Naturally, it’s all about Cameron’s speech, which appears to have utterly discombobulated the progressives:
He didn't even mention what was going on in Luton. Speaking the same day in Munich, of all places, he turned his fire instead on "Islamists", "state multiculturalism" and "non-violent extremists" in the Muslim community.Do they? Do they really?
Muslims must embrace "British" values of freedom, democracy and equal rights, he declared, as if the vast majority didn't do so already.
Is Seumas saying that, since 2006, when 40% of British Muslims surveyed by the Telegraph said that they’d like to see Britain controlled by sharia, things have changed?
That the 36% who supported the execution of apostates in a poll in 2008 have now changed their minds?
And, grotesquely comparing non-violent Islamists to "rightwing fascists", he warned that there would be a strict checklist of Muslim bodies the government would not now work with or fund (including the umbrella Muslim Council of Britain). He did criticise Islamophobia, but that passing comment was drowned out by the drumbeat of condemnation targeted at Muslims and their political organisations.And why shouldn’t he? We hear – from the ‘Guardian’ – nothing but condemnation of certain political organisations, do we?
…by branding political Islam as extremist, he's playing on the ignorance of those for whom Muslim and Islamist are as good as indistinguishable. What is called Islamism includes a wide spectrum of political trends, peaceful and violent, socially conservative and progressive, from Turkey's ruling party to al-Qaida. Mainstream Islamists, certainly including almost all the groups Cameron is now casting into outer darkness, are in fact committed to democratic freedoms.Yeah. Right.
We’ve already seen just how poorly your own newspaper covers the aims and ambitions – and backgrounds – of these groups.
So pardon me if I don’t take your glib claims at face value any more.
The practical policy consequences of Cameron's neocon turn may be modest. But its wider impact is likely to be chilling and poisonous. If the government's message is that peaceful independent Muslim political activism is beyond the pale, it won't just be regarded as hypocritical and undemocratic – it will strengthen the hand of those committed to violence.Appeasement never works. Hasn’t it been tried once too many times before?
21 comments:
They keep trying to peddle the innocent Muslim theme, without actually explaining why groups like the EDL form and no it's not because they are right wing fascists or racists. It's past time that those in power took a close look at political Islam and its overriding need to dominate everything it comes into contact with, a fascist ideology wrapped in the trappings of a religion is not what the UK needs, nor any civilised country. Shying away from this scrutiny has caused the tensions of the last few years whether it has been for political (votes) reasons or because of the cries of racist. The question needs to be asked if political Islam is compatible with western secular values and the answer seems to be no. If this is the case then it needs to be dealt with before it deals with us.
Spot-on Julia, spot-on Quiet Man. Even those who would claim to be peaceful, apolitical Muslims within the UK support the Muslim jihadists, whether knowingly or not. They provide a vey large(and growing) infrastructure here within which the jihadists may live and operate virtually invisibly, among those sympathetic to them. Looking for a needle in a haystack would be a valid comparison, if only the needle were able to make conscious efforts to conceal itself.
I've worked with plenty of Muslims, mostly of Pakistani stock and mostly under 30, and while you can never be sure what's in someone's heart and mind I very much doubt any of them had a single radicalised bone in their bodies. Several were what I think of as culturally Muslim, in the same way that I think of some Jewish people as culturally Jewish - they don't believe a word of it but still stick to kosher food because, well, it's just part of who they are. Similarly I've been in an office with a Muslim moaning about Ramadan and being desperate for a smoke and something to eat hours before sunset. I got the impression he was going through it all because he felt he should rather than through any serious belief, and that seemed like just the same as going to Confession only because you'd feel a little bad if you didn't, and making up some moderately sinful but pretty harmless guff on the way to church just to keep them happy (I'm sure that upsetting the applecart by living a completely blameless week and rocking up with nothing to confess would actually have been the biggest sin of all).
Surveys worry me a little. I keep thinking back to Yes, Minister's Sir Humphrey demonstrating to Bernard how he could easily be persuaded to answer both for and against an issue when asked the right questions. That aside could two groups be being conflated in the surveys? There are certainly plenty of Anjem Choudarys out there but there are also those who "want Sharia" in the sense that they want their version of the Jewish Courts (and when was the last time the tabloids mentioned Halakha?), which of course they now have. Frankly the more legal options available for private matters the merrier as far as I'm concerned. If someone wants to sign a contract in Arabic or whatever that's up to them. If someone wants to get clearance for their divorce from a Rabbi, ditto. These folks are not a threat and should not be an issue either.
