Europhobia on the Rise… In Europe?
Euro
Jules Crittenden writes:
“Europhobia” is on the rise across Europe, where many Christian, Jews and secular Europeans are menaced and misunderstood — some on a daily basis — the European Monitoring Center on Racism and Xenophobia said Monday in a new report.
The Vienna-based center, which tracks ethnic and religious bias across the 25-country European Union, said westerners routinely suffered problems ranging from terrorism attacks to assassinations to relentless assaults on their deeply held values, laws and cultural traditions.
It called on leaders to strengthen policies on integration of Muslims, and on Muslims to “engage more actively in public life.” It also told them to “get over” nonsense like the Motoons, start ratting out the murderers in their midst, and if they want to live in western democracies, “figure out which end is the dog and which end is the tail.”
“The key word is ‘respect,’” said Beate Winkler, director of the group. “People need to feel respected and included. We need to highlight the common ground that we have.”
Since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, many of Europe’s nearly 500 million residents feel “they have been put under a dreadful fear of horrible death by terrorism,” Winkler said, adding that for thousands of innocent commuters in Spain and Britain, the simple act of commuting to work became a nightmare of death, mayhem, terror, tragedy and irrecoverable loss. And that’s not mentioning the bizarre hatred France’s Arabs have for other people’s cars.
Although the center conceded that it had been hampered by incomplete data that make Europhobic acts “underreported and underrecorded,” it listed hundreds of cases of violence or threats against Europeans in the EU since 2004.
The original article is… somewhat different, but Jules seems to be spot on.
I would like to read more research into it, but when I look at my personal experiences, especially the last couple of years, I agree with Jules’ version.
The last few months, I am actually starting to wonder whether European schools shouldn’t pay more attention to Europe’s rich history and culture (and to the history and culture of the specific European country the student lives in). Of course we are taught the ‘facts’, but there is one thing missing, at least in the Netherlands that is: we are not taught to be proud of our nation.
To Americans, this may sound strange; the situation seems to be quite different in the U.S. However, in – again at least – the Netherlands, there is almost a fear of being too nationalistic, of being too proud of one’s country. Perhaps we should get rid of that attitude: it’s time to be proud again; proud of our history, proud of our culture and proud of the things ‘we’ accomplished and can accomplish in the future.
If the children of some immigrants aren’t taught to be proud of (or at least respect) the European country they live in at home, they should be taught to be proud of it at school.
UPDATE
Just shoot me. Post has been edited. Never.post.while.in.hurry.
Second UPDATE
European blogger Cernig responds to Jules Crittenden.
I don’t agree (especially not regarding his view on Jules who is a good friend of mine) with everything Cernig writes (just as I don’t agree with everything Jules writes – who is more a columnist and less a political analyst – I’m not pretending to be either, but columnists have a particular style), but it is interesting to read ‘both sides’ (as in political sides – Europeans don’t agree on this issue either) of the transatlantic debate.
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20 Responses to “Europhobia on the Rise… In Europe?”
I love thi quote, but what does it mean?
“figure out which end is the dog and which end is the tail.”
Hi Michael,
Well, that’s what happens when you rely on Crittenden – a man who would nuke Iran to halt global warming. I think you will find he’s been cherry-picking.
Here’s the BBC’s take on the same report:
I’m a Brit who was on the first “Rock against Racism” marches (the ones where the neo-nazis tried to start riots), not an American – so I’m not fooled by the rightwings double-talk. The European Right has always leavened its “nationalism” with a healthy dose of racism and xenophobia. LePen, the BNP and others are simply the most visible tip of that rightwing iceberg. Others like Thatcher and Chirac may not actively promote white supremacist thought but it is implicit in their “Little England” and “France for the French” rhetoric. Meanwhile, the American Right tries its best to not acknowledge that the “dhimmicrats” of France are actually the conservative racists who have been in charge there the last decade and that the troubles in Paris have more to do with their racist policies than with any form of euroweenie socialist appeasement.
People like Crittenden and Steyn should be ashamed of themselves for their deliberate subterfuge on their American readers – and the extremist european right should be ashamed of their xenophobic duplicity – it is simple bigotry in full knowledge of the lie.
Oh…and the BBC has a PDF of the full report.
Regards, C
Cernig… post has been edited. Jules e-mailed me (although I don’t always agree with him, he is a very good friend) to point out that.. umh, the piece is, umh, satire…
heh. I was stupid, obviously. My mistake. I have edited the post.
That being said, I do agree with his take on it. The report is… we have heard enough of that. We want our immigrants to integrate instead of complain. This should be the emphasis.
and o, criticizing integration seems to equal ‘racism’ to some..
if you’re calling chirac a racist… what about blair? is he racist? Straw? racist?
Heh, well, sometimes satire is a bit too close to the truth.
