I’ve had several readers send me links to items referencing moderate Muslims. One offered that posting them would serve as response to “the defamers who vilify SDA as anti-Muslim racist”.
While it’s charitable to think that SDA critics might be influenced by actual SDA content, I’ve come to accept that when it comes to those who are motivated by hatred of all things conservative, it doesn’t much matter what I write, or don’t write – someone will find a way to misrepresent it.
But while I was mulling it over, I chanced upon this post at CJunk that that pretty much strips the argument bare;
�Very few people were true Nazis� he said, �but, many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.�
We are told again and again by �experts� and �talking heads� that Islam is the religion of peace, and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unquantified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the specter of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam. The fact is, that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars world wide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honor kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. The hard quantifiable fact is, that the �peaceful majority� is the �silent majority� and it is cowed and extraneous.
During these debates, I’m often reminded* of a chapter in James Gray’s The Winter Years – a series of recollections of the depression on the Canadian prairies. Gray spent many of those years at the Winnipeg Free Press. He tells the story of Paul Ausborn;
Paul Ausborn was a man who heard voices, a sea captain who had sailed the Baltic for the Kaiser in the First World War. After the war, he sold his ship and bought an apartment block in Kiel and served the Weimar Republic in a small way by teaching navigation to German youth. It was while teaching navigation in 1926 that the voices told him that Adolf Hitler was coming to power in Germany and would lead the world to war.
Ausborn sold his property and moved his family to Manitoba. However, he hadn’t escaped the Nazis.
Through his old connections with the Social Democrats in exile, Ausborn obtained a large collection of pictures of the atrocites being committed by the Nazis in Germany. He rented a store on Logan Avenue to show his gallery of infamy to Winnipeg. Nazi sympathizers wrecked his exhibit. He started over and put another exhibition together. at the same time, he scoured the German-Canadian community for supporters and could find only a handful. […] Ausborn was overwhelmed again and again by the force that the Nazis were exerting on the German population of western Canada, and by the lack of interest in his work on the part of other Canadians. He was beaten up by Bundists, and harried by city policeman who saw nothing wrong in Hitler, because the only people Hitler was bothering were Jews and Communists.
As an indication of Ausborn’s physical courage, he and two young friends once invaded a huge pro-Nazi picnic and distributed 6,000 anti-Nazi pamphlets and miraculously escaped unharmed. But in his efforts to rouse the city to the menace of Naziism, he lost every battle, every skirmish even. Nazi agents, on the other hand, infiltrated the university, the schools, the churches, and every other part of the German community. Ausborn was ostracized by the other Germans, most of his family deserted him and with his money gone, he was reduced to living on relief.
[…]
One day early in 1937 he came in to see me in a state of near-collapse. He had received word of the death of an old friend at the hands of the Nazis, and announced he was going to enlist in the International Brigade and fight in Spain. At fifty he was too old to fight, so he drove an ambulance on the Madrid front that summer. He came home to Winnipeg in the fall to give the organization of another anti-Nazi front a whirl. His Spanish interlude made him complete non grata with the city police, but most of us on the Free Press had read Mein Kampf by then and were taking both Ausborn and Hitler seriously. But until the very outbreak of the war, anti-Naziism was a lost cause in Winnipeg and the boisterous rejection of appeasement by the Free Press won it few plaudits.
While the “vast majority” of moderate German Canadians (my mother’s family among them) were peaceful, hard working citizens who held no Nazi sympathies, and would have recoiled at the notion of gassing hundreds of thousands of children in the name of racial purity – in the end, it mattered not a whit. What mattered were the extremists bent on attaining the power to transform a perverse ideology into reality, and the weaponry to export it – and the majority who just sat back and let it all happen.
Jose: “Ok now we get to the nut of it. Based on our situation right now what force would you endorse. Invade and occupy Iran? Expell tens of millions of law abiding productive citizens in Western countries because we think as many of 10 of them might be violent criminals”
How about Muslims in reasonably peaceful countries, and especially western countries, expelling radicals from their mosques. How about Muslims mobilizing to protest terrorism and fanatics instead of protesting every perceived little slight against Islam. How about Muslims issueing news releases denouncing the news releases of fanatics. How about, and this is novel, “peaceful Muslims” standing up and supporting “peaceful” initiatives and showing open displeasure of violence.
It takes nothing to get a violent protest going with Muslims burning, raging, screaming, and chanting death to Jews, America, and all of us. Well, how about a nice, orderly, peaceful march with signs that extoll the apparant “peaceful” nature of Islam, and signs and chants that tell the whole world that Islam is for “peace” not violence. Wow! How novel.
