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| ON THE OTHER HAND |
| Europe in 2015 By Antonio C. Abaya Written Feb. 19, 2006 For the Standard Today, February 20 issue Circulating in the Internet these days is a humorous commentary on the clash of civilizations between the nominally Christian but largely secular West and the fervently and uncompromisingly fundamentalist Islamic world. The funniest part in this commentary is a renaming of the countries of Europe (in 2015) to reflect current European fears, obviously exaggerated, that they are being challenged by their growing Muslim communities, if not in population, at least in cultural assertiveness. No, this has nothing to do with the increasingly violent riots in Muslim cities over the editorial cartoons originally published in a Danish newspaper last September, some of which showed the Prophet Mohammed (itself already considered a blasphemous act) as a terrorist, making it a double blasphemy. But both the cartoons and the new map do reflect the growing unease in both communities as secularism erodes both the demographic growth and moral strength of the nominally Christian West, while rising religious fundamentalism stokes the embers of militancy among the Muslims, previously suppressed by the long coercive arms of European colonialism. In the putative map of Europe of 2015, the following changes are suggested: a. Russia is renamed Greater Chechnya. The Russians have not lost the war against the Muslim Chechens, but neither are they winning it. b. Germany becomes the New Turkey, in recognition of the gastarbeiter or guest workers who were flown or trucked in from Anatolia to man the factories of the wirtschaftswunder or economic miracle of the 1960s, and who have chosen to stay (and have multiplied faster than the locals).. c. Wedged between Turkish Germany and Chechen Russia, that most Catholic of all countries, Poland, has become a mere Principality of Poland. d. Bosnia and Herzegovina, the only country named after two twin sisters, has become, more aptly, the Bosnian Sultanate. e. Belgium is renamed Belgistan, for no apparent reason other than its growing Muslim community, not having colonized any predominantly Muslim nation. f. Neighboring Holland, formerly Master of the Moluccas, becomes Euro-Indonesia. g. Italy, including Sardinia and Sicily, has been merged with Albania across the Adriatic, its main source of illegal (Muslim) immigrants, and is renamed the Albanian Federation. h. France, trying to head off the Muslim challenge with a ban on head scarves, has given up and becomes The Islamic Republic of New Algeria. Or New Senegal. i. Spain recovers the ancient glory of the caliphate of Granada with its new name, The Moorish Emirate of Iberia. j. Most amusing of all, the British Isles are renamed North Pakistan, while the resort islands of Majorca and Minorca in the Balearics, favorite haunts of British tourists fleeing from their appalling climate, become the new and vastly diminished British Isles. The other European countries were not renamed. But in the light of recent developments in this clash of civilizations, Denmark and Norway await some clever nomenclature. What?s Arabic for garbage cans? We can all laugh about this, but underneath the nervous laughter must be some soul-searching, by Europeans as well as by other people who must deal with Muslim communities, about what this is all going to lead to. The nominally Christian but largely secular civilization of the West (of which the Philippines has to be considered a part) and the stridently fundamentalist civilization of Islam are on a collision course, as they have never been since the Moorish invasion and occupation of the Iberian Peninsula (from the 8th to the 15th centuries), or the direct clashes on grounds considered sacred by both during the Crusades (11th to the 13th centuries), or the rise and fall of the Ottoman Empire (14th to the 20th centuries). In the 21st century, the West is no longer viewed as much the seat of a rival religion as it is the fountain of secularism that fundamentalists believe is destroying the foundations of their own civilization through hedonism, materialism, sexual permissiveness, pornography, alcoholism, drug addiction and other social malaises. On the other hand, the secular West sees fundamentalist Islam and the theocracy that it espouses as backward, medieval, retrograde, illiberal, a mirror image of what Christian Europe was from the 4th to the 16th centuries when the Church held unchallenged authority over the affairs of Man and State, to which the Europe of today, together with the rest of the Christian world (with the possible exception of the Opus Dei), do not ever want to return. How the two irreconcilable opposites will resolve this impasse by 2015 and beyond is the challenge of our times. That Fukuyama fellow, who pronounced the End of History with the victory of Capitalism over Communism, obviously did not know what he was talking about. ***** Reactions to [email protected]. Other articles in www.tapatt.org OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO |
| Reactions to �Europe in 2015�
Dear Tony, You're right about Fukuyama's book. His book title should have been "The End of History of Mankind As Fiction." Frank Jimenez, [email protected] West Orange, New Jersey, Feb. 23, 2006 wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww You can lay this in part to the very success of birth control and family planning in the west. Europe has attained zero population growth resulting in one of the best living conditions by its white population. However this came at a price. They needed to import labor from their former colonies in order to continue producing while their indigenous had become loathe to perform the lower paying jobs. These laborers bring along their families or start their own and these people do not practice birth control. In essence, Europeans are breeding themselves out of existence. In a way, heavily Catholic Filipinos, wherein the church still holds considerable influence, has benefited from this situation in that it now supplies the labor needs of many of these countries along with their traditional sources in the former colonies. This is happening in the US as well in that America is increasingly becoming Hispanic, mainly because Catholic Hispanics don't practice much birth control either. Notice as well that second to the Hispanics. Filipinos comprise the second biggest ethnic population in the US. The west has become increasingly aware of this situation and are desperately trying to maintain their national identity while at the same time supplying the needs of their industries to maintain their economies. So they have increasingly turned to technology. Device means of production that needs less and less manual labor. The rest they outsource outside, so they no longer need to import the expertise. However, it may be too late for them because having opened the gates, they cannot get rid of those who are already within and are breeding themselves faster than the host population. I wonder what the world will indeed look like, 100 years from now. Lino Ongteco, [email protected] Feb. 23, 2005 MY REPLY. I said as much when I wrote that �(the Turks in Germany) are multiplying faster than the locals. wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Dear Mr. Abaya, If one is to trace the founding essence of all religions, one can readily honestly and sincerely say that all religions are precious pearls connected by the tread of golden divinity. One respected philosopher once said and I quote, "The Christian follows the gently Nazarene in the winding slopes of Calvary. The Buddist follows his great emancipator through his wanderings in the wilderness. The Mohammedan makes his pilgrimage across the desert sands to the black tent of Mecca. Truth leads, and ignorance follows in his train." Religion is the _expression of man's belief in and reverence for a superhuman power recognized as the creator and governor of the universe. It is a divinely inspired code of morals. A religions person is one inspired to nobler living by this code, his source of illumination. However, the practice of religion has divided people into sects and superstitious ways of relating themselves to God, with meaningless ceremonies, often involving cruelty. To emerge out of such untruth and hatred, there is an urgent need to rediscover truth and a peaceful way of living. While religious hierarchies indeed greatly help mankind to organize the spirit of religion, they are sometimes a menace to freedom of thought and conscience. Thus, you explain rightly in your article. Jesse Alto, [email protected] Feb. 23, 2006 wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Say the Muslims in Europe, to avail themselves of a higher standard of living, have been residing in mostly Western Europe for a few generations. I think it's almost time for them to adjust to the dynamic changes in cultural and religious mores. If they think they have a better life in the Middle East or Africa, what's there to prevent them from going back to their beloved land and adhere to their ultra conservative beliefs hardly changing over so many centuries. No reason to be burning edifices belonging to their gracious hosts. Such gratitude. Teddyboy Tagle, [email protected] Feb. 23, 2006 wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Your article entitled "Europe in 2015" is not really funny. Let's face it, the Muslims are multiplying like crazy in our midst and imposing their own culture on the rest of us, and this is also not funny. Recently, I visited my home province of Biliran, that bucolic Visayan island beside Leyte, and I was surprised to see Maranaos selling their wares in the public market of Naval, the provincial capital. I simply did not expect these people to find their way to this very remote place. As a resident of Kidapawan City in Cotabato province, I can attest to the fact that wherever our brother Muslims settle, the area soon becomes a breeding ground for drug dealers, gun smugglers, insurgents, kidnappers, and other assorted criminals. These no-goods are protected within Islamic communities. Ever heard of a Muslim community giving up one of their own who committed a c rime against a Christian? As one who grew up in Cotabato, I haven't. I am therefore fearful that Biliran, a beautiful island proud of its "drug-free" environment, will not be so beautiful anymore. Ever noticed that wherever Muslims congregate, the place immediately becomes relatively inaccessible to Christians except for those who buy their (Muslim's) goods? Think about that Muslim community in Quiapo. It's also dangerous to let a Muslim head an agency in a Christian area; he'll bring in his relatives and they'll make a permanent community in that area. Pretty soon they'll have enclaves everywhere in the archipelago and our ball-less and greedy politicians who care only for votes and fearful for their lives (Muslim communities may be small in Christian areas but their residents act in unison and do not hesitate in harming Christians who annoy them) will not do anything about this. Not much later, we'll have to rename our country. How about Greater Bangsa Moro Islamic Republic? The Europeans may have problems with Muslims in their midst, but our problem is much, much bigger and there is no solution in sight. Hermenegildo Gutierrez, [email protected] Feb. 23, 2006 wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww A message dated 2/22/2006 9:51:58 AM Eastern Standard Time, [email protected] writes: The nominally Christian but largely secular civilization of the West (of which the Philippines