Discussion > Are ordinary British people really being radicalised by Islam?
I'd rather you didn't. It's a weighty topic, but has nothing to do with climate.
Also, I dislike the ideology packaging that goes in on the media, they portray anyone
who dissents as belonging to a wider group which includes right-wing fundamentalist
bigots. Considering a recent thread about Scottish independence, let's not stoke that
particular fire in case we prove them right.
BYJ
I take it that you do not want anyone to think you are an extremist nutter by association hehe.
When I first came onto this forum however many years ago; one of the subjects in the right hand column was a suggested new UK constitution, it had nothing to do with climate change and it was written by his grace.
Whatever reputation or 'standing' BH has earned it has been earned despite the media not by pandering to the media.
I would ask; what better place than Bishop hill to try and discuss such a difficult subject when the regulars are intelligent and knowledgeable people (can you suggest somewhere better?).
There is hardly ever a good word spoken about the media on BH but you want to prevent a discussion in case we offend them; colour me disgusted.
I suspect that the sheer number of Muslim incomers during the past few years in the UK are steadily tipping the balance away from the previously-accepted ways of life in the UK. In my experience, Muslim peoples do not assimilate, but attempt to alter their current surroundings to fit their own cultural habits.
Very similar to UK and European immigrants in NZ since the first wave of their kin arrived here, despite the wishes of the local population 200 years ago!
Brits don't readily assimilate when they transplant themselves on the other side of the planet, either..
Alas, possibly one of the most damaging threads to the credibility of scientific scepticism stutters to life...
Alexander
You are absolutely right of course but in that era all the advanced nations were exploring the world and if we had not colonised it then others would have. Today we travel the world and even if we still have British values and attitudes we settle and assimilate quite well I believe; we are not a problem to the host nation. However the UK has 1000 years of democratic government which right now is threatened by an extremely undemocratic internal group. I said at the start of this thread that as far as I am concerned; all the Muslims who are now British citizens must remain British citizens but we still have a problem that needs to be addressed.
BYJ
You did not come onto this thread to discuss anything; simply to denounce everything. You are an intelligent man but you almost seem to be saying that we on BH should not be thinking about Muslims; it is not our business?
I am not denouncing the discussion, only warning that having it on a climate sceptical blog is playing into the ideological prejudices of the enemy.
This is not part of the blog, this is a discussion section for people who visit the blog. Any off topic posts on the main blog would be removed fairly quickly.
What part of what I said do you think is dangerous to BH, is it just saying 'Muslim'?
Dung,
Carry on, you are going to anyway. In many ways your posts here on GHE and now immigration are a 5th column.
I think you'll find most religions are as bad and for many years Christians were as bloodthirsty as ISIS, so the DNA and writings are there as it were. Religion is all about 'my fictional boss is better than your fictional boss and I'll kill you if you disagree.'
Many of the UK radicals are not recent immigrants and often show little real religious interest. It's just another form of gang culture. Many girls who wear the full tent are not following the rules of their culture, they're doing it because they want to. It's the equivalent of tattoos and dyed hair.
Yes, many recent immigrants do not integrate but then we haven't asked them to and have often gone out of our way to stop them needing to.
At the same time we have let people do their own thing, our society endlessly puts itself down. It continuously apologises for past actions, good or bad. It tells teenagers of all walks, 'you deserve more'. They go off and get a poxy degree in something useless and then are furious they don’t get that well paid job they wanted, let alone the directorship at the bank. How often do we hear people whining about the gap between rich and poor? No reminder that the poorest are infinitely better off.
Instead of saying 'yes I know property is expensive and in short supply but the shortfall is equal to all the immigrants we've let in.' they blame the rich, white baby boomers for hogging all the one time cheap property. No mention that not only was it cheap but it was pretty poor quality too. Blame DIY shows or the House Doctor for high priced property. So not only are Muslim children subject to pressures unique to their heritage, they’re being bombarded by the self-indulgent message all kids are getting. Jihad is not dissimilar to all these pop shows. One tells kids that they can become rich and powerful for a few minutes of mediocre singing and the other says they become powerful and rich (maybe in the next life) by blowing somebody up. Nobody’s saying ‘work hard and climb up the prosperity ladder’ anymore. Indeed it’s seen as tacky and a bit plebby. Everybody looks down on the middle classes.