This whole exercise is so frustrating. Are you really that dense Jose? Are you really being sincere? Are you really that blind that you can’t for the life of you come up on your own with at least ten ways in which a group of people can show peaceful support for “peaceful” religion?
As far as the “Muslim states” that you mentioned, but which you earlier on failed to recognize exist: they must be marginalized and bullied into submission. States such as Iran are already “owned” by the fanatics. The peaceful majority within those states have no say and are irrelevant. The only game in town is that of the fanatics. Sad… but historically and pragmatically true. Invade… not yet… but if coersion and bullying don’t work, it may be an unfortunate necessity in the future.
Debris Trail,
A snake can’t bite if it doesn’t have a head.
Cruise missles targeted at Government buildings and the residences of Government officials have a wonderful way of causing the “average joe” to run like hell the other way. Rockets tend to the same.
You would be amazed at the level of paranoid “self-preservation” one can create about going home when you light off a car bomb in a residential area.
You take out the leaders, where ever they might be, and the mass’ will get the message eventually. You assinate, imprison, blow-up, execute, everything that you know is truely part of the problem, pretty soon, no problem.
You don’t tell them your coming either, you just do it. The Mossad could definately give us some lessons in that.
A movement is only as strong as it’s leaders, and if the mass’ discover their leaders were full of shit, then it’s hard to spark up the rhetoric again.
Drastic, but necessary, and no one says anything about persecuting people living in the western world, unless they prove to be part of the problem. We have laws, and the fact that Iran and Syria choose to disregard those laws is reason enough.
In my experience — I was married too one, and then dated one — the words “moderate” and “German” rarely go together.
The one thing you speak of, talk. Negotiating, or debating the issues the Muslim fanatics have with the west in general… that’s the mistake you make.
They don’t give a shit, they seek no settlement. To negotiate implies that there is something both sides want.
The fanatic Muslim wants you dead.
Thats not the greatest place to start a negotiation from.
jose…”Canada defending Israel from Iran ….?”
i don’t think that anyone posted anything insinuating that canada would actually physically send military support to defend Isreal…i know i didn’t. what the hell would canada send, some 60 year old decrepid helicopters that kill more of their passengers then they would enemies, subs that light ablaze in saline water, and some hurculese planes that have recently been deemed unsafe? we are over taxing our military as it is right now…thanks to our various canadian governments over the last few decades our canadian public has been insured that we will be in equiped to defend ourselves if a third world war breaks out
i’m more interested in pointing out that things need to change in this country, everyone needs to wake up and recognize the escalating conflict in the middle east is actually going to affect us here in canada and the rest of the world sooner rather than later…
oh and sure the islamic extremists have lost ground in some countries in the last 20 years… i just find it funny that you use Afganistan as one of your examples… it took a hell of a lot of american bombs and allied boots on the ground to clean out the taliban from that country (well we haven’t gotten rid of them completely, there is still the odd roadside bombing now isnt there.. ) it took military action, that is what i’m getting at here, talking to them wasnt going to get them to lay down their arms and turn in the terorrist… anyways kinda baffled how the afgani example fits into your arguement that we should just give the islamic nations 30 years to cool off and get with the times….
also maybe your right, osama isnt exactly like hitler… maybe he’s more like Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel – Nazi Chief of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces
eo
Jose ,
Oh dear where can I start.
When your inanities are under heavy attack you must take your time. Serious obfustication cannot be rushed even for someone as talented as yourself .
” If Iran makes a move on Israel or is about to get a nuclear weapon I’d support taking action. We may be at that latter point now.”
The west enjoys a terrific firepower advantage over Iran. Heck even Israel does. Canada defending Israel from Iran is a bit like Belgium defending the United States from Canada. Sure if it really comes to that but it’s not going to is it.”
Gobblygook is no defence to nuclear weapons.
“For examples where radical islamic terrorists have lost ground in the last 20 years I list Libya, Egypt, Lebanon, Afghanistan Syria and possibly even Pakistan.
Libya, Egypt -two aging dictatorships trying to hold them back
Lebanon, Syria Well- OK, everything is cool there except for the rubble of the Danish embassies.
Afghanistan- should we tell the PPCLI to get comfortable and take off that cumbersome body armour?
Pakistan Tell General Musharraf, he night disagree
“Osama Bin Laden isn’t a religous traditionalist he’s a 20th century intellectual.”
