We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
|
Dear UKIP, you’ve changed “UKIP leader Paul Nuttall says UK should ban burqa”, the Independent reports.
In the 2015 election I was pleased to note that UKIP, the third most popular party in the UK in terms of number of votes, was also the closest to libertarian among the mainstream parties. Since then the United Kingdom Independence Party has both fulfilled and lost its purpose. Its new leader, Paul Nuttall, seems to want to achieve his aim of supplanting Labour as the main opposition to the Tories by outcompeting Labour in the field of authoritarianism. Just listen to the tail-wags-the-dog justification for banning the burqa that Mr Nutall gives in the video clip linked to by the Independent:
“Whether we like it or not we are the most watched people in the world. There’s more CCTV in Britain per head than anywhere else on the planet and for the CCTV to be effective you need to see people’s faces.”
|
Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
|
He has a good point there: if I lived in the UK, that would certainly make me consider wearing a burqa, against all my other sensibilities.
The writing was on the wall when they came out (no pun originally intended, but keeping it in…) against gay marriage for no better reason than popularism, which was the point I determined I could not vote for them. I would have rated the Conservatives as the most libertarian option at the last election (socially liberal, and more economically liberal than the other parties), although ironically they have taken a step backwards in the fallout from the EU vote.
Still, for consistency Mr Nutall will not doubt be demanding the banning of balaclavas, baseball caps and umbrellas…
Oh, that is quality! If we’re going to have a police state let’s make Stalin’s remains turn green with envy! Let’s show them furriners how to really do it!
Actually thinking about it, this could be a good way to piss off UKIP, the security above liberty types and hardcore muslims. Everyone start wearing burqas (with appropriately inappropriate accompaniments – mankinis perhaps…) to walk round the place. Preferably burqas in bright colours with anti-religious messages on them. How many better opportunities would we get to upset so many different groups of authoritarian idiots at once?
alternatively, they could try opposing the surveillance. Is that too much to ask?
I’m not so sure post-BRExit what UKIP’s purpose is (other than to ensure that BRExit actually happens).
If they were to transform into the natural party of the otherwise unrepresented working classes (because Labour no longer represents them), then I don’t think that would be too bad. Especially if it helped to accelerate the decline of Labour into the abyss.
I think that pretty much nails it.
Well, that is the whole point. They still use a pound sign as their logo (in purple and yellow – like Monarch Airlines – who are shite) when the Euro issue is dead. Just a bunch of Grumplestiltskins.
Seems like many of the new political movements aren’t simply looking for an unoccupied spot on the left/right continuum.
Instead, they’re a collection of a la carte selections from all over that continuum.
Holding overarching principles dictates, to a large degree, where on that continuum you find the most coherence. If you’re driven by principle, that’s usually where you end up. How you think about each separate issue is then linked by that principle.
If you’re driven by interests instead of principles, you can pick and choose which ideology best serves those interests for each individual issue. You can believe that less government control is best, except when it takes government control to limit those pesky Islamic burqas, and feel no contradiction.
The writing was on the wall when they came out (no pun originally intended, but keeping it in…) against gay marriage for no better reason than popularism, which was the point I determined I could not vote for them.
“Keeping it in” eh Watchman? I don’t think being contra gay marriage is actually that popular. People are more concerned about whether their kids (gay or straight) will ever be able to afford a house. Things like that.
Nuttall wants UKIP to replace Labour, in that sense he doesn’t really have too much of a tough job does he, so he can appeal to anyone he likes?
NickM,
Agree that most people are not concerned, which made that particular decision particularly wierd, as there was no obvious benefit and it lost UKIP their libertarian wing and the chance of support from people like me (probably for the votes of a handful of people – how many people in the UK really would vote for a party because it opposed something fundamentally fair?). It is where I first saw the victory of the authoritarian tendency in UKIP over the liberal tendency come through.
And if I’m going to pick up on my double entendres, I need to re-read my re-reads obviously. Hadn’t spotted that one. And you’ve put a Beautiful South song in my head by reminding me of it…
The southwest American burqua is a colorful bandana pulled up over the nose. While this legitimately served as a dust mask, the more famous application was when the wearer was about to redistribute some wealth at the point of a gun without having been duly elected first. As a result, wearing this in town drew disapproving looks.
In England I suppose if you’re wearing one of these, in tasteful white silk of course, while applying some disproportionate force to a would-be redistributor, it would make it harder for the government to come to the aid of the hoodlum.
Taking away Labour voters and seats from Mr Corbyn is probably a good thing. There is clearly a need for a party that caters for the desires of the working classes as neither Labour nor the Lib Dems seem capable of not sneering at them right now.
Yes this does kind of trash libertarianism, which is sad, but I consider the sacrifice to be probably worth it
Ultimately, it is obvious that whatever the official reason given, the real reason for a burqa ban would be that we are uncomfortable with that aspect of their culture. Whilst one can make security arguments for the ban, and have it cover other face coverings as well to make the case, this is a bit contrived. The best use of a face covering is when actually committing a crime, such as a robbery or vandalism, not walking about on the town possibly thinking about committing a crime. I don’t find it plausible that a terrorist would be dissuaded from their act just because they couldn’t do it wearing a burqa. In fact, they might well be advised to downplay the whole Muslim thing, at least until it is obvious. Paul Nuttall needs to think a bit more about this.
Peter T,
Yes, obviously. It’s Taqiya in action. Hell’s teeth if they have to where a mini-skirt and order a Bacardi and Coke to blow up a bar full of infidels then Allah sees the bigger picture.
Francis T,
Why do we need a party for the working class (whatever that means these days)? In any case didn’t Margaret Thatcher really chime with the aspirant working class? Socialism only appeals to youthful idealists (who – usually – grow out of it), octo-sprogged perennial dole bludgers and Professors of Sociology. I tend to keep all of the above out of my social circle (and Watchman you can have that one pro bono).
