Immigration Dozens dead as vehicle crashed into crowd in Nice, France

[Wanderlust]

Stellar comments.

My concern is because there is a concerted effort by these propagandists to preach this ideology in our prisons, to a heavily black population already somewhat inured to violence, many of whom are indeed alienated from "white" society, and many of whom do indeed, in my opinion, suffer from mental illnesses.

Conversion to an Islamic fundamentalist ideology in prison is a valid concern and particularly amongst such a socially vulnerable group, but so far, it thankfully hasn't manifested into much:

The threat of extremist violence has not materialized in any meaningful way. At
most, only one al-Qa’ida-style plot can be linked to American Muslim prisoners adopting
extremist views and orchestrating violent attacks while in prison. This is infinitesimal
compared to the hundreds of thousands of Muslims behind bars and the thousands
released from prison each year.

http://www.ispu.org/pdfs/ISPU_Report_Prison_SpearIt_WEB.pdf

For those who are curious, the report I pulled this quote from is worth a read--it addresses the facts and fictions about Islam in Prison since 9/11.

France is walking a thin line in this regard. I have a feeling it's very different in Sweden, although you would know better, but the French are very tough in terms of policing and counter-terrorism and they've gotten a lot tougher in the last year. Speaking to people who have some knowledge of it, the interaction with the Muslim population has gotten much more intrusive; it makes our now discredited stop and frisk procedures look like a child's game. However, go too far, and it could devolve into civil war.

1.) I agree with your analysis but I also think that another important reason why France, particularly, has been targeted so frequently is in part because of its brutal colonial past in North Africa that has neither been forgiven nor forgotten--it just adds another layer to the simmering tension that has exacerbated the rise of Islamic fundamentalists. It's no coincidence that most of the recent terrorist attacks in Paris have come at the hands of French/Belgian nationals of Moroccan, Algerian and Tunisian descent.

2.) The Swedes definitely utilize more nuance and finesse but a while back, they also came under fire for going too far at times--at one point, they were doing "random" ID checks and searches at the central station, in hopes of ferreting out illegal immigrants but when one lives in a multicultural country like Sweden where there are now many legitimate Swedes of color or of foreign origin, that can be quite problematic and ignite tensions and resentment. Needless to say, this tactic was immediately abandoned.

I don't, to be clear, agree with Davef that the Muslims who would do this constitute .1% of the population. The number who have some sympathy with them is even higher, particularly in Europe.* What Europeans should be asking themselves, in my opinion, is why is that the case, why the discrepancy? Yes, I know, we've gotten different kinds of immigrants to some extent. However, in my opinion, it's also because while they were allowed to immigrate when times were good and they could be useful doing menial work, or in Scandinavia perhaps out of humanitarian motives, there was never any real effort to integrate them. Now, the jobs have dried up, and they sit in their isolated housing units, virtual ghettos you built for them, and the young, especially, who are in limbo because they're not accepted as Europeans, but they're also not Somalis or Algerians or whatever, either, are ripe for this kind of propaganda. I don't understand how this couldn't have been foreseen, but then I think that a lot as I see the stupidity exhibited by the people in charge of these decisions.

Agreed. I'm of the mind that fundamentalism in a modern context has more to do with legitimacy, power, and identity than it does with religion--the angry, the disaffected, the disenfranchised, the marginalized, the "othered," the social outcasts/outsiders, and the mentally ill flock like lambs to the slaughter to every form and manifestation of fundamentalism.

And speaking for Scandinavia and Sweden in particular, there has absolutely been a failure to integrate muslim immigrants into society. The chief reason for this has been because many of them, especially the Somalis, are un/undereducated and unskilled and their Swedish language skills remain subpar--which is connected to the fact that they have been isolated and relegated to the suburban outskirts, devoid of ethnic Swedes, where ghettos unsurprisingly formed overnight. This also inhibits true social and cultural integration because their values don't get the necessary air to breathe, expand and evolve; they stay secluded amongst themselves, many of whom have been entrenched in warfare, violence and fundamentalism for generations. I think the Swedish government's heart has been in the right place but they obviously didn't think everything through and now we have throngs of disaffected youth growing more disaffected by the day.

In terms of questionable associations I would include membership in extreme right wing, quasi-Nazi "white" organizations like those all over eastern Europe and even in countries like Hungary, and people from the Balkans who had any association with the ultra nationalist organizations there which were involved in violence against their neighbors. I don't want you in any country of mine.