That’s a good one! I wish you could tell him yourself. Just as they were preparing to give you a Wahabi haircut, just tell them, ” But that’s just my opinion!”
“Professor “Two blatant lies”-1. Radical Islam isn’t Nazi Germany and we don’t have people like Kate being persecuted by their agents and supporters. 2. They don’t control a national government and are more likely to be killed by other muslims.
Huh. Since I’m stating my opinion I assume you mean to say that I a) Hold a different opinion and am misintrepreting it.”
Saying it is just your opinion doesn’t keep it from being a lie. At best it’s willful ignorance.
Journalists and dissenters are persecuted throughout most if not all of the Muslim world. Other posters have pointed out which countries are controlled by Islamists.
Perhaps you a reincarnation of Chancy Gardener. Someone so obtuse that they are sometimes taken to be a sage.
Latvian president apologizes war crimes
The Jerusalem Post ^ | Feb. 20, 2006 | GREER FAY CASHMAN
Posted on 02/21/2006 3:02:40 PM PST by lizol
Latvian president apologizes war crimes
By GREER FAY CASHMAN
Standing in the grounds of Beit Hanassi at a state reception hosted for her by President Moshe Katsav, Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga, looking directly at the Israeli military honor guard standing in front of her, apologized to the Jewish people for Latvian war crimes.
“We are deeply sorry about the participation of Latvia in the atrocities of the Holocaust,” she said, adding that Latvia was deeply committed to its children growing up with a full understanding of what happened under Nazi and Soviet occupation, including the collaboration that occurred.
Taking her cue from Katsav, who had referred to parallels in Israeli and Latvian history, Vike-Freiberga said that Latvia, which for most of its history has been under foreign domination, has a special sympathy for the people of Israel in their striving for independence. +
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1583023/posts
The natural end result of appeasement: Death. +
JPost.com � Israel � Article
Feb. 21, 2006 19:46
Hamas calls for the nuclear destruction of Israel
By MARGOT DUDKEVITCH
Details released by the Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) on Tuesday revealed that graphics appearing on the Hamas website call for the destruction of Israel in a nuclear holocaust. +
http://www.rapp.org/url/?QLYPJNVB +
Hitler wrote Mein Kampf in Landsberg prison in 1924 and the destruction of the Jews is advocated time and again:
“It is the inexorable Jew who struggles for his domination over the nations. No nation can remove this hand from its throat except by the sword … Such a process is and remains a bloody one.”
On 21 January 1939 Adolf Hitler told the Czech Foreign Minister Chvalkovsky: “We are going to destroy the Jews … The day of reckoning has come.” +
http://www.shoah.dk/Hitler/new_page_12.htm
Kate, great post. I recently came across a book called No Escape: My Young Years Under Hitler’s Shadow by W. John Koch (Koch Publishing, Edmonton, AB 2004) in which the author, who came of age in Germany during the Hitler years, made many of the same points you did about the German public and their attitudes toward Hitler. The gist is that nobody really wanted to recognize the Nazis for what they were, for a variety of reasons…until it was too late to do anything about it. Obviously, some of us are making the same mistake with radical Islam…and not just within Islam, but the broader culture as well.
Like Jose, for example:
“The west enjoys a terrific firepower advantage over Iran. Heck even Israel does. Canada defending Israel from Iran is a bit like Belgium defending the United States from Canada. Sure if it really comes to that but it’s not going to is it.”
You really think Mutual Assured Destruction will work against apocalyptic religious fanatics, Jose? Especially when Iran’s psychotic leader, Almandijani, sees himself as a messianic figure destined to lead all Islam to glory and world domination…and if it doesn’t work out, he’s got 72 virgins to endlessly ravish in the afterlife?
Yes, we could turn Iran into a sheet of glass if they tried anything…but that’ll be small consolation to anybody caught in the blast radius and fallout pattern of detonating Iranian nukes. Which is the only thing worse than going to war to prevent Iran from acquiring WMD, should we have to…would be letting them have them.
Here’s a familiar quote, rife with irony:
“A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. ”
So said Margaret Mead
Depends on what you mean by “thoughtful” I guess – you should read about Mead’s own since-discredited work and her own agenda.
I suppose the mosque troublemakers probably think of themselves as thoughtful students of the Koran.
Wes S- “Yes, we could turn Iran into a sheet of glass if they tried anything.”
Why would that be necessary? A conventional strike on their facilities prior to the weapon’s completion is more than sufficient.
Spot on Kate.