Why should it only be UKIP with no raison d’être in a hypothetical (as are all) future? Very rare is the Party that is not after the spoils, justified of course by preventing backsliding.
Has anyone suggested to the Scottish National Party that it should disband upon achieving Scottish independence? It’s not as if the FLN packed their bags and retired when Algeria got independence. Mind you, in an independent Scotland, there would be no need for the ‘Scottish’ prefix, so it could become the ‘National Party’, if it isn’t that in some ways already.
As to the burkha per se… I find it offensive because it is passive-aggressive body armour. It is saying, “Men can’t help themselves”. It is saying all those Western slags are asking for it and that all men are rapists. It could confuse a feminist that could.
I’m going to take a contrarian view: A burka ban isn’t any worse than a ban on public nudity. Now maybe a ban on public nudity is contrary to libertarian purity, but if some people don’t want to see nudity or burkas in “their” public spaces, while other people want to wear burkas or go sky-clad in “their” public spaces, then the government has to make a bad compromise, and it’s not at all obvious that “wear what you want” is the least bad compromise.
And if we are going to leave the spiky mace of the law out of these decisions, then we need to also leave it out when people express social disapproval of burka-wearing, or nudity, or whatever. If burka wearers are to be guaranteed that the heavy hand of government won’t come down on their shoulders, then those who shun burka wearers and refuse to sell to them, or even those who commit hate speech against them, should be equally confident that the heavy hand of government won’t come down on their shoulders. Absent that guarantee, I can’t fault those who say, “If the government is going to take sides, it ought to take our side!” even in cases where I disagree with their position.
UKIP’s authoritarian side was never far from the surface. There have been many other authoritarian noises from senior party officers over the years, sometimes these were quietly dropped but in other cases they remained policy. The goal of replacing Labour isn’t a bad idea in itself, UKIP tends to be more popular in areas where Labour are historically stronger. However they are going about it the wrong way in my opinion.
A burka ban isn’t any worse than a ban on public nudity.
Sure. Then fight concept that on its own merits, because I would likely support it.
But not on some bogus “security” reasoning.
Deep Lurker, yes, of course people should be free to shun and refuse to sell to burqa wearers. And there should be no such crime as “hate speech” on the books.
We need a free speech party. UKIP, merely by existing, cannot avoid fighting “you can’t say that”. It would be nice if they were really principled about it and focussed on it, not just inevitably forced to oppose the silencers. It would be nice if they replaced Labour. It would be wonderful if they replaced Labour while being very principled – but perhaps I should be more realistic.
Farage is gone as UKIP leader (almost certainly truly gone this time 🙂 ). I respect him for desiring to go – most party leaders stay too long rather than go too soon – but it’s a shame. New leader (Nutall) and new goal (replace Labour) will change UKIP. Getting people who used to vote Labour to vote for you may not make for libertarian purity. My hope is that the goal of cutting Labour voters out from under Labour intellectuals will find itself strongly aided by denouncing “you can’t say that” – so that feature of UKIP will survive and thrive.
“You can’t say that” is still a fairly recent change in the UK. As Deep Lurker points out (nudity ban, etc.), you can’t quite say that about “You can’t wear that”. 🙂 (And if the government moves to ban V-masks and suchlike but makes an exemption for burkhas, Nutall might yet accidentally find himself on the rightish side of some ‘sauce for the gander’ argument.)
Islam is the most authoritarian major political ideology in the UK and is a threat to all liberal or libertarian principles: all parties, not comfortable with submission, should be actively opposing it especially in its most extreme manifestations and symbolism such as the burqa, to send a message to its adherents that they are in conflict. They call us infidels, our country is dar ul haq (the zone of war), and the majority support shariah and praise violent jihad, what more provocation do we need before counter attacking?
Banning the ritual slaughter of animals and the distribution of their meat; removing charitable status and state support from Islamic organisations; removing loudspeakers from mosques; patrolling to protect the liberty of nonsubmitters in ghetto areas; vigorous application of the law for incitement to violence whether quranic, hadith or sunnah based.
They are already a threat, I hate CCTV but I sure as hell do not want their subversion of Western freedoms go unchallenged, so why not use it against them?
I’ve lost all patience for fair and equal treatment when it comes to islam. It is no different to communism or Nazism in its evil. It has no purpose other that to control and conquer. Ban all it’s symbols, it practices, burn its churches down, expel everyone who adheres to it. I couldn’t care less what happens to the disciples of evil. Evil has no rights.
“I couldn’t care less what happens to the disciples of evil. Evil has no rights.”
They’re looking at you and thinking the exact same thing.
Pray y’all stay in power.
Theresa May is doing just fine by herself, with the support of ‘mumsnet’ and other adherents of methodistfascism. She and her friends are a much greater threat to our freedoms than Islam currently is or is ever likely to be in the UK.
Peter T: the asymmetrical application of “racism” and “Islamophobia” to critcs of Islam to reduce the accepted area of debate on Farcebook and in the street shows the appalling degree of collaboration between the establishment and the hostile colonists. Allowing Islam to silence us into acquiescence with the assistance of the state is precisely why we should be on the attack, with the state’s authoritarian impulses and credibility as welcome collateral damage.
Deep Lurker:
Paul Nuttal:
I find a profound similarity between these statements.
Nuttal seems to agree with Deep Lurker, both in the preference for a more libertarian-friendly ideal as well as in the resignation to fact that that’s not on offer. “Whether we like it or not we are the most watched people in the world” is hardly the most full-throated clamour for more effective mass surveillance. It is, of course, surrender to it, but if that’s Nuttal’s position, that paints him not as the enemy but as the battleground, or maybe the trophy.
