Eurabia and Fear Mongering

I am tired of people trying to scare me to death. We live constantly in fear from
*terrorists (or at least those in government who tell us terrorists will hit malls this Christmas shopping season even though they could wreak more havoc at a Bears’ game),
*toy makers trying to poison our children,
*the heart association (and the cancer society and a myriad of doctors who tell us about the toxins in our systems, the food we eat, the danger of red meat, coffee, chocolate, food in general),
*researchers who point out that test scores among school children are falling and America will soon be filled with illiterates,
*bankers and economists,
*you name it.

The most recent fear monger is an expat American living in Norway. I have been reading his disturbing book called While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying the West From Within by Bruce Bawer (Doubleday, 2006).

Bawer says that Europe has a huge number of Muslim immigrants who do the same kind of work that many of our illegals supposedly do. Bawer draws a clear distinction between moderate Muslims and Islamists, whom he describes as fundamentalist fanatics.

The problem, he says, is that while most Europeans deny any bigotry based on color/race, or origin, or religion, they completely segregate (isolate, separate, alienate, and all those other ates) immigrants, keep them on the dole, and condescendingly call them “our colorful immigrants.” Europeans don’t want them – or any foreigners/outsiders - to integrate into society and allow them to remain outsiders, even calling children and grandchildren second and third generation immigrants rather than giving them full citizenship. This turns even the most moderate Muslim into an Islamist.

Many of these immigrants never learn the language of the country they live in, and their children go to religious rather than public schools. And the Europeans support the schools, the imams, and the mosques with huge monetary grants. The immigrants never assimilate into European society and never follow the laws of the country to which they have moved. Rather, they live in ghettos, follow fundamentalist Muslim law above national law, and have become a huge force that works against the country in which they live.

The murder/assassination of Theo VanGogh a couple years ago in the Netherlands is a prime example of fanatics following religious law above national law, Bawer says. Immigrants feel compelled by their religion to kill infidels. And while this drew great public attention, the rape of European women because they dress, according to Islamist belief, like whores becomes acceptable and the women no longer are victims because they violate the fanatics’ core beliefs. In France, he points out, many young French women cover their heads to avoid the rapes and beatings from Muslim youths who beat and rape them for their immodesty.

These fanatics, Bawer also says, have such strong Islamist values that they practice widespread female genital mutilation, beating of women, and “honor” killings of women who violate the Islamist’s beliefs by having the misfortune to be raped, thereby bringing dishonor on their families. The rapists go free under sharia, Islamist law. European courts, rather than allowing themselves to be seen as biased, excuse the crimes as cultural. That, of course is terrible.

Bawer, I believe, is sincere. And making money from his book, which is ranked 1,733 in sales on Amazon, 7,193 on www.barnesandnoble.com. (I was glad to get into the low 100,000s when my novel Family Plot was in print.) But living in the middle of the European culture wars, and comparing them with America’s relatively open society, which does not provide financial support for Muslims to remain separate, keeps him from having a broader perspective.

The Economist (November 3, 2007, “The power of private prayer: A heretical thought about religion in Europe,” p. 9) debunks Bawer’s hysteria: “[T]he imminent arrival of Eurabia can be dismissed as poor mathematics. Muslim minorities in Europe are indeed growing fast and causing political friction, but they account for less than 5% of the total population by American standards of immigration. Even if that proportion trebles in the next 20 years, Eruabia will still be a long way off.”

Of course, as long as Europe remains segregated, cultural problems will magnify. I have no pretensions of telling Europeans what to do about the “problem” of Muslims. In fact, the “Muslim problem” of today sounds scarily like the “Jewish problem” that got the Nazis going.

But I do have a word for American experts who work for their own ends by spouting fear in the various media every day (which raises my blood pressure and will cause my early death!). I want to hear from reasoned, intelligent people who truly have my best interests (not their own paychecks) at heart.

Otherwise, fear mongers should shut the hell up.

Please click comments below and let me know what you think.