Those who seek to erode core civil liberties use the same tactics everywhere: elevating fear levels, demonizing Others, equating authoritarianism with safety.
As a devout cynic I look at Muslim immigrants/refugees from the perspective of Charlie Wilson's war in Afghanistan. The US searched the world for the most violently insane extremists they could find amongst Muslims, to resist the Soviet occupation. In the wake of the Soviets withdrawal and the collapse of the Soviet Union (i.e. the lack of any threat of return) those same violent extremists, now trained and armed by the US of A, took over the management of Afghanistan.
The parallel I'm referring to here is that after 70 years of war in the Middle East, led at least in part by the USA and her allies, a large proportion of the immigrants and refugees coming to the West not only have good reason to be hostile to our governments and the people who keep electing warmongers to government offices, but they have deep psychological issues that are not readily addressed simply by giving them food and shelter. While it might be surprising that there isn't more violence perpetrated by Muslims against nations who have occupied, oppressed, and otherwise ruthlessly interfered with their homelands, my point is simply that our governments hands are not clean in any respect. Importing large numbers of warzone refugees of any culture/language/religion was always going to cause trouble, that trouble was entirely predictable, and therefore (in line with Arthur Silber's dictum that the predictable consequences of any policy ARE the reasons for that policy) that trouble was a part of the reason for the policy of inviting refugees into the West.
Out governments want us fighting each other, with them playing referee. They want to set:
- Muslims against Christians
- Muslims against Atheists
- Atheists against Religion
- Black against White
- Men against Women
- Locals against Foreigners
- Republicans against Democrats
- Employers against Employees
- Rich, Middle & Working classes against the Poor
- Blue collar against White collar
- Cats against Dogs,
- and vice versa and etc, etc
Our governments, while claiming to be opposed to Marxism, are in fact using Marxist class warfare strategies and tactics against us.
Divide and Conquer is not merely the oldest trick in the book, it's also the most commonly used trick in the here and now, today.
When one or two accounts are permitted to flood the comments board with repetitive content, those who would offer intelligent, productive discussion are far less likely to participate. Either moderation of crapflooding has to happen, or commenters need an "ignore" function to disappear the great volume of bilge from their personal board.
Or, this space won't be worth reading -- should be blown off as many do with Youtube comments.
Louati's response to the question on multiculturalism is what-aboutism. The fact is that culture precedes civil liberties, that is some cultures preserve and expand civil liberties and some cultures are a threat to civil liberties. The jury is still out on Islam and civil liberties in the West. (Statistics indicate that Islam is a threat to civil liberties.) The recent debates right here about "wokism" and civil liberties is exactly about cultural threats to civil liberties. The ongoing policy question is how do cultural threats to civil liberties get addressed? Louati does not answer this question.
The State (all states) proceed ruthlessly with Imperialist Predatory capitalist goals, reap mayhem and hate. Unending regime changes, resource theft, dictators propped up, etc. Endless refugees created, many, seething righteous hate. The state then both encourages and obstructs the flow of refugees, into westernized nations and enclaves, exponentially adding to the divide and conquer. The state then exploits the ensuing chaos, to ratchet up draconian measures. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis.
Meanwhile, generational wealth takes more and more. Vassal governments, now but straw man legal fictions, puppets of generational wealth, enforce more violently, the will of the generational wealth sponsors.
The grip on the people's throats, the immense power of generational wealth, tightens, while they, remain obscured, tax free, autonomous, cannibalising what's left of each failed state.
classic, end of empire scenario, played out in real time, on tv, on twitter.
there will be no saving the world, no messiahs, no champions.
I don't doubt that Yasser is spot on regarding the class separatism and the history of cultural separatism applied by various power centers in France towards Muslims over the years. The double standard is sickening and I am sure that French Muslims are far more keenly aware of it than anyone else (they have to be). However, for once, I would love to see a Muslim voice respond to a) concerns about Muslim cultural isolation/separatism and b) the notion of institutional religious reform of the magnitude we saw in Christianity in the 16th century by *leading* with a frank discussion of those very topics, their practicality, etc. instead of veering into what-aboutism, recounting of oppressions, which can both be true and yet cast a dishonest aura over all that follows at the same time for not directly dealing with the original question/concern.