This.
The idea the panopticon state is here and switched on, so hey, lets at least use it to benefit our tribe against their tribe, is not realism, it is surrender and more or less guarantees the panopticon will grow more and more intrusive. And it suggests a touching faith in government that it will only be used against the bad people. The notion dismal Islam is a bigger threat to us than our own government suggests some people are being pulled into a singularity of their own obsessions.
bobby b, I am well aware of that. I have no doubt what so ever that the first western nation to import a muslim majority will very quickly find itself under the yolk of sharia and the barbaric cultural practices found in say, Pakistan or Somalia. Which is why I am quite comfortable with persecuting and expelling from the country everyone who adheres to this evil ‘religion’. Acceptance of this evil under misguided principles of tolerance, where we must tolerate them while they murder us is utterly insane.
Libertarianism is only possible in a high-trust society, people from clannish tribal societies must be made to feel unwelcome here.
Perry de H: the encroachment of the state has been in parallel with the rise of Islam. How much freer we were when publishers did not hesitate to release The Satanic Verses! Particularly since 9/11 the state has used security as the driver for intrusive measures, and diminished freedom of expression, enthroning “offence” especially to muslims as something to be avoided at any cost. Yet who is threatening us? The Religion of Voldemort which the enforcers refuse to name. The authoritarian state and the authoritarian religion are in symbiosis. If we are to reclaim the state for classical liberalism we must start with delegitimising Islam.
Ljh, so once we give Our State all the powers it seeks to rid us of the Islamist invasion, (which it, Our State, actively supports), we can all go back to the previous state of affairs where Our State was a benevolent ruler, never seeking any such extraordinary powers but for the purpose of ridding us of the Islamist invasion (which it actively supports, as above)?
Alisa please read what I have written before attacking me! The State is using Islam to enhance it’s powers. Islam is extremely hostile to criticism and so freedom of speech. Islam does not recognize freedom of conscience to be an apostate, lesbian/gay, for a woman to marry out of the religion, nor is there any equality before the law for nonbelievers or muslim women.
These three principles of free speech, free conscience and freedom before the law are underlying principles of any country you or I would wish to live in. We should be fundamentalist about them not allow the state or religion to undercut them. Giving Islam and its symbols protection is to be complicit in the very sharp reduction in freedom over the past three decades.
There’s a vacuum at the heart of British politics where old Labour used to be, and it’s pulling UKIP towards it. If Stephen Wolfe had got his act together then UKIP might have stayed on the same course, but with Nuttal in charge I think it’s going to be old Labour reborn, and I think they’ll win seats that way, especially up north, and once that happens you can kiss old UKIP goodbye. This will have one good outcome, at least, in that will make things very difficult for New ‘Sociology degree’ Labour.
And as for the burqa ban, look, I don’t like government authoritarianism, and Nuttal’s comments make no logical sense (the fact that we have more CCTV than anywhere else doesn’t entail or support the conclusion that we must always do what it best for its operation), but Islam is a cancer that will destroy us within a few generations if we don’t aggressively take the fight to it. So I’m more convinced that Mr Black is right than Perry and Peter T.
Mr. Black, I couldn’t agree with you more concerning the danger of admitting Islam.
But I think we limit ourselves to, number one, not admitting any more, and then, number two, holding them to the same legal precepts to which we hold ourselves.
If we’ve written our laws correctly (and I think we have), then anytime Islam tries to be evil, we stop them, we try them, and we punish them, just like we’ve always done to everyone else.
We don’t NEED to lose our rights of due process and equal treatment under the laws in order to stop evil. We just need to ensure that we don’t give evil more of a break than we give ourselves. If we can guard against that – if we can guard against the killing creep of “tolerance” for evil merely because some of our new arrivals seem to like it – then we can preserve a major component of our society that makes that society worth preserving.
I see that there are some people who want to attack Islam – great. Lets do it. It’s an ideology – they all deserve to be torn down. Yes, even libertarianism (not that we’d ever build that up because we’d be too busy arguing…).
Just try to remember that attacking Muslims is wrong. It’s up to them whether they want to follow Islam and whether they want to wear silly clothes (and a lot of the men do as well, at least for prayers). So attacking their choices (rather than the beliefs behind it or the systems that help them make them) is illiberal and wrong.
The answer to the supposed Islamic problem (don’t see it myself, but then I’m probably being defeated by a clever false-flag operation by the various Muslims I live near and work with, who are determinedly appearing to be integrated and only different from me in following a religion – just like Christians to be honest) is unlikely to be to make it more difficult for Muslims to integrate by making them feel attacked, but rather targetting the patriarchal (any passing feminists, please note Islam is a genuine patriarchy) networks that underpin particular schools of thought. Maybe working out that there is no real professional qualification for imams so we can appoint our own rather than importing them would help. And particularly, cutting the links to ancestral homelands, which happens over time anyway (if your only relatives are third cousins, you become a tourist) if you manage immigration.
Mr Black and Ljh are proposing exactly the same measures as those they oppose – identity politics and actions against groups not individuals. As a rule of thumb, if you are identifying your foes by a label rather than as individuals or by actions, you are wrong.
Watchman,
“So attacking their choices (rather than the beliefs behind it or the systems that help them make them) is illiberal and wrong.”
Rephrase that to
“So attacking their right to make choices regardless of anyone else’s opinion (rather than the beliefs behind it or the systems that help them make them) is illiberal and wrong.”
and I would agree.
I think that is quite correct. It will not be Corbyn’s Labour at least, but I doubt we will like it much.
