Rotten in Denmark? You decide....

The title of the article you linked to does not seem consistent with the body of the article. It contains a viewpoint that the article itself carefully does not espouse - I wonder whether a sub-editor slapped on the title.

I don't have all the answers, but one thing that should be clear is that the radical Islamists are attacking us from the extreme Right. I don't like the somewhat less extreme Right (as represented by the current US administration, for example), and think it has made some terrible blunders, e.g. the Iraq fiasco. But those of us who are children of the Enlightenment Left should be clear that religiously-based authoritarianism is our enemy, regardless of which religion it might happen to be.

For once we agree.

This issue is too important to leave to the wackos, and it seems pretty obvious to me that the whole environment of immigration in Europe needs some fundamental change. The assumption on the European side seems always to have been that imigrants are guestworkers (even when that wasn't the formal relationship) and that of many immigrants . . . well that seems to be a tough call. Many seem willing to work on an essentially American-style assimilation basis, which assumes that those who emigrate have already made a decision about cultural purity and rigidity (they've foregone that option by moving into another culture). But many others seem to have never come to terms with the fact that they have, in fact, emigrated to rather than colonized another culture.

This is an unhealthy state of affairs and one that can easily get ugly if its isn't altered--so much nativist clap-trap appeals to just the resentments liable to arise from this situation.

I doubt, though, that civics classes will be the answer.

--eric

Western cultural flaccidity that has been spawned by multiculturalism

Do you need to use the phallocentric metaphors?

the master's tools may tear down the master's house.

Western cultural flaccidity that has been spawned by multiculturalism

What do you mean by "multiculturalism"?

For instance, I've been accused of this heinous crime because I believe it's stupid to force people to learn English when they'll learn it anyway. I don't believe in a multi-lingual state, but I don't believe in nativist paranoia, either.

Or am I a multiculturalist because I believe in stemming Mexican immigration, but I don't believe in pissing away money on a largely symbolic fence?

Or am I a multiculturalist because I LIKE many of the cultural differences and changes immgrants bring to us, and I'd like Thai imigrants to open nice little ethnic take-out joints and not another Cracker Barrell outlet?

Tell me where the lines are drawn! Tell me whether I need cultural viagra!

flaccid.

What's faccid? Caving in to the parents who thought their kids would catch something from halal meat? Or who are pretending that eating turkey is SUCH a strong tradition that their children's very identities as right thinking christians would be threatened by eating chicken at Christmas?

invert mr. negation.

I have taken to insulting, rather than trying to enlighten the mortally weak. After all, it was childish fear of being called names that has caused them to bend over so far that the welcome sign in their small intestine has become such a destination. Those castrates make me sick!

Oran--
Or am I a multiculturalist because I believe in stemming Mexican immigration, but I don't believe in pissing away money on a largely symbolic fence?

No, not a multiculturalist (for that reason). Just an idiot. (On that issue.)

Fences of the right type work.

That doesn't mean all fences work equally well, or that any fence works perfectly.

Take the most famous fence of all time, by way of illustration. The Great Wall of China.

Lest you think that times were so different then that those Mongols couldn't figure out any way of breaching the thing, or getting over it, or around it, all that would be wrong. They could.

But the Wall still tended to work. Mostly. When the Chinese Empire was in good enough shape to man and repair it properly that is.

It wasn't supposed to work unattended. The largest part of its purpose was to facilitate DETECTION of crossings. The second was to slow them down and thin them out, so that the Chinese army could get there in time to prevent a whole vast hoard from streaming through.

Similarly with a border fence. Is 700 miles enough? Probably not. Would nothing work? Well, well advertised land mines would sure as hell work, maybe even largely unattended. (Oh the howls!!! That would just be UNCONSIONALBE!!!)

But much lesser methods would work pretty well even lightly attended. And modified as needed. And no, the cost isn't much, considering. Two rows of high concertina fence with a road inbetween, and perhaps anti-vehicle ditches etc. to thwart blunderbus breaches. Motion detectors. In fact they MIGHT be enough in really nasty desert areas.

All the noise to the contrary, or most of it, is simply dishonest. Or shoot from the hip without examining the real evidence, because they aren't interested in the truth, only advancing their argument.

The Israeli's sure think the Gaza fence has worked, mostly. Against people crossings, that is. Not rocket crossings.