What galls me about the obsession with Muslims is that that these extreme right "white" nationalist groups are just as fundamentalist and insane as the Islamic Jihadists are. At the core, they are the same types of angry, lost, misguided, maladapted, mentally ill people:

According to FBI data, the Aryan Brotherhood is particularly deadly. Although its members represent less than one-tenth of 1% of the nation’s entire prison population, its members are responsible for 18% of all prison murders nationwide, numerous violent and drug-related offenses outside of
prison, and of attempting various acts of terrorism. Equally telling is a 2007 prison intelligence assessment indicating that “the prison gangs most capable of using IEDs [Improvised Explosive Devices] are the white supremacy organizations, including the Aryan Brotherhood, the Order of White Knights, and inmates who claim religious affiliation with Druidism and Odinism.”

https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-...ang-aryan-brotherhood-face-federal-indictment

They are also not the very religious type either, as you can see on latest examples of terrorists.

You're right, of course. Religion is just the vehicle, but fundamentalism is more of a social problem than it is a theological one. Fundamentalists are usually comprised of society's most "vulnerable," whether racially, ethnically, culturally, socially, economically or mentally.

 

[Dinarid]

The problem is that Muslims won't engage in any kind of meaningful dialogue. They just call the terrorism "un-Islamic" and since they "aren't real Muslims", the Ummah has no responsibility to deal with them. And then of course cry "Islamophobia" and whine about how Muslims are victims of imperialism and colonialism. I won't take them seriously until they decry the oppression of non-Muslims of the Middle East.

 

[Wanderlust]

I won't take them seriously until they decry the oppression of non-Muslims of the Middle East.

1.) It's ridiculous and unreasonable that all Muslims should have to speak out against acts of terror carried out by Islamic fundamentalists. Why should individual Muslims be held accountable for other people they don't even know just because they share the same religion (and in some cases, they may be part of a different sect)? No one ever makes such requests of Christians. Since 9/11 in the US alone, there have been at least 13 attacks against abortion clinics in the US by Christian terrorists, while there are 7 attacks linked to Islamic extremism and yet no one is asking Pope Francis or all Catholics or all Protestants or all Baptists or all Methodists to condemn those attacks. If you went on a murderous rampage, why should I look to one of my Croatian friends for an apology? Does that make sense?

2.) Furthermore, influential and powerful Muslims have certainly spoken out against acts of terror against Non-Muslims in the Middle East:

Arab League Chief Nabil al-Arabi denounced Monday the “crimes against humanity” committed by ISIS militants in Iraq against the minority Yazidi sect, demanding the perpetrators be brought to justice, Agence France-Presse reported.


Al-Arabi “strongly denounced the crimes, killings, dispossession carried out by the terrorist (ISIS) against civilians and minorities in Iraq that have affected Christians in Mosul and Yazidis,” he said in a statement.


Referring to reports of hundreds of Yazidis killed in the ISIS onslaught, al-Arabi said “these terrorist crimes amount to crimes against humanity that cannot be overlooked.”


“The perpetrators must be held accountable and brought to international justice,” the statement added.

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/New...ghs-options-to-evacuate-trapped-Yazidis-.html

The declaration of a "caliphate" by Islamist militants in Iraq lacks legitimacy and their death threats to Christians are a danger to civilization, Turkey's top cleric, the successor to the last caliph's most senior imam, said."

The statement made against Christians is truly awful. Islamic scholars need to focus on this (because) an inability to peacefully sustain other faiths and cultures heralds the collapse of a civilization," he told Reuters in an interview.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-security-turkey-religion-idUSKBN0FR16120140722

Today, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) denounces the terrorist group known as Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS) for its attacks on Iraq's religious minorities and the destruction of their places of worship.

"ISIS actions against religious minorities in Iraq violate the Quranic teaching, 'Let there be no compulsion in religion' (Surat al-Baqara 2:256) ," said ISNA President Imam Mohamed Magid. "Their actions are to be denounced and are in no way representative of what Islam actually teaches."

http://www.isna.net/isna-denounces-isis-attacks-on-iraqs-religious-minorities.html

“The International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) condemns the forced expulsion of the Christian brothers of Iraq from their homes, cities and provinces,” the group said in a statement posted on the website of its leader, the influential cleric Sheikh Youssef al-Qaradawi on Tuesday.

“These are acts that violate Islamic laws, Islamic conscience and leave but a negative image of Islam and Muslims. They (Christians) are native sons of Iraq and not intruders,” it said. “The aim must be to bury discord, unite the ranks and solve Iraq’s problems, rather than thrusting it into matters that would further complicate the situation,” it added.

The Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Iyad Ameen Madani condemned what the terrorist group, “The Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS)” is committing against innocent Christian Iraqi citizens in Mosul and Nineveh including forced deportation under the threat of execution; thus further tearing apart the social fabric of the Iraqi people."

In a scathing July 24, 2014 editorial on the issue, the London-based Qatari daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi stated that the targeting in Mosul of Christians, who have been part of the history and culture of Iraq for centuries, is the most extensive ethnic cleansing of modern times, and a black mark upon the reputation of Islam and the Muslims. The paper went on to call on moderate Muslims to condemn these terrible actions of the “cancerous” and “terrorist” IS, lest they become complicit in a crime against humanity.