Weekend before last there was a classic article in the Globe. Some unelected “moderate” muslim leader spoke to a Globe hack and expressed his delight that Canada was populated by such moderate muslims that they are able to march in the streets and demand the end of free speech without turning to violence. Fantastic. My only comment was that these mulim leaders in Canada would have a lot more credibility if they also marched in the streets to protest honour killings, ritual rapes, public stoning, beheading of aid workers and a thousand sins committed in the name of Islam. When they take a stand on those issues, and actually ATTEMPT to wrestle the name of Islam away from the extremists, then I’ll be much more in the mood to accept their sanctimoneous pat-on-the-head for Canadian multiculturalism.
Give me an Idea and I will move the world. H/T Archimedes (287 B.C.-212 B.C. circa). +
ERIC S. RAYMOND:
Americans have never really understood ideological warfare. Our gut-level assumption is that everybody in the world really wants the same comfortable material success we have. We use �extremist� as a negative epithetic. Even the few fanatics and revolutionary idealists we have, whatever their political flavor, expect everybody else to behave like a bourgeois.
We don�t expect ideas to matter � or, when they do, we expect them to matter only because people have been flipped into a vulnerable mode by repression or poverty. Thus all our divagation about the �root causes� of Islamic terrorism, as if the terrorists� very clear and very ideological account of their own theory and motivations is somehow not to be believed.
By contrast, ideological and memetic warfare has been a favored tactic for all of America�s three great adversaries of the last hundred years � Nazis, Communists, and Islamists.
Read the whole thing. + via instapundit
http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=260#
Couple of things I’d like to note as this discussion unfolds:
1) Islamism is far more dangerous than Nazism. It’s way more difficult to become a White Supremacist Super Aryan Man God than it is to submit your will to Islamism. Anyone, of any pigmentation, either gender or differing social backgrounds can quite succesfully join and die for Allah. In other words, the recruitment pool is deeper.
2) The destruction of Iran’s nuclear facilities or even the entire bloody country in no way diminishes the overall threat, it just lengthens the timeline. While they enjoy state protection around the globe, it isn’t necessary. The control structure is decentralized. It’s a Hydra, not a snake.
Also, look at how grievances were/are exploited by the Nazis and Islamists. Occasionally some may have some validity, but are irrelevant to the long-term goals and ideology. Therefore, it becomes convenient for the “moderates” to ignore the ideology and divert attention elsewhere, thus hitching a ride with the extremists.
That’s what we see today with certain groups and individuals denouncing “violence”, but not the ideology that spawns and mandates the violence. Instead we hear about Israel, US foreign policy, cartoons, etc…
You didn’t have to resort to history to make your point. In fact, in constantly talking about the evil Nazis, you also make all Germans forever feel uncomfortable. By constantly referring to Nazis, you make it sound like they were the only evil cultural group to strike this earth, when in fact, all cultures are guilty of similar evils. So why not give it a rest…instead you could refer to current events, for example, the rampage in Nigeria against Christians, to make your point?
“Rioters have killed at least 16 people in Nigeria during a demonstration against cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.Thousands of Muslims attacked Christians and burned at least 15 churches in Maiduguri in the north east of the country. Witnesses said three children and a Catholic priest were among those killed.
An Associated Press reporter told how mobs of Muslim protesters swarmed the city centre with machetes, sticks and iron rods.
One group threw a tyre around a man, poured petrol on him and set him ablaze.”
Now, I can’t think of a single good reason why the cartoons published by a newspaper in Denmark, would give even a fanatical extremist any excuse to rampage against Christians in Nigeria.
Great post. And the quote, “History is like a long running West End theatre production. The play is the same but the actors change from year to year”, by Antenor is spot-on, too.
There are numerous arguments to the inaccurate platitude “Religion of Peace” to describe Islam, and the incident summary and body count at thereligionofpeace.com bears these out.
What amazes me is Canadians: we have the possibility of a totally whacked president of a fundamentalist islamic country trying to arm himself with nukes (the same country that believes Israel should be wiped off the map, let’s not forget), and what is the biggest issue to Canada and its politicians?
Government-sponsored daycare.
Gawd. No wonder we are ignored on the world stage, and with justification too. It’s not that Canada punches below its weight, foreign-policy and diplomacy-wise, but that it doesn’t punch at all.
mhb23re
Grandpa and the Nazis
As a descendant of Germans who emigrated to Western Canada, Kate McMillan is no stranger to the idea of enemy sympathizers during armed conflict. She links to a post at CJunk which relates the plight of German Canadians who were against Nazi Germany …
I’m frankly puzzled that so few of you who now praise Kate for offering a post purporting to draw connections between the present global situation of Muslims and the pre-WW II situation of Canadian Germans have spent so little time thinking about the implications of the narratives she cites.