I have taken to insulting, rather than trying to enlighten the mortally weak. After all, it was childish fear of being called names that has caused them to bend over so far that the welcome sign in their small intestine has become such a destination. Those castrates make me sick!

Seems to me you protest a bit too much.

What's all this bluster covering up?

Fences of the right type work.

At the moment hardly anyone seems to think the illegal immigration problem warrants the building and manning of a new Great Wall. Or even blowing people's legs off. Especially when those legs are apparently much needed to cart beef carcasses around.

(You can, of course argue that they aren't, but the people paying for all our election campaigns have a different way of seeing things. They seem to think that a 700-mile waste of time and money will make most folks go back to their playstations, and they are probably right.)

Oran--
Or who are pretending that eating turkey is SUCH a strong tradition that their children's very identities as right thinking christians would be threatened by eating chicken at Christmas?

That's the test is it? Imminent danger of loss of identity for host societies, or else cave into any an all immigrant demands to change their own customs to accommodate those of the newcomers, who came to the host society when those customs were in place and open for examination. (Send Muslim scouts if the dangers are deemed severe enough to their delicate, and oh so rigorously asserted, sensibilities.)

The true and to date increasing decadence of the West has little to do with how much skin our women sometimes show. It has lots to do with our unwillingness to defend our own culture - which in my view has no equal in human history. And yes that's just my view.

And guess what? I love falafel and humus and tahinni. Arab women can be hot. Live and let live. Toleration however should have it's limits, including not tolerating the intolerant just because they aren't Euro origin or practice a non-Euro religion.

I don't love Sharia law, or anything close, and don't want it or anything close to be adopted in any Western country, or shire. And so on.

NPR piece linked to:
One politician has called for the internment of some Muslim radicals in Denmark for security reasons.

This shouldn't be beyond the pale of consideration in Europe. Empasis on the word SOME radicals. Not all Muslims, or vast wholesale sweeps.

Now whether it's actually necessary now for more than a few, as opposed to lesser measures is another matter. I hope not. Even the threat of that could have a chilling effect on Muslim radicals in Europe. Which is exactly what I want. A DEEP chill on them, and their sense of untouchability unless they're actually caught red handed committing physical atrocities, with their communities counted on to see and hear no evil, no matter what.

NPR--
And last year, a radio station went so far as to call for the extermination of all radical Muslims.

That however is beyond the pale. Odious extremism. There is the qualifying word "radical", but extermination is something that's done wholesale. No one goes about trying to exterminate only the most troublesome cockroaches in their flat. They're going for absolute elimination so far as they can manage.

NPR
"Espersen points out that thanks to new laws, annual immigration has declined to 2,000 last year from 27,000 in 2001. Asylum for refugees has also dropped sharply."

Excellent.

Though Denmark shouldn't deprive itself of e.g. Chinese immigrants if it has a labor shortage. It could quite justifiably discriminate against Muslim immigrants, given the civilizational conflict / quasi cold war that's going on at the moment. That after all is the reason for the Danish change of heart, not irrational views about skin color and the like. Though once one decides e.g. in WWII that one doesn't want to give Nazis free reign to come into the US or organize here, a German accent can become a marker for further investigation - without Germanness itself being the reason for the aversion.

NPR--
"Khader insists that Islam and the West are not grappling with a clash of civilizations."

Wrong. There is a clash of civilizations.

But that doesn't mean all Muslims in the West have to continue to adhere to a totalitarian version of Islam. The trouble is that that's what mainstream Islam is, and there isn't all that strong a tradition of something clearly distinct. The separation is clean if a Muslim leaves behind his religion and becomes a secularist (or converts to some non-Muslim religion). And that in fact is what most of the Muslim background intellectuals who have been outspoken against Islamist extremism have done. There hasn't been a lot of strong stance taking unmixed with apology among those who still count themselves as believers, albeit more moderate ones.

Sure there've been historical periods of relatively relaxed religiosity in Muslim lands (especially Turkey and before that in Saracen Spain), but that tended to be more an emphasis on the secular side of life than a liberalizing reform of religious tenants themselves, or a clear separation of church and state. There isn't a whole lot of tradition within Islam of treating believers in other faiths as equals (as opposed to letting them live without conversion, but taxing them unequally and granting them notably fewer civil rights including before the law). There wasn't much in Christianity either before the reformation and enlightenment, but this is now and that was then - for Christians and post Christians and Jews, but not for believing Muslims, unfortunately.