Watchman: I am afraid you’ve only waded in the polite shallows of multiculturalism! My departure from it is based on intimate exposure to the ummah and the realisation of how antithetical to the rindividual choice and conscience it is and how arrogant, hostile and overarching the assumptions, with which it operates, are.
The only Muslims we should be sharing the joys of western society are exmuslims who explicitly distance themselves from shariah, big Mo and his works and sayings. They need our protection. The distinction between “moderate” and extreme Islam is artificial. (Cf Erdogan:”there is no moderation in Islam”). We should give those who are Muslim by accident of birth a chance to distance themselves and make life in the West uncongenial for those who persist in their ideology. Do you understand the totalitarian pressure on ordinary members of Muslim background to conform placed upon them by the ummah? Such as wearing the burqa? The penalty for which is sometimes death?
I am not attacking you, Ljh, it was a real question on my part. And although I acknowledge and value your attempt at answering, unfortunately I remain as confused as before regarding your logic. Sorry, but Bobby’s and Watchman’s comments make much more sense to me.
I, for one, am delighted that our benevolent masters watch us on the streets (via the wonders of modern camera technology) and monitor all internet activity. I go through life filled with confidence and, indeed, joy – knowing that our every word and action is guided by our masters, who are so superior to us serfs in every way. Remember it it is all-for-our-own-good.
To be serious…..
I have no real idea what UKIP believes these days.
To be fair, if we do indeed get out of the E.U., it does not matter what UKIP believes – as their purpose will have been achieved.
Paul,
They had you bugged years ago – it’s too late now, they’re on to you…
Ljh,
Do you really know what shariah is – like any legal creation it is a reflection of those using and shaping it, and because it is based on religon not precedent, it is more flexible. So it is perfectly possible to follow shariah and integrate in western society. You just choose an interpretation that allows you to do so. Your understanding of religion generally also seems a bit odd – you seem to think there is only one strand of Islamic thought, which kind of differs from what the world tells us (just visit Oman to realise that, or check out how the largest Islamic groups in Indonesia are refusing to support objections to a mayor of Jakarta just because he is Christian). If you are identifying Islam as the fairly hardline and very conservative religion promoted by the Saudis, then fine, but be aware that this is just one type and that even the Saudis are continually debating it (one of the more liberal members of the royal family apparently raised the idea of women being allowed to drive to save a lot of costs from the economy today – turns out Islam like every other ideology can respond to stimuli).
As it happens, I do understand the pressures to which you refer(I’ve worked in effectively all-Muslim schools, albeit they were part of the state system (and were not ideologically Muslim – my favourite memory from this time is the nativity story, performed by years 2 and 3, all of Bangladeshi or Pakistani origin, with an audience mostly wearing headscarves – otherwise indistinguishable from the equally-badly acted nativity my all white school did many years ago…)). Hence my suggestion we target the sources of the pressure – undermine the patriarchial structures; stop external influences being reinforced in mosques and the like; and also, since you raise the seemingly dead art of multiculturism, stop giving support to ‘community’ groups where community is a definition for identity. Concrete measures which manage to avoid the stupidity of your approach, and work through giving the young and the female agency (worth noting mind you that the largest mosque near me has female members on its governing council already – and changed its chair a few years back after the idiot in post made inappropriate comments about terrorism – sounds spookily like what would happen in the Church of England).
Incidentally, there is no such thing as an ex-Muslim (other than in the eyes of those who do not believe apostacy exists). There are people who once followed Islam, and now do not, but what they were is not part of their stated identity. And frankly, what you propose by only allowing ex-Muslims to stay requires people regsitering and updating their religious beliefs to government (and government presumably checking), which sounds like a facistic extension of state power over religion.
Alisa: a summary of Islam and personal freedom
The two are incompatible: if we value our freedoms we should make the practice of Islam difficult within our society by defending freedom of speech, conscience and equality without compromise.
Much intrusive legislation predicated on security arises from Islamically motivated attacks both from without and increasingly, due to migration, within. At every point we have caved and encouraged selfcensorship, false narratives (religion of peace), confused racism with adherence to a creed, allowed parallel societies where shariah rather than common law rules, and placation, strengthening Islam’s position.
If we are to fight against the intrusive state, we also need to disempower the totalitarian ideology which triggered it. Within our society the individuals, their choices and their consequences, should have primacy, in opposition to the submission of all to its practices which Islam demands.
A woman in a burqa is a slave to a totalitarian ideology. Let’s help free her from its outward trappings. Cctv exists, it might have a use to those who proudly show their faces.
You really think that the State was not intrusive before…well, before what, exactly?
Ljh,
I take it McCarthy in the US was anti-Muslim. That interment without trial in Northern Ireland was aimed at Northern Irish terrorists?
If the state wants a scapegoat, there are normally enough idiots around who frankly deserve the negative attention that brings without the state haveing to pick on innocent populations, and we suffer the consequences. Your fixation on Islam misses the fact that the state has expanded its powers by using whatever threats are to hand – so by advocating an attack on Islam you are actually simply aiding the state in increasing its power.
Alisa: compare freedom of speech over the past thirty years!
The War on Terror has been the justification for a lot of illiberal legislation without allowing us to name the enemy nor teach the history of the 1300 year old conflict.
There is a lot of datagathering firepower no state has ever before possessed. You cannot uninvent it, so why not focus it on our enemies while vigorously defending our foundational principles.
A message from the OSU driver/stabber:
“By Allah, we will not let you sleep unless you give peace to the Muslims. You will not celebrate or enjoy any holiday,” he wrote before the attack. “Btw, every single Muslim who disapproves of my actions is a sleeper cell, waiting for a signal. I am warning you Oh America.”
