Tying Two Books Together

Well, I just finished reading Bruce Bawer's While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying The West From Within. All the while I was reading this I was reminded of a section in David Frum's most recent opus, Comback where he strongly encourages the next Republican president (and I would say, the next president regardless of party affiliation) to strengthen ties with whomever we consider allies in the east (particularly India) because it may soon be the case that we as a people who love freedom of expression and who enjoy a high level of personal liberty to live our lives as we see fit can no longer count on many of the countries of Europe. Why? Because of the massive growth of radical Islamists in those countries. This is happening because of two major trends. First, after World War Two, the birthrate of Europeans has declined to about 1.45 per couple, well below the rate of 2.1 needed simply to sustain a population. Birthrates to Muslims living in Europe tend to be much higher, about three times as high according to The Council on Foreign Relations. The second trend is that of what are called "fetching marriages" where young Muslim women are betrothed to Muslim men in other countries. The marriage will allow not only the husband but his entire family to emigrate to most European countries. These combine to create a situation of high concentrations of Muslims in many European cities. In a 2005 report the Pew Forum On Religion & Public Life:

they make up at least 25 percent of the populations in
Marseille and Rotterdam, 20 percent in Malmo (in Sweden),
15 percent in Brussels and Birmingham, and 10
percent or more in London, Paris and Copenhagen.
Over the next few decades, a number of large European
cities will likely become majority Muslim.

Now Bawer is NOT some ranting ultra-right-xenophobic writer but a pretty liberal gay man with a Ph.D. in English who left the United States in 1997 to live in Europe and currently resides in Norway. The accounts he describes in the book are a mix of both personal (such as his partner being attacked by a small gang of Muslim youths for being gay) to those of how the European press handled the attacks of 9/11, 7/7, 3/11, up to and including the 2006 uproar over the publishing of cartoon images of Islam and Muhammad which lead to the deaths of about 100 people by the "peace loving" radical followers of Islam. The accounts of how European "leaders" and "intellectuals" submitted to the terrorists are tale of legend. I didn't have time to track down all of the quotes (I do have a day job) but those I did find made me ill and seriously question how we can trust them if push really comes to shove. Shades of Neville Chamberlain... the only question is which city will be the modern version of Munich? Interestingly, Bawer, no huge fan of religion, says that one of Europe's problems in dealing with what is happening is due to the fact that the marginalizing of Christianity has left a vacuum in the souls (and apparently heads) of Europe's intelligentsia. Since they have no place for religion in their own lives they simply do not understand the power religion can have in the lives of others.

One of the largest hurdles to any hope of integration is that most European Muslims seem to not view themselves as citizens of the country of residence but to hold primary allegiance to the greater global Muslim community. Why do they get away with this? In large part it is because rather than trying to be a "melting pot" like the United States, European countries approach immigrants like one would a patchwork quilt where you are not only encouraged to keep a separate identity from your new home country, but often though subtle (and not so subtle) societal pressures made to keep yourselves distinct from the true "native born".

Now some of the gutless wonders of Europe are calling for the implementation (or at least allowance) of Sharia legal system. Technically this is supposed to apply only to Muslims, but as one site promoting religious tolerance says "sometimes this is not the case". Two interesting sites to read about what implementing Sharia would mean can be found here and here.

I know that many of you do not have the time to read Bawer's book, but I do urge you to read his commentary 9/11 Five Years Later: A View from Europe.