At the moment hardly anyone seems to think the illegal immigration problem warrants the building and manning of a new Great Wall.

Including me, which was clear from my post, as you know. That sort of misleading reference is a type of dishonesty you know.

Technology has progressed a bit, and the nature of the border crossing threat is a bit different than the vast hordes of Mongol warriors on horseback which the Chinese faced, now isn't it?

You can, of course argue that they aren't, but the people paying for all our election campaigns have a different way of seeing things. They seem to think that a 700-mile waste of time and money will make most folks go back to their playstations, and they are probably right.

I do argue that the illegals aren't necessary to carve up and haul around our beef, and so presumably did you, since you said above that 1) you favored measures to restrict the inflow of illegal aliens but 2) you were against a fence since it would be ineffective. The illegals probably do make our meet slightly cheaper, while depriving less desirable (for the employer) equally unskilled black prison leavers for example of one line of previously well paying work.

So now you're countering my argument that the right sort of fence would be effective (one way short of one bolstered with landmines but instead high wire bolstered with a road and lots of motion detectors) by saying the money's against it. Yes it is, but it doesn't help that liberals like yourself line up against the fence for what you argue are other reasons - even after you've stopped debating whether those other reasons (fence effectiveness) really hold water.

Could it be that you just don't want to break with liberals on the issue, and are determined to find a way not to?

(And yes I agree that many employers and their advocates such as the Wall Street Journal Ed page, unlike the vast majority of the Republican electorate and a lot of the Dem electorate as well but a minority, side with the Dems on this issue.)

And last year, a radio station went so far as to call for the extermination of all radical Muslims.

They are probably talking about Radio Holger (named after Holger Danske), a tiny radio station with practically no listeners, run by a single mentally disturbed man.

Though Denmark shouldn't deprive itself of e.g. Chinese immigrants if it has a labor shortage.

There aren't that many of them.

It could quite justifiably discriminate against Muslim immigrants, given the civilizational conflict / quasi cold war that's going on at the moment.

No, we couldn't. There's very little of a civilizational conflict going on. At least here in Denmark.

Not all our brown-skinned immigrants are Muslims, and not all our Muslims are radicals. Actually, only about a tenth even go the Mosque.

That after all is the reason for the Danish change of heart, not irrational views about skin color and the like.

Nope. It has a lot more to do with the organization of our Welfare State and our Labour Market. The de facto minimum wages are much higher here than in the US, thus there is much less demand for unskilled workers and consequently much higher unemployment rates for the immigrants.

Then add chain migration, low literacy of the first generation immigrants, and the usual cultural conflicts.

Though once one decides e.g. in WWII that one doesn't want to give Nazis free reign to come into the US or organize here, a German accent can become a marker for further investigation - without Germanness itself being the reason for the aversion.

Remember the Japanese...

The true and to date increasing decadence of the West has little to do with how much skin our women sometimes show. It has lots to do with our unwillingness to defend our own culture - which in my view has no equal in human history. And yes that's just my view.

Well, deciding whatb that culture IS is a bit of a trick.

To me western culture has as part of it a certain hospitality toward newcomers. Certainly we should feel secure enough to offer halal food at a Christmas dinner (and get Muslims to participate in our holiday), at no real cost to us.

Certainly we should feel secure enough to offer halal food at a Christmas dinner

No.

Thanksgiving, yes. Though what I'd say is that we (primarily Judeo Christian board/organiztion/whatever)
should invite THEM to offer THEIR halal food, while we offer them our traditional food.

Christmas and Easter are primarily Christian holidays.

Look, I'm willing to be welcoming, up to a point.

But the fact is and IM NOT ABOUT TO IGNORE IT THAT MUSLIMS HAVE FOR THE LAST DECADE HAD A LOT TO ANSWER FOR IN TARGETTING AND DOING ALL THEY COULD TO KILL WESTERN CIVILIANS.

Want to hear their apologies first if they want to live amongst us. Don't want to apologize?