Samuel Paty murder is an abberation, not because Muslims are not barbaric by and large, approving of murdering anyone publishing a cartoon of their Prophet, rather it is an abberation because there are so few willing to be beheaded in order to preserve free speech.
Put your money where your mouth is Greenwald.
Re-publish the Charlie Hebdo cartoons. Watch what happens. If you live through it, come back and lecture this old homo about the relative equivalencies between American evangelicals wanting to lay hands on us to eject demons and barbaric Muslims wanting to execute us to please their Sky God.
It's amazing how low the level of discussion becomes when the talk turns to Muslims by non-Muslims. I usually see a lot of intelligent comments to Glenn's posts, including many that I emphatically disagree with. But here, much of it is pretty deplorable, grounded in ignorance and propaganda. Very sad. Hoping for better next time.
Another great article Glenn!!! Love the charts and graphs that really tell the story. I was not surprised to see Buddhist top the list as most tolerant. I live in Nepal, where it's a mix of everything, but in my hood, it's mostly split 50/50 between Hindus and Buddhists, with a smattering of Christians, Muslims and Other thrown in. We all get along great here, not a single problem I've seen in over 20 years! Peeps are respectful to each other regardless of race, ethnicity, religion or class... pretty much. Nepalese even respect AGE, as elders like me are given much deserved deference, and that goes for anyone older than anyone else.
I came here from NYC, and as a Jew, I was surprised to find the world FULL of tolerance... well, at least relative to the US. So I would like to say, that for whatever reason, Americans have lost respect for THEMSELVES. Things were much different when I was young, when we were taught Civics in grade-schools from Day 1. If nothing else, at least we were proud to be an American. But on top of that, we were taught to be tolerant by our grade school teachers, and our neighborhood leaders supported that (for the most part). I don't see that happening at all now, do you? Sure, there were race riots and lots of fascist Nazi fucks running around, but people did try back in the 60s.
Well, love ur work, this from an old hippie boomer dude.
Greenwald seems to have a moral-equivalence blindspot in re Islam. It *isn’t* like any other religion, least of all Mormonism. It is indeed separatist in Europe, (or at least large chunks of it are) and there are Pew surveys of Muslims both in Islamic countries and in the west that are disturbing in the extreme, relating to all sorts of values taken for granted in the west....
Sure, let’s not abridge our civil liberties. But for goodness sake, let’s speak plainly about Islam. As plainly as its supremacist nature (yes, “nature”) requires.
Jehovah's Witness/Mormons are last in the survey in accepting gay marriage. I'll take a Muhammad Ali (not going to Vietnam) over a Mitt Romney any day.
I’m pretty confident that people don’t actually have to be afraid of these things in order to use fear as a pretext. As long as people can be convinced that someone somewhere has fear of something then they will use it as justification.
Fear in this context isn’t some fake excuse. It’s actually information warfare being used to dissolve group solidarity and to preempt objections.
No Muslim believes in human rights unless they are living under a death fatwa.
What the western liberal countries ought to be doing is confronting the barbarism and only allowing immigration by their heretics, homos, and infidels from Muslim majority countries whose life spans are that of a mosquito.
I think you're being unfair to Macron. Maybe his actions with respect to the police are wrong (it's a French thing, they seem to like their police to behave like thugs) but his defence of laicite in France, and of freedom of speech, and his appeal to Muslims to remember their great scientists, philosophers and others, and not to listen to ignorant mullahs trained in madrassas in places like Pakistan is completely right. He also acknowledges that France as a whole is in the wrong to have allowed their very large Muslim population to become ghettoised and insulated / isolated from mainstream French society. It's important too to recognise that the Muslim population of France is very different in its historical origins and reasons for being in France from the Muslim population of the USA. I live in France, but we have a similar problem in the UK where there are large populations of Muslims, often from very poor rural traditional villages in the Punjab and Pakistan who live together in almost completely Muslim areas, such as parts of Bradford in Yorkshire. They tend not to mix well, at least in part because they do not drink and therefore don't go to pubs and other social gathering places. They also have a very traditional attitude to women, so a very high proportion of Muslim women do not even speak English.
As a devout cynic I look at Muslim immigrants/refugees from the perspective of Charlie Wilson's war in Afghanistan. The US searched the world for the most violently insane extremists they could find amongst Muslims, to resist the Soviet occupation. In the wake of the Soviets withdrawal and the collapse of the Soviet Union (i.e. the lack of any threat of return) those same violent extremists, now trained and armed by the US of A, took over the management of Afghanistan.
