The Talibanisation of British Children
This article, I think, lends strong support to my argument for banning the burqa. I have a massive file of stories like this, actually; I've been hearing such stories for more than a decade.
Brainwashed Muslim parents ask school librarians not to lend their children storybooks. (Jacqueline Wilson, the former Children's Laureate, is targeted for 'leading children astray' with her stories that deal with contemporary social issues, such as single motherhood.)
Some Muslim children have been kept away from school visits to temples, churches and art galleries.
Teddy bears and pets are also branded un-Islamic.
How about the daughter of a relative of mine, who was having a birthday-party and invited all the girls in her class. The Muslim pupils organised a boycott because she had invited 'unbelievers'.
In one secondary school, a talented Muslim pupil was cast in the leading role in the George Bernard Shaw play Caesar And Cleopatra. Her parents didn't seem to object, and all was going well until the dress rehearsal, when she turned up at school with bruises on her face, crying and refusing to go on stage. The local imam had summoned her family and warned them that acting in plays was 'worse than whoredom'. The father, an engineer, refused to be cowed, but the mother, scared of what people would say, beat her daughter and threatened to take her out of school (which she duly did).
The key point is that these stories are now common in Britain--not weird aberrations, but common. Note that the author of the article is a Muslim woman. (Yes, an authentic moderate Muslim.) She adds:
The full burka has been banned in France (where the hijab - a headscarf - is also not allowed in schools) and other European nations will follow.
In Britain, where personal liberty is sacrosanct, such state actions would appear authoritarian.
To me, that hands-off approach makes no sense.
Why are we fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan and indulging Taliban values here?
Even if it offends liberal principles, the powerful must find a way of stopping Islamicists from promulgating their distorted creed.
If they don't, the future is bleak for Muslims and the country. Many of us British Muslims care deeply about both.
The West needs to be on her side.
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Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
This week I met a businessman born and raised in Leceister -- he commutes 130 miles each way to work so he can live near extended family -- who mentioned in passing that Christmas is now banned in the local schools. Ramadan and other festivals of the assertive "South Asian" minority now have pride of place.
Aug '10
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
This portion of the article particularly struck me:
"Samad Hussein... speaks for many when he says:
'Now these girls, nearly naked in the roads, drinking and swearing, sex everywhere. I can't let my young daughters be like that.
‘So I send them to Muslim schools. I don't want to, but it is bad out there.' "
I was a teenage girl not long ago, and I can sympathize with the way this man feels. I can't mention the indignities I've seen "liberated" girls inflict on themselves. And now I have friends who desperately want to become "respectable women", but have no idea how to do it!
When Tocquevile visited America, he noticed American women were more free and less innocent (i.e. sheltered) than their European counterparts, but also fiercer guardians of their own virtue.
But my peer's parents often acted as if morals and manners simply restricted and excluded people, as if they'd lost the sense that freely-chosen moral boundaries empower women especially, and that manners can give those who feel excluded social confidence.
Can we re-own freely-chosen social boundaries so that people needn't fly to oppression for comfort?
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
Claire, please bear with me while I try to explain a dichotomy that perplexes me. Your column on banning the burqa was compelling, and the examples of encroaching Islamist tyranny you cite above make my blood run cold. The moderate Muslim lady you quote is exactly right, of course. The problem, insofar as I can see it, is that while there may be a great many moderate Muslims, their leadership appears decidedly immoderate, and they are crushing their own people.
How do you simultaneously plead the case of these good people against tyrannical Islamic leaders and publish their warnings to us all, while giving the benefit of the doubt to the cleric spearheading the Ground Zero Mosque who can't condemn Hamas, has ties to radical elements as spelled out by Andrew McCarthy, and calls for the spread of Islam in the US?
It seems incompatible to warn of the subjugation of a great many people in Britain at the hands of radical Islamists, while blithely accepting that similar subjugation isn't the goal of Islamist leaders in America. What am I missing?
Aug '10
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
Correction: peers' parents, not peer's. I did have more than one. Ack!
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
Dave, you're referring to my agreement with Conor here, right? I think it's extremely important to separate strong arguments for opposing the mosque from weak ones. We all know about the Islamic doctrine of taqiyya, but that doesn't mean all Moslems are lying about everything, all the time, and to assume so is to risk losing real allies. I have a lot of reservations about this mosque and about Imam Rauf. I've mentioned them. His unwillingness to condemn Hamas is a serious, strong argument. The fact that his wife made a donation to CAIR--that doesn't warm my heart, but it's less strong, as an argument. It's plausible to me that the name Cordoba was chosen out of tone deafness, rather than as a deliberate provocation. Tone deafness is a very common phenomenon. I'd need to know a lot more about Rauf before I could come to a firm judgment. Embracing the bad arguments only makes people who also have serious arguments look like unreasonable lunatics.
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
Claire, yes, I'm referring to that post as well as the one a couple of weeks back about calling their bluff (I can't link to it from my smart phone). While I understand that not all moslems are lying all the time, etc., I question whether this specific cleric, given his connections and history, is lying about the goal of this specific mosque. He published a book with one title in the US, and an extraordinarily different title overseas that referenced dawah in America.
It seems to me at least that the burden of proof is on him to refute these ties and statements, and make the funding of this mosque public. And until he does, why should he get the benefit of the doubt? My fear is that it is our bluff that is being called, and that it may be only a matter of time before the heart-wrenching stories you brought us in this post become common on American soil too. By that time, it may be too late to turn it back.
At any rate, thank you for posting this material and answering my question. Stay safe over there.
Jul '10
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
"I was a teenage girl not long ago, and I can sympathize with the way this man feels. I can't mention the indignities I've seen "liberated" girls inflict on themselves. And now I have friends who desperately want to become "respectable women", but have no idea how to do it!"
"Midget": your remark is the most interesting one I have read in years. It goes to the heart of the West's weakness in facing Islam. Thank you.
Jun '10
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
Claire..."I think it's extremely important to separate strong arguments for opposing the mosque from weak ones."
Whatever Muslims wish to do or believe amongst themselves would absolutely be their business with one huge exception. They are not willing to live by those same rules themselves. If moderate Muslims can figure out a way to ignore the Koran and the Haddiths,and denounce Sharia, I would welcome them anywhere. But are they willing to be half- Muslim? What is a moderate Muslim, anyway? I would love to see a definition. Until I do, even a weak argument for opposing GZM is better than no argument at all. If we do not fight for our own values, the inherent aggressiveness of Islam will overcome us. I will not submit.
MFR, I would hope girls could learn to be respectable (actually, better yet, to have self-respect) without having to suffer the equally indignant repression imposed on them by "non-moderate" Muslims. Whether to suffer the indignities of liberation or the indignities of repression, is that really the question? I think there are other paths to follow.
Aug '10
Re: The Talibanisation of British Children
cdor:
MFR, I would hope girls could learn to be respectable (actually, better yet, to have self-respect) without having to suffer the equally indignant repression imposed on them by "non-moderate" Muslims... I think there are other paths to follow. · Aug 6 at 5:04am
Definitely I agree. That's why I brought Tocqueville up, why I mentioned the importance of freely-chosen moral boundaries and manners.
Whatever their disadvantages, when we in the West lost respect for our traditional moral code(s), we didn't just lose "patriarchal oppression". We also lost some valuable social tools that allowed women, the physically weaker and less-aggressive sex, to be "respectable", that is, to have their self-respect reinforced by their community.
Even so simple a ritual as ballroom dancing -- where "leaders" and "followers" have traditional roles to play, and women get to touch men in an environment where, if the man gets out-of-bounds physically, everyone else there will call him on it -- offers a path between libertinism and oppression.
Heck, even the role-playing and boundaries of BDSM are better than what some young women put themselves through today! There, at least, there are boundaries...