Don't want to invite them to any sort of dinner in OUR house.

doug, chill. not all muslims, just the radicals. but you meant that. but unhinged comments are best left on other weblogs, this is not a place for venting. don't let oran kelley bait you, that's what he's good at, give him his pride. also, christmas is a lot less christian than easter and always has been. and we aren't a judeo-christian culture, we're a christian one. the judeo-christian is standard PC bullshit, but it isn't like we give due reverence to halakah or kashrut. if you're going to meet the obfuscations of kelley you should at least look beyond the rhetoric being fed to you. and oran, did we serve kosher food during christmas dinner when the jews showed up? puleez. no, we turned the jews into christians with curly hair. they're called reform jews. now, this interests me, here are demographics of the city where you live:

The racial makeup of the city was 96.00% White, 0.65% African American, 0.98% Native American, 0.50% Asian, 0.03% Pacific Islander, 0.48% from other races, and 1.36% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 1.67% of the population.

go move to a large city like dearborn and 'welcome' the muslims there, will you? fuck, i live in oregon and it still isn't as white as where you live. go enjoy the diversity you seem to be so positively disposed toward.

no, we turned the jews into christians with curly hair. they're called reform jews. now, this interests me, here are demographics of the city where you live:

The racial makeup of the city was 96.00% White, 0.65% African American, 0.98% Native American, 0.50% Asian, 0.03% Pacific Islander, 0.48% from other races, and 1.36% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 1.67% of the population.

go move to a large city like dearborn and 'welcome' the muslims there, will you? fuck, i live in oregon and it still isn't as white as where you live. go enjoy the diversity you seem to be so positively disposed toward.

This, btw, is directed at me. Fact is, though, I grew up and spent most of my life in North Jersey, most of my school classes were very mixed indeed as regards religion and national origin. The high school class I was in was know as the "United Nations" because of the large number of Vietnamese, Russian Jews, Taiwanese, Koreans, etc, etc. in it. Every single school I attended is ranked in the bottom quintile in achievement scores. There were race riots and deep racial tensions in one of my schools. My National Honor Society dinner served three separately prepared dinners (one plain old, one Kosher/Halal, one vegetarian for some of the subcontinental folk--never really got the religious justification there, but they did have the best food). So, as far as American live and let live goes, I been there, done that and got the t-shirt.

I now live in one of the whitest communities in America. Let me tell you, the food suffers.

But anyhow, MY culture is decidedly not christian. My culture is the culture of the enlightenment. Does it bear Christian influence? Sure. Do I make a big deal of maintaining the purity of Christian customs? No. And neither should anyone claiming to be defending the enlightenment heritage.

Dougjnn:
Razib/ Chet already asked you to calm down - I am sure you have by now.

I mentioned this before and Razib did not agree. I will repeat it again. Unlike the Jews, Indian Hindus and the Chinese, who immigrated to other lands either as businessmen or indentured servants and therefore were deferential to the local prevailing cultures, Muslims came to most areas as conquerors. They also managed to convert the majority of the local populations (India being the conspicuous exception). Doug, have you ever considered that in that respect, Islam resembles Christianity a lot, politically and militarily? And Muslims behave very much like European colonists - wishing to supplant local beliefs and practices with their own? Which is why non-Muslim Asians form "model" minorities wherever they go but Muslims generally don't? Also, have you considered that Europeans and Americans (and now Israel) have had a heavy hand in the radicalization of current day Islam by opposing leaders like Mossadeq, Nasser and destroying progressive Lebanon? If you want to rebut my argument by saying that Christianity's medieval practices are long in the past, please do remember that colonialism is barely fifty years old. While most other ex-colonies have moved on, Muslims are clinging tenaciously to that not so distant memory of humiliation in their own lands. The plight of the Palestinians and the recent debacle in Iraq haven't helped very much. I doubt that even the most devout Muslim would have found grounds to argue with us, had we concentrated our efforts against the true culprits in Afghanistan (and Pakistan).

That is all past history. I agree with you that we should not kow-tow to unreasonable demands of newly arrived minorities to accommodate their special needs in our public policy. After all, they knew where they were going - no one arrives in America aboard slave ships any more. I am an immigrant and I came to the US for a reason. I don't want the US to become like India. If I did, then as Razib said, there is always New Delhi. But it makes better sense to keep the debate on the sane level of law and human rights (and plain decency) than to engage in a loud quarrel about the relative merits of competing religions and cuts of meat.

Speaking of which, I have an excellent recipe for an Indian chicken dish posted at my blog (A Change of Taste - still on the front page) for those who would like to take a break from turkey and ham during the festive season.