Levant Finally Admits the Root Problems of the Human Rights Commissions

Levant is finally admitting clearly and unequivocally who and what the root problems are in the HRCs. Here he is quoted in the Canadian Jewish News:

Levant [says the] human rights commissions...have fostered a climate of censorship, media chill and political correctness that’s now being exploited by those he calls enemies of the West, Israel and the Jewish People.

"The Jews should have known better,” Levant said. “We know about the ‘hard jihad,’ but the ‘soft jihad’ is far more effective and clever – it says to find the weakness in the law."

At the commission, however, Soharwardy [the Muslim complainant] found a far more sympathetic ear – in Levant’s view because he is Muslim.

Because of the pervasive climate of political correctness that infuses human rights commissions, Levant asserts, little heed is paid to Jewish or Christian complainants...

Regarding Muslim groups that file complaints with human rights tribunals, "the Canadian Islamic Congress did far more to destroy western freedom than 9/11 did,” Levant said. “Nine/11 did not change how we live, but [the Canadian Islamic Congress] got editors to censor ourselves."

Levant quibbles a little with the reporter - that it isn't the CIC that did the damage but the cartoon threats in general. But he is using heavy language to talk about a specific group and their specific modus operandi to shut him and others up in the name of their religion (I've bolded these emphatic words).

After Levant has clearly identified the problematic group, labeled it as an enemy of the West, described its strategy, and the force of its destruction, what more does he have to say? Nothing.

He surely has read enough online views, blogs and immigration restriction advocates to realize what the remedy is, even if he couldn't come up with it himself? What use is someone telling me that there is a wolf in the neighborhood ready to eat small children and pet dogs if I, and the neighborhood, don't lay out strategies to get rid of this intruder?

Perhaps Levant's next battle will be with himself, to pull out these logical conclusions from of his arguments.

The Impatient Muslims

If Muslims had any sense, they would be working out their take-over in stealth, creeping along with their sharia, and adding numbers and influence through immigration. They have been very successful so far. In fact, things are going much faster than expected. If one counts open mass immigration from non-Western countries to have started around 1965, that's a tremendous amount of work they've done in less than fifty years.

But, I've always maintained that they are impatient. But, it is not them that have this restless blood, it is the Koran that mandates it. They don’t trust their stealth strategy, unlike liberalism, which has taken over whole societies without even firing a bullet.

These recent events of terror plots (read jihad) in Detroit indicates that no matter how successful they may be with stealth sharia and immigration, or the hijra (as Sam Solomon has written about), it is inadequate to think of their strategy as simply these peaceful ones. If Mohammed had been smarter, he would have told Muslims to use violence very sparingly. The funny thing is that they've waited over five hundred years to make their come-back conquest of the West. If it seems to them that fifty years are an eternity, I wonder what these five hundred years were like?

Why Dymphna Is Seriously Mistaken

My previous post was about the Gates of Vienna co-blogger Dymphna, who accepted immigrant Hirsi Ali's comments on the cliched (and self-serving) view that America is an "idea."

It could be that Dymphna just went along with this because she likes Ali, since she starts her post praising Ali and her: "[I]ncisive intelligence [and] her willingness to take politically incorrect positions."

She should read Ali's interview carefully, since there are parts where Ali is tediously conventional and at times incoherent, especially when she critiques Christianity and when she vacillates between radical and moderate Islam.

I won't go into the interview, since I have discussed Ali's mixed messages several times on both this blog and at Camera Lucida. Rather, I would just like to mention Dymphna's (and I assume her co-blogger Baron Bodissey 's) error.

If America is just an idea, devoid of a culture, a history and a specific ethnic people which built and developed it into the America even Ali can identify (she differentiates it easily from France, for example), here is the problem. How can Dymphna and Bodissey believe in Muslims’ peculiarities of religion and culture – which they report daily on their anti-jiahd blog - if they accept that America is none of that, and is merely an abstract idea? Why one set of criteria for Muslims, and another for America? Muslims themselves have rejected that America is cultureless or a mere idea. They must believe in the concreteness of America’s people, religion culture and certainly ethnicity, since they are working so hard to be rid of it.

In a strange way, Dymphna is behaving like the Muslims she daily denounces on her anti-jihad blog. While Muslims want everyone to be Muslim by hook or by crook (often by crook), she also has no qualms about anyone (everyone) being American through immigration. Dymphna’s abstract and idea-based America open to all is a mirror image of the universalist, yet religion-specific, violent ummah of Islam.

There's nothing wrong with bad ideas as long as they don't see the light of day. But Dymphna's convoluted views are commonly held, and their devastating consequence is that they will allow more of these Muslims (like any other immigrants) to enter this "idea-based" America through the generous and open immigration system. These Muslims will then escalate their activity of destroying America they have assessed as being very particular and certainly not an idea (nor Muslim), and engulfing it into their Islamic ummah. The happy universalism that Dymphna may have envisioned then turns rapidly into the Islamic purgatory she never expected.