Ljh,
I take it Anders Breivik speaks for all ‘white’ or Christian people then. Or possibly you’re somehow extrapolating that the ravings of one lunatic (who acted alone, which by normal patters of Islamic extremist attacks means he had no network, as does the lack of weapons) are a statement of truth (and if accurately quoted, you are taking seriously someone who used “btw”! You do know that is generally not a good idea, btw?).
Whats more, you seem to be doing exactly what he wants by promoting the sleeper cell point, since he was clearly smart enough (i.e. more than you, less than most people?) to see most Muslims would disapprove of his actions, and to try and neutralise this reaction in a rather clumsy and obvious way. Either that or he seriously believed all Muslims have been hypnotised to react to a certain signal (I’m sure there is a tasteless joke available here, but can’t think of it frustratingly), and you’d have to be rather bad at logic to be thinking someone who believes that is evidence for anything.
So my charitable-ish conclusion is that you are a useful idiot for the Islamicists, promoting the sort of differenation on the basis of Muslim/non-Muslim they explicitly want. And you are a useful idiot for those who want increased state power, as you advocate unleashing it indiscriminately against people purely on the basis of a label. Not really a great situation to be in, but feel free to occupy it.
Watchman: read the quran, surah and hadiths as agreed upon by the four main schools of Islamic law to discover just how orthodox jihadism is as opposed to Breivik’s homeassembled eclectic ramblings.
It is a matter of proportion. Muslim residents of this island by and large stick to themselves – and they are only 5% of the population. My fellow “conservatives” are however very happy to levy a 40% tax rate on me, issue vast amounts of debt that will impoverish my children (if of course we stay here; I am increasingly thinking we should move if we can, although there aren’t many places good left frankly), check my emails and internet activity (if not yet then very soon), etc etc. Fascism is by and large already here. I’d rather take my chances with the 1 in 10 million likelihood of being killed by a terrorist and focus my energy on more urgent problems (or at least on complaining about more urgent problems).
Watchman, I will occupy that space along with Ljh. Frankly, your comments on this thread have been silly and the last one (at 4:58 PM)was particularly nonsensical. “[M]ost Muslims would disapprove of his actions“? Really? You have a strange definition of “most”. That may be true in the cloistered circles in which you move (although, frankly, I doubt it; they just aren’t telling you about their true feelings), but of the billions of Muslims around the world I have no doubt that the vast majority do approve of those actions. An endless parade of surveys tells us so, but you won’t listen to them. You call the OSU driver/stabber “one lunatic”, pretending that he is analogous to Anders Breivik, but somehow it has escaped your notice that he has thousands of compatriots committing similar atrocities across the globe but no one (to my knowledge) has emulated Breivik. He may have “acted alone” in an extremely narrow sense, but he is absolutely a part of a large, if not specifically coordinated, network of similar “lunatics”.
Islam is a cancer, wholly incompatible with western values, and has been waging in intermittent but unceasing war against the west for 1300 years. It cannot be permitted to infect our society, any more than you can introduce poison into your water. A tiny amount is tolerable (although it will make you ill), but too much will kill you. Bobby b is correct: the solution is to stop the immigration of Muslims, and to hold those already in the country to the strict letter of the law. They cannot be permitted to intimidate non-Muslims into silence, or to threaten apostates, or to incite violence (at home or abroad), or in any manner use the very principles which define western society as weapons against us.
It is not Ljh but you who is the “useful idiot”. You have been seduced by the lies of Islam’s apologists, and by the serene face presented to you in settings where they lack power. Your opinions of them are mere projections on your part; you think that because you are welcoming and tolerant everyone else is, too. It’s willful self-deception, at best. The people you work with, and the schools you visit, are not the true face of Islam, but a façade adopted solely for the purpose of gaining control. Once they do, your freedoms will be lost forever. You can preen all you like about your virtue and tolerance, but examine any Muslim-dominated country and you’ll see the true nature of that noxious ideology. And it’s people like you who will welcome it into their own countries, and then wonder what happened as you watch the stonings and beheadings. You are a fool.
Islam is a threat, no doubt. It is just not the biggest threat I face, not even close. Islamic nutters might run a truck down Oxford Street one day and kill a couple hundred people, and that would be terrible. But they are not the ones turning the UK into Bentham’s panopticon.
“It is just not the biggest threat I face, not even close.”
Dissent.
Islam’s remorseless drive for expansion and domination presents the most likely driving force for the next true world-class war.
More so than Russia, China, North Korea . . . wherever you can perceive a threat . . . the next world-spanning, multi-million-victims fight is most likely to arise out of Islam, and chances of this expand as their geographical rule grows.
You’re correct that most of us have no real reason to fear the lone wolf with a truck, or the nut with an AK, or the couple with explosive party toys. Statistically, we’ll die of our bad habits long before we become someone’s heavenly slave.
But the next world war will be caused by Islam’s push to rule us all. It’s not the most likely threat we face, but it is the biggest.
Doesn’t mean we should lie down and let them watch us from the towers, but I’d like to think we can multi-task.
I think Islam is the bigger threat than statist government.
Give in to big government, you may have a chance to push it back. After all, isn’t that what the past few centuries have been about? Pushing back the power of the state? And we can see that it has worked, occasionally. Well, kinda.
Give in to Islam, and you have lost.
Forever.
The one time Islam really lost as an ideology over a territory was ages ago (Reconquista?), and unlikely to be repeated again today.
I just don’t see this. Name a single Islamic country (or future combination of Muslim countries) that has the potential to start a world war and seriously threaten the current balance of power in, say, the way Wilhelmine or Nazi Germany, Showa Japan or Soviet Russia did or could have done in the twentieth century? Just look at each Arab-Israeli war or the US led wars in the Gulf against Saddam Hussein to see what happens when a ‘western’ country has a conventional arms confrontation with countries with Islamic culture.