has to be considered a part) and the stridently fundamentalist civilization of Islam are on a collision course, as they have never been since the Moorish invasion and occupation of the Iberian Peninsula (from the 8th to the 15th centuries), or the direct clashes on grounds considered sacred by both during the Crusades (11th to the 13th centuries), or the rise and fall of the Ottoman Empire (14th to the 20th centuries). The degree of fanaticism with which both the extremists of both religions, Christianity and Islam practice their faith, will relegate both camps in the fringes of advanced and developed civililzations of the next century. It is wrong to generalize people according to their religious affiliation. There are, in both religions, extremists who we, the moderate, tolerant believers must learn to distinguish from ourselves. We should move on...as we are now increasingly discovering and enjoying the power of the democratic processes in bettering our system of government. Meanwhile, there will always be extremists who, through terrorism, would try to impose themselves on others....we just have to keep on...in levelling the playing field and in educating our future generations on the wisdom of equality, open mindedness, and democracy. The goal is to raise our next generations' level of critical thinking so that they all can become problem solvers. The problems these extremists present to us will require the best of our thinking power and the recognition of Christ's way inbedded in the democratic processes. We also need to accept problems they present to us as a natural part of our way of life...since their perverted sense of god and themselves keep them from getting rid of their intolerance of others and from what had become of them: terrorists. Ms. Ott, [email protected] Feb. 23, 2006 Also, may I share with you this speech of John Gokongwei before the graduating class at Ateneo, 2005. Graduates --- I wish I were one of you today, instead of 77-year-old man, giving a speech you will probably forget when you wake up from your hangover tomorrow. You may be surprised I feel this way. Many of you are feeling fearful and apprehensive about your future. You are thinking that, perhaps, your Ateneo diploma will not mean a whole lot in the future in a country with too many problems. And you are probably right. You are thinking that our country is slipping-no, sliding. Again, you may be right. Twenty years ago, we were at par with countries like Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore. Today, we are left way behind. You know the facts. Twenty years ago, the per capita income of the Filipino was 1,000 US dollars. Today, it's 1,100 dollars. That's a growth of only ten percent in twenty years. Meanwhile, Thailand's per capita income today is double ours; Malaysia, triple ours; and Singapore, almost twenty times ours. With globalization coming, you know it is even more urgent to wake up. Trade barriers are falling, which means we will have to compete harder. In the new world, entrepreneurs will be forced to invest their money where it is most efficient. And that is not necessarily in the Philippines. Even for Filipino entrepreneurs, that can be the case. For example, a Filipino brand like Maxx candy can be manufactured in Bangkok --where labor, taxes, power and financing are cheaper and more efficient -- and then exported to other ASEAN countries. This will be a common scenario if things do not change. Pretty soon, we will become a nation that buys everything and produces practically nothing. We will be like the prodigal son who took his father's money and spent it all. The difference is that we do not have a generous father to run back to. But despite this, I am still very excited about the future. I will tell you why later. You have been taught at the Ateneo to be "a person for others." Of course, that is noble: To serve your countrymen. Question is: How? And my answer is: Be an entrepreneur! You may think I am just a foolish man talking mundane stuff when the question before him is almost philosophical. But I am being very thoughtful here, and if I may presume this about myself, being patriotic as well. Entrepreneurship is the answer. We need young people who will find the idea, grab the opportunity, take the risk, and set aside comfort to set up businesses that will provide jobs. But why? What are jobs? Jobs are what allow people to feel useful and build their self-esteem. Jobs make people productive members of the community. Jobs make people feel they are worthy citizens. And jobs make a country worthy players in the world market. In that order of things, it is the entrepreneurs who have the power to harness the creativity and talents of others to achieve a common good. This should leave the world a better place than it was. Let me make it clear: Job creation is a priority for any nation to move forward. For example, it is the young entrepreneurs of Malaysia, Thailand, and Singapore who created the dynamic businesses that have propelled their countries to the top. Young people like yourselves. Meanwhile, in the Philippines, progress is slow. Very little is new. Hardly anything is fresh. With a few exceptions, the biggest companies before the war -- like PLDT, Ayala, and San Miguel -- are still the biggest companies today. All right, being from the Ateneo, many of you probably have offers from these corporations already. You may even have offers from JG Summit. I say: Great! Take these offers, work as hard as you can, learn everything these companies can teach and then leave! If you dream of creating something great, do not let a 9-to-5 job-even a high-paying one-lull you into a complacent, comfortable life. Let that high-paying job propel you toward entrepreneurship instead. When I speak of the hardship ahead, I do not mean to be skeptical but