I try to avoid commenting on Hirsi Ali's latest media pop-up. Because that's what she does. She shows up at some major national newspaper, makes her liberal statements on radical Islam, promotes yet another autobiography, then she resumes her post at the genrous American Enterprise Institute. Here is her interview on October 17, 2009 with the LA Times.

There are many things to critique in her interview. As I had thought a while ago, she seems to be focussing some of her energy on the treatment of Muslim women under Islam (and sharia). I wonder if this means that she will try to facilitate "abused" Muslim women refugees' entry in the U.S., as a sanctuary country? The article calls her "Feminism's freedom fighter." Feminism for whom? Although she may associate Islam with mysogyny, I wonder how many Muslim women really think so, and are content to follow their religion and mandates? These will be interesting developments to follow.

And I need to mention, that her bigoted view of all religion, and I think her equal dislike of Christianiyt, has her say these things to a public, American newspaper:

[M]ost people with a Christian background who are on that level of development [she means here educated] no longer defend Christianity in the same way that those who are born into Islam still defend it.

Her comparison of the Koran with the Bible is that Christians have "reformed" their religion over time, to "move away from less radical ideas." If Christians can do so, then surely Muslims can to.

Her final point, without analysing her points too much, is that Christians have changed, they have reinterprated the Bible to suit

More Proof that Conservatives Are Out to Lunch

Dymphna of the Gates of Vienna, who was one of the conservatives whose whereabouts I inquired about here, has given me - only a few days later - more reason (proof) for my concern. She has posted an interview Ayan Hirsi Ali recently had with the LA Times, and added her own commentary. It is an astonishing revelation by one of the most prominent anti-jihad conservative bloggers. There is nothing conservative about what Dymphna has written. Here a quote from Ali's interview that merited Dymphna 's commentary.

Ali, who is eligible for American citizenship in three years says:

America has the advantage that when you become a citizen, you pledge loyalty to a Constitution that’s about ideas and not about ethnicity. Because of that, Americans do not feel shy about teaching new Americans why citizenship is important, why patriotism is important, pride about the Founding Fathers. That’s an easier sell than taking pride in the history of France, for instance.

To which Dymphna adds:

Heh. Another Francophobe here.

That's it. A foreign ex-Muslim comes to her country, derides her country's history and culture, and reduces it to an abstract concept, and all Dymphna could do was agree with a chuckle.

In my recent trip to NYC, and even in my travels across New York State and Pennsylvania, I was struck by the uniqueness of what I saw. Nothing like NYC could grow out of a Canadian culture, try as people might with Toronto. All the farmlands at the bottom of hills and forests are so uniquely American (and admittedly Canadian – there are still a lot of resemblances between these two countries), with their distinct red barns, the tall round silos, and the carefully cultivated very large farms which are like comforting oases in valleys below the giant mountains. But the difference in size is still tremendous between Canada and the U.S., and the farmlands are a testament to this (and of course the NYC monoliths). Even the mountains are bigger!

I find it astonishing that immigrants to the U.S., and of course here in Canada, keep stressing - self-servingly, I am now sure - that there is no "culture" here, that everything is a blank slate up for grabs by anyone who crosses the shores.

I'm surprised that someone like Dymphna fell for this. But, wasn't that my point all along?

Better To Put Conservatives To Task; Someone Has To Wake Them Up

Kevin Michael Grace talked about "my country (Canada)" in his email to me and in his Vdare article. Yet, he brought no insights, merely predictions of doom, for his country after his two-year absence. I will continue to wait with anticipation what Grace offers to the discussion - what else can he say after this? I hope something better.

I think Grace's presence has been an important one in Canadian blogging and alternate news. I have always respected his views. I've emailed him twice, once on general immigration and multiculturalism issues, another time to wish him well on his apparent illness. I never got any response from him for either correspondence.

It's interesting that he should email me this time in response to my post on the whereabouts of conservatives, and not to any email I sent. But, I don't think it was really to communicate with me, but rather to set his name straight - that he is not a nihilist but merely a pessimist. I believe that if this post had been left on my blog, he wouldn't have bothered to respond; it was instead linked at a popular conservative website that he clearly reads.

He hasn't responded to my long (third) email explaining my conclusions on the absence of conservatives, which I sent directly to him as well as publishing it on my blog. I genuinely thought he would respond. The issues are important, and I think my concerns are legitimate.

I have declared that no Canadian conservative (of any ilk) is bothering about multiculturalism and immigration these days. Grace was one of the few. William Gairdner was another, but he stopped his media presence soon after his book The Trouble with Canada came out in the early 1990s.

In fact, I have stated that Grace himself has reneged on that position, preferring to attach himself to a pessimistic, and what I ultimately do call a nihilistic, view that it is self-censorship which is the culprit and that it will have the last word. Here is his definitive quote from his Vdare article last month:

Self-censorship has become a defining Canadian characteristic. Despite Hadjis’s brave decision [KPA: Hadjis was the HRC judge who deemed Section 13 unconstitutional during the Lemire case. But he is not brave, merely opportunistic. Too many scandalous events had occurred during the case, and Hadjis simply had to find a way to dismiss it], it is unlikely we will see a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend any time soon.