The parallel I'm referring to here is that after 70 years of war in the Middle East, led at least in part by the USA and her allies, a large proportion of the immigrants and refugees coming to the West not only have good reason to be hostile to our governments and the people who keep electing warmongers to government offices, but they have deep psychological issues that are not readily addressed simply by giving them food and shelter. While it might be surprising that there isn't more violence perpetrated by Muslims against nations who have occupied, oppressed, and otherwise ruthlessly interfered with their homelands, my point is simply that our governments hands are not clean in any respect. Importing large numbers of warzone refugees of any culture/language/religion was always going to cause trouble, that trouble was entirely predictable, and therefore (in line with Arthur Silber's dictum that the predictable consequences of any policy ARE the reasons for that policy) that trouble was a part of the reason for the policy of inviting refugees into the West.
Out governments want us fighting each other, with them playing referee. They want to set:
- Muslims against Christians
- Muslims against Atheists
- Atheists against Religion
- Black against White
- Men against Women
- Locals against Foreigners
- Republicans against Democrats
- Employers against Employees
- Rich, Middle & Working classes against the Poor
- Blue collar against White collar
- Cats against Dogs,
- and vice versa and etc, etc
Our governments, while claiming to be opposed to Marxism, are in fact using Marxist class warfare strategies and tactics against us.
Divide and Conquer is not merely the oldest trick in the book, it's also the most commonly used trick in the here and now, today.
Because it works.
This is why we can't have nice things.
When one or two accounts are permitted to flood the comments board with repetitive content, those who would offer intelligent, productive discussion are far less likely to participate. Either moderation of crapflooding has to happen, or commenters need an "ignore" function to disappear the great volume of bilge from their personal board.
Or, this space won't be worth reading -- should be blown off as many do with Youtube comments.
Unsubstantiated causal claim: That the terror attacks are to avenge Western wars in the Middle East.
Rather the terror attacks are to impose Sharia Law on all of Europe, squashing dissent and criticism of their religion by terror.
And it has worked.
Who would guess France would be the country with a spine and Macron would be leading them.
Louati's response to the question on multiculturalism is what-aboutism. The fact is that culture precedes civil liberties, that is some cultures preserve and expand civil liberties and some cultures are a threat to civil liberties. The jury is still out on Islam and civil liberties in the West. (Statistics indicate that Islam is a threat to civil liberties.) The recent debates right here about "wokism" and civil liberties is exactly about cultural threats to civil liberties. The ongoing policy question is how do cultural threats to civil liberties get addressed? Louati does not answer this question.
The State (all states) proceed ruthlessly with Imperialist Predatory capitalist goals, reap mayhem and hate. Unending regime changes, resource theft, dictators propped up, etc. Endless refugees created, many, seething righteous hate. The state then both encourages and obstructs the flow of refugees, into westernized nations and enclaves, exponentially adding to the divide and conquer. The state then exploits the ensuing chaos, to ratchet up draconian measures. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis.
Meanwhile, generational wealth takes more and more. Vassal governments, now but straw man legal fictions, puppets of generational wealth, enforce more violently, the will of the generational wealth sponsors.
The grip on the people's throats, the immense power of generational wealth, tightens, while they, remain obscured, tax free, autonomous, cannibalising what's left of each failed state.
classic, end of empire scenario, played out in real time, on tv, on twitter.
there will be no saving the world, no messiahs, no champions.
but we can save ourselves. good luck
I don't doubt that Yasser is spot on regarding the class separatism and the history of cultural separatism applied by various power centers in France towards Muslims over the years. The double standard is sickening and I am sure that French Muslims are far more keenly aware of it than anyone else (they have to be). However, for once, I would love to see a Muslim voice respond to a) concerns about Muslim cultural isolation/separatism and b) the notion of institutional religious reform of the magnitude we saw in Christianity in the 16th century by *leading* with a frank discussion of those very topics, their practicality, etc. instead of veering into what-aboutism, recounting of oppressions, which can both be true and yet cast a dishonest aura over all that follows at the same time for not directly dealing with the original question/concern.
Real question, Is it ever ok to limit immigration to peoples that will mesh well with western culture?