Egyptian sociologist and human rights activist Sa’d Al-Din Ibrahim wrote in his weekly column for the Egyptian daily Al-Masri Al-Yawm that the IS’s barbaric, racist and murderous treatment of Christians, unprecedented in the history of the Arab East, is reminiscent of the Nazis and Tatars, and does great harm to Islam. He called upon the Arab League to condemn the IS’s actions.


Columnist Ahmad Al-Sarraf used a scathingly sarcastic tone to express his outrage. In his column in the Kuwaiti daily Al-Qabas, he told the Christians to leave the Arab lands, because the Arabs no longer have any use for progress, civilization, tolerance or coexistence, but only for backwardness, fanaticism and violence.

Mosul (IraqiNews.com) On Sunday, the most prominent Sunni Muslim cleric of Baghdad and head of the Iraqi Scholars Association in the South condemned the killing of 28 Yazidi citizens and the displacement of 3,000 Christian families from Mosul and urged the European Union and international organizations to intervene.
Sheikh Khalid Al Mulla said, in an interview for IraqiNews.com, that “What a pity that the extremist groups of the organization of Islamic state in Iraq and the Levant wore the dress of Islam falsely to kill and displace the Christian brothers who live with us for thousands of years; we have not seen any harassment of them before,” urging that “the religious scholars and Sunni scientists, in particular, should take responsibility in upholding the true voice of Islam “.

New Delhi: Over 80 Indian Muslims, including activists, intellectuals, community and religious leaders, scholars and academics, representing very many organizations from across India released a joint statement at a press conference held simultaneously in New Delhi and Mumbai at 3.0 PM today, condemning the brutal atrocities of ISIS on minorities and denouncing persecution and violence in the name of Islam.

“Indian Muslims are shocked and pained by the brutality and atrocities being perpetrated by the ISIS (Islamic State of Syria and Iraq) against Christians, Shias, Kurds, Yazidis and other minorities in the regions now under their control,” they said, adding, “We strongly condemn such barbarism which is against the teachings of Islam.”

http://aprildryan.com/2014/08/22/muslim-groups-leaders-condemn-isil/

 

[Dinarid]

1.) It's ridiculous and unreasonable that all Muslims should have to speak out against acts of terror carried out by Islamic fundamentalists. Why should individual Muslims be held accountable for other people they don't even know just because they share the same religion (and in some cases, they may be part of a different sect)? No one ever makes such requests of Christians. Since 9/11 in the US alone, there have been at least 13 attacks against abortion clinics in the US by Christian terrorists, while there are 7 attacks linked to Islamic extremism and yet no one is asking Pope Francis or all Catholics or all Protestants or all Baptists or all Methodists to condemn those attacks. If you went on a murderous rampage, why should I look to one of my Croatian friends for an apology? Does that make sense?

2.) Furthermore, influential and powerful Muslims have certainly spoken out against acts of terror against Non-Muslims in the Middle East:



http://english.alarabiya.net/en/New...ghs-options-to-evacuate-trapped-Yazidis-.html



http://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-security-turkey-religion-idUSKBN0FR16120140722




http://www.isna.net/isna-denounces-isis-attacks-on-iraqs-religious-minorities.html













http://aprildryan.com/2014/08/22/muslim-groups-leaders-condemn-isil/

Your views on this make perfect sense, and is quite admirable to me- you have an instinctual reaction to defend a minority which you see as vulnerable to bigotry and prejudice. However, the issue with Islamic terrorism is that it is Islamic. It is the product of the Ummah. The same was true about National Socialism in Germany, and the Ustaša in Croatia.

After the Holocaust, the Germans felt responsibility for what happened to the Jews, Slavs, and Romani. There were no "buts" at all in their response, and they took it upon themselves to apologize. Their instinct was not to complain about Germanophobia. And German-Americans were actually discriminated against quite unfairly- many were sent to internment camps and basically treated as enemies of their own country. This is of course wrong, but it is overshadowed by the genocide committed by Nazi Germany. I am not arguing that what happened to German-Americans is unimportant or should be forgotten- in fact, I wish more people knew about it. The Pope has actually admitted that the role of the Church in the treatment of homosexuals has been indeed regrettable.

The instinct of most Muslims in Europe and America is to express regret over the attacks and then condemn Islamophobia- and quite understandably. This is righteous. However, the immediate discourse that follows is usually a narrative about how Muslims are oppressed and how Muslims will ultimately be victimized by these acts due to Islamophobia. There is a refusal to accept that these terrorists are a product of Ummah, as I mentioned earlier, and a denial that the terrorist acts have anything to do with Islam. Everyone will then move on, real bigotry against Muslims will simmer, and then another terrorist attack will happen- but on top of all that, the genocide against indigenous peoples in the Middle East, the oppression of women, violence against sexual minorities, and general intolerance within the Ummah will continue. The remarks by leading Muslims about non-Muslims in the Middle East aren't enough, because these are few and far between and I haven't heard a thing from the Ummah in the West about it. There is no need for Muslims to "apologize", but to simply accept that this is a problem, allow an open discussion, and yes, for some of the Islamic nations in the Middle East whose leaders paint their society as committed to justice, to apologize.