This is more than pessimistic, this is borderline nihilistic.

So, this is how things progress here. Even the most outspoken and original thinker in the country – yes that is a big honor – capitulates at some point. The only rebuttal to my critique Grace had was to send me an article on “libertarian-extreme,” to show that he had no inclinations towards libertarianism, which was one of my other critiques of him in my blog post. But anyone can find fault with the Madonnas and the Dennis Rodmans, and most of Grace's article was about the extreme (libertarian) behaviors of celebrities.

In a blog post I drafted more than a year ago (July 31, 2008) but never posted, which I titled “Purging the Blogs,” this is what I wrote about Grace:

[Removing my link to] The Ambler:

This was one of the best Canadian blogs around. Kevin Michael Grace would have an array of topics from film reviews to mordant political commentary. I thought he was dead-on with his assessment of the Conrad Black case. But, he had written earlier that he was recovering from an illness. Then it looked like he did recover. Nonetheless, his sparse posts, and his last terribly distressing one, has led me to conclude that he has somehow given up on us, his readers and fellow-citizens. We needed people like him to see through the foggy world of multiculturalism and political correctness.

The Ambler hasn't posted anything since March 2008. If he resumes, and posts on a regular basis, I will reinstall his blog link.

I cannot find (or thankfully remember) this "last terribly distressing" post; many of Grace's articles are no longer available at his website. But perhaps my intuition on his mood and mindset was correct after all, even as far back as July 2008.

Here is something interesting I wrote about Kevin Michael Grace at my other blog Camera Lucida (

Will Kevin Michael Grace Go Back To His Roots?

Yesterday I posted my letter to Kevin Michael Grace, after he responded to my blog post on disappearing conservatives. I asked where all the conservatives had gone (including him).

His response was to send me an article he wrote in 2004 for Reason. It is well worth reading this article, since it captures the absurdities of "freedom" which our society espouses. I neglected to provide the link to that article in my copy of the email for my blog post, so here it is.

But, that was five years ago, and people can change quite a bit in five years . And many libertarians love to write about what unrestrained freedom does to people, which is what Grace has done in Reason. Madonna and Dennis Rodman are certainly not ordinary - in fact they're pretty crazy. We can all (liberals, conservatives and libertarians) have a lot of fun mocking them.

An article five years ago about extreme individuals abusing the freedoms of society doesn't necessarily make one a non-libertarian. Here is a much more succinct and realistic critique of libertarianism that commentator Ferg made at the View From the Right:

True there are individual exceptions to this, but the large majority of people who identify themselves as conservative do not really WANT to give up their rent-a-spouse easy divorces, their we can not have a baby NOW abortions, their government bailouts, their abdicate parenting leave it to the professionals mind set, their religion is not literal faith, their easy credit and two income families, their sexually liberated women, their dump the old people on the nursing homes and let the professionals deal with their infirmities attitude, their self fulfillment dreams, etc. etc. etc. Expecting conservatives to be better than liberals on these things is like expecting one group of fifteenth century Venetian noblemen to be better, more honest and more moral than any other group of fifteenth century Venetian noblemen. Not going to happen. Hence, the dodge into libertarianism. Timothy Leary is alive and well, and harder to kill than Ozzie and Harriet. Indeed, Ozzie and Harriet have become objects of derision today, while Leary is just someone who went a bit too far. People today, even conservatives, do not believe in original sin. But we are all fallen, and that is why society is supposed to be structured to contain our fallen natures, not glory in them Beware of what you celebrate, for what you celebrate you encourage.

After a prolonged absence from his website and other media, Grace's "comeback" article at Vdare is also a disappointment. I have already critiqued that article, but I will repeat my qualms more succinctly .

- Grace doesn't take seriously the multicultural/immigration link to the Human Rights Commissions and the Canadian Human Rights Act. In fact, he claims that there is no connection at all. Yet the two most notorious HRCs cases directly involved immigrants and Canada’s multiculturalism, where Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn were brought to the HRCs by offended Muslims.

- Grace emphasized the censorship aspect of the HRCs and the CHRA, which is in effect saying that they curtail free speech. This is the line that Levant, now a proven libertarian, has taken all along. When I challenged Levant via my blog posts about this, I have received no comment so far. When I tried to ask him a related question at an open meeting he held, he clearly avoided my question.

- At a time when huge societal changes are taking place, and especially on the Muslim front, I was surprised that Grace's article at Vdare never discussed those issues. In fact, he dismissed them by saying:

Canada may have the highest immigration rate in the world, but this is not an issue. Canada’s major cities may have been turned into simulacrums of the Third World, but this is not an issue. Quebec is the tail that wags the Canadian dog, but this is not an issue. There is little left of what we used to be, and what little that exists steadily disappears, but this is not an issue, either.