Samuel Paty murder is an abberation, not because Muslims are not barbaric by and large, approving of murdering anyone publishing a cartoon of their Prophet, rather it is an abberation because there are so few willing to be beheaded in order to preserve free speech.
Put your money where your mouth is Greenwald.
Re-publish the Charlie Hebdo cartoons. Watch what happens. If you live through it, come back and lecture this old homo about the relative equivalencies between American evangelicals wanting to lay hands on us to eject demons and barbaric Muslims wanting to execute us to please their Sky God.
It's amazing how low the level of discussion becomes when the talk turns to Muslims by non-Muslims. I usually see a lot of intelligent comments to Glenn's posts, including many that I emphatically disagree with. But here, much of it is pretty deplorable, grounded in ignorance and propaganda. Very sad. Hoping for better next time.
Another great article Glenn!!! Love the charts and graphs that really tell the story. I was not surprised to see Buddhist top the list as most tolerant. I live in Nepal, where it's a mix of everything, but in my hood, it's mostly split 50/50 between Hindus and Buddhists, with a smattering of Christians, Muslims and Other thrown in. We all get along great here, not a single problem I've seen in over 20 years! Peeps are respectful to each other regardless of race, ethnicity, religion or class... pretty much. Nepalese even respect AGE, as elders like me are given much deserved deference, and that goes for anyone older than anyone else.
I came here from NYC, and as a Jew, I was surprised to find the world FULL of tolerance... well, at least relative to the US. So I would like to say, that for whatever reason, Americans have lost respect for THEMSELVES. Things were much different when I was young, when we were taught Civics in grade-schools from Day 1. If nothing else, at least we were proud to be an American. But on top of that, we were taught to be tolerant by our grade school teachers, and our neighborhood leaders supported that (for the most part). I don't see that happening at all now, do you? Sure, there were race riots and lots of fascist Nazi fucks running around, but people did try back in the 60s.
Well, love ur work, this from an old hippie boomer dude.
Greenwald seems to have a moral-equivalence blindspot in re Islam. It *isn’t* like any other religion, least of all Mormonism. It is indeed separatist in Europe, (or at least large chunks of it are) and there are Pew surveys of Muslims both in Islamic countries and in the west that are disturbing in the extreme, relating to all sorts of values taken for granted in the west....
Sure, let’s not abridge our civil liberties. But for goodness sake, let’s speak plainly about Islam. As plainly as its supremacist nature (yes, “nature”) requires.
Jehovah's Witness/Mormons are last in the survey in accepting gay marriage. I'll take a Muhammad Ali (not going to Vietnam) over a Mitt Romney any day.
I’m pretty confident that people don’t actually have to be afraid of these things in order to use fear as a pretext. As long as people can be convinced that someone somewhere has fear of something then they will use it as justification.
Fear in this context isn’t some fake excuse. It’s actually information warfare being used to dissolve group solidarity and to preempt objections.
No Muslim believes in human rights unless they are living under a death fatwa.
What the western liberal countries ought to be doing is confronting the barbarism and only allowing immigration by their heretics, homos, and infidels from Muslim majority countries whose life spans are that of a mosquito.
I think you're being unfair to Macron. Maybe his actions with respect to the police are wrong (it's a French thing, they seem to like their police to behave like thugs) but his defence of laicite in France, and of freedom of speech, and his appeal to Muslims to remember their great scientists, philosophers and others, and not to listen to ignorant mullahs trained in madrassas in places like Pakistan is completely right. He also acknowledges that France as a whole is in the wrong to have allowed their very large Muslim population to become ghettoised and insulated / isolated from mainstream French society. It's important too to recognise that the Muslim population of France is very different in its historical origins and reasons for being in France from the Muslim population of the USA. I live in France, but we have a similar problem in the UK where there are large populations of Muslims, often from very poor rural traditional villages in the Punjab and Pakistan who live together in almost completely Muslim areas, such as parts of Bradford in Yorkshire. They tend not to mix well, at least in part because they do not drink and therefore don't go to pubs and other social gathering places. They also have a very traditional attitude to women, so a very high proportion of Muslim women do not even speak English.
It doesn't make sense to debunk French islamophobia with pew polls of US muslims, the immigrant populations are very different.
The point should be that the 'muslim vs western' framing itself is bad.