The Anjem Choudary Mini-me types, on the other hand... they need to be sat down and told in unmistakable terms that if they want to live under a Sharia criminal code imposed by the state then of course they absolutely may do so. Heathrow Airport can be found at the end of the Piccadilly Line and one way tickets to third world shitholes are available - pick one and fuck off.
Milne is a liar.
Milne's reputation even among fellow travellers was well summed-up by the Leftist blog Harry's Place:
"The real source of Milne’s disgrace is that he turned his fiefdom into a platform for the far right Islamist politics. Milne – along with the likes of his chums Galloway and Murray – is responsible for making fascism respectable on the Left. During the period of Milne’s tenure, Guardian readers have been treated to a series of articles by Anas Altikriti, Azzam Tamimi, and other members of the hitherto obscure clerical fascist grouping, the Muslim Brotherhood. And who can forget this piece, in which Osama Saeed called for the re-establishing of the Caliphate."
http://hurryupharry.org/2006/12/15/so-goodbye-then-seumas-milne/
The glittering left loves to think you will bow down to it all, because they themselves have a get out clause. It's called money.
As always with the left, they really don't think much of ordinary people as such: they are okay with you living in a Muslim-Sharia world because they can jet off somewhere else if the going promises to get tough.
Of course, some lefties think the Islamists who want control will give their kind a special pass to carry on because they printed such nice things about the Religion of Peace (TM). Should however the Muslim control gets too much, as I said the champagne socialists can easily bugger off and leave the rabble to face it.
I've just read there's to be a TV programme next week on Muslim schools. Doesn't seem as if it will be complimentary.
I'm well read in Marx and other supposedly left figures. Nothing in it all has made me an adherent. One could say much the same of economics and politics generally. Seems to me that there are similarities between the operation of the IRA and current Muslim rot. The real people need to stand up for decent values, not let a bunch of grim ideologues take the stage. I agree with the comments here.
"It's past time that those in power took a close look at political Islam and its overriding need to dominate everything it comes into contact with..."
Maybe this speech of iDave that has upset the progressives' applecart is the first step?
"They provide a vey large(and growing) infrastructure here within which the jihadists may live and operate virtually invisibly, among those sympathetic to them. "
I just wonder what, exactly, can be done about that...
"Surveys worry me a little."
Yes, there's no doubt about that. And many may have answered that question with what they would LIKE to see, though knowing it isn't possible.
But we just don't know.
"Frankly the more legal options available for private matters the merrier as far as I'm concerned."
Is it going to stay private? Or is it just the camel's nose into the tent?
"Milne's reputation even among fellow travellers was well summed-up by the Leftist blog Harry's Place..."
Yes, there's a deep loathing for him there. Must be one of the reasons I quite like the place!
"...the champagne socialists can easily bugger off and leave the rabble to face it."
And they will.
"I've just read there's to be a TV programme next week on Muslim schools. Doesn't seem as if it will be complimentary."
Interesting! Even more so because it's Channel Four again. Wonder if the West Midlands Police will be watching?
"The real people need to stand up for decent values, not let a bunch of grim ideologues take the stage."
As always, it's the one who shouts loudest who gets to be heard in the corridors of Westminster. Not the one who has something interesting to say...
Appeasement is the very worst policy. It needs only one policy towards the tail currently wagging the dog.
As I've mentioned befire they tried appeasement in Luton 20+ years ago when they renamed the Mecca Bingo Hall, look where that got them.
But we just don't know.
What we can be certain of is that it's an exaggerated figure. I'd take a punt on the loony contingent being a similar size proportion to that of Scots who genuinely want true independence from the UK, and of course many of them are young. It's so much easier being radical when you're not yet twenty, still full of piss and vinegar. Go survey the Muslim version of the SAGA mailing list and you'd probably get very different responses to Sharia. Most will say 'Meh' and much of the rest will go 'what?', 'when's tea?' and 'I quite like her, especially That Don't Impress Me Much'. I'm not saying there's no threat from wild eyed young Islamaloons praying for their 72 virgins as they blow themselves and a bus or a train to bits because we've seen that there is. But if there really was the wide radicalisation that some of these surveys and articles like to suggest then you'd expect Britain to be seeing a July 7 incident every few weeks. That it isn't I take as evidence that the surveys are, well, not bunk as such, but like the everything-gives-you-cancer-but-also-cures-it trope it's more about selling newspapers than anything else.
Is it going to stay private? Or is it just the camel's nose into the tent?