Self-censorship has become a defining Canadian characteristic.

He clearly means in the context of the HRCs and the CHRA. But, I have argued against that perspective here, and have been writing about it throughout my reports on Levant and the HRCS. I have stressed that high immigration and Canada's multiculturalism do indeed have a lot to do with these institutions and policies.

Until Grace starts addressing these pressing issues once again, like he used to, I will continue to question his core beliefs. But, I would rather he returned to his previous hard-line perspectives and write the kind of incisive articles he does so well.

Are the Human Rights Commissions and the Canadian Human Rights Acts Only About Censorship?

Kevin Michael Grace, host of The Ambler and writer at Vdare has sent me an email about linking him with libertariansim. I have posted both his email and my response to him.

Here is his email:

Dear Ms. Asrat:

I don't know where you got the idea I am a libertarian, paleo or otherwise. See this. I may be a pessimist, but I am not a nihilist; the biggest influence on my political and social thinking is Hilaire Belloc. As for immigration to my country (Canada), my position is: end it. I see no need for Canada to take in more than, say, 5,000 immigrants a year for the foreseeable future. As for Muslim immigration, my position is: none, ever.

Cordially,

Kevin Michael Grace

Here is my long response:

Dear Mr. Grace,

Thank you for your email. It has always been a pleasure reading your articles, and I am glad to see that your website is up.

As I wrote in my blog post, I am observing a trend (seeing and sensing, as I've put it), so some of my thoughts are some kind of intuitive analysis of what I see happening.

I do apologize if I singled you out incorrectly, or unfairly, but this is how I see what's happening. After a prolonged absence, your first article - your comeback article, if I may say so - was on the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Human Rights Commissions. I have written about your article in this post. Surprisingly, I found that your concern over the HRCs and the CHRA was not to disclose their positions on non-discrimination, but to talk about their attempts at censorship - or as you say "self-censorship."

I make a case in my post that the primary objective of the CHRA and the HRCs is to prevent non-discrimination, perceived or real, toward groups ranging from homosexuals to feminists, with minority groups filling in the gaps. This self-censorship which you talk about is a consequence of this coercion by non-mainstream groups who are sabotaging long-held beliefs and behaviors to favor their way of life.

Most Canadians do discriminate. I will wager that in the safety of their private homes many will not self-censor. But, public life is often harsher, and people have to toe the line if they want to prevent hassles, including getting sued or losing their jobs.

With increasing liberalism (in the case of homosexuals and feminists), and mass immigration of visible minorities, chances for getting into trouble (i.e. doing something that will be construed as racism or discriminatory), has resulted with a culture of fear. People will say as little as possible about contentious issues in public.

I was surprised, therefore that your argument against the HRCs and the CHRA was that they were a secret plan to "kill politics." I think they were partly a result of immigration (or admittance of non-traditional peoples) and their fears of discrimination. It was the blacks and Jews who influenced the formation of the CHRA in the first place. But, this is of course maintained by liberal ideas and politics.

So, rather than talk about these societal changes, and the historical reasons for the formation of the HRCs and the CHRA, and what fuels them these days which includes high immigration levels, it seems that you preferred to talk about self-censorship as the overriding factor. As I said before, this self-censorship came out of a specific historical and social context. It seems your concern relates to the narrow focus of individual freedoms (of speech, of expression etc.) that libertarians hold dear, rather than to the broader social issues that conservatives try to address, which certainly also includes free speech and expression as part of the whole picture.

That is why I implied that you might have libertarian inclinations.

Sincerely,

Kidist Paulos Asrat

Why People Slide Ever Closer Towards Libertarianism

My previous post titled "Where have all the conservatives gone?" has been linked at View From the Right. An interesting discussion has ensued on libertarians and libertarianism. Commentator Ferg has sent a great post about what most people are not ready to relinquish, which slides them ever closer towards libertarianism.

Where Have All the Conservatives Gone?

There is a strange trend I'm seeing (and sensing) all over the media - whether it is with informal bloggers or more seasoned writers. People are turning to some form of libertarianism.

Here are a few examples:

Kathy Shaidle who now blogs at David Horowitz's NewsReal Blog, had a post up describing her political position as "Libertarian for myself, but conservative for everyone else."

Dymphna, of Gates of Vienna, has written that she and her co-blogger husband Baron Bodissey avoid using the label "Republican" to describe their political leanings, but adds that libertarian might be a better fit for them.

Ezra Levant, who clearly is not a liberal and most likely supports Harper's Conservative Party, shows signs that he is a libertarian at heart, especially with his profile at his Facebook site. His official website mentions no such affiliation.

Kevin Michael Grace who hosts the website The Ambler, who at one time was writing sharp articles on immigration (he was definitely against it, and it seemed for cultural reasons), appears these days to be a libertarian - of the paleo sort.

Although Peter Brimelow, of Vdare, has never come out directly and said what his political position is, I have come to the conclusion that he also is a paleo-libertarian.