realistic. Even you Ateneans, who are famous for your eloquence, you cannot talk your way out of this one. There is nothing to do but to deal with it. I learned this lesson when, as a 13-year-old, I lost my dad. Before that, I was like many of you: a privileged kid. I went to Cebu's best school; lived in a big house; and got free entrance to the Vision, the largest movie house in Cebu, which my father owned. Then my dad died, and I lost all these. My family had become poor -- poor enough to split my family. My mother and five siblings moved to China where the cost of living was lower. I was placed under the care of my Grand Uncle Manuel Gotianuy, who put me through school. But just two years later, the war broke out, and even my Uncle Manuel could no longer see me through. I was out in the streets -- literally. Looking back, this time was one of the best times of my life. We lost everything, true, but so did everybody! War was the great equalizer. In that setting, anyone who was willing to size up the situation, use his wits, and work hard, could make it! It was every man for himself, and I had to find a way to support myself and my family. I decided to be a market vendor. Why? Because it was something that I, a 15-year-old boy in short pants, could do. I started by selling simple products in the palengke half an hour by bike from the city. I had a bicycle. I would wake up at five in the morning, load thread, soap and candles into my bike, and rush to the palengke. I would rent a stall for one peso a day, lay out my goods on a table as big as this podium, and begin selling. I did that the whole day. I sold about twenty pesos of goods every day. Today, twenty pesos will only allow you to send twenty text messages to your crush, but 63 years ago, it was enough to support my family. And it left me enough to plow back into my small, but growing, business. I was the youngest vendor in the palengke, but that didn't faze me. In fact, I rather saw it as an opportunity. Remember, that was 63 years and 100 pounds ago, so I could move faster, stay under the sun more, and keep selling longer than everyone else. Then, when I had enough money and more confidence, I decided to travel to Manila from Cebu to sell all kinds of goods like rubber tires. Instead of my bike, I now traveled on a batel -- a boat so small that on windless days, we would just float there. On bad days, the trip could take two weeks! During one trip, our batel sank! We would have all perished in the sea were it not for my inventory of tires. The viajeros were happy because my tires saved their lives, and I was happy because the viajeros, by hanging on to them, saved my tires. On these long and lonely trips I had to entertain myself with books, like Gone With The Wind. After the war, I had saved up 50,000 pesos. That was when you could buy a chicken for 20 centavos and a car for 2,000 pesos. I was 19 years old. Now I had enough money to bring my family home from China. Once they were all here, they helped me expand our trading business to include imports. Remember that the war had left the Philippines with very few goods. So we imported whatever was needed and imported them from everywhere-including used clothes and textile remnants from the United States. We were probably the first ukay-ukay dealers here. Then, when I had gained more experience and built my reputation, I borrowed money from the bank and got into manufacturing. I saw that coffee was abundant, and Nescafe of Nestle was too expensive for a country still rebuilding from the war, so my company created Blend 45. That was our first branded hit. And from there, we had enough profits to launch Jack and Jill. From one market stall, we are now in nine core businesses-including retail, real estate, publishing, petrochemicals, textiles, banking, food manufacturing, Cebu Pacific Air and Sun Cellular. When we had shown success in the smaller businesses, we were able to raise money in the capital markets -- through IPOs and bond offerings -- and then get into more complex, capital-intensive enterprises. We did it slow, but sure. Success doesn't happen overnight. It's the small successes achieved day by day that build a company. So, don't be impatient or focused on immediate financial rewards. I only started flying business class when I got too fat to fit in the economy seats. And I even wore a used overcoat while courting my wife-it came from my ukay-ukay business. Thank God Elizabeth didn't mind the mothball smell of my overcoat or maybe she wouldn't have married me. Save what you earn and plow it back. And never forget your families! Your parents denied themselves many things to send you here. They could have traveled around the world a couple of times with the money they set aside for your education, and your social life, and your comforts. Remember them -- and thank them. When you have families of your own, you must be home with them for at least one meal everyday. I did that while I was building my company. Now, with all my six children married, I ask that we spend every Sunday lunch together, when everything under the sun is discussed. As it is with business, so it is with family. There are no short cuts for building either one. Remember, no short cuts. Saint Ignatius of Loyola, your patron saint, and founder of this 450-year old organization I admire, described an ideal Jesuit as one who "lives with one foot raised." I believe that means someone who is always ready to respond to opportunities. Saint Ignatius knew that, to build a successful organization, he needed to recruit and educate men who were not afraid of change but were in fact excited by it. In fact, the Jesuits were one of the earliest practitioners of globalization. As early as the 16th century, upon reaching a foreign country, they compiled dictionaries in local languages like Tamil and