Firstly there's no reason to think otherwise. Criminal law, which I imagine is what everyone worries about, is codified already, has a similarly ancient history, and was here first. Other religious courts, even if run by an ultra-Zionist, don't try to compete. Existing sharia courts, which have been around in the UK for some years now - again, considered a non-issue up to about Aug 2001 - don't either. On a side note we have Islam to thank for introducing the idea of evidence into legal procedure to our ancient ancestors who just used to boil bits of each other and get a priest to mumble some Latin and declare God's verdict depending on whatever seemed plausible to the rest of the town. The only thing you could be sure of was that if the trial killed you then you'd be declared innocent.
Secondly, the good news is that any change to the underlying principles of criminal law is up to us, not Anjem Choudary. He's welcome to want what he wants but he must be told in clear terms that he will be disappointed if he stays put. Hell, I want a criminal law that would probably send Paul Dacre into an even bigger frothing fit than Choudary's rantings - I'm damned sure I'm going to be disappointed as well. Just tell the boozy, pot smoking hypocrite to fuck off somewhere like Saudi Arabia if he likes the legal system there (and being treated like a second class citizen - I hear they're Saudis first and then Muslims over there). Fortunately there are plenty of people prepared to do just that and even the government isn't hesitating to say no. He can have his little wank fantasy about turning Buck House into a mosque and Big Ben into a minaret or whatever, but I rate the chances of it happening as close to zero. The chances of it happening in his lifetime are rather less, but if the thought helps give him that special moment...
Years ago when the fox hunting debate was going through the commons, several of us pointed out that Halal slaughter was so much more cruel than fox hunting, Tony Banks lab mp agreed, but said we can not upset the muslims,
Thomas Hamilton shoots and kills school children, all pistol shooters are branded murderers and shooting is banned in the U.K.
Muslims set off bombs and kill people in the underground and on a bus, more are being tried for planning to bomb.
I am prepared to say not all muslims are wanton suicide bombers, but until we shooters are treated the same as muslims, I will think that, if muslims were treated the same as us shooters they would have been thrown out of the country, their korans would have been destroyed as our pistols were, you could only be a muslim outside this country, to do so here would get you 5 years jail.
When will governments realise we are all equal under the law and treat us so?
"I just wonder what, exactly, can be done about that..."
In our country, hopefully, we have now put aside policies like ethnic cleansing (murder), concentration camps and internment. We couldn't now afford the last two anyway even if we wanted to, and the first would be too horrific to contemplate! Deportation on such a scale? No way. So the answer to your question is "nothing." Islamists know this, and rely upon it as part of their strategy. They themselves seem to lack such compunction.
@AngryExile: Its not that Sharia law would overtake criminal law, but civil law thats the problem. We have laws in this country on equality - particularly for women and gay people. Sharia is totally inimicable to such concepts. We cannot allow a parallel system of law to be set up that is contrary to the mainstream one, even if mainstream law is nominally superior. In a close knit community such as the Muslim one, there would be zero chance of a woman (say) having the chance to go to mainstream law. It just wouldn't happen. She'd be stuck with Sharia, like it or not.
Sharia law would not be two people on an equal footing deciding to settle their differences by their own methods. It would be an imposition of lop sided rules by a more powerful person (the man) on a weaker one (the woman).
Jim, sharia courts have been going in the UK for civil matters for about thirty years. Nobody gave a shit until recently and if there had been no Sept 11 attacks I'm pretty sure we'd all still not be giving a shit.
We have laws in this country on equality - particularly for women and gay people. Sharia is totally inimicable to such concepts.
Firstly I think you may have missed a few important parts of what I said. I'm talking contracts, loans, things of that nature. Secondly, you missed the point about all parties being willing to submit to that court and abide by its judgment. Yes, their laws don't gel with homosexuality (but neither does Christian /Jewish on strict interpretation) among other things, but you forget that it would be - hell, it IS - optional. Two people in dispute and one doesn't want to use a sharia court, guess what? They don't use a sharia court. But if both of them agree to it then what it's got to do with me, you or anyone else?
... there would be zero chance of a woman (say) having the chance to go to mainstream law.
I'd point out first that there are Muslim women practising in mainstream law, and secondly that where duress is involved to force an unwilling participant to a court not of their choosing it should create a separate matter dealt with by a criminal court and a negation of the ruling.
It would be an imposition of lop sided rules by a more powerful person (the man) on a weaker one (the woman).
Just like burqas, if she chooses it freely on her then own head be it. You can lead a horse etc etc. And what if two Muslim men want to use the sharia court? What do you think happens when you say no? They'll nod and say yes and then go and fucking do it anyway without telling anyone. And why shouldn't they if it's between them and nobody else? Why should I care what archaic rules they choose to resolve their disagreement?