 

[arvistro]

Wanderlust, were those "attacks on abortion clinics" committed by Christians deadly? I seriously do not know. If so then there is bias in how events get to news

 

[bicicleur 2]

I'm not excusing anyone driving a 60 ton truck into a crowd of families, Gyms. Surely you know that. However, if we're going to fight this thing we have to understand what's going on, and that includes getting a sort of "profile"of the perpetrators. That's something with which I have some experience.

What I'm trying to explain is that in the west many, if not most, of these "home grown" terrorists seem to have long histories of mental illness and/or criminality and violence. I think that may be because, at least in the U.S., the majority of Muslims are integrated into our society to some extent, so these are the only people who can be influenced enough by the propaganda to take these kinds of actions.

The problem is with the ideology, the propaganda. My major concern, frankly, is not that any significant number of American Muslims will be persuaded to commit these kinds of atrocities. Not as things stand now. My concern is because there is a concerted effort by these propagandists to preach this ideology in our prisons, to a heavily black population already somewhat inured to violence, many of whom are indeed alienated from "white" society, and many of whom do indeed, in my opinion, suffer from mental illnesses.

What I fear may happen, if a too heavy handed approach is taken, is that "normal", average, law abiding Muslim Americans will also become radicalized. This is indeed possible. Since you reference "The Standard", I think the continued Israeli tolerance of the building of settlements on the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and particularly the bulldozing of the homes of the families of terrorists is incredibly misguided as well as inhumane. They just increase the hatred already festering there. France is walking a thin line in this regard. I have a feeling it's very different in Sweden, although you would know better, but the French are very tough in terms of policing and counter-terrorism and they've gotten a lot tougher in the last year. Speaking to people who have some knowledge of it, the interaction with the Muslim population has gotten much more intrusive; it makes our now discredited stop and frisk procedures look like a child's game. However, go too far, and it could devolve into civil war.

I don't, to be clear, agree with Davef that the Muslims who would do this constitute .1% of the population. The number who have some sympathy with them is even higher, particularly in Europe.* What Europeans should be asking themselves, in my opinion, is why is that the case, why the discrepancy? Yes, I know, we've gotten different kinds of immigrants to some extent. However, in my opinion, it's also because while they were allowed to immigrate when times were good and they could be useful doing menial work, or in Scandinavia perhaps out of humanitarian motives, there was never any real effort to integrate them. Now, the jobs have dried up, and they sit in their isolated housing units, virtual ghettos you built for them, and the young, especially, who are in limbo because they're not accepted as Europeans, but they're also not Somalis or Algerians or whatever, either, are ripe for this kind of propaganda. I don't understand how this couldn't have been foreseen, but then I think that a lot as I see the stupidity exhibited by the people in charge of these decisions.

It's easy to react emotionally to horrific events. but if we're to solve these problems we have to react rationally, instead.

*http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34967994

Btw, in terms of immigration, yes, I think immigrants should be intensively screened. When my family and I went to the U.S., the American consulate investigated my parents' political associations to a quite incredible degree, to see if they had any questionable associations. There were health checks as well, for TB and other infectious diseases, including sexually transmitted ones. In addition to all of that, my father had to have work skills. I don't see why immigrants now should have more lenient standards applied to them. In terms of questionable associations I would include membership in extreme right wing, quasi-Nazi "white" organizations like those all over eastern Europe and even in countries like Hungary, and people from the Balkans who had any association with the ultra nationalist organizations there which were involved in violence against their neighbors. I don't want you in any country of mine.

@Arvistro,
I find it hard to believe that every Muslim resident of Brussels is a terrorist in waiting. I think there's a lot of hyperbole going on.

Belgium has 457 known Syria fighters.
It is the highest rate in Europe.
Something is terribly wrong here.
Terrible mistakes have been made.