Seriously, are none of you even the least bit disturbed by Kate’s (apparently willful) ignorance of, for example, the relationship between the aims of what might be termed the fascist fanatic fringe and the Canadian government’s own record during the 1910s, 20s and 30s?
Or are media-fostered cliches enough to satisfy you all?
Stephen:
I am sure Kate can expand on the historical parallels. I am however, puzzled that you expect her to do so, given that they are obvious and a de facto reason for the post. Please explain: either you have an extremely interesting perspective on the issues, or we shall be entertained by historical revisionism of the highest order.
Speaking up against the ideology of Nazism does not mean that you hate all Germans. Speaking up against the ideology of Islam does not mean that you are a rascist and hate all Muslims. Leftists do not seem to get this. I can’t begin to count all the times liberals have called me a bigot or Islamophobe for simply pointing out the historical aspects of the ideology of Islam. Liberals I know look at me like I have 2 heads when I tell them about dhimmis, or how Islam rearranged the stories of the Old and New Testaments and then proclaimed that the perfidious Jews were lying again.
Kate’s post about how people saw nothing wrong with Hitler is stunning in how it resembles what is going on today. It was also the same in the Cold War. People thought the Communists were just fine and that they were just responding to the evil Americans. History seems to be repeating itself, maybe until we all catch on. I just hope that Canada does not end up on the wrong side of history.
“Now, I can’t think of a single good reason why the cartoons published by a newspaper in Denmark, would give even a fanatical extremist any excuse to rampage against Christians in Nigeria.”
That is because they don’t need an excuse. It was what they wanted to do all along. Now they have a pretense to accomplish that.
Hitler’s holocaust was inspired by the Ottoman Muslims. He noted that the world was passive towards the early 20th century Ottoman genocide of Armenians and Christian minorities. Of which they still haven’t taken responsibility for.
As for moderate Muslims. Ontario passed a law outlawing all pitbulls, based on the violent behaviour of a few. Until the breed is completely eliminated, pitbulls must be muzzled in public.
Could the same thinking be applied to people with an ideology deemed to be dangerous to the safety of the general public? We’ll see.
Stuff & Things XXI
Cats in Sinks in the site to go to if you want to see high-quality pictures of cats in sinks.Mark Bourrie has rolled over for Warren Kinsella. While it’s probably the smart thing to do, I’m a little disappointed. I’m…
Irwin Daisy “Could the same thinking be applied to people with an ideology deemed to be dangerous to the safety of the general public?”
You don’t understand Islam isn’t an ideology its a pernicous force probably genetic that is incompatible with all other lifeforms on this planet. It must be confronted with maximum force. Using conventional counter terrorism weapons such as the M1 of F-18 is just the kind of cowardly, self hating appeasment tactic the morally bankrupt left would employ. No we need to employ tactical nuclear weapons. Anything less will simply be seen as a sign of weakness.
Jose: Huh?
Islam is a belief system that preys on the impoverished, uneducated and disenfranchised. It is imperialist and warlike by nature, the whole of humanity is either in the house of submission or the house of war. It’s a sin for it’s adherents to question any part of the Quran – even though Mohammed or whoever, plagerised much earlier Jewish and Christian texts and twisted these stories to suit their own ends. It isn’t just it’s most radical followers who want to convert the world to Islam or dhimmitude by whatever means necessary, it’s what the ‘religion’s’ key imperative is.
It’s not just the west that has to have a better understanding of Islam, and it’s motives, it’s so-called moderate Muslims as well, in order to create some sort of positive change. Otherwise, the question remains, will non-Muslims, the world over start to see Islam as a danger to society and react accordingly? Ask yourself, would you wear a Moe cartoon on a t-shirt in Toronto, or would you be mortally afraid to? Could the same be said with regards to any other religion?
Jose
Your lie-form is incompatible with all other lifeforms on this planet.
I picked up the following review on Arts and Letters Daily that provides some insight into the Europe – danish and by implication canadian multicultural response to Islam.
http://www.nysun.com/pf.php?id=28013&access=219449
It is worth the read.
messianic
Consider This
Part of the whole counting sheep aspect of The Insomniac stems from the way we are not given all the information we need to be truly informed about a given issue. It troubles me. Knowledge is power and this week,
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