And here is the vanishing, and magically reappearing, libertarian stance of Ilana Mercer, who’s not really indecisive , but instead has never really left libertarianism (read the page headings). Once one's caught the libertarian bug, it is there to stay.

Taki Magazine's Taki himself, whose online magazine is an alterative to the liberal media, has declared that he doesn't want his writers to use the word "conservative." He apparently endorsed Ron Paul in the last elections, so this founder of the magazine The American Conservative is most likely another (paleo) libertarian.

The editors and directors of the International Free Press Society often write articles emphasizing loss of freedom rather than loss of culture. Even the Mohammed cartoon debates focussed on the freedoms that Muslims are curtailing rather than the cultures they’re destroying.

There seems to be a distancing from conservatism amongst the intellectual elites. Perhaps a comprehensive conservative outlook is difficult to embrace. For example, it is far easier for Levant to focus his energy on dismantling the body that is limiting his free speech - the Human Rights Commissions - rather than addressing the phenomenon holistically and looking at the underlying causes and problems. "Then what?" becomes the million dollar question. Unpleasant truths and harsh measures start to rear their ugly heads.

I think what these writers and leaders are afraid of is the looming responsibility they would have if they took on conservatism as a whole, rather than in small segments - and their own favorite segments, at that, which usually have to do with some freedom or other.

Vdare writers can go on about immigration, yet they seem reluctant to walk the walk (unlike Numbers USA) to direct their protests into action. Levant, by just addressing the Human Rights Commissions is in effect saying "Après moi, le déluge; I’ve done my bit, the rest is too hard." Grace has simply become more nihilistic and pessimistic over time.

I think the solution is not to be overwhelmed, and not to cut up the problem into small pieces, which then often become unrelated when left in their truncated sections. A holistic, all-inclusive approach is really the best. And if that becomes overwhelming for individuals, then they should form groups of people who can contribute to different areas.

Perhaps I’m being too optimistic. Perhaps none of those I mentioned above is willing to pick up the torch of conservatism. I still don’t know why conservatism is so maligned. It reminds me of non-Christians who feel they would be oppressed if they became Christian – that they would lose all their freedom. Paradoxically, the opposite is true. And, it is the same with conservatism.

Conservatives have become (should become) the avant-garde of our time, the front-line warriors. It takes courage, vision and a certain humility to be a conservative. All those chattering writers, who think they’re so brave taking on the "liberal media" have barely scraped the surface of what needs to be done, and not only that, they are also clearly unwilling to do anything but write (i.e. complain). Thus, being a self-serving libertarian is much easier than being a society-rescuing conservative.

Recent Events

I have posted a link to my postings on free speech, including Westergaard's presentations in New York and Princeton, on the side bar under "Recent Events."

Muslims' Organic Growth

It is a treat to be around more-or-less like-minded people. It often allows one to develop ideas and thoughts without negative and critical opposition, which usually cut off such thoughts and ideas at their bud.

One of the conversations I got into during my brief stay in New York was when I was describing the purpose of Our Changing Landscape. The blog started out, as I have previously written, as the surprised recordings of the changes I was seeing around me. As I was explaining the evolution of this blog, another revelation of the Muslims' strategy came to mind.

Muslims are changing things very organically. I don't think there is a centralized bureau planning a change here and a change there. The whole transformation of the societies Muslims are taking over is done with pushes forward and pulling back when gone too far, and a tentative reach there followed by a more decisive move. Stealth (jihad, sharia) is a popular word these days describing Muslims' activities. Stealth implies a certain strategy, a certain planning of events. I think Muslims are much less strategic than we think, and are simply pushing themselves into hostile environments, slowly encroaching into those territories for final takeover. This could take a few years or a few decades. That is why I think "organic" better describes their movement.

Muslims continuously test our resistance. When it is too strong, they wait for another opportune moment to introduce their change, often with much better success. Sometimes, they will just get overly aggressive, to see how far they can get away with things. They bargain for a higher stake, but are really going after a lower one, until another opportunity arises and the stake can only go higher.

This is the organic growth that "peaceful" Muslims are nurturing, with the full confidence that the end goal will be accomplished. But there are those moments which unfurl the Toronto 18 and the London Subway Bombers, condoned by all Muslims. Such violent acts (in conjunction with these organic infiltrations) are demanded by the Koran and have to be obeyed. It is all part of the growth.

Muslims have perfected the unobtrusive, organic growth. Suddenly, like ivy on a building, or algae in a pond, they are everywhere.

Email to Paul Belien

Here is an email I sent to Paul Belien, Vice President of the International Free Press Society, with my blog posts on my recent visit to New York and Princeton.

Readers might be interested in finding these blog posts in this separate list.

Dear Dr. Belien,

Thank you for passing your contact information to me during my visit with you and other International Free Press Society Board of Directors to attend Kurt Westergaard's Princeton, and later on Manhattan, presentations.

