and Cristian faith.
So if the judges condemn for and forbit Wilders to warn people and rebuking his neighbours,
the judges condemn and forbit the followers of the Jewisch and Cristian faith to perform their holy duty!
I thought their was freedom of religion in The Netherlands???