In the 1950s and 1960s Belgium needed coalmine workers.
Italians and Poles came. Later Turks and Morrocans came.
There were no big problems. It was a win-win situation.
These people were unskilled and they came to work were the jobs were.
Their children got good results in schools and allthough they still have their own identity they are well-integrated.
In the 1970s mines had to be shut down.
The Walloon socialists started importing other people, and for the worst thinkable reason.
Unskilled Morrocans from backward areas.
There were no jobs for these unskilled people.
But they lived in ghettos under social welfare and got Belgian citizenships and voting rights.
The welfare was very generous and the Walloon socialists taught they were importing people that would vote socialist out of gratitude.
Those Morrocans in the ghettos invited their family and other people from the same villages.
In the end we had whole tribes in the same suburb.
Then the political correct caste came in.
They blame Belgian racism for whatever went wrong in these ghetto's.
They say these people don't get any chance for another future.
I admit there is racism in Belgium, there is in any society. And it has some influence on their lives. And this is not allowed by the Belgian government.
But people who want to integrate can get help from the government to improve their skills and do get chances to change their life if they want to.
Furthermore their children are offered good education at schools.
The trouble is that these tribal ghetto people do believe what the political correct caste is telling.
They tell their children going to school is a lost effort.
They drop school and see their future as small criminals.
There is omerta in the Brussels suburbs and police actions are sabbotaged.
There is big sympathy for Muslim extremism.
There is a huge responsability for the Walloon socialists like Phillipe Moureaux.
But the rhetoric of the political correct caste stands in the way of any remediation.
First these ghetto people should be aware that they have their own future in their own hands.
Many did. They don't live in these ghettos any more.
It is the less smart amongst them that belive the propaganda of both the political correct caste and the Islam fundamentalists who stay.

 

[Angela]

1.) It's ridiculous and unreasonable that all Muslims should have to speak out against acts of terror carried out by Islamic fundamentalists. Why should individual Muslims be held accountable for other people they don't even know just because they share the same religion (and in some cases, they may be part of a different sect)? No one ever makes such requests of Christians.

Are there any Christians left in Sweden? There certainly are in the U.S. so it's more important in that context, I would think. (I must say, you have an extraordinary familiarity with the details of American life, for a Swede, so perhaps you've at least lived here for a time?)

However, if you've lived here you obviously didn't spend much time in church and/or with religious people,
or pay attention to the declarations of groups like the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops or the Right to Life groups.

No one needs to make such requests of Christians because Christians take it upon themselves to condemn it in the strongest terms from the pulpits on Sundays, and not just through the declarations of organizing bodies, not that they really need to, because it's just unthinkable for the vast, vast majority of Christians to even contemplate such a thing. I'd like to see the imans of mosques do the same.

As to the statements of Bishops:
https://news.google.com/newspapers?...AIBAJ&sjid=PF0NAAAAIBAJ&pg=4918,2067478&hl=en

National Right to Life Committee:
http://www.bpnews.net/1965/fatal-abortion-clinic-bombing-condemned-by-prolife-leaders

There is no meaningful comparison between these two situations, between what is taught from the pulpits of Christian churches, and what is taught in mosques (although they are getting more clever and not being so open recently) and in Muslim religious schools even in the west.

@Bicicleur,
You should know by now, Bicicleur, that I'm very aware of the complexities involved. Extreme left wing, just like extreme right wing, polemics and talking points are not my thing. Both are fundamentally dishonest.

Just a point of clarification. Why, if the jobs were declining, was there a push to actively seek immigration from less developed areas of North Africa?

 

[bicicleur 2]

@Bicicleur,
You should know by now, Bicicleur, that I'm very aware of the complexities involved. Extreme left wing, just like extreme right wing, polemics and talking points are not my thing. Both are fundamentally dishonest.

I know Angela.
There are others around here that don't want to see this.
And even so, those political correct people aren't even extreme left.
They belong to the moderate-left establishment.
I don't know, but I think you'd even consider Obama as one of them.

Just a point of clarification. Why, if the jobs were declining, was there a push to actively seek immigration from less developed areas of North Africa?

as I told you, it was for the worst possible reason, both from the inviting Walloon socialists as from the immigrants themselves

they were backward people, allready marginal and without any future in Morroco

for them living on a very generous welfare system in Belgium was a much better option
and then they invited their whole tribe in and the Walloon socialist let them

well, that is the socialist Walloons and their coalition partners

the socialist Walloons didn't get absolute majority but they allways got enough votes to make it impossible to form a government without them

now Belgium has the first federal government ever without the Walloon socialists
but most parties in the present government were coalition partners in the past
except one, N-VA who got the majority of the votes in the Flemish part
it was Laurette Onkelinkx of the Walloon socialist who accused in parliament several N-VA ministers - and hence the majority of the Flemish people - of racism

she simply couldn't accept her loss

Belgium is a small complicated country.
There is no 'tribalism' as many of you here think.
But voting behaviour of Flemish and Walloons were allways different. And there were historic reasons.
Though that may change now.
Nevertheless we have very complicated institutions.

 

[Angela]

I know Angela.
There are others around here that don't want to see this.
And even so, those political correct people aren't even extreme left.
They belong to the moderate-left establishment.



as I told you, it was for the worst possible reason, both from the inviting Walloon socialists as from the immigrants themselves

they were backward people, allready marginal and without any future in Morroco

for them living on a very generous welfare system in Belgium was a much better option
and then they invited their whole tribe in and the Walloon socialist let them

well, that is the socialist Walloons and their coalition partners

the socialist Walloons didn't get absolute majority but they allways got enough votes to make it impossible to form a government without them

now Belgium has the first federal government ever without the Walloon socialists
but most parties in the present government were coalition partners in the past
except one, N-VA who got the majority of the votes in the Flemish part
it was Laurette Onkelinkx of the Walloon socialist who accused in parliament several N-VA ministers - and hence the majority of the Flemish people - of racism

she simply couldn't accept her loss

That's become standard operating procedure in the west. In the U.S., if you criticize President Obama's policies it means you're a racist, if you point out that when the dust settles some of these "unjustified" police shootings were actually justified, you're a racist. Of course, the right can be just as bad. From their playbook, no policeman was ever a racist, or dishonest, or temperamentally unsuited to the job. People who know nothing about law enforcement are the first to make such general, idiotic, pronouncements.

As to whether these are extreme left wing views, again from my perspective and speaking in an American context, what used to be extreme left wing views are becoming mainstream leftist views.

I'm still not clear, however, about what you're saying here; I have to stop watching the morning news shows while I'm on the Board, and I think I need another cup of coffee as well.

What is the worst possible reason? Do you mean the Walloon Socialists actively recruited immigrants from the least developed parts of North Africa because they knew they'd vote for the Socialist party if they provided benefits for them? Or, do you mean they just permitted continued immigration from Morocco, but now from less developed areas, even though they knew the jobs no longer existed?

I think I'm confused because you said that the earlier wave of migrants from Morocco, who did have jobs waiting for them, did integrate pretty well. I'm assuming they were from more developed areas of Morocco?

 

[bicicleur 2]

What is the worst possible reason? Do you mean the Walloon Socialists actively recruited immigrants from the least developed parts of North Africa because they knew they'd vote for the Socialist party if they provided benefits for them? Or, do you mean they just permitted continued immigration from Morocco, but now from less developed areas, even though they knew the jobs no longer existed?

I think I'm confused because you said that the earlier wave of migrants from Morocco, who did have jobs waiting for them, did integrate pretty well. I'm assuming they were from more developed areas of Morocco?

they didn't actively recruit
but if you expose a big pot of honey - paid by the taxpayer - some flies come flying in, and they alert their whole tribe

I don't know whether the earlier wave of Morocons came from the same area or not
they certainly came with other intentions and expectations

and something else :
the earlier Morocans live in the former coal mine areas
the latter in the Brussels suburb ghettos

and yes, I just saw it too
I think I know what it is on the morning news that gpt your attention

 

[Angela]

Dependency breeds dependency to some extent, although there are definitely people who because of health, intelligence, or mental health issues can't compete and must be helped.

You can, however, create dependency, a type of learned dependency, and that applies to whites as well as black or mixed people. When I was a child, and certainly from the stories, even in dire circumstances like in the Great Depression, people were ashamed to take "hand-outs" or go to a food bank. Now, the moronic millennials think they're entitled to not only free education, and free health care, which I understand, but to free housing, free food etc. I used to call these kinds of people Gucci Socialists. They didn't want to give up their Gucci shoes, they wanted everyone to have them. It never occurred to them that if everyone had them they would lose a lot of their value.

 

[Maleth]

No words to express this horror.....I am questioning the Mental health professionals if they are going one step too far by trying to integrate people with clear psychotic violent behavior (as some kind of human right) instead of being locked up in mental institutions with dignified treatment, and not all of them can be returned in public. This kind of question back fires at anyone who asks it and considered a taboo, as it might as it will sound like collective punishment. But truly what is best?.

Also the opposition from many quarters to seriously crack down on hate Internet sites from all directions, Besides the ultra violent movies and games we have all round. Does no body question this anymore? Is it all fine? They are there as if its no body business and get to them with just a click of a button. Is this really freedom of speech? What has hate sites have to do with freedom? No one considers the resentment and anger it can cause and fire backs in all directions?

 

[gyms]

‘We are on the brink of civil war’ warns French intelligence chief
http://metro.co.uk/2016/07/12/we-ar...-war-warns-french-intelligence-chief-6002362/

‘Even one or two attacks and it will happen. It therefore behooves us to anticipate and block all these groups.’

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/were-brink...ing-warning-before-nice-terror-attack-1570820

"It's this that worries me when I talk to all the European colleagues," he said. "We will, at one time or another, have to generate resources to deal with other extremist groups, because the confrontation is inevitable."

 

[Maleth]

‘We are on the brink of civil war’ warns French intelligence chief
http://metro.co.uk/2016/07/12/we-ar...-war-warns-french-intelligence-chief-6002362/

‘Even one or two attacks and it will happen. It therefore behooves us to anticipate and block all these groups.’