Why can’t we say that both extremes are wrong? That racism and xenophobic reaction to immigrants is wrong but it is still incumbent upon the immigrants to respect the culture and history of the country where they reside, to adopt some of the basic traditions alongside their own, and to pledge loyalty to the government that gives them opportunities that their homeland did not.
I’m sure that there are incidents of racism or xenophobia that prevent immigrant groups from assimilating, but also incidents of immigrant groups who have no desire to assimilate; both are problematic and should be addressed.
I was going to leave another comment, because my previous comments were far too simplistic.
I feel very passionate about the issue of integration, because it went and continues to go terribly wrong.
I’m also wondering in how far growing racism is related to the problems with integration… It would be interesting to see a in dept study to that.
Anyway, I’d like to second C.S.’s comment. I apologize for posting a too simplistic view the first time around.
You’re making too much sense, C. You know logic and common sense do not work in geopolitics hehehe
Yep.
Michael,
I’m happy with Blair’s take on multiculturalism. It is the rightwing that isn’t. So much so that the UK’s major “Little Englander” newspaper had to utterly misquote and warp his keynote speech on the subject. I included a link to my post on this in my comment above, because so few in the US seem to have noticed their perversion of his words. Here it is again.
I’ll leave you with Blair’s closing statement from that speech – which the Dully Torygraph truncated by leaving off the last sentence.
And only the racists and the extremists have a problem with any part of that.
Regards, C
Cernig: yeah I know that quote from Blair. It’s a great one.
An important question, though, is… what’s ‘integration’? How would you define that?
OK, scratch my comments and read Blair’s speech. He said it in much more detail, and more eloquently.
MvdG,
My guess is that Blair would answer your “what is integration” question with this paragraph:
Of course the problem then becomes whether or not certain extremist groups really do have values that can be compatible with the values of the Western nations to which they immigrate.
C.S. i read the entire speech myself. My question was not what Blair thinks of it, my question is what Cernig thinks of it.
MvdG: OK, sorry to have intruded then. I just took Cernig’s post as a pretty thorough endorsement of Blair’s views but I’ll butt out and allow him/her to respond to your question.
I agree, it looked like an endorsement, however, it doesn’t mean that he agrees with everything Blair said on this subject.
Michael,
As I said in my post, whatever my other differences with Blair may be, on this one (multiculturalism) I feel he has it 100% right.
Can I just add that, as for Jules Crittenden’s post – calling something “satire” is such an easy out. It lets someone air their prejudices (and he seems to be just as much a Europhobe as he is an Islamophobe) with a built-in hedge against critics.
Regards, C
LOL… somehow you’re giving me the impression that you’re not very fond of Jules Cernig;)
Cernig, I have posted the link to your article about this.
Very well put. Non-integration feeds upon itself. Lack of acceptation leads to isolation and non-integration yes, but lack of effort for integration leads to lack of acceptation. At least in Spain the attitude is very much, that being that this is our country they should be the ones adapting to it, not vice-versa. In fact, most people don’t care what you call your God, or what you wear on your head, or what your idea of good music is. In Spain rejection for immigrants comes from two sources; Crime and Complaint. Despite having nearly 200 of our own blown to bits by Muslim extremists, most people, though they would deeply disagree with many of the things Islam seems to promote, are perfectly willing to let Muslims do their own thing, as long as they are here legally and aren’t selling drugs or mugging people. Not much to ask, is it? Proof that the rejection isn’t religion or even just cultural is that rejection for South American immigrants is almost as high as for Arab immigrants, despite sharing a language, religion and history. Proof again is that no one much minds the Chinese, despite being vastly different.
Crime has been growing steadily with the immigration avalanche, and hardly a day goes by where you don’t hear “4 men break into home, beat family and steal valuables” (after digging they usually turn out to be East European, especially Romanian) or “Young man stabbed in street fight” (South American gang members) or the like. This does not breed acceptance, and neither does the fact that the sense of entitlement that the NGOs teach the immigrants to have, as if we all owe them this huge favor for coming to the country.
I have no doubt integration is a two way street, but I think that natives (mostly) are walking but getting stuck in big potholes, while many immigrants have stopped at the beginning and are waiting for a government bus to take them.
Hi Michael,
Thanks for the link, and no – I’m not a fan of Jules’ work.
Lynx brings up an interesting side issue to this discussion, since in conversations with family and friends in Britain – and a large part of the British media – it is issues with East European immigrants rather than the Muslim ones that are creating the biggest noises. But you really don’t hear the US extreme right talking about that. Perhaps because it would throw a shadow over their glee at supposedly defeating the commies and bringing democracy to Eastern Europe. Perhaps because it would distract from their Islamophobia to suggest that integrating other immigrant groups can be just as problemmatic.
Regards, C
For someone who so often jumps o the traditional press, it is interesting you rewrite your post to cover up error. It’s fairly clear that as communists and others did you use values such as honesty only as a tool to attack those you don’t like.