No. Countries with an Islamic culture are only a significant danger to western countries if (i) they obtain significant numbers of offensive nuclear weapons; or (ii) western countries have to invade and occupy such countries and get sucked into protracted counter-insurgency operations. The first remains a danger, but by no means unique to Islamic countries. And after the Iraq occupation debacle in the 2000s, a repetition of the second is not likely to occur any time soon.
Jan Hards: both Iran and Saudi Arabia have or are attempting to obtain nuclear weapons. They are currently fighting a proxy war in Yemen….
Wobbly: no. Not even close. Ask yourself what is impeding the pushback against Islam? Well that would be western governments with anti-discrimination laws and criminalisation of free speech under the guise of prevention ‘hate speech’. So allowing statist government to have panoptic surveillance powers to know what people are saying to each other is pretty much guaranteed to also make the host society unable to resist Islam culturally. And this is a cultural war.
No matter how you slice it, the problem is statist government. Islam is weak, it is a weed in the garden that we are not being permitted to uproot, spray or control… by government, which is far from weak.
I’m with Perry on this one, the two concerns are related. Religious bigotry can only survive in a climate of repressed criticism, and a big surveillance orientated government who clamp down on dissenting voices is the perfect environment for it. Give people basic freedoms and responsibilities rather than an army of politically motivated morons who decide what you can and can’t do “for the good of society” on a whim, and any loopy religious worldview will suffer under a deluge of mockery and ridicule, ultimately marginalized.
An example of this is the recent closure of Milo Yiannopoulos’ appearance at his old school, a perfectly innocent event if ever there was one, but apparently the government powers decided it would be easier to cave in to the violent oppressive bigots than allow the freedom loving voice to be heard. What ever happened to “I don’t agree with you but I will defend your right to say it”? This is the legacy we face and in that a violent religious nutcase can get whatever they desire., just by being violent.
Ljh:
I can’t see either development as being the likely cause of a world war.
How about Turkey shutting down Incirlik airbase containing tens of Nato nuclear weapons?
How about Turkey invading Syria and shooting down a Russian plane, oops?
Pakistan v India over Kashmir?
You lack imagination, Jan. I’m sure you sleep easier at night dismissing these dangers.
>Islamic nutters might run a truck down Oxford Street one day and kill a couple hundred people, and that would be terrible. But they are not the ones turning the UK into Bentham’s panopticon.
Sure, Islamic terrorism isn’t an existential threat. It’s the longer-term demographics that are, and that means discouraging Islam.
The best approach would be to limit immigration properly, if that can happen then there’s less pressure to resort to authoritarian stunts like burqa bans.
Runcie Balspune sums it up perfectly up to this point in the discussion. There is another aspect to this though: one of Perry’s comments here may be read as if the real threat posed by Islam are the random acts of violence many of its adherents have been displaying throughout the West for the past couple of decades (AKA ‘terrorist attacks’, which I prefer to think of as politically motivated murder sprees). However, that is not the real threat, just one of the tools the Islamists are using to gain power within Western societies. The real threat will materialize when these people do eventually reach those positions of power, direct or indirect, and the result will be the same encroachments on various liberties we are seeing from our current governments, only to much greater degrees – namely, even less freedom of speech and of belief, less economic freedom, less property rights, etc (not to mention real, rather than imaginary violence towards gays and women). Runcie’s comment above is important in that it shows how our current governments are paving the way for that very eventuality, doing a good part of the Islamists work for them, even before they have gained real or formal political power within our own Western societies.
Ljh:
I expect the US military has complete control of any nuclear weapons at the Incirlik Airbase and the weapons would be withdrawn long before any rogue Turkish forces were able to take control of them. I am happy to be corrected, but I do not think any nuclear weapons are controlled by NATO. I’m not sure what this has to do with the Islamic world attempting in the future (in Bobby’s words) “to rule us all”?
The Turks shot down a Russian aircraft about a year ago. Notwithstanding this, there’s not even the remotest prospect of a war between Russia and Turkey – even an undeclared war between their forces within Syria. I suspect that the Russians, in their usual heavy handed way, decided soon after their arrival in Syria to test the willingness of Turkey to tolerate incursions of its airspace – maybe also to see what NATO’s reaction to this might be. As we saw, the test provided a result and both Russia and Turkey have no doubt calibrated their respective involvements in Syria in accordance with that result. Again, I don’t see what this has to do with an Islamic attempt to gain global domination.
Sure – if that went nuclear we are facing tens of millions of deaths on the Indian subcontinent. It would be an incredibly bloody but localised conflict. But not a Muslim world war of global conquest.
I did not dismiss these specific dangers – I didn’t even raise them. They have nothing to do with a potential Islamic attempt at global or even regional hegemony in the manner of a Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan or a Soviet Russia, which is what some of the posters on this thread seem to be suggesting is a real risk.
If you want to look for tensions in the world which have greater potential to trigger a world war (or war between the great powers), look instead to the tensions in East Asia (none of which involve Muslim powers).
Correct. This side of Turkey going to war with the USA, as if, I am not all too bothered by that scenario.
I would have to agree with Jan on pretty much every point.
There were nuclear weapons on site when Turkey shut down Incirlik and prevented Nato forces including US from either leaving or continuing normal operations. I think this was August or September this year as part of the fallout from the “coup”.
July 2016
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jul/17/turkey-coup-attempt-raises-fears-over-safety-of-us-nuclear-stockpile
Last time I looked the US was part of Nato as is Turkey .
London: Bangladesh on the Thames
British: A people like the rest of the Western Europeans who hate themselves and their civilization and who can’t defend themselves against a Barbie Doll.
