Sleepless in neutral
Jay: Well, this is fate! She's divorced, we don't want to redo the cabinets, and you need a wife. What do they call it when everything intersects?
Sam Baldwin: The Bermuda Triangle.
Empire State Building to go green for Muslim holiday
New York's iconic Empire State Building is to be lit up green from Friday in honor of the Muslim holiday of Eid, the biggest festival in the Muslim calendar marking the end of Ramadan, officials said.
"This is the first time that the Empire State Building will be illuminated for Eid, and the lighting will become an annual event in the same tradition of the yearly lightings for Christmas and Hannukah," according to a statement ...
An estimated seven million Muslims live in the United States.
[The Taxi Driver takes Jonah to the Empire State Building]
Taxi Driver: There it is. What are you gonna do when you get up there? Spit off the top?
They're coming to take our country and we must stop themThe greatest impact of Muslims on New York has been the destruction of its two tallest buildings and the rest of the World Trade Center, an act that millions of Muslims around the world ecstatically celebrated. So, by way of granting equal recognition to the religion whose followers performed that act (performing it as a religious devotion) and maliciously cheered that act, New York City lights up its next highest building in the color of green to honor the religion in whose name the World Trade Center was destroyed.
Muslims topple the World Trade Center, then get the Empire State Building lit up in their honor. This epitomizes America's response to 9/11.
Should we be granting concessions to a religion which still has questionable compatibility with secular democracy?
Islam doesn't just threaten secularism and democracy
When you describe the West that you are defending as "secular and democratic," it means that you are reducing the West to just one layer of itself, the most recent. It means you are not on the side of the European Christians who for a thousand years successfully strove to save Europe from Islam. It means you are being loyal only to secularism and democracy, not to the West as a whole.
Islam doesn't just threaten secularism and democracy; it threatens everything we are, our total existence as a civilization. And that is what we need to defend.
References
Empire State Building to go green for Muslim holiday - AFP
They're coming to take our country and we must stop them - Lawrence Auster
Islam doesn't just threaten secularism and democracy - Lawrence Auster
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You write:
ReplyDelete"Should we be granting concessions to a religion which still has questionable compatibility with secular democracy?"
Is the main thing about the West that you want to defend from Islam its secularism and democracy? Suppose you were living in Europe in the 8th century when the Moslem armies invaded the present day France, seeking to Islamize all Europe. Would you not have sided with Charles Martel against the Moslems, because Europe at that time was not secular and democratic, but Christian and monarchical?
Or if you were living in Europe in the 17th century when the Ottoman Turks almost captured Vienna but were beaten back, saving Europe from Islamization. Europe at that time was not secular but Christian. Would you not have been on Europe's side, because it wasn't secular?
When you describe the West that you are defending as "secular and democratic," it means that you are reducing the West to just one layer of itself, the most recent. It means you are not on the side of the European Christians who for a thousand years successfully strove to save Europe from Islam. It means you are being loyal only to secularism and democracy, not to the West as a whole.
Islam doesn't just threaten secularism and democracy; it threatens everything we are, our total existence as a civilization. And that is what we need to defend.
Hi Lawrence,
ReplyDeleteFirstly, thank you for the work you are doing at View From the Right. I often quote your words on my blog, so I think there is a lot of merit in your ideas - and certainly a clarity of thought that is sorely lacking across the issues of Islam, immigration, etc. I would like to see writers such as yourself debated more widely, hence my blog.
I hope my style of presentation does not cheapen or lighten your work - that is not my intention, quite the opposite. But I realise, probably less than I should, that these are sensitive issues and, in the case of the Empire State Building, quite personal. I can imagine that this issue is a defining moment and an illustration of how difficult forward progress is, when in fact we seem to be going backwards.
On this topic, I concluded with:
"Should we be granting concessions to a religion which still has questionable compatibility with secular democracy?"
Whereas you would have concluded with:
"They're coming to take our country and we must stop them", or
"Why are we still granting concessions to a religion which will destroy everything about the West, including us?"
OK, here's the problem. Like it or not, there is still a debate about the compatibility of Muslims with the West. For some, when the twin towers went down, the debate was over: expel all Muslims, period. For some, the entire history of Christianity versus Islam is enough of a debate: expel all Muslims, period.
But for a lot of people, there is still a debate. And who is winning that debate? The view that Islam is peaceful and is hijacked by a few nutters. Either that, or apathy and disinterest are winning.
So, whilst making bold statements like "they're coming to take our country and we must stop them" is a reasonable proposition, it is not engaging people. It gets dismissed too easily as another right-wing doomsayer rant. How then to engage people in this debate?
I'm a pretty stupid guy, so I have some qualifications in how the ordinary person (stupid-guy) thinks. And these are his obstacles:
* Stupid-guy knows nothing about Muslims, history, current affairs, etc. But as stupid-guy still entertains the "Islam is peaceful" view, he has to be educated that there is plenty of evidence to question that belief. And he doesn't like to be educated. Hence you have to spoon-feed him sugar coated tidbits of information, bit by bit.
* Stupid-guy is stupid. So, bold statements are too big for him to contemplate, especially when he's still a baby in terms of knowledge of Muslim communities. You have to talk small, or his eyes will glaze over and he'll nod off into fairy land.
So, if you say "Islam ... threatens everything we are, our total existence as a civilization" that's too much for stupid's brain to contemplate at once. I don't believe you can tell people the extent of the threat, you have to provide evidence, and let them debate and come to their own conclusions.
* The only way through to time-poor, attention-deprived, and skeptic stupid-guy is to spoon-feed him lots of small interesting facts. So, maybe the issues have to be presented in short-term and narrow focus. If you get enough of these facts into stupid-guy's head, then maybe he will contemplate bolder statements that writers such as yourself make.
* Stupid-guy is also skeptic, so if you say "They're coming to take our country and we must stop them" he'll just dismiss you. That's why I keep it short-term and narrow focused with "incompatible with secularism and democracy" which is within stupid's field of vision.
* Stupid-guy can only put one foot in front of the other, so talking about solutions is too far ahead for him. Until he has a grip on the whole problem, he can't contemplate solutions.
So that explains why I sometimes keep a narrow and near-sighted outlook. Maybe when the blog grows and there are sufficient "dots", I can start writing posts that join the dots together and pose bolder statements that you would like. I still have a lot to learn, so that will take time.
Also, the presentation style is flippant because, though there is good work being done by the likes of yourself and Mr Spencer and so on, it's not cutting through the fog on information out there. The blogs scroll past at a great pace, and only the best can keep up. It's a full-on study course. Blogs like yours are post-graduate, whereas I'm dealing with the undergraduates (or below). Hence my style is to entertain and laugh along the way. Though I make light of the issues, once the blog is done and the debate is there for all to see, then it will be time to get down to the serious business of working towards solutions.
You ask:
"Is the main thing about the West that you want to defend from Islam its secularism and democracy?"
I'm all for uniting the West, in whatever form it exists now, and defending it all against the Islamic challenge. Christians, atheists, Jews, Buddhists, etc, are all threatened and need to be involved and defended.
Are there other things I would defend about the West? Sure there are lots of other things I would defend. I think immigration and birthrates threaten who we are, as does globalisation, as does a lack of law and order, a lack of discipline, etc. But with my blog I am starting with what I see as the main threats: Islam, immigration, and birthrates.
Am I a Christian? No, I am not religious. Though I have a Christian upbringing and Christian relatives.
Would I have sided with 8th and 17th century Christians? I'm sure if I was born into that community I would have sided with the Christians.
You write:
"When you describe the West that you are defending as "secular and democratic," it means that you are reducing the West to just one layer of itself, the most recent. It means you are not on the side of the European Christians who for a thousand years successfully strove to save Europe from Islam. It means you are being loyal only to secularism and democracy, not to the West as a whole."
Wow, that's a big ask. Firstly, you presume I know anything about history. I'm afraid I have to plead: "stupid-guy, your honour". I know very little.
What are your reasons for invoking a loyalty to a grand trans-temporal European Christian culture? A grand call to arms? A sense of destiny? A sense of brotherhood with Christian ancestors that have fought Muslims through time? A respect for the culture that built and defended who we are for a thousand years, the lives that were sacrificed for it - a culture we are throwing away at breakneck speed? Interesting ideas which, until now, have never entered my head.
Am I against Christianity? No, its values made me the decent person that I, and most of us, are. I have Christian relatives who believe in God and I don't want to shake their beliefs. Do I believe Christianity is a necessary part of the West? I believe in some ways we need to return to a more traditional, conservative past. But does that necessarily mean a Christian past? I don't know. That's a bit too far ahead of my thinking right now.
Back to my choice of the phrase "secularism and democracy". So, whilst I still don't want to overwhelm stupid-guy with bold statements, is there a better way to describe the West than "secularism and democracy"? I will have to think about that. I suppose I could just use the term "the West", but I was trying to avoid the whole and emphasise those parts of the West that Islam threatens first.
Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I was saying anything very difficult to understand. I was saying that this war did not start yesterday, that it has been going on for 1,400 years. Our side came close to losing a few times. If we're going to understand that war, and what enabled our forebears to win it, we need to know something about them and what they were fighting for. I also don't think it's too much of a stretch to expect people to understand that Europe in the past was Christian and monarchical, not secular and democratic.
You have restated extremely well what I'm getting at:
"What are your reasons for invoking a loyalty to a grand trans-temporal European Christian culture? A grand call to arms? A sense of destiny? A sense of brotherhood with Christian ancestors that have fought Muslims through time? A respect for the culture that built and defended who we are for a thousand years, the lives that were sacrificed for it—a culture we are throwing away at breakneck speed? Interesting ideas which, until now, have never entered my head."
That is exactly what I am trying to invoke—"a sense of brotherhood with Christian ancestors that have fought Muslims through time." As to why I am invoking it, the answer is, because it is true, and because it is necessary. Can we fight this war successfully without understanding the enemy who has been invading us for 1,400 years? Can we fight it successfully without feeling solidarity with our own side as it existed in the past, who they were, what they believed, how they won? What Charles Martel did in 732 and what John III Sobieski did in 1683 is pretty inspiring. Since when do people in a war not need examples of heroism and leadership? But if we believe only in the modern, democratic, supposedly secular West, then we will not want to know about Martel and Sobieski, because they were not modern democrats like us and so we can't "relate" to them. We will cutting ourselves off from our own team.
Also, you ask if there is a better way to describe the West than "secularism and democracy." I agree that calling it just "The West" is better than calling it "the secular and democratic West," because "the West" encompasses the whole thing, whatever that may mean to us.
ReplyDeleteHere are a few articles of mine on What the West is beyond secularism and democracy.
What is the West, and can it survive?
What is the West?
Response to reader who denies that Christianity has contributed anything to the West
Why the non-West and the West hate the West
What is European America?
How liberal Christianity promotes open borders and one-worldism
Squalid Shoebox
ReplyDeleteYou may like this pithy one liner from SIOE's Steven gash
New York gives the green light for a couple of more airplanes
http://www.sioeengland.blogspot.com/
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I understand the method you deploy on getting to the average person, of the danger that Islam poses to us all. This is the method that newspapers such as the Daily Mail and Express are adopting in England. Mr Auster's VFR on OTH, is post-doc level.
I enjoy reading VFR. The material is well argued and clearly presented, not just by LA but by many other commentators.
LA mentions Martel and Sobieski. I would like to add the Knights of St John, who despite their original calling to care for the sick and wounded, fought against Islamic invasions of Europe, with a zeal and heroism seldom seen since then. Their heroic defence of Rhodes, and particularly Malta (Ernle Bradford's The Great Siege), is a salutary lesson on the strength, both spiritual and moral, but mainly spiritual, that we need to re-invoke if we are ever to turn back the tide of Islam. The belief in the "religion" of secular democracy, just does not provide the spiritual fortitude to turn back the certainty that imbues the followers of Islam.
LA, I canvassed the opinion of a few stupid guys, and they are not happy that you have increased their workload to now learning about our Christian ancestors and the West. But they accept it is an honourable pursuit and that you may well be correct that it is necessary. They don't quite know how, or if, it will fit within the flippant tenor of this blog, but that's their challenge. And being Australian stupid guys, who's highest value outwardly appears to be irreverency, often towards religion, it is even more so a challenge. Quite a twist for the descendants of convicts from Britain to be stirred by noble ancestors.
ReplyDeleteDP111, thanks for the tip on the Knights of St John - another of which I am ignorant. I am tempted to use your one-liner, but I would rather not evoke images of planes into buildings - relevant and true though it may be.