I was very pleased to have been invited in late August by one of your board members to be included in this important visit. You might be interested in the reports I made on my blog Our Changing Landscape on the various outcomes of that trip, including reports on him in the Canadian press and television.

Here is a list of the posts:

- Freedom in Denmark?
- Jonathan Kay, Feeble Spokesman for the National Post
- Ezra Levant and Kurt Westergaard: Fate
- Muslims in the West: A Simple Case of Cause and Effect
- Westergaard's Bombshell, So To Speak
- Hope and Optimism
- The Politics of Revolution which Temper and Harden the Breast

Please feel free to browse through the rest of Our Changing Landscape.

Sincerely,

Kidist Paulos Asrat

Update on Hope and Optimism

The link I provided in my comment: "This is how Levant should be thinking, and not 'optimistically' finish off his incomplete mission" at my post on Wednesday leads to an incorrect link (the up-to-date list of my HRC posts). I should have linked it to Levant's own post which he simply titles "Why I'm Optimistic" where he confesses that he has "never been more optimistic" on the fate (negative) of the HRCs and his contributions to that effect.

This relates better to my critique on my Wednesday post. I think that Levant's narrow focus on the HRCs and ignoring or downplaying the overall picture surrounding them shouldn't be cause for optimism, since that is a work only partially done. I hope now that my Hope and Optimism post reads a little more coherently.

The Politics of Revolution which Temper and Harden the Breast

Paul Belien, Vice President of the International Free Press Society, has an article up in the Brussels Journal about Kurt Westergaard's reception at Yale and Princeton. After I heard Westergaard present his story at Princeton, we shared a ride back together to NYC, with members of the IFPS, and one of the things I said to him was "What I found really sad about your account is that in your speech you said that this was 'just another day at work,' and then all this happened to you."

Belien writes about the hostility and complete lack of empathy the Princeton and Yale students had towards Westergaard, who has to live in a barricaded home and under 24-hour security for the rest of his life.

It is surprising, and disheartening, that young people cannot even feel any sadness that a member of their society (at large, yes) has to live under such inhuman conditions. Yet they are ready to stand by a foreign god and his foreign followers, something which has nothing to do with them, their history or even their current life, except to be part of the liberal ideology which they so readily espouse.

Here is a quote from Burke's excerpted book I read on my trip to New York:

The worst of these politics of revolution is this; they temper and harden the breast, in order to prepare it for the desperate strokes which are sometimes used in extreme occasions...This sort of people are so taken up with their theories about the rights of man, that they have totally forgot his nature.

Hope and Optimism

Ezra Levan't optimism, which I wrote about yesterday, reminds me of the hope that Lars Hedegaard talked about on Michael Coren's show a couple of weeks ago. When asked by Coren if there is any hope, Hedegaard replies "Of course there is hope, there's always hope."

I agree in an abstract sort of way there is always hope. But, in a country that cannot set its immigration laws without the EU either dismantling or modifying them, I find Hedegaard's optimism for Denmark to be on the same level as Levant's for Canada. Hate crime is already part of the criminal code in Canada, and Section 13 has not been revoked yet, and many say that Harper's Conservative government won't do anything about it.

So, freedom of speech, dismantling of the HRCs, these are the missions of these men. At the end of the day, all the effort they make, all the hope and optimism they have, may just go up in smoke because of the systemic barriers to those missions.

Mark Steyn's Lucidity, Although He Doesn't Get It Quite Right

He writes at The Corner:

[T]he superficial fluffily benign language of multiculturalism that comes so naturally to our rulers provides a lot of cover for the shriveling of free speech...

As Canadians have discovered, liberty is lost very quietly and quickly. And trying to get it back is slow and painful — particularly at a time when artists, universities, publishers, and others who congratulate themselves incessantly on their truth-telling courage find increasingly pre-emptive self-censorship the better part of valor.

Steyn, like Kevin Michael Grace, thinks the biggest problem is voluntary self-censorship. Well, yes that is probably true in the case of the ultra-liberal elites that Steyn uses as his examples. But, I doubt that the majority of ordinary people really do self-censor, but are coerced into self-censorship instead.

As I've said many times before, dismantling (or merely battling) the Human Rights Commissions is only the beginning. There is so much ingrained in society now that allows HRC-type events to occur. My favorite is the myriad of free legal aid services available for poor, minority complainants who can still go to a real court and sue those they deem racist or discriminatory. All kinds of similar subversive activities take place all the time.

So, Ezra Levant has to think about what his real battles are. It is well and good to eradicate kangaroo courts, but the problem lies much deeper than that.

The multiculturalism that Steyn writes about is being fueled by our high immigration rates, and that is part of where the problem lies. Certainly, homosexuals, feminists, the disabled and other "victimized" HRC complainants exist, but then, I attribute that to rampant liberalism, which is the same liberalism that allows multiculturalism to fester.

This is how Levant should be thinking, and not "optimistically" finish off his incomplete mission.