British Government about 99% of the time: Crap on Israel and Jews and give Muslims and Arabs a pass. Kick the Jews out and import millions of Muslims. So much like the rest of Western Europe – Brexit or no Brexit.
So glad my ancestors left between 1635 to 1647. So glad your German King lost his marbles and the war from 1776 to 1783.
Hate to confuse you with facts, but not even close.
I think it’s reasonable to observe that Islamic Terrorism is a significant threat to the future of the West, but one of the reasons that its appealing to see it as the *greatest* threat is that comparitively speaking it’s:
* A threat which can be addressed by adopting recognizable (if drastic) measures
* A threat whose source is *obvious*, posed by an external ‘out group’, and can be easily articulated as one to the general public
Islamism is like contracting smallpox, because with a properly conditioned immune system, you can fight it off.
Whereas PdH’s (and my) concern is that the far greater problem is that Western *society* is creating a threat which is:
* Not easily addressable by adopting a relatively simple set of strategies, least of all by deploying the military
* Complicated, multi-layered and caused by *ourselves*.
Suffering from a bout of collectivism is more like developing an autoimmune disease, because to counter it and effect a cure, we have to accept that the problem is *ourselves*, which of course is painful to some and unthinkable to many.
Even if you accept that both problems need to be solved (and I do), it’s far easier to kick the latter can down the street and concentrate on the ‘low hanging fruit’ of Islamism. Because it is low-hanging fruit – all it takes is for enough people (with launch codes) to decide that it’s time to eradicate or isolate Islam – and it will happen.
You really don’t know what you are talking about. Stop reading Mark Stein, it rots your brain. I live here and, just like you, I am glad you don’t.
So what? The nuclear warheads are under US, not NATO, control. So is Turkey going to commit an act of war against the USA and take them? Seriously, get a grip.
what Laird and Mr Black said.
as for London, what with being run by a Wahhabi Islamist I think that Riyadh on the Thames is closer to the mark
Yeah woman cannot drive here, are forced to go around dressed like daleks, have to walk behind their husbands, you cannot buy alcohol anywhere, you are not allowed to be an atheist or build churches or synagogues and pork is banned. Oh the humanity. 🙄
Well, I agree with Perry that Islam isn’t an immediate existential threat, but bobby b is correct that it is by far the biggest long-term threat to the west. There won’t be WW3 tomorrow. But if there is one day, its proximate cause will the Islamic imperative to dominate. Iran or its intellectual heir will have nuclear weapons sooner or later (and likely biological and chemical ones sooner), and the Islamic ideology strongly suggests that it will use them.
I think Perry has it about right. The hate because they envy us our bacon, booze and broads. They want all that but they can’t have it so they blow things up.
Culture bomb them. Make love not war as a means of war.
Laird – are you saying that you think that any future Islamic power which develops/obtains nuclear weapons will be less susceptible (when compared to, say, the Soviets during the cold war) to the deterrent effect of facing opponents who also hold nuclear weapons – particularly when such opponents will have a significant preponderance of such weapons? In other words, do you think such an Islamic regime would be more willing to use such weapons even though it must surely know that in doing so it will be completely annihilated? I just don’t see it – any such regime will be loath to lose what they currently hold on the extremely unlikely prospect that they can use nuclear weapons against their opponents in a “first strike” and hope to bluff such opponents into not retaliating in kind. Even if they are extreme Islamists.
What does keep me awake some nights (pace Ljh) is the thought that a stateless Islamist terror group might get hold of WMD and, being largely uncaring of its opponents’ ability to retaliate in kind, uses such weapons within western population concentrations. Now that would be horrible (a few western cities might get wiped out). But it would not be an existential threat as such Islamist terror groups are very unlikely to secure sufficient quantities of WMD to wipe out entire western nations.
Perhaps I would be more uneasy (and give more credence to yours, bobby b’s and Ljh’s fears) if I could look at countries today, with large Islamic populations, and see them producing scholars, engineers, scientists etc. who were as good as any being produced in the west, developing technology which matched that currently developed in the west, and capable of organising in ways (notably militarily) which could match or out-perform the western equivalents – and all the while remaining true to the tenets of their Islamist beliefs. But we just don’t see this. The Islamic world only poses a threat, albeit far from existential, because:
(i) the most significant oil reserves (for the time being) lie within its bounds;
(ii) Islamist terror groups would most likely use any WMD they manage to get hold of on western targets; and
(iii) the cultural relativism, political correctness etc. within western countries over the past few decades has allowed the substantial Islamic minorities who have immigrated to and live within western countries to do so in conditions in which their backward Islamic ideas are sheltered by western ruling elites from exposure to challenge from liberal ideas.
And these less than existential threats have, in turn, led to a decline of liberty in western societies and, as Perry has noted, caused the growth of the panopticon state. And, I agree with Perry, that development is a far greater threat to all of us than anything posed by Islam.
>The hate because they envy us our bacon, booze and broads. They want all that but they can’t have it so they blow things up.
>Culture bomb them. Make love not war as a means of war.
NickM, Osama bin Laden tried that on himself, and it turned him into a radical Islamicist.
Jan H
There is the potential problem of the ‘true believer’ being in power, one who actively wishes for an Armageddon-type situation, like Jim Jones, the noted socialist in the jungle of Guayana with the 900+ mass murder/suicide of his followers.
If a true believer were in power in a Shia-dominated nuclear state, and were, say to understand as his duty to bring on the Hidden One, then it is possible that such a scenario that a holder of nuclear weapons might be tempted to use them and regard it as a duty. For example, a devout Shia head of government might anticipate the arrival of the Mahdi:
A fire in the sky? Scud be clearer, I suppose. And there are reportedly some who are ‘Hasteners‘, who appear to think that worse is better (a bit like some libertarians), but who wish to spread conflict so that the Hidden One returns to guide them to final victory, rather than the patient waiters, who think that the Mahdi will come when it suits him.
Of course, when I see, say, the family of a martyr weeping over his death, I ask myself if, deep down, they really believe what they profess. If the martyr is in Paradise, then surely it’s a good job well done?
>The hate because they envy us our bacon, booze and broads. They want all that but they can’t have it so they blow things up.
>Culture bomb them. Make love not war as a means of war.
Also, there are far more radical Muslims amongst second and third generation Western Islamic immigrants, compared to the first generation, so it’s not working too well.
MAD doesn’t work well when one side sees destruction not as a threat but as a promise of glory.
As Mr. Ed notes, the “Twelvers” are real (and are arguably, pace Wikipedia’s article, the predominant Shia branch), and one tenet of their belief system is that when the Mahdi is revealed, that the Return will occur, and we end up with the Islamic Judgment Day, etc etc.
Hence the 2005 report of Ahmadinejad addressing the UN being surrounded by a ‘Divine Aura’ after his success in gaining the Iranian Presidency with 62% of the vote – a convincing lead that American presidents might envy. Of course, while he’s not the only transformational president whose sycophants claim that their political crush is some kind of messiah, it is somewhat more worrisome when most of your constituents are waiting for the 12th Imam to immanentize the eschaton.
And it only ever will be an existential threat for as long as our own political & media institutions keep preventing Western society’s natural antibodies from working. Islam is a pissant annoyance in the absence of an empowered institutional Quisling class. The fight-back is well under way (see ‘Brexit’) but I fear there is a great deal of territory to recapture & many battle to be fought before we can be confident of the future.
This is a wierd discussion – if Islam is a threat to us, why are we not then a threat to Islam. Apparently, according to the Islam is a threat narrative, we are threatened by people (and note they are people, not a monolithic other) who somehow all follow Islam devoutly according to the way they are taught (clearly never met many Muslims…), and will not change their views. But the vast majority of Muslims want to adopt and use parts of western life, which does not suggst this…
The militaristic interpretation of Islam is a particular social interpretation of a belief structure, rooted in partiarchal societies (basically tribal and village societies) which emphasise separate identities and male power (either in the family, or in ‘outlaw’ bands). If that sort of society falls down due to say proper urban living and increased wealth bringing a focus on nuclear families, a different interpreation of Islam becomes the norm. And wierdly that is what happens – check out the middle-class muslims found around the country, or the failure of extremist ideology to get a hold over any major areas in any major Islamic city (other than by force of arms). We are basically dealing with country boys and unintegrated immigrants, plus a few converts, waving the Islamicist flag, with a few power-seekers and the village elders who see their power threatened fleeing.
So for the sort of Islam which scares so many commentators here to the extent they are able to ignore the threat of the state being used against it, the answer is simple – destroy the underlying society. So by all means attack those funding the means of preserving it (I am pretty certain I advocated this earlier in the thread) but try to see the difference between this and attacking all Muslims.
I concur. But first a battle for ‘the narrative’ needs to be won against a very different enemy. And that fight is now actually happening, thank goodness.
A recent survey found that only 4% of British Muslims think Al-Qaida was responsible for 9/11:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/02/uk-muslims-show-worrying-belief-in-conspiracy-theories-claims-thinktank
This idea that Muslims will change once they’re exposed to urban Western life doesn’t seem to be holding up. Most Muslim societies are now going backwards, not forwards
Also, whether most Muslims in the West support extremism is beside the point. It’s what they’ll vote for and support once there’s a big enough Islamic foothold that is the issue. Mo at no. 79 may not be that fond of extremism now, but he may still gladly vote for an Islamic party in twenty years time. We need to make the West a hostile place for Muslims so they don’t want to come here.
Fine. But instead our governments make it hostile to the rest of us – by snooping on our every step, among other things. Let me know when Muslims stop coming to the UK because there are just too damn many CCTV cameras for their taste.
This is true. The other obvious problem which will precipitate what you describe is the demographic threat. A majority or large minority muslim country, no matter if those muslims are partially westernised, is not a good place for liberty.
Tomsmith, the point about demographics is being made so often that it seems to be taken for granted – and yet and in all honesty, I’m not sure what it means in practice at all. Islam (or any other belief system, theist or not) is not genetic. At the same time, from the POV of the Islamic doctrine, we are all Muslims, it’s just that not all of us know it, yet.
Culture is carried with people and is resilient over generations. Demographic change in the direction of more muslims therefore means that Europe will become more Islamic.
There may also be a genetic aspect: why wouldn’t culture influence genetics and vice versa?
Yes.
Not really – and it is true both ways, good and bad.
There likely would be, but over much, much longer periods of time than what we are discussing here – i.e. much longer than your regular ‘long term’. My very rough guess would be over ten generations or so.
But Perry – the person in Kent (the British representative on various international “libertarian” bodies) says that Jeremy Bentham was a great pro freedom person, and he says that Thomas Hobbes and Sir Francis Bacon were to – so all is well (A is not A, water is dry, and 1+1=78, and determinism is libertarianism – political and philosophical).
“Gay Marriage” – marriage should not be a state matter (the Births, Marriages and Deaths [Registration] Act of 1835 was a blunder – in many ways, as was the Census that started in 1801).
Face coverings – a private property matter. If someone can go about with a darkened visor on a motorcycle helmet, then they can go about with an Islamic face covering. If the private property owner agrees.
The UKIP leader?
I have nothing to boast about when it comes to national party leaders.
So far the evidence is that Islam and the culture of Islam is resilient over generations
Many people come from places where cultures have persisted for very long periods of time. They carry those cultures and any genetic traces of those cultures with them when they come.