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/were-brink...ing-warning-before-nice-terror-attack-1570820

"It's this that worries me when I talk to all the European colleagues," he said. "We will, at one time or another, have to generate resources to deal with other extremist groups, because the confrontation is inevitable."

It happened many times before in documented history, so its all quite possible. Many tell tale signs brewing up fast.......

whats happening again now in America?...more shootings. Im getting news phobia...........http://edition.cnn.com/2016/07/17/us/baton-route-police-shooting/index.html

 

[gyms]

http://nypost.com/2016/07/15/a-cry-...can-we-finally-face-the-truth-about-this-war/

Isn’t it possible that this new kind of terrorism, practiced by neo-Islam, is not related to any particular issue?
Isn’t it possible that Bouhelel didn’t want anything specific because he wanted everything, starting with the right to kill people not because of what they did but because of who they were?
“The Muslim warrior (ghazi) should make sure that no one is safe anywhere unless he submits to an Islamic authority,” wrote Sheik Yussef al-Ayyeri, the late theoretician of al Qaeda and ISIS.
In all its various versions, whether ISIS, the Taliban in Afghanistan or the Khomeinist cabal in Tehran, this neo-Islam demands to impose its will on the whole of mankind, by terror if necessary.
And there is nothing more futile than the debate over whether this is “true Islam.” The Grand Mosque in Paris condemns the Nice attacks, but in its normal “sermons,” it also condemns everything that Nice represented.

 

[Angela]

No words to express this horror.....I am questioning the Mental health professionals if they are going one step too far by trying to integrate people with clear psychotic violent behavior (as some kind of human right) instead of being locked up in mental institutions with dignified treatment, and not all of them can be returned in public. This kind of question back fires at anyone who asks it and considered a taboo, as it might as it will sound like collective punishment. But truly what is best?.

Also the opposition from many quarters to seriously crack down on hate Internet sites from all directions, Besides the ultra violent movies and games we have all round. Does no body question this anymore? Is it all fine? They are there as if its no body business and get to them with just a click of a button. Is this really freedom of speech? What has hate sites have to do with freedom? No one considers the resentment and anger it can cause and fire backs in all directions?

Good sense, as usual, Maleth.

The whole movement to not put mentally ill people in institutions has had disastrous consequences both for society and for the people themselves.

So much of public policy results from emotional reactions to perceived, usually actual ills, but is an over-reaction, with the policy makers not thinking through the consequences of the policy.

In the U.S. the abuses that were found in mental health institutions meant they were all closed, instead of tightening up on regulation and indeed on the criteria for being in them in the first place.

Every time one of these disturbed young men causes a horror like this, whatever the claimed or not claimed "political", "social", or "religious" motivation, there is a chorus of "talking heads" blaming the parents, blaming the neighbors or co-workers for "not seeing the signs".

Of course, in many cases they did see some of the signs, but there's nothing you can do about it. Parents routinely go to Family Court to ask for help with their disturbed children. However, what the courts can do is extremely limited. Even when they're minors, how can you force them to cooperate with mental health professionals, how can you force them to take the medications? Precisely how can you force a six foot tall young man to swallow his meds?

There are procedures to seek institutionalization, but the fact that he wants to live in a cardboard box on the street, urinate and defecate there, is belligerent, and sees and speaks to people no one else can see isn't enough. If people call the police after a violent incident of some sort, unless there was serious injury to another person, they put the person in the psych ward where they put them on meds, give them a script and then let them go.

It's a nightmare for everyone involved, exacerbated by alcohol and drug use.

Don't even get me started on hate sites on the internet, and I'm not just talking about Jihadist sites; I'm talking about Neo-Nazi sites. I've said until I'm blue in the face that "free speech" pertains to government action with regard to speech, and even there you can't preach "sedition" or even general violence. A private company can exercise judgment. These groups and certain individuals should not be permitted to post on the internet.

With violent video games, I don't think they're really harmful to "normal", well balanced kids. My son used to play them quite a bit, to my displeasure. (This was one of those parental conflict things where I lost.) The other day I said I wondered what the uncensored videos of Nice showed. My son told me not to look at them; he had gone on one of the links that showed the beheading of poor Daniel Pearl and he said he almost vomited.

However, if someone is prone to violent thoughts anyway, I believe they make them worse. There's a reason why so many of the young gunmen in the U.S. are reported to have obsessively played some of these games. Companies should exercise some common sense, and parents shouldn't buy them. Of course, you always have some Neanderthals like my husband who wouldn't be on board, so there's that...

 

[LeBrok]

Good sense, as usual, Maleth.

The whole movement to not put mentally ill people in institutions has had disastrous consequences both for society and for the people themselves.

I have a psychiatrist friend who always says so. My issue with this is based on fundamental human rights. Should we lock people in psychiatric institutions, which is practically prison, just because they act differently than the rest of society. Until they commit a crime we shouldn't be in position to infringe on guaranteed human freedoms. Am I right?
However it would clean up the streets from all the homeless people, which are all mental cases.

 

[Maleth]

Good sense, as usual, Maleth.

Thank you

The whole movement to not put mentally ill people in institutions has had disastrous consequences both for society and for the people themselves.

So much of public policy results from emotional reactions to perceived, usually actual ills, but is an over-reaction, with the policy makers not thinking through the consequences of the policy.

In the U.S. the abuses that were found in mental health institutions meant they were all closed, instead of tightening up on regulation and indeed on the criteria for being in them in the first place.

Every time one of these disturbed young men causes a horror like this, whatever the claimed or not claimed "political", "social", or "religious" motivation, there is a chorus of "talking heads" blaming the parents, blaming the neighbors or co-workers for "not seeing the signs".

Of course, in many cases they did see some of the signs, but there's nothing you can do about it. Parents routinely go to Family Court to ask for help with their disturbed children. However, what the courts can do is extremely limited. Even when they're minors, how can you force them to cooperate with mental health professionals, how can you force them to take the medications? Precisely how can you force a six foot tall young man to swallow his meds?

I can tell you my little experience when I used to go and visit an elderly man who was a neighbor who always used to suffer from schizophrenia. He used to be fixated on cameras watching him and being exposed to radiation. Apart from that he kept a job and wasn't ever violent except verbally occasionally. Unfortunately he would not let anyone in the house, and distrusted social workers. He was abounded by his family. He knocked on my door one day telling me he was very sick and I called an ambulance to which he was grateful. After he got treatment being he had no one to care for him it was advised to put him in a mental home. He accepted and apparently he did not want to move from there. The point is trough visiting him occasionally I have heard a few stories of people admitted in his (all male) ward, where it was a case that the husbands there were acting violently towards their wife (mostly in their old age). One threatened her with a knife another literally threw a fan at her and kept threatening that he was going to jump of the roof to commit suicide. Luckily when seen by the Psychiatrist they immediately advised to be admitted to the mental hospital with few visits back home from time to time. Maybe they are a little stricter locally on these issues and do not take much chances. I am not sure how lax the system is say in France or any other country in these kind of situations, but from what I can gather, this satan made human had MUCH more worrying signs then the ones I was told of. Sincerely I do not know how it works. The same with Andrea Lubiz of German wings. Was he really worthy of being allowed to fly a plane? wasn't his medical back ground enough not to be able to put him in charge of so many lives?..........Its all to Lax in my opinion.

Don't even get me started on hate sites on the internet, and I'm not just talking about Jihadist sites; I'm talking about Neo-Nazi sites. I've said until I'm blue in the face that "free speech" pertains to government action with regard to speech, and even there you can't preach "sedition" or even general violence. A private company can exercise judgment. These groups and certain individuals should not be permitted to post on the internet.

Legal poison to the mind.

With violent video games, I don't think they're really harmful to "normal", well balanced kids. My son used to play them quite a bit, to my displeasure. (This was one of those parental conflict things where I lost.) The other day I said I wondered what the uncensored videos of Nice showed. My son told me not to look at them; he had gone on one of the links that showed the beheading of poor Daniel Pearl and he said he almost vomited.

However, if someone is prone to violent thoughts anyway, I believe they make them worse. There's a reason why so many of the young gunmen in the U.S. are reported to have obsessively played some of these games. Companies should exercise some common sense, and parents shouldn't buy them. Of course, you always have some Neanderthals like my husband who wouldn't be on board, so there's that...

I truly think so too.

 

[Maleth]

I have a psychiatrist friend who always says so. My issue with this is based on fundamental human rights. Should we lock people in psychiatric institutions, which is practically prison, just because they act differently than the rest of society. Until they commit a crime we shouldn't be in position to infringe on guaranteed human freedoms. Am I right?
However it would clean up the streets from all the homeless people, which are all mental cases.

There are different grades of cases and a huge number of conditions. Of course clearly most of them are not worthy of being locked up, but some have many clear signs through actions both what they state verbally and do physically that they might just qualify for some more rigorous monitoring.....(to be diplomatically correct)

 

[gyms]

http://www.nosharia.com/is Islam incompatable with modern society.htm
Islam identifies people and individuals by their religion: Non-Muslim and Muslim. This is a concept that cannot fit to any of modern definitions of citizenship. No civil society can function based on such defining identity. Dividing the society based on such clear-cut identity ultimately creates a society based on discrimination or ghettos. The legal aspect of such a division is beyond comprehension. Identifying groups of people or a country by their religion by default would mean denial of individual’s right and dignity, to place collective “minority rights” above individual rights”.