Salim Mansur Writes a Book on Islam and Ignores Parts of the Koran He Just Doesn't Like

Salim Mansur, associate professor at the University of Western Ontario and columnists for several national papers, has just published a book on Islam titled: Islam's Predicament: Perspectives of a Dissident Muslim. His book is excerpted in two articles at the National Post, here and here.

Mansur makes an incredible statement in this quote below excerpted from his book. It is absurd because it is coming from someone who professes to be a Muslim, and who must have at some point read the Koran.

The Koran's command about there being no coercion in religion was cast aside [during the skirmishes between Muslims soon after Mohammed’s death], and Islam in its Arabian environment came to be inseparable from the power and sweep of the sword.

This clearly defies explicit verses by the Koran where, according to Robert Spencer’s latest book The Complete Infidel’s Guide to the Koran "Muslims have the responsibility to fight the Infidels (4:89, 2:191, 9:5) and subjugate the People of the Book under the rule of Islamic law (9:29)."

Not only are Muslims mandated by Koranic verses to subjugate (Spencer doesn’t say coercion but subjugation, but isn’t that just splitting hairs?) the infidels, but the message in the Koran is clear; it is a book of subjugation, of bringing everyone into the religion of Mohammed. Such totalitarianism is surely a precursor to violence, since if everyone has to be Muslim, then those that have no desire to be Muslim can only be forced to do so.

I don’t know what version of the Koran Mansur reads - his version could be lost in translation - and what type of Islam he practices (he calls himself Ismaili, who profess to be the "peaceful" Muslims, which then means they don’t agree with the Koran, which means they are not Muslims – that circular argument we have with "moderate" Muslims).

But the danger here is that his book will be widely read by the Canadian public eager to call Islam a religion of peace, and who now have it on record, by a "Muslim" no less, that it is indeed so.

Another dangerous book that shouldn’t be on the shelves in our bookstores.

Spencer's Absurdities, Again

Robert Spencer was recently interviewed on Frontpage Magazine, where he talks about his new book The Complete Infidel’s Guide to the Koran. As usual, Spencer is adept at quoting Koranic verses and explaining them to some extent, and I believe he has made tremendous contributions in that regard. But there’s always a catch to Spencer’s interpretations, despite his diligent scholarship.

Spencer talks about the Arabic nature of Islam, and how the Koran needs to be read and understood in Arabic only – the language of Mohammed. All Muslims, irrelevant of their native tongues, have to recite the Koran in Arabic. Spencer mentions a funny (and poignant) quote from a Pakistani Muslim in his interview who says "I am very proud of my religion, and have memorized almost all of the Koran. And one day I plan to get one of those translations and find out what it means."

Now this gives Spencer license to say absurd things. It is as though Spencer is unable to believe his original – factually sound – findings, but has to make up his own interpretations instead. Perhaps that is why Mohammed wanted his Koran read in Arabic only, as "lost in translation" is a phrase that comes to mind, and of which Spencer is frequently guilty.

This is what Spencer says about the dangers of "peaceful" Muslims not understanding the Koran:

[W]hen the Koran is not immediately understood – and its seventh-century Arabic can be difficult even for native Arabic speakers – those who believe in it understand it by means of how it is preached and presented in the local mosque. If the imams there do not preach hatred of Infidels and the necessity to fight and subjugate them, then these probably won’t be live ideas in the minds of the devout – and such has long been the case in many areas of the world.

At the same time, however, the Koran says what it says, and so jihadist movements do point to chapter and verse to attempt to recruit peaceful Muslims to their cause, and to justify their actions within the Islamic community.

I suppose the biggest mystery about Islam could be how it has remained latent for so long, mostly stuck in Middle Eastern and South Asian countries, and parts of Africa. There is no mention of outright jihad in the past several centuries, until it suddenly came to full force in our era. In Spencer’s view, this could be because imams "there" - as Spencer ambiguously refers to non-Western Muslim lands - had decided in previous centuries not to emphasize the jihadist verses to their non-Western followers.

First, Spencer needs to provide concrete evidence that imams never preached jihad in non-Western Islamic countries until contemporary political issues, which he calls terrorism, started to occur. But, second, and more likely, surely they didn’t need to put that aspect of Islam front and center, since jihad had been accomplished successfully with the Islamization of these countries.

My interpretation of this resurgence of jihadist preaching – non-peaceful preaching, as Spencer would call it - is that Islam has reached a new phase, where it has now entered the West filled with infidels, including Christians and Jews. The jihadist component of Islam has to click in naturally to Islamize, or at least fight and subjugate, the infidels in these countries, as it is written in the Koran. Peaceful preaching is no longer sufficient, and the jihadist mode is necessary for the great task at hand.

This is why I wonder about Spencer’s true understanding of Islam, despite his many years studying it. He can read the words, but misses the meanings, it seems to me. I wonder if Spencer reads the Koran in the original Arabic, and if not, perhaps that is why he cannot understand Mohammed’s glorious message as presented in the Arabic (true) Koran. Or maybe some infidels just don't get it, which is perhaps why so many countries fell so swiftly and quickly to the mighty sword of Allah.

There is a warning here, somewhere.

Westergaard's Bombshell, So To Speak...

The YouTubes of Michael Coren interviewing Lars Hedegaard and Kurt Westergaard are up [here]. Here is another interesting part of that interview for me. Michael Coren, who is a proponent of the "moderate Muslim," and who has many Muslim friends – all moderate, I would imagine – asks Westergaard the following, with Westergaard’s unexpected (to Coren) response:

[This section is around the 1:40 point in part 3 of the hour-long interview].

Coren: Did you hear from many Muslims who said to you: “I don’t like the cartoon, but I do defend you right to draw it and have it published.”?

Westergaard: Well I heard from many Muslims who didn’t like the cartoon, but they didn’t accept it as a part of the debate in a democratic society, in a secular democratic society. I was always greeted with curses. It’s very difficult, I think, for a Dane today to discuss a matter if the arguments from the other side are curses: "Go to hell and stay there, and so on."

Now, there is a fraction of a pause on the part of the agile Coren, who then fluidly goes on to ask Westergaard how he heard about the dangers to his life.

This is fascinating. I don't think Coren has a list of questions he follows to a "t." He is too independent and enjoys arguing too much to reduce his questions to pre-determined sequences. The most interesting follow-up question to Westergaard’s dramatic revelation would have been: "Why do you think no Muslim defended your actions?"

But, such an approach would have blown Coren's thesis that "moderate" Muslims exist out there, and would have directed the argument into another, much more fruitful, discussion. Of course, this didn't happen, and won't happen any time soon with Coren.

Muslims in the West: A Simple Case of Cause and Effect

Kurt Westergaard and Lars Hedegaard - President of the International Free Press Society - were on Michael Coren's show tonight in a pre-taped interview. Most of what Hedegaard and Westergaard said is found in various other interviews, some on YouTube. But in this particular interview, one thing stood out for me.

Hedegaard, discussing the ambushed Western world by Muslims, started talking about the unique circumstances of our age when non-Muslim countries are being forced to adhere to Islamic principles and laws.

I've always thought that it was strange that the Danes were forced to follow Islamic mandates, and had to fight to publish their own stories (and images) in their own papers and books, in their own country. How could a Western country be under the thumb of Islamic laws?

Well, that is exactly what Hedergaard commented upon, giving examples of other harsh representations of Mohammed in, for example, Dante's Inferno. This depiction never unleashed the kind of furor we see now. The point is, in that era, Muslims did their own thing in their own regions, as did the European countries. The two regions were as far apart geographically as culturally.

The problem now is not that Europe (or America and Canada) is especially aligned, or close, to Muslim countries; there is still a big disconnect. The problem is that Muslims have entered Europe (and the Americas) in such large numbers that they are dictating the rules of the game. They are turning Western countries into their own.

Sharia is thus no longer confined to Muslim countries, but is being forced upon non-Muslim countries as well, with, of course, the full intention that these non-Muslim countries become Muslim eventually.

The problem is serious, but the solution is simpler. Rather than continuously confront the determined Muslims within their own countries, Europeans, and North Americans, need to find ways to reduce their numbers and their strength so that sharia doesn't become an overriding (or competing) reality. The more Muslims there are, the stronger they become, and the more demands they will make on their host countries to embrace their culture, society and religion. The cause and effect is quite logical, really. Now, it is time to do something about the cause.

Ezra Levant and Kurt Westergaard: Fate

It looks like all the forces are joining together to convene at the right time and right place. Westergaard has been in Toronto around the same time that Ezra Levant is testifying before Parliament on the Human Rights Commissions' abuses. The common factor is of course the cartoon, which has irrevocabley changed Westergaard's life, and which cost Levant three years of his life and much money out of his pocket.

Jonathan Kay, the Feeble Spokesman for the National Post

Jonathan Kay has written a report on Kurt Westergaard's visit at the National Post. Only the last sentence is worth quoting, and taking apart. Kay writes:

I don't blame Canadian politicians for courting Muslim voters, or any other ethno-religious group. But I'd urge them to think about Westergaard's test when they do so. Welcoming newcomers into our society in exchange for their embrace of liberal values is the essence of the Canadian social contract. Welcoming them without any conditions at all, on the other hand, means living behind steel doors.

Kay's ignorance and liberalism is at display for all to see. Muslims will enter Canada with "conditions," and once they enter under the false promises of keeping these "conditions," will resume their natural activity of being Muslims.

Kay is of course advocating assimilation - or policies that demand assimilation of immigrants. But, no true Muslim will want to assimilate into Canadian culture. In fact, his very religion prohibits it. So Kay, behind his rose-colored glasses, is essentially condemning us to live behind steel doors for eternity.

Plus, one final point. What does Kay mean by "I don't blame Canadian politicians for courting Muslim voters, or any other ethno-religious