Yes, I know the irony of talking down this country for talking itself down but quite a few of our problems are self-inflicted (yes I know it’s not us at BH). And one of the biggest is pretending that multiculturism isn’t very, very wrong. Race doesn’t matter, culture does and until we stand up for the best parts of ours *, youngsters will take us at our own value and treat us accordingly.
* every culture has its dark side. eg the UK has a serious drinking problem.
It's OK to discuss in public any threat imagined out of nowhere much which will affect our way of life. TBYJ would have it OK to discuss the climate one, but not talk about the other.
Funny, that's the way the BBC and the Guardian see it.
It's my observation that real threats would tend to fall into the category 'not to be discussed, it will stir up hatred, backlash, worry the folks and so on'. Imaginary or largely hypothetical threats (not just climate, but all the scares you can read about in the papers) are to be discussed, at length, by people with agendas.
I am not worried about radical Islam. I am a little worried about fertile Islam in my backyard. More spacist than racist.
And this is a dissentient's blog. It wasn't always about climate, nor must it be now. The bish will snip what he doesn't like.
TinyCO2
"Race doesn't matter, culture does and until we stand up for the best parts of ours *, youngsters will take us at our own value and treat us accordingly.
* every culture has its dark side. eg the UK has a serious drinking problem."
That first sentence is exactly what I believe; what I am talking about is a culture problem not a race problem. However we are not going to solve it by pretending it does not exist as I am sure you already know :)
And this is why we continually fail to score at the open goal of climate stupidity.
TBYJ "open goal of climate stupidity."
Since when was it an open goal? It's very highly defended stupidity as was multiculturism. The reason the two issues are so stupid is due to a bad part of UK culture.
Sorry BYJ but I did not understand what the word 'THIS' was meant to refer to?
On the other hand it raises another issue :)
Two totally different subjects and for totally different reasons 'THE POWERS THAT BE' are trying to suppress all discussion! On the issue of Climate Change Policy; we need to shut up because the science is 'settled' and we are too stupid to have a valid opinion. On the issue of Radical Islam and its threat to our lives and our society; we must shut up because the Muslim community must not be offended and we are too stupid to safely discuss this openly without causing trouble.
Funny that init.
I wanted to make some suggestions about how we could maybe move the Muslim problem in the right direction.
Just as a starting point how about the following:
1) All Sharia courts must be shut down immediately; they are not legal and neither are they part of our culture.
2) If ANY British citizen of whatever faith leaves this country to fight with a terrorist organisation then they instantly lose their British Nationality and should not be allowed back into the UK. What they and their families then do is not our problem.
3) All Madrassas must be shut down immediately.
4) Mosques will remain open as normal EXCEPT that all teaching will be in English and a Christian priest will always be present.
5) Muslim worship at home will be unrestricted.
6) If a UK Muslim is involved in a terrorist attack anywhere in the world then all UK Mosques will close for a month.
7) If a UK Muslim leaves the UK to join a terrorist group then all UK mosques will be closed for a month.
8) No Muslims will be allowed to emigrate to the UK for 5 years and then the situation will be reviewed.
The objective is meant to be a carrot and stick which would force Muslims to make a choice between being a peaceful worshipping Muslim UK citizen or moving to a country which better suits his/her preferred lifestyle.
OK those are just suggestions so what do people think?
That would be picking on one religion, it wouldn't be fair. What you would need to do is make rules for everyone. So, if you deem faith schools illegal then all faith schools have to be illegal. Does every religious text have to be gone through with a black pen excluding all the unsuitable stuff?
We see the problem with FGM. They are considering if piercings or designer vaginas are the same as FGM. Certainly it has to have a minimum age limit but how do you determine if a wife is being forced to have 'work' and not chosing it because it's her right to do what she wants to her body? When does free speech become incitement to violence or bullying? These types of issues can be endless.
What we need is common sense which is a very rare beast and even harder to agree on. There needs to be national debates about what we want on this and a great many other things.
Perhaps a better discussion here would be how do we determine fairness and rules that carry across all faiths and cultures?
