That is one disillusioned and bitter Islamist!

I loved this...The theory goes that when they graduate they will be practicing and believing Muslims, ready to take their rightful place in society.

This goal should be the first and foremost priority of every Muslim in the world. After all, what's more important: being rich in this life but losing your soul to eternal punishment, or somehow getting by in this life and gaining Paradise in the next? ....

Aww shucks, do I have to choose?

Posted by: reset at June 16, 2005 3:36 PM

Must be an epidemic these days:

http://fjordman.blogspot.com/2005/06/immigrants-convert-to-christianity-to.html

Many new residents in Denmark find that changing an address and speaking the language is not enough to become a part of the nation. Since the year 2000, at least 660 people have converted to Christianity, almost half of them former Muslims. Arne Kappelgaard, reverend at Kingos Church in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro quarter, has baptised 12 converts: a Buddhist, a Hindu, and ten Muslims. ‘Many of them turned away from Islam, for example, a long time ago and seek something else,’ he said. ‘Many Iranians are not comfortable with the version of their religion that they have experienced in their homeland, and some seem to find what they’re searching for in Christianity. But the conversions are the results of many different life stories.’

Posted by: Fjordman at June 16, 2005 3:51 PM

I don’t understand why people would immigrate to a country like America and then think they and their children will go on living like they did “in the old country.” What is the point of immigrating to a country if it isn’t to become part of that country? Do they want really want their new country to be like the one that they felt the need to leave? Why?
It doesn’t make sense to me. Go back where you came from.

But then again I am a godless infidel. What do I know?

Posted by: f.g. at June 16, 2005 4:06 PM

"A lot of our students have older brothers and sisters who have gone out of control. They smoke, use drugs, sleep around and disobey their parents."

She was wearing tight jeans, no Hijab and a lot of make-up.

Rebel, young Muslims, rebel.

And by the way, I'd sure like to speak with this person who was so shocked to see the girl's older brother with an arm full of tattoos.

What's wrong with tattoos? If this idiot wants to really be shocked, she should head out to witness a "mosh pit" at a metal music show. She'd freak out and run away screeching.

Posted by: DCWatson at June 16, 2005 4:07 PM

Oh... the parents also mentioned that she had a boyfriend and that they didn't want her to "get into trouble."
i remember when a freind of mine was dating a syrian girl, and when the dad found out, the girl's dad and two brothers and three cousins came over to my buddies house to call him outside to kick the sh*t out of him, since then i never thought of going out with a middle eastern girl cause of the scorn that would come my way for being born the way i am.,
thats some messed up sh*t to deal with in the post 1960's civil rights era.

Posted by: SPQR at June 16, 2005 4:09 PM

What's wrong with tattoos? If this idiot wants to really be shocked, she should head out to witness a "mosh pit" at a metal music show. She'd freak out and run away screeching
posted by DCwatson,
as a fellow pitter(i figure you are) i think the moslem society should see a slayer pit, then they would maybe get an idea of how violent we can be, with our freinds to say the least,its just a little frustrating that our self inflicted violence is not given the reverence that the shia get when they whip their backs all up till its bloody, cause i know after three hours of pitting those guys who were in there with me shareed something that bonded us together without saying a word to each other.
off topic a little is that i have a freind from college who is lebenese and has long hair and is a metal head. he told me that in his country he would have to get into fights all the time because the religous zelots in his homeland would talk sh*t about his hair and then would try to push him around. more power to the metal heads around the world

Posted by: SPQR at June 16, 2005 4:18 PM

Immigrants are expected to conform to the culture where they have chosen to live. It is a choice. They are free to leave if they are not happy with their choice. Muslims that can not integrate into the West and are unhappy with Western culture should leave at the first available opportunity.

Posted by: epg at June 16, 2005 4:36 PM

oh no. the site's been taken over by metal people, what would Yahiya think of the new wave........men in make up!!!!!! Now there's trouble

Posted by: cockadoodledooo at June 16, 2005 4:56 PM

"These doctors, businessmen, engineers and other professionals develop a project outline and raise funds. Usually they have to go outside to Arabia or other foreign sources for the bulk of the money because local donors are a bit scarce."

