Spineless French government ignores insolent Muslim provocation

[GMantis]

http://www.limitstogrowth.org/articles/2010/09/01/muslim-bullying-paralyzes-paris/
And I thought that France actually wanted to get tough with Muslims...

[GMantis]

GMantis is posting a link to a Pat Robertson video? Well, this issue sure does make strange bedfellows...

Actually, I didn't know this was Pat Robertson. I don't agree with him, to put it mildly, but I still would have posted it if I knew it was him, as he wasn't the one who made the report about this.

GMantis is typically Bulgarian on these sort of issues. If you're surprised by this, that only goes to show you've never looked past his avatar.

That is true, most other Bulgarians would agree with me. First, because being ruled by Muslims for centuries doesn't exactly leave predispose to tolerance of such behavior and secondly, certain minorities are doing the same thing here.
By the way, before sneering too much on the Bulgarian attitude, the general attitude in Europe is also moving in this direction and will move even faster with behavior like this. Also, Bulgarians have managed to live mostly peacefully with our Muslims, which are much larger part of the population than in most European countries, for much longer than most of those countries had a Muslim population.

I've had plenty of arguments with GMantis. I guess I'm just not too familiar with the "Bulgarian position" on Muslim immigrants. 

There's not much Muslim immigration here, but the attitude to the Muslim immigration in Western Europe is, approximately: "How can they be such fools?!" So not different from the attitude of the American conservatives

You still seem to miss the point that the European Muslim population has zero impact on the policies of the Euopean Nations. I don't know what you imagine is going on but it for sure is no muslim take-over of Western Europe. The idea that they have is ridiculous and uninformed. It's no coincidence that the only ones here argueign that they have are a Eastern-European and 2 americans wh very clearly have never been near Paris or Amsterdam. The concept's on a par with argueing that the Manhattan Mosque is evidence of the fact that the NY legislature has been intimitated into doing as muslims want because of 9/11. If anything muslims now are a minority under attack in most of Western Europe. The atmosphere in many capitals is comparable to the 'sensible anti-semitism' that many mainstream European politicians defended in the '30s. Links like the one that started this nonsense are a symptom of a xenophobic new standard of Political correctness where everything muslims do must be connected to their evil religion.

The statement about the zero impact of Muslims is ridiculous, even if you discount the electoral districts where politicians have to court the Muslim vote. The fact that the relationship between the European countries and their Muslim population is now a constant object of political issues certainly indicates a rather significant influence on policy.
I disagree with the idea that Muslims are under attack in Western Europe. In fact, they are very privileged by World standards. Incidentally, I've lived in Germany and England for several years and my impression is that the government of those countries, at least, go out of the way to make Muslims feel welcome. And as this video shows, France is not that different.

Well most Muslim communities are certainly poor, at least by the standards of Western Europe. That's basically an objective fact. And they do face a considerable amount of discrimination and have done for decades, though the reasons for that have shifted from standard racism to a more complicated form of othering.

Yes, they've certainly been suffering a lot of positive discrimination

You have very well described my response to your, Franzl's, gmantis', or almost the entirety of the western european yellow press' attitude. Thank you.

Frankly, from someone like you I would expect a better argument. Or any argument.

It's not just on Muslim migrants, it's on Muslims (Muslims in Bulgaria aren't migrants). The old Zhivkovian anti-Muslim canard.

There is a significant difference between disapproving of the blatant violation of laws by Muslims and supporting the cruel treatment of a peaceful Muslim minority, done for idiotic reasons.

[GMantis]

I basically disagree with everything posted so far. That doesn't usually happen with such a long thread.

You managed to disagree both with the argument that Muslims are a persecuted minority and with the argument that they are allowed to get away with too much? That would probably makes you anti-Muslim by Swedish standards, doesn't it ?

[GMantis]

Some stuff makes me too sick to develop a long argument.

Too bad that this makes you seem like you have no arguments

[GMantis]

Now really, what would make anyone think that muslims are privileged? Seriously many countries actively legislate to limit their freedom to express their religion or to live according to the way they interpret it. They are the constant target of people such as yourself who seem determined to voice their innermost convictions at every chance they get and of a lot of racism directed towards them by groups that'd have been anti-semite 70 years ago.

They are many such countries and most of them are Muslim, but I don't see you editorializing about them. And you seem to miss one of the main principle of personal rights: they end when they start infringing on other people's rights.

[GMantis]

HA!  I've never been to France!

I assume AG is making a joke on the fact that Arabs are really semites as well (the whole notion of calling anti-judaism anti-semitism is a weird product of history).

Nah. My "joke" is a bit deeper )) Replace Arabs w/ Zulus, I'd still make it.

You know the old one, they used to tell before the Jews started to take on the "white" airs. An old Armenian guy is dying. On his deathbed, he calls up his family and says: "take care of the Jews". Everyone's surprised: "why the Jews?", so the old man has to explain: "When they are done w/ the Jews, they'll start w/ us".

So, anyway, when I see an anti-semite, I don't care who are his Jews.

So, wanting a minority not to have special privileges is basically xenophobia according to you?

[GMantis]

So ag, according to you, any attempt to make a minority obey a law which may not fit entirely with their religion or not let them impose their view on others is intolerance, severe discrimination and "antisemitism"?

[GMantis]

So ag, according to you, any attempt to make a minority obey a law which may not fit entirely with their religion or not let them impose their view on others is intolerance, severe discrimination and "antisemitism"?

