Ayaan Hirsi Ali addressed the national gathering of the Danish People's Party on September 18th. In her speech, Ali, who is Somalian, challenged the DPP's position of calling for a complete stop to all immigration from all non-western countries, although she shares the broader goal of halting and reversing the process of Islamization in the West. A complete video of her speech can be found at Vlad Tepes' blog here.Some on the Left and in the mainstream media have tried to sieze on Ali's remarks, but what they fail to realize is that she is playing a vital role in moving forward the practical and necessary discussion of both the principles and the realpolitik of actually stopping Islamization -- as opposed to the vague generalities and short-sighted oversimplifications that might serve well to get votes and sell books, but which either do not translate into real policies, or, worse, are used to justify regressive, xenophobic policies.
The bottom line is that Islam must be opposed in the name of defending freedom, not in the name of defending the purity of the White Christian West (a fantasy which does not even exist anyway, and wouldn't be worth defending if it did). People who don't like dark-skinned foreigners who don't worship Jebus are just as much of a threat to freedom as are Islamist terrorists and their taqiyya spewing "moderate" accomplices.
Here is how the Copenhagen Post covered Ali's speech:
[Hat tip to the Islam In Europe blog.]Hirsi Ali takes on right-wing party
Monday, 20 September 2010 14:32
Danish People’s Party’s annual congress saw prominent Somali rebuking their policies
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a 40-year-old former refugee and a prominent critic of religious extremism, addressed the 15th annual party congress of the Danish People’s Party (DF) on Saturday.
She spoke about the importance of integrating non-Western immigrants in Europe and teaching boys about women's rights and sexual morality in the West from an early age.
After building up the party faithful by suggesting that immigrants should enter into a contract to respect the conditions in Danish society, Ali stoked the fire further by saying in English: ‘I do not understand Danish, but I've heard rumours that your party will stop all immigration from non-western countries?’
After meeting applause again from the crowd, Ali turned on them with the rebuke, ‘I too am from a non-Western country,’ and that ‘it is wrong to say that all non-Westerners can’t be integrated into Denmark’.
The response that time was considerably less enthusiastic, but nevertheless party leader Pia Kjærsgaard remained supportive of Ali. As Kjærsgaard said to her: ‘You are many people’s idol, and you are my idol.’
DF has a tradition of inviting controversial guest speakers. In 2008, it was addressed by Mohammed cartoonist Kurt Westergaard.
Like Westergaard, Ali lives under a constant threat to her life and required a heavy security presence at the meeting. Ali has lived with death threats since composing the screenplay for the 2005 Theo van Gogh film Submission,
In 2005, she was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. She now works for the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute in Washington, DC.
5 comments:
Apuleus Platonicus,
once again you're attributing to people things they never said, and then crush the straw-man. This is the Danish People's Party position as reported by Copenhagen Post:
Peter Skaarup, DF’s deputy chairman and immigration spokesman, said that they feel it is necessary to restrict, if not fully put a stop to, the integration to Denmark from the non-Western world, as this integration is a hindrance on the country’s economy, which is already under pressure due to the effects of the financial crisis.
Skaarup added that he feels it was necessary to stop the immigration in order to secure the survival of the welfare state, as it can only continue to exist if immigrants pay taxes.
If immigrants only receive benefits but not pay taxes, the state cannot survive, he argued, adding that figures show it is integration from the non-Western world which causes problems, as these immigrants contribute too little to the welfare state.
Where is your alleged "purity of White Cristian Europe"?
And another point. From Ayaan Hirsi Ali wikipedia article: the findings were that Hirsi Ali had not legitimately received Dutch citizenship, because she had lied about her name and date of birth. Is this person eligible to teach the Danes how they should treat immigration?
The DPP's position well illustrates the problem I am talking about -- at least as I see it. I like the DPP and I think they are "part of the solution" -- and that is why I think Ali's speech is important.
The problem with the DPP immigration policy is that they refuse to clearly identify Islam itself as the problem. In part this appears to be due to a lack of nerve on their part -- they are afraid of being labeled as religious bigots or something like that.
And so what do they do instead of pointing the finger at Islam? They come up with some blather about "the non-western world" and "securing the survival of the welfare state."
Personally I do not think that the DPP's policy is necessarily racist -- but it dances around the edges, and it is at the very least chauvinistic.
Who is "western"? Are Eastern Europeans "western"? Are African Americans "western"? Are fifth generation descendants of Chinese immigrants in Perth who speak with an Australian accent "western"?
The problem is Islam. The problem is not "foreigners" or "non-western" people or "immigration" in general.
I think the DPP are among the good guys in terms of the fight against Islamization. They are completely different from people like Le Pen -- of that there is no question. But it is vitally important to avoid obscuring the real issues, which the DPP policy needlessly does.