BTW - none of the above removes the urgent need to tell Anjem Choudary to fuck off.
Angry Exile: all well and good, but to what extent can we be assured that (e.g.) a woman wearing a burka is doing so out of a sense of religious conviction or because she'll have her face smashed in if she doesn't? Of course, smashing people's faces in is against The Peace, and punishable by law - one that supersedes whatever nominal wisp of Sharia currently exists in the UK - but it's after the fact.
As for the larger point of how prevalent extremism is: I think that the history of despotisms has been to point out how few hotheads it needs in a society to effect genuinely radical change. The etymological root of Bolshevism may have been rooted in 'majority', but that was a fiction. Even under Soviet Communism no more than 10% of people were actually party members. The question is one of will. If one in ten is willing to make the lives of the other nine in ten a misery, then the majority will acquiesce. As a libertarian, I didn't want to sell the Commies the rope with which they would hang me, and I don't want to sell the Islamists the knife with which they will cut my throat.
When it comes to the generational divide, it's long been noted that the younger generation are much more aggressively Islamist than their parents. That is scarcely cause for comfort. I suppose one could hope they will mellow with age, but multiculturalist mollycoddling and sheer demographics mean this is unlikely. Islam as a politico-religious system is dysfunctional and probably moribund in the long term but that doesn't mean it will go down without a fight. It will get worse before it gets better.
...to what extent can we be assured that (e.g.) a woman wearing a burka is doing so out of a sense of religious conviction or because she'll have her face smashed in if she doesn't?
To what extent can we know that a woman chooses to totter around on fuck me high heels of her volition? Do we assume that there must be a bloke making her? Do we ban them to be on the safe side? Of course not, and not least because you cannot make women more free by making articles of women's clothing illegal, no matter how distasteful or ridiculous or (high heels again) unsafe they may be.
Are more women forced to wear burqas than high heels? No doubt, but to assume it always holds true is to throw away the requirement to actually investigate and reverse the legal burden of proof. Prove the husband/father/brother is making her and we lock the cunt up. Shouldn't be too hard since only a tiny minority of Muslim women put bags on their heads (which should also tell us something). Otherwise innocent 'til proven guilty holds, and that's something we should be very wary of changing.
...the history of despotisms has been to point out how few hotheads it needs in a society to effect genuinely radical change. ... The question is one of will. If one in ten is willing to make the lives of the other nine in ten a misery, then the majority will acquiesce.
I think there's rather more to it than that. If you don't have people actually in positions where they can do something then you're going to need more than will. You're going to need numbers after all (cf Egypt - if there weren't that many protestors Mubarak would probably still be there). In the absence of both you end up like Anjem, a prick with a big mouth and a sick wank fantasy. And then there's the point that the will of the other 9 out of 10 is not for acquiescence but opposition and resistance.
As a libertarian, I didn't want to sell the Commies the rope with which they would hang me, and I don't want to sell the Islamists the knife with which they will cut my throat.
As a libertarian I don't mind them having a knife or a rope providing I can keep one hand on my gun. Admittedly there is a slight issue there as regards practising that principle in Britain or Australia, but it's one created by not by commies or Islamonuts but our own governments - by our fellow citizens who voted the knobs in, actually.
When it comes to the generational divide, it's long been noted that the younger generation are much more aggressively Islamist than their parents.
Same with Western kids. Rebels without a clue. Most grow out of it with a bit of life experience.
... one could hope they will mellow with age, but multiculturalist mollycoddling and sheer demographics mean this is unlikely.
Agree about the multiculti thing, though that's only ever been a government and guardianista approach. Might be becoming just guardianista now. Not sure how demographics changes how individuals mellow or not as they age.
Islam as a politico-religious system is dysfunctional and probably moribund in the long term but that doesn't mean it will go down without a fight. It will get worse before it gets better.
Probably. These things are Darwinian. Christianity has been where Islam is now and since you don't proselytise successfully in the long run by pissing off absolutely everyone that you meet it's had to get realistic and soften the way it deals with those not of its faith.
On the other hand we're seeing a resurgence in fundie Christianity, particularly in the US. Pastor Fred Phelps and Anjem Choudary... so different? Not to me. Bombing a bus vs bombing an abortion clinic? Ditto. Literal interpretation of the Koran or literal interpretation of the Bible? Have you read Deuteronomy? Leviticus? Numbers? Fucking terrifying. Don't get me started on its suggestions on how to treat women ;-)
"reverses the legal burden of proof"
/facepalm
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