No. According to me, any claim that, at present, Muslims in Europe enjoy any preferencial treatment is at plain variance with reality and can emerge only in the sick imagination of a zoological anti-semite.

In your particular case, I also have to consider the old Bulgarian history of severe anti-Muslim discrimination, and the general support that such policies enjoy in that country. Yes, I do believe that a substantial component of the Bulgarian polity is dangerously racist. I guess, you are clearly a part of that unpleasant tradition. Therefore, my attitude to you is not dissimilar to my attitude to Muslim, Jewish or other fundamentalists - a mixture of pity and revulsion. Which, of course, does not prevent me from fully supporting your right to hold and proclaim your obscene, and, in fact, profoundly anti-European views.

So when as in the video, Muslims violate European laws unpunished or as in Gustaf's example (and in many others, if you cared to find them) impose their culture on others, this is not a privilege? Unless you believe that minorities deserve such a right, which would of course prove my previous assertion. (Though if so, why do you think that Muslims suffer severe discrimination?)
As for the second part of your answer, it's quite pathetic, honestly. Generally, when someone needs to sink to personal attacks, he's already lost the debate. Even if we ignore the fact that, my country's unfortunate occasions of blatant anti-Muslim policies are brief in comparison of relative tolerance, to accuse someone who you don't know personally, just because of them of racism is completely uncalled for, especially since I've already indicated my disapproval of those policies. Also, it seems that for you believing that a negative characteristic is prevalent in a minority is "antisemitism" of the worst kind, but when it's a majority, it's all right. And yes, I fully support your right to your hypocritical and naive views, even if they are utterly unsuitable for an actual multicultural society.

[GMantis]

1. I haven't seen that Muslims or any other minorities get away w/ violating the laws any more frequently then the members of the dominant majority. If anything, I observe that they get persecuted even if they violate no laws.

Clearly, in Gustaf's example there hasn't been any discussion of violating any laws at all - only about violating some norms of propriety, at worst. Likewise, your main point was that France, somehow, isn't tough enough on Muslims - not on whatever (some) Muslims do that might be objectionable.

And, of course, I do object to adopting the laws for the explicit purpose of discriminating against or humiliating a minority group. For instance, I'd object to a law prohibiting the use of human blood in bakery products used in religious celebration, even though I do not know of any group that would be directly hurt by this practice. Still more I would object to a law that would prohibit male circumcision, or wearing a turban, or whatever that would have such an impact without an overriding social interest in mind (and, no, I do not consider the sense of propriety of certain members of the majority to be such an interest).

The French government is not tough enough indeed -  a state that refuses to follow it's laws against a certain group of can't be tough at all. That's been my argument all along, whatever straw men you want to construct.
No, the problem in Gustaf's example is that not only members of a minority are intolerant but that they also want to impose their intolerance on the wider society. The fact that this is often tolerated in Western Europe is a very strong argument that Muslims are not persecuted there. And what is this persecution you keep talking about? The behavior of certain extremist groups cannot overcome the overall behavior of most states.
You will also find that most posters here also oppose such laws. As I think I've stated before, I'm only against (and would ban) acts that harm others or infringe on their rights. And yes, when a minority insists of controlling a society against the will of the majority, that is a violation of the rights of a society. And again you are quite hypocritical: the propriety of the minority shouldn't be touched with a finger, but the propriety of the majority is fair game.

2. I haven't been involved in any personal attacks in this case, to the best of my knowledge. I am not attacking you - I am attacking your views, which I do find despicable. You change your views - I change my opinion of you. If you stop being a racist, I will never accuse you of that. Now, we might disagree on what is racism - that's ok. It's enough for me if it is clear that whatever you like to describe your views as (call them Humanitarianism, or Grzhk, if you like), they are sick and revolting from my standpoint. Not because of the name - but because of the content.

Racism generally means the belief that a races (or more generally ethnic groups) are different and some (usually including one's own) are superior. I don't understand at all what is racist about my views, so I suggest you either stop ridiculous accusations or explain how exactly I'm racist.

3. Ah, and of course, talking about "negative characteristics" of a group (and not of individual members of that group), whether majority, or minority, or whatever, is, indeed, racism. Talking about hatefullness of certain doctrines is ok - I have been quite explicit, for instance, about what I think of fundamentalist Judaism (or, to somewhat lesser extent, of fundamentalist Islam in Christianity as well)  in this very thread. But hatefulness of the doctrine does not imply that it is ok for the Government to discriminate against its adherents.

This has not stopped you from claiming that "a substantial component of the Bulgarian polity is dangerously racist". Perhaps you are racist yourself , which would not be surprising considering your rather expansive definition of racism.
It's good that you agree that certain doctrines are hateful. But what is the point of such agreement if you oppose any measures against the followers of those doctrines who wish to impose them on others?

naive views, even if they are utterly unsuitable for an actual multicultural society.

I've lived in NYC for a big chunk of my life. This is where my views were formed. To the best of my observation, things work pretty well there (w/ some exceptions of course - there is no limit to perfection). I would hate US to be transformed along the European lines in this respect, as I do see happening now.

In any case, as I said: I find your views to be a direct threat to the way I live, and have always lived  - with no apologies to whatever society, in which I happen to find myself.

Of course, I don't have your knowledge of NYC, though the question is whether the society works because or despite views like yours. And what with zero tolerance policing, I don't see something like the events described in the video, happen in New York.
And ag, unless you believe that you have the right to violate laws that don't agree with your beliefs, or that you have the right to impose your views on the wider society, or that you deserve special privileges because of them, I have absolutely nothing against your way of life.