Vietnamese so that they could spread their message in the local language. In a few centuries, they have been able to spread their mission in many countries through education. The Jesuits have another quote. "Make the whole world your house" which means that the ideal Jesuit must be at home everywhere. By adapting to change, but at the same time staying true to their beliefs, the Society of Jesus has become the long-lasting and successful organization it is today and has made the world their house. So, let live with one foot raised in facing the next big opportunity: globalization. Globalization can be your greatest enemy. It will be your downfall if you are too afraid and too weak to fight it out. But it can also be your biggest ally. With the Asian Free Trade agreement and tariffs near zero, your market has grown from 80 million Filipinos to half a billion Southeast Asians. Imagine what that means to you as an entrepreneur if you are able to find a need and fill it. And imagine, too, what that will do for the economy of our country! Yes, our government may not be perfect, and oureconomic environment not ideal, but true entrepreneurs will find opportunities anywhere. Look at the young Filipino entrepreneurs who made it. When I say young-and I'm 77, remember-I am talking , Ben Chan of Bench, Rolando Hortaleza of Splash, the guys who weren't content with the 9-to-5 job, who were willing to delay their gratification and comfort, and who created something new, something fresh. Something Filipinos are now very proud of. They all started small but now sell their hamburgers, T-shirts andcosmetics in Asia, America, and the Middle East. In doing so, these young Filipino entrepreneurs created jobs while doing something they were passionate about. Globalization is an opportunity of a lifetime-for you. And that is why I want to be out there with you instead of here behind this podium-perhaps too old and too slow to seize the opportunities you can. Let me leave you with one last thought. Trade barriers have fallen. The only barriers left are the barriers you have in your mind. So, Ateneans, Class of 2004, heed the call of entrepreneurship. With a little bit of will and a little bit of imagination, you can turn this crisis into your patriotic moment-and truly become a person for others. "Live with one foot raised and make the world your house." To this great University, my sincerest thanks for this singular honor conferred on me today. To the graduates, congratulations and Godspeed. "Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam". Thank you. wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww British Muslims: �a state within a state' By Alasdair Palmer Feb. 19, 2006 For the past two weeks, Patrick Sookhdeo has been canvassing the opinions of Muslim clerics in Britain on the row over the cartoons featuring images of Mohammed that were first published in Denmark and then reprinted in several other European countries. "They think they have won the debate," he says with a sigh. "They believe that the British Government has capitulated to them, because it feared the consequences if it did not. "The cartoons, you see, have not been published in this country, and the Government has been very critical of those countries in which they were published. To many of the Islamic clerics, that's a clear victory. "It's confirmation of what they believe to be a familiar pattern: if spokesmen for British Muslims threaten what they call 'adverse consequences' - violence to the rest of us - then the British Government will cave in. I think it is a very dangerous precedent." Dr Sookhdeo adds that he believes that "in a decade, you will see parts of English cities which are controlled by Muslim clerics and which follow, not the common law, but aspects of Muslim sharia law. "It is already starting to happen - and unless the Government changes the way it treats the so-called leaders of the Islamic community, it will continue." For someone with such strong and uncompromising views, Dr Sookhdeo is a surprisingly gentle and easy-going man. He speaks with authority on Islam, as it was his first faith: he was brought up as a Muslim in Guyana, the only English colony in South America, and attended a madrassa there. "But Islamic instruction was very different in the 1950s, when I was at school," he says. "There was no talk of suicide bombing or indeed of violence of any kind. Islam was very peaceful." Dr Sookhdeo's family emigrated to England when he was 10. In his early twenties, when he was at university, he converted to Christianity. "I had simply seen it as the white man's religion, the religion of the colonialists and the oppressors - in a very similar way, in fact, to the way that many Muslims see Christianity today. " Leaving Islam was not easy. According to the literal interpretation of the Koran, the punishment for apostasy is death - and it actually is punished by death in some Middle Eastern states. "It wasn't quite like that here," he says, "although it was traumatic in some ways." Dr Sookhdeo continued to study Islam, doing a PhD at London University on the religion. He is currently director of the Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity. He also advises the Army on security issues related to Islam. Several years ago, Dr Sookhdeo insisted that the next wave of radical Islam in Britain would involve suicide bombings in this country. His prediction was depressingly confirmed on 7/7 last year. So his claim that, in the next decade, the Muslim community in Britain will not be integrated into mainstream British society, but will isolate itself to a much greater extent, carries weight behind it. Dr Sookhdeo has proved his prescience. "The Government, and Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, are fundamentally deluded about the nature of Islam," he