Endorsing Lou from Queens

Submitted by Reuben Horne (Australia), Nov 9, 2005 at 18:12

Dr Pipes,

With a conciseness that I always lack, Lou from Queens has summarised very neatly and in a practicable way a view that I very strongly adhere to. I am befuddled by the arguments of right wing demagogues who complain that people have not assimilated when they fail to address the underlying problem of the left having eroded respect of the very societal framework of laws, government and welfare state that they expect people to assimilate into.

How can a society without pride in its identity and history expect others coming from a strong religious identity and a history (real or imagined) to integrate into a culture that provides them with neither of these things? We are in effect asking them to embrace an inferior product. Lord knows why but some of the Muslims actually do assimilate and the few that I've spoken to on the matter are mad as hell about the western habit of all pervasive self deprication. They after all have had a first hand view of what constitutes an amoral society.

The right wing is all but too willing to buy into the left wings side of the argument as their own concerns are narrowly concentrated around economic matters especially in Australia. Yeilding issues of national policy where the lexicon has been drafted primarily by left wing theorists (just as in economics the terminology is almost entirely the product of the right) is an stable and easy truce to strike. The only problem is the left has locked itself into a pattern that acts to defeat the national interest. We cannot afford to fund the entire world as a welfare state. In any event as the Bikini Islands Atol incident proved (when the US set up a permanent welfare state for some islanders whose homeland it destroyed in nuclear testing) welfare states are often deletorious if put in place in perpetuity promoting indolence, dependency and even criminality.

The French situation is not so unique with indivisible ethnic enclaves appearing all over the world. The situation in France therefore makes for an interesting study in which a number of lessons may be gleaned. Firstly Franco-Arabian relations and purported sympathy for the Islamist cause did little to quell this jihad against the French. Secondly as grave and serious a reality check as this incident has been in France the politicians continue with their dissemblage. Their actions and words are almost laughable. Today in the 14th consecutive evening of rioting they expressed relief that fewer cars were destroyed. Thirdly even second generation Algerians and other Muslims have not assimilated so one wonders when this miraculous multicultural melting pot will appear. The second generation may be even worse than the first since having been born into a society with a welfare state and free health care they are unlikely to be able to gauge the relative value of such things as well as the first.

Cordially,
Reuben Horne.

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