TinyCO2
I admire your desire for fairness but I think right now we should be looking only at Muslims because only Muslims are producing terrorists on a global scale.
Not so much as what is fair as what you can achieve. Personally I'd like it to be legal to shoot cats but I accept that it would be both wrong and unpopular with cat lovers. I would not be sucessful proposing it as a bylaw and it may become more difficult to get other more important issues raised.
No matter how much you might like your new rules a lot of people won't. However what many would support is a law against anyone inciting hatred against others, irrespective of type. The hard part would be to define it so as not to catch a slanging match between friends or miss somebody demanding cartoonists be killed.
@Dung you are Off topic .. but a key similarity is the Real World vs Fantasy world angle , and the religious fundamental aspect of CAGW belief
- That there is a real world..but people can become obsessed with a fantasy view angle which they put more faith in that the real world
- @Dung mate I think you know very little about the the reality of Islam. The danger of going off topic is that BH is used to say something "crazy" on that topic, in damages the credibility of our climate arguments in the minds of the outsiders (in reality all arguments stand on their own)
- For a start in islam it is important to understand that there are 1.Cultural muslims who are not free to leave the faith (apostasy) 2. Muslims who do fundamentally believe from the heart.
"Mosques will remain open as normal EXCEPT that all teaching will be in English and a Christian priest will always be present."
now you've gone off on your own fantasy world. The belief is that Mo was given wisdom in Arabic and that any translatioj is by nature imperfect , so a true scholar has to go back to the original arabic (which of course is different from modern arabic)... Would we really ever insist that an atheist must bne present in Churches to ensure fair play ? so your Christian priest idea is barmy.
BTW although you got excited about an off the cuff death threat in the Guardian..you can see how routine they are in Islamic discussions from an article in today's Malaysia newspaper in an article about ONE state trying to strengthen it's Sharia law journalist gets death, rape threats over video questioning hudud
@stewgreen
I find it helps to read the whole thread before making a comment.
If you think my ideas are crazy then please feel free to suggest your own ideas or tell me that the current situation is just fine and dandy.
I will reinterate my main point, since these days people are prone to misinterpret points rushing to an assumption of what you meant rather than actually read it.
: Dung;s post is off the climate topic , but it IS USEFUL in that it does highlight the similarity that for both climate activists and islamic radicals there is a similarity ie the attraction in believing in a simplified fantasy view of the world
.... rather than proper complex reality.
Pt 2 : "If you think my ideas are crazy then please feel free to suggest your own ideas" : No this is the same as for climate activists.Despite their protests, when I point out flaws in their arguments, I do not need to also show better alternate hypotheses..it's not a two way street.
- One reason here I am not going to give alternate suugestions here is that reality is complexand it takes time to explain.
... Furthermore don't be snarky @Dung, in rational discussion anyone should be free/comfortable to give their input without fear of intimidation from others.
Stew
You asked me/told me not to be snarky but you had already told ME "now you've gone off on your own fantasy world"
Quite obviously this was said to make me feel comfortable and free to make comments.
I live in a democracy which has its own laws and traditions. The British government needs to explain to Muslims which parts of their religion are acceptable in this country and which parts most certainly are not acceptable. Just because the government has not done this and instead is bending over backwards to get Muslim approval does not mean that the truth should not be spoken by others.
You would make a great government minister Stew; telling me you can not make a single suggestion to solve a global problem because it is too complex for me to understand. ^ .^
The answer is NO!
Virtually all the so called radicalised Brits are Muslims and their culture is Islamic. Radicalisation is an interpretation of the Koran and if you are not already a follower of the Koran then you can not be radicalised.
Yes there will be people who are introduced to the Koran who are not already Muslims and if those people are able to accept those teachings then they become vulnerable. The massive majority of radicalised Muslims start from a peaceful interpretation of the Koran and are persuaded that they should follow a new interpretation. If you are not a Muslim then you will not be joining a Jihad anytime soon.
Looking at Britain now you have to say that all those who are British Citizens of whatever race or culture should be treated in the same way. It is not the fault of any immigrants that they now live in a society about which they have huge reservations. All immigrants are here with the approval of our governments both Labour and Conservative.
To be continued.