insists. "Tony Blair unintentionally revealed his ignorance when he said, in an effort to conciliate Muslims, that he had 'read through the Koran twice' and that he kept it by his bedside. "He thought he was saying something which showed how seriously he took Islam. But most Muslims thought it was a joke, if not an insult. Because, of course, every Muslim knows that you cannot read the Koran through from cover to cover and understand it. The chapters are not written to be read in that way. Indeed, after the first chapter, the chapters of the Koran are ordered according to their length, not according to their content or chronology: the longest chapters are first, the shorter ones are at the end. "You need to know which passage was revealed at what period and in what time in order to be able to understand it - you cannot simply read it from beginning to end and expect to learn anything at all. "That is one reason why it takes so long to be able to read and understand the Koran: the meaning of any part of it depends on a knowledge of its context - a context that is not in the Koran itself." The Prime Minister's ignorance of Islam, Dr Sookhdeo contends, is of a piece with his unsuccessful attempts to conciliate it. And it does indeed seem as if the Government's policy towards radical Islam is based on the hope that if it makes concessions to its leaders, they will reciprocate and relations between fundamentalist Muslims and Tony Blair's Government will then turn into something resembling an ecumenical prayer meeting. Dr Sookhdeo nods in vigorous agreement with that. "Yes - and it is a very big mistake. Look at what happened in the 1990s. The security services knew about Abu Hamza and the preachers like him. They knew that London was becoming the centre for Islamic terrorists. The police knew. The Government knew. Yet nothing was done. "The whole approach towards Muslim militants was based on appeasement. 7/7 proved that that approach does not work - yet it is still being followed. For example, there is a book, The Noble Koran: a New Rendering of its Meaning in English, which is openly available in Muslim bookshops. "It calls for the killing of Jews and Christians, and it sets out a strategy for killing the infidels and for warfare against them. The Government has done nothing whatever to interfere with the sale of that book. "Why not? Government ministers have promised to punish religious hatred, to criminalise the glorification of terrorism, yet they do nothing about this book, which blatantly does both." Perhaps the explanation is just that they do not take it seriously. "I fear that is exactly the problem," says Dr Sookhdeo. "The trouble is that Tony Blair and other ministers see Islam through the prism of their own secular outlook. They simply do not realise how seriously Muslims take their religion. Islamic clerics regard themselves as locked in mortal combat with secularism. "For example, one of the fundamental notions of a secular society is the moral importance of freedom, of individual choice. But in Islam, choice is not allowable: there cannot be free choice about whether to choose or reject any of the fundamental aspects of the religion, because they are all divinely ordained. God has laid down the law, and man must obey. 'Islamic clerics do not believe in a society in which Islam is one religion among others in a society ruled by basically non-religious laws. They believe it must be the dominant religion - and it is their aim to achieve this . "That is why they do not believe in integration. In 1980, the Islamic Council of Europe laid out their strategy for the future - and the fundamental rule was never dilute your presence. That is to say, do not integrate. "Rather, concentrate Muslim presence in a particular area until you are a majority in that area, so that the institutions of the local community come to reflect Islamic structures. The education system will be Islamic, the shops will serve only halal food, there will be no advertisements showing naked or semi-naked women, and so on." That plan, says Dr Sookhdeo, is being followed in Britain. "That is why you are seeing areas which are now almost totally Muslim. The next step will be pushing the Government to recognise sharia law for Muslim communities - which will be backed up by the claim that it is "racist" or "Islamophobic" or "violating the rights of Muslims" to deny them sharia law. "There's already a Sharia Law Council for the UK. The Government has already started making concessions: it has changed the law so that there are sharia-compliant mortgages and sharia pensions. "Some Muslims are now pressing to be allowed four wives: they say it is part of their religion. They claim that not being allowed four wives is a denial of their religious liberty. There are Muslim men in Britain who marry and divorce three women, then marry a fourth time - and stay married, in sharia law, to all four. "The more fundamentalist clerics think that it is only a matter of time before they will persuade the Government to concede on the issue of sharia law. Given the Government's record of capitulating, you can see why they believe that." Dr Sookhdeo's vision of a relentless battle between secular and Islamic Britain seems hard to reconcile with the co-operation that seems to mark the vast majority of the interactions between the two communities. "Well, it isn't me who says Islam is at war with secularisation," he says. "That's how Islamic clerics describe the situation." But isn't it true that most Muslims who live in theocratic states want to get out of them as quickly as possible and live in a secular country such as Britain or America? And that most Muslims who come to Britain adopt the values of a liberal, democratic, tolerant society, rather than insisting on the inflexible rules of their religion? "You have