HMMMM....

"We're isolated from each other and interact with non-Muslims most of the time."

UH - Huh.....

"Our children are growing up with almost no Muslims around them and are therefore identifying themselves as non-Muslims!"

DO TELL

Posted by: Laurel at June 16, 2005 7:14 PM

"She was, for all practical purposes, a non-Muslim with a Muslim sounding name."
--- from the article above

An outcome devoutly to be wished -- for as many as can be influenced to jettison the belief-system. But we can't count on it, and must have an immigration policy that assumes the worst -- that such a result will be rare, or that people can, when a personal crisis hits, backslide into Islam -- the real, unvarnished, full-court-press Islam we would all prefer not to think about.

Posted by: Hugh at June 16, 2005 7:48 PM

Read the article.
Haha, finally some good news! Let's hope it's an accurate depiction of the Muslim scene in North America and not just journalistic exaggeration.

Yahiya Emerick is a convert, btw. He wrote the appropriately named, Islam For Dummies.

Posted by: scissor at June 16, 2005 8:12 PM

Tattoos are forbidden by Islam.

Music -except the wailing muezzin- is essentially forbidden by Islam.

Dating or marrying anyone but a Muslim is forbidden by Islam.

Education, unless it furthers Islam, is forbidden.

The more the parents crack down, the more there is hope that some of their children will crack through the armor of dogma.

Most will slide back into conservative Koranic comfort later, but a few apostates are better than none.

May they get their broken hearts, laughing skulls, butterflies and dragons tattoo'd on their unmentionables, start bands named 72 Dead Virgins or Mo's Gotta Go and play speed dirges to freedom from fascist fatwas, and learn to enjoy the manifold glories of this world, sipping Foster's and Bass Ale and Yeungling.

Finding jihadis pathetic, ridiculous, lame and ludicrous.

And make a black comic film mocking the entire suicidal Islamic effort entitled:

"I WAS A TEEN-AGED JIHADI: or how I got out of my suicide belt and into my girlfriends' jeans"

Posted by: BigSleep at June 16, 2005 8:47 PM

The girl, who had seven older siblings that went through an urban public school told me that her parents were sending her to the Muslim school because they wanted "at least one good one."

Good for what? Hating the infidels and possibly strapping a bomb on?

Posted by: magnoon at June 16, 2005 8:48 PM

I'm sure all those descriptions of the "wayward" Muslim kids are exaggerated. Just like they always exaggerate the West's "decadence". Always described in the worst possible terms. Our women are all running around dressed like Christina Aguilera, acting like drunken hussies, while their hijabbed women are oh so pure and virtuous. They keep trying to convince themselves their way of life is the best, when the reality is that they wallow in misery and bleakness and their societies are embarrassing, savage cesspits.

I feel sorry Muslim kids who want to live normal lives, in THIS century, and are forced to live like 7th Century barbarians instead. Sure, the odd one might really rebel and go wild, but I believe most just want to make their own way in this world and would do well, if they were allowed to live like humans versus mindless drones of Islam. They had a chance in the previous generation, like other immigrant groups. But Islam is different. It is going backwards, with the current generation tightening the noose around the necks of their kids. And consequently, our necks too.

Posted by: feralee at June 16, 2005 9:27 PM

The only thing I have against Muslim schools is that they're sometimes training grounds for jihad against the rest of us. Otherwise, I have no objection to people putting their kids into private schools that go counter to the rebellion chic of our general culture.

Also, I have a lot of sympathy for the parents who don't want to see their kids out of control. Where I come from, tattoos mean that someone has taken an enemy head and people are afraid of vengeful ghosts and spirits; and body modification practiced downhill from the tattooed headhunters was a way to deform the feet of girls and women. Thank God for the "cultural imperialism" that encouraged the local cultures to do away with such things! As for substance abuse, I'm sorry, but I can see in it nothing but stupefaction and the diminishment of the human being, not his being opened up or given spiritual awareness.

As for sex out of marriage, it is just another part of the West's moral and cultural suicide. I might not stone the girl who got knocked up, but I would make the young man pay to support the child (Yes, I'm a savage who sees abortion not only as another form of murder, but also Western liberalism betraying its best and most fundamental principles).