Even Wilders' policy of stopping immigration from Muslim majority countries is not perfect -- although it is much better. In fact I would say that as long as there are clear provisions for accepting people who are legitimate refugees seeking asylum FROM Islam, that is, people such as Hirsi Ali, then it is a workable policy that says what should be said, and accomplishes what should be accomplished.
>The problem with the DPP immigration policy is that they refuse to clearly identify Islam itself as the problem.
They can't, as far as I can understand, because of EU restrictions imposed on their legislation:
The Act on the Prohibition of Discrimination in the Labour Market was amended by Act. no. 253 of 7 April 2004 (introducing a prohibition against discrimination based on religious conviction as well as a shared burden of proof) in line with EU Directive 2000/43.
So, AFAIK, if you want to be a politically correct politician, avoid references to people's religion or ethnicity. This makes geographic location the only viable restriction. The only exception from this principle is when you speak negatively of Russians or Germans, these ethnicities can be bashed freely, but that is a different story. So if somebody deserves your wrath, it's the politically correct leftist EU bureaucrats, the Danes are simply law-obedient.
>it is at the very least chauvinistic.
chauvinistic is a charged word, and says nothing about the nature of their errors.
>Who is "western"?
All those groups are western. Immigrants who think we are inferior, disrespect our culture, attack our women because they think our women are dressed as whores, should look for other countries more suitable for their tastes. If they think the West is evil, why come there?
Besides, denial of existence is a popular trick as far as identity is concerned. There are no westerners, except there are bad westerners.
>who are legitimate refugees seeking asylum FROM Islam, that is, people such as Hirsi Ali
pardon me, but it's a bad example. What prevents them from lying to immigration officers just as she did? And besides you cannot outlaw Islamic immigration with the existing EU policies.
>The problem is Islam. The problem is not "foreigners" or "non-western" people or "immigration" in general.
The problem seems to be that people themselves cannot decide who can live in their home and who can't. Certain options are simply outlawed by those who think they know better than the voters.
This very attitude has lead Russia in 1993 to the liberal dictatorship that it remains to this day. Since then we lost what little we had of the freedom of speech, fair elections, fair trials. They did it to Russia, don't do it to the rest of the world.
>The problem with the DPP immigration policy is that they refuse to clearly identify Islam itself as the problem.
They can't, as far as I can understand, because of EU restrictions imposed on their legislation:
The Act on the Prohibition of Discrimination in the Labour Market was amended by Act. no. 253 of 7 April 2004 (introducing a prohibition against discrimination based on religious conviction as well as a shared burden of proof) in line with EU Directive 2000/43.
So, AFAIK, if you want to be a politically correct politician, avoid references to people's religion or ethnicity. This makes geographic location the only viable restriction. The only exception from this principle is when you speak negatively of Russians or Germans, these ethnicities can be bashed freely, but that is a different story. So if somebody deserves your wrath, it's the politically correct leftist EU bureaucrats, the Danes are simply law-obedient.
>it is at the very least chauvinistic.
chauvinistic is a charged word, and says nothing about the nature of their errors.
>Who is "western"?
All those groups are western. Immigrants who think we are inferior, disrespect our culture, attack our women because they think our women are dressed as whores, should look for other countries more suitable for their tastes. If they think the West is evil, why come there?
Besides, denial of existence is a popular trick as far as identity is concerned. There are no westerners, except there are bad westerners.
>who are legitimate refugees seeking asylum FROM Islam, that is, people such as Hirsi Ali
pardon me, but it's a bad example. What prevents them from lying to immigration officers just as she did? And besides you cannot outlaw Islamic immigration with the existing EU policies.
>The problem is Islam. The problem is not "foreigners" or "non-western" people or "immigration" in general.
The problem seems to be that people themselves cannot decide who can live in their home and who can't. Certain options are simply outlawed by those who think they know better than the voters.
This very attitude has lead Russia in 1993 to the liberal dictatorship that it remains to this day. Since than we lost what little we had of the freedom of speech, fair elections, fair trials. They did it to Russia, don't do it to the rest of the world.
Part II
>who are legitimate refugees seeking asylum FROM Islam, that is, people such as Hirsi Ali
pardon me, but it's a bad example. What prevents them from lying to immigration officers just as she did? And besides you cannot outlaw Islamic immigration with the existing EU policies.
>The problem is Islam. The problem is not "foreigners" or "non-western" people or "immigration" in general.
The problem seems to be that people themselves cannot decide who can live in their home and who can't. Certain options are simply outlawed by those who think they know better than the voters.
This very attitude has lead Russia in 1993 to the liberal dictatorship that it remains to this day. Since than we lost what little we had of the freedom of speech, fair elections, fair trials. They did it to Russia, don't do it to the rest of the world
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