to distinguish between ordinary Muslims and their self-appointed leaders," explains Dr Sookhdeo. "I agree that the best hope for our collective future is that the majority of Muslims who have grown up here have accepted the secular nature of the British state and society, the division between religion and politics, and the importance of allowing people to choose freely how they will live. "But that is not how most of the clerics talk. And, more significantly, it is not how the 'community leaders' whom the Government has decided represent the Muslim community think either. "Take, for example, Tariq Ramadan, whom the Government has appointed as an adviser because ministers think he is a 'community leader'. Ramadan sounds, in public, very moderate. But in reality, he has some very extreme views. He attacks liberal Muslims as 'Muslims without Islam'. He is affiliated to the violent and uncompromising Muslim Brotherhood. "He calls the education in the state schools of the West 'aggression against the Islamic personality of the child'. He has said that 'the Muslim respects the laws of the country only if they do not contradict any Islamic principle'. He has added that 'compromising on principles is a sign of fear and weakness'." So what's the answer? What should the Government be doing? "First, it should try to engage with the real Muslim majority, not with the self-appointed 'community leaders' who don't actually represent anyone: they have not been elected, and the vast majority of ordinary Muslims have nothing to do with them. "Second, the Government should say no to faith-based schools, because they are a block to integration. There should be no compromise over education, or over English as the language of education. The policy of political multiculturalism should be reversed. "The hope was that it would to ensure separate communities would soften at the edges and integrate. But the opposite has in fact happened: Islamic communities have hardened. There is much less integration than there was for the generation that arrived when I did. There will be much less in the future if the present trend continues. "Finally, the Government should make it absolutely clear: we welcome diversity, we welcome different religions - but all of them have to accept the secular basis of British law and society. That is a non-negotiable condition of being here. "If the Government does not do all of those things then I fear for the future, because Islamic communities within Britain will form a state within a state. Religion will occupy an ever-larger place in our collective political life. And, speaking as a religious man myself, I fear that outcome." wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Muslims in Australia Interview with Ray Marten November 11, 2005. http://www.treasurer.gov.au/tsr/content/transcripts/2005/151.asp It was noted that after Peter Costello said this, his popularity ratings went through the roof. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ It would appear that Australia might be ahead of the United States in getting it right. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ CANBERRA: Muslims who want to live under Islamic Sharia law were told on Wednesday to get out of Australia, as the government targeted radicals in abid to head off potential terror attacks. A day after a group of mainstream Muslim leaders pledged loyalty to Australia at a special meeting with Prime Minister John Howard, he and his ministers made it clear that extremists would face a crackdown . Treasurer Peter Costello hinted that some radical clerics could be asked to leave the country if they did not accept that Australia was a secular state and its laws were made by parliament. "If those are not your values, if you want a country which has Sharia law or a theocratic state, then Australia is not for you," he said on national television. "I'd be saying to clerics who are teaching that there are two laws governing people in Australia, one the Australian law and another the Islamic law, that this is false. If you can't agree with parliamentary law, independent courts, democracy, and would prefer Sharia law, and have the opportunity to go to another country which practices it, perhaps, then, that's a better option," Costello said. Asked whether he meant radical clerics would be forced to leave, he said those with dual citizenship could possibly be asked move to the other country. Education Minister Brendan Nelson later told reporters that Muslims who did not want to accept local values should "clear off" "Basically, people who don't want to be Australians, and they don't want to live by Australian values and understand them, well then they can basically clear off," he said. Separately, Howard angered some Australian Muslims on Wednesday by saying he supported spies monitoring the nation's mosques. ***** wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww A Spectator's Role for China's Muslims By JIM YARDLEY, The New York Times February 19, 2006 LINXIA, China ONE FAITH, MANY GROUPS China's 10 Muslim nationalities, including Hui, above, and Uighurs, below, have differed over how much to assimilate into the country's majority culture. But they have found common cause over issues that denigrate Islam. RELIGION is often hidden in China, so the unabashed public display of Islam here in the city known as Little Mecca is particularly striking. Men have beards and wear white caps. Women wear head scarves. Minarets poke up from large mosques. A bookstore sells Korans and religious study guides in Arabic. These are reminders that with almost 21 million followers of Islam, China has roughly as many Muslims as Europe or even Iraq. But the openness of religion in this isolated region along the ancient Silk Road does not mean that China's Muslims are active participants in the protests