Part of the problem of the public school is that is has to take everyone who comes, and has been forbidden by law (either statute or judge-made precedent) to discipline the unruly. Add to this that it must pretend that Western civilization never had anything to do with Abrahamic theism, and it's no wonder they don't perform.

Posted by: Kepha at June 17, 2005 12:35 AM

"She was wearing tight jeans, no Hijab and a lot of make-up.

Her face said it all: she's been around."

This is just laughable. So the writer of this article can take one look at that girl's face, and determine that "She's been around". These are the same (Muslim) people who cry constantly, that people judge them just by looking at them.

Posted by: Tiferet at June 17, 2005 4:03 AM

kepha, you shmuck, my heritage had tatoos dating back before 800BCE, it has nothing negative, so i would say back off, it has nothing to do with negative conotations, it is a personal thing, and if you think it is bad then you are a person whom thinks it is good to look into others personal lives and say what is good and what is bad. and i never asked for anyones consent for my choices, and i think of giving MY permision for others to live their personal lives as they see fit as long as it does not affect others as intrusive and agianst everything i stand for.

Posted by: SPQR at June 17, 2005 4:17 AM

SPQR, since you claim such a long heritage of tattoos, kindly do not take the title of the city where my family comes from, where tattoos are and have always been nothing but a barbarous affectation by callow children. There is a lot of ugly PC about your statement, from the contemptible fake expression BCE instead of BC to the indefensible notion - which you defend not by argument but by insult - that in sex anything goes as long as there is "consent", all I can say is go home and learn to think. If you think that this comment was insulting, it was merely responding to your nonsense in your own tone.

Posted by: Paolo at June 17, 2005 6:56 AM

Ha! I was absolutely certain the writer of this article was a woman. Thanks Robert for taking off the Ms.

Maybe we should follow scrappleface: Dominique de Villapin [who is a man].

If anybody knows an easy way to tell by the name if a Muslim is male or female, please let me know!

I get confused easily...

Rebecca

Posted by: rb at June 17, 2005 9:04 AM

I think that this is the most important sentence:

This goal should be the first and foremost priority of every Muslim in the world. After all, what's more important: being rich in this life but losing your soul to eternal punishment, or somehow getting by in this life and gaining Paradise in the next?

For a believing Muslim, THIS LIFE MEANS NOTHING, and they live terrified that they will go to hell punished eternally because they did not follow all of the silly rules.

From here, it is a hop, skip and a jump to becoming a Jihadist and dying for Allah by fighting againstthe Infidels (wherever you find them.)

A Muslim is a zombie, and a feather's touch away from being a zombie killer.

Ethelred - questioningIslam@yahoo.com

Posted by: Ethelred at June 17, 2005 9:11 AM

Paolo:

My Hebrew schoolteachers were using BCE and CE 40+ years, so I'm not so sure it was the PC crowd who coined the expression.

Posted by: waterdragon52 at June 17, 2005 9:23 AM

An outcome devoutly to be wished -- for as many as can be influenced to jettison the belief-system. But we can't count on it, and must have an immigration policy that assumes the worst -- that such a result will be rare, or that people can, when a personal crisis hits, backslide into Islam -- the real, unvarnished, full-court-press Islam we would all prefer not to think about.

Posted by: Hugh at June 16, 2005 07:48 PM

People,

Listen to what Hugh says, above. Most kids in the immediate prepubertal and pubertal period "rebel." It's wise old Mother Nature's way of making the "nest" so uncomfortable for the about-to-be-reproductively competent human that he/she will leave it, to seek genetic company outside the nuclear family, and thus avoid a lot of the problems that result from inbreeding.

This "rebellion" does not, however, mean that all, or possibly even any, of the kinds of things taught by the nuclear family during early to mid childhood disappear. They're there. The kid, who during the "rebellious" period is (incredible though it may seem) actively seeking a "roadmap" of some sort of thinking that will guide him through life, will often "experiment" with religions other than those believed by his family, or no religion, in "defiance" of his family, or cults, or politics--you name it, the rebellious teen is searching for that roadmap for his life.

Very often, though, after all the searching is done, he will return to a system that more or less resembles that originally taught by his family. It's emotional "comfort food," and once he's tasted things that are exotic to his family, he often returns to the macaroni and cheese equivalent of thinking.

So Hugh should be taken very seriously here. The fact that the kid has tatoos or makeup or tight jeans etc. in no way guarantees that at some time in the future the views taught in childhood won't spring forth as a vehicle for some really nasty stuff.

SPQR wrote:

i use BCE cause the librel left has determed that AD is useless...

Posted by: SPQR at June 17, 2005 08:25 AM

Hey, folks,

"BCE" became common usage NOT as a rejection of Christianity, but because professional historians etc. all around the world, among whom there are many different "reference times" in their various cultures, needed some moment in time as a universally understood reference point in time, particularly when writing in professional journals etc. that are read by many different countries, religions, and so on.

Since English is the most widely spoken language in the world (particularly if you include all those who speak English as a second language), most professional publications intended for the international market use English. Since the majority of native English speakers used "BC," it was concluded that "BC" could be modified just a bit so that everyone, no matter where he came from, could use it and everyone would know what it meant.

The fact that it's use is "religion neutral" should not offend any of us.

Posted by: Cubed at June 17, 2005 11:48 AM

Well, I for one can't get used to BCE/CE. I hate it, in fact. It seems like historical negationism to me.

The historical fact being negated is the life of Christ.

I don't like it and never will.

There.

Rebecca

Posted by: rb at June 17, 2005 12:44 PM

Look, Cubed, I am a published research historian, and BCE offends me mortally - as a historian much more than as a Christian. It is a vile case of cultural imperialism, doubly so: imposing on Christians the notion that their religion should be ignored, and on non-Western cultures the notion that what is "common" is Western. "Common" to whom? Not to Jews, not to Muslims, not to Hindus, not to Chinese or Japanese or Mayas or any other culture. The Common Era is dated since Christ was born, and the fact that Dionysius the Small made a six-year mistake in dating it does not alter that fact. In all my publications I have always used the terms BC and AD, and while I have had no problems thus far, I have always promised myself that if ever a miserable editor altered it to the worthless BCE, I would either have it changed back or pull the piece.

Posted by: Paolo at June 17, 2005 4:22 PM

Guys,

You are not obligated to like BCE, or to use it. It's just there, a metaphysical "is," agreed upon by those who find it convenient.

Like it if you wish, don't like it if you don't; use it or not, it's your choice--no problem.

Posted by: Cubed at June 17, 2005 6:02 PM

cubed-

I have to disagree vehemently about the manipulation of language going on lately. It is not a neutral or "scientific" or "given" or "metaphysical" activity.

Like changing "Peking" to "Beijing" (ever tried to order a "Beijing Duck" in a restaurant"?) or "Mao Tse Tung" to "Mao Zedong" (a psychotic scumbag is a psychotic scumbag under any name), and especially this nonsense of diluting the given, original meaning of "A.D." & "B.C". to "C.E." & "B.C.E." is laughable p.c. crap. All of it.

Who wanted it? is the real question.

And: DID IT IMPROVE ANYTHING?

Who did not understand what the capitol of China was before the journalistic/governmental meddlers changed a perfectly useful word ("Peking") into something "closer to the Chinese pronunciation" (a laughable rationalization).

Pure nonsense. Do they now insist everyone outside of France spell "Paris" "Paree" ?

Of course not.

And why not is the question to ask.

WHAT is being manipulated?

Not neutral things like how an unimportant European city is pronounced (do we spell "Prague" "Praha"?... and, if not, why not?), but ONLY critical points in the cultural battleground.

I despise this erosion of meanings, and resist it pointedly, because I KNOW what it is attempting to do:

1) to create the Perfect Orwellian Revisionist History. ("He who controls the language controls the meanings... he who controls the meanings controls the mind...") Where you invalidate the past by changing the very words used to search back into history itself.

2) to degrade the given meanings of words/acronym (A.D./Anno Domine- Year of Our Lord) and assert an "inoffensive" illegitimate definition for a commonly held and easily understood reality.

I'm a skeptic, not a Christian, but I accept the usages of common words in the cultural lineage, because I understand and respect that they TELL the evolution of thought, discovery, the scientific method and even the secularization of originally-religious terms into popular and often 'neutral' thought-forms.

3) to undermine the Western Enlightenment by forcing its achievements to be bastardized in order to please those who did none of the work to get to the point where they could complain, meddle, change and warp the accomplishments of millenia.

It is insidious, and should be dismissed as folly.

If the Muslims (or whomever) don't like "A.D." or "B.C." (and dont forget who it has been changed to placate), they can write their own parallel histories. They don't believe in the Enlightenment, so why should they share in its fruits?

(And I prefer "Mao Tse Dung", actually.)

Posted by: BigSleep at June 17, 2005 11:43 PM

Grazzia, Paolo.

SPQR, so, tell me what tattoos menat in your tradition (Polynesian? Pre- Islamic Indonesian? African? Scythian?). I may be a (won't repeat it when there are ladies and gentlemen present), but I'm willing to listen.

And, for the record, I also stick with AD and BC. The system came into being when a monk named Dionysius Exiguus (Dennis the Short) tried to figure out the date of Christ's birth and use that as a starting point rather than the founding of the City of Rome.

Posted by: Kepha at June 18, 2005 3:23 AM

By the way, as a speaker of Northern Chinese and Hakka, neither the older Wade-Giles Romanization system nor today's Pinyin is at all helpful to someone accustomed to English phonics. Pinyin just so happens to be official in Beijing, so it's used. It still stinks. Who ever heard of "q" being used to represent a sound in between "ts" and "ch", or "x" to represent "sh" (without the tongue retroflexed) or "z" to represent the "dz" as in "adz".

Posted by: Kepha at June 18, 2005 3:27 AM

So how does Bombay become Mumbai?
And why is the multi million £££ film industy still affectionately called Bollywodd and not Mumywood?

I can understand a little adjustment for a more scientific way of getting any particular language into latin script. But why when translating from cyrilic script into English does Alexander, as in Alexander Solzhenitsyn become Aleksandr in English these days? We have the name Alexander already, I know several, it's in every language across Europe and into the Middle East.

And I'm with you on BC and AD.

Posted by: Granny Weatherwax at June 18, 2005 6:36 AM

On BC/AD, question from the wonderful '1066 and All That':

Has it occurred to you that the Romans counted backwards?

Posted by: Interested at June 18, 2005 8:55 AM

Interested
They called us weeny, weedy and weaky, so what did they know?

Posted by: Granny Weatherwax at June 18, 2005 1:12 PM

Well Guys, I'm with Kepha on this one.

My kids aren't going to a state run public school either, No Way.

Immorality is elevated and esteemed, and lawlessness & rebellion run rampant.

Don't get me wrong, I don't want 'Rod and Tod Flanders' for kids, but our state schools are one big cesspool with limited 'discipline'.

Don't fall off your chairs in shock but I can whole heartedly understand the Muslims point of view here.

Posted by: kc England at June 18, 2005 4:05 PM

Don't fall off your chairs in shock but I can whole heartedly understand the Muslims point of view here.

Posted by: kc England at June 18, 2005 04:05 PM

I can understand it too, but you won't send your children to private schools to be indoctrinated in the dogma of a radical religion, whereas that's the main function of Islamic schools. They teach malleable little muslims how to hate infidels, to believe they are superior, and they extinguish creativity and independent thought. They are brainwashing institutions that alienate students from their own society and from the 21st century.

Muslims could just as easily send their children to Catholic private schools, or non-religious private schools. My daughter attended Catholic schools after the third grade and at that time, I was raising her alone. It was a struggle to pay the tuition sometimes but well worth the small sacrifices I had to make. Three years in the public school debacle came to a head when a little "underprivileged" thief, bussed in from from the ghetto, stole her brand new coat while her teacher ignored her protests and tears. I can understand parental concern about public schools; they are horrible.
But Islamic schools are even worse.

Posted by: Susanp at June 19, 2005 1:29 AM