and seminal debates roiling the larger Islamic world. In that world, they are almost invisible. A case in point is the outrage and violence over the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad that last week continued to ripple through Islamic countries. Here in Linxia, which has more than 80 mosques, news of the cartoons spread quickly. The local religious affairs bureau also moved quickly. Local Muslims say officials visited imams and cautioned them against inciting followers. The same happened in 2003, when a few protests broke out over the American invasion of Iraq. The China Islamic Association, the quasi-governmental agency that regulates Islam, quickly intervened and shut down the protest. Not that most Chinese Muslims need any warning. With 1.3 billion people, China is so huge and Muslims constitute such a tiny minority that most Muslims intuitively learn to keep quiet. "We can talk about these things among ourselves," said a shopper at a Muslim bookstore. "But China has a law. We are not allowed to speak out about these things that are upsetting the Muslim world." The tight government regulation of religion, as well as restrictions on free speech, can even separate Muslims on the Chinese mainland from their peers in Hong Kong, where citizens enjoy far greater civil liberties. On Friday, Hong Kong Muslims held a protest against the cartoons. Human rights groups have long criticized the lack of religious freedom in China and highlighted the harsh treatment of underground Catholics, Tibetan Buddhists and Uighurs, the Muslim ethnic group in the western region of Xinjiang. Yet other Chinese Muslim groups that might be expected to support the Uighurs have rarely done so. Dru C. Gladney, a leading Western scholar on Chinese Muslims, said the country's 10 Muslim nationalities usually find common cause only when they feel an issue denigrates Islam, as was the case with the cartoons. Sometimes, disputes between different factions can end in violence. Mr. Gladney said the largest group, the Hui, regard some Uighurs as unpatriotic separatists who give other Chinese Muslims a bad name. The Hui, he said, have blended fairly well into society by placing pragmatism over religious zeal and adopting the low profile of an immigrant group living in a foreign land � despite their presence in China for more than 1,300 years. "They don't tend to get too involved in international Islamic conflict," said Mr. Gladney, a professor of Asian studies at the University of Hawaii. "They don't want to be branded as radical Muslims." Yet Chinese Muslims should not be considered completely housebroken by authoritarian rule. Since the seventh century, when Islam began arriving in China along trading routes, there have been periodic Muslim revolts. Under the Communist Party, Muslim rage, if mostly contained on international issues, has erupted over localized affronts. Large protests broke out in 1989. Muslims took to the streets to denounce a book that described minarets as phallic symbols and compared pilgrimages to Mecca with orgies. Government officials, who allowed the protests, quickly banned the book and even held a book burning. A few years ago, thousands of Muslims protested in various cities after a pig's head was nailed to the door of a mosque in Henan Province. And last year, riots erupted after Hui from all over central China rushed to the aid of a Muslim involved in a traffic dispute. At the Mayanzhuang Islamic school in Linxia, Ma Huiyun, 40, the director of studies, said the cartoons infuriated him and other local Muslims. "But we have to cooperate with the government," he said. "They asked us to be calm. They said they would speak on our behalf and express our unhappiness." Mr. Ma said Chinese Muslims want closer ties to the Islamic heartland in the Middle East. His school now has two computers to obtain news from the Middle East or about the Iraq war. This year, Mr. Ma made his first pilgrimage to Mecca, one of roughly 10,000 Chinese Muslims estimated to have taken part in the hajj. The government has begun hiring Chinese Muslims to work in Middle Eastern embassies and state-owned companies that do business in the region. But many Muslims here cite obstacles to developing relationships with Muslims in other countries, and as a result, the Chinese remain largely isolated. "There is really not a lot of understanding about us in the outside world," Mr. Ma said. Linxia, once known as Hezhou, has been a center of Islam for centuries and now has a climate of religious tolerance. But Muslims elsewhere in China face more restrictions. In Xinjiang, for example, Muslim schools are tightly monitored and are allowed only limited numbers of students. Many of the same societal problems that fueled protests by Islamic immigrants in Europe � discrimination, lower education levels, higher unemployment, a sense of cultural separation from the dominant majority � can be found in China, too. China's Muslim population is stable, but among upwardly mobile Chinese, Islam is not as popular as Buddhism or Christianity. The pressure to assimilate, too, has watered down Islam in many places; in cities, some people who call themselves Muslims abstain from eating pork but rarely attend mosque. Not so in Linxia. At the Muslim schools in the city, most of the students are young boys from poor families who may one day became imams. It will be their job to navigate the delicate task of being Muslim in China. "Obviously, we're different from Muslims in other parts of the world," said Ma Ruxiong, a teacher at the Nanguan Mosque, the city's oldest. "We just can't go into the streets and protest. You have to have permission from the government. But there are other things we can do. We pray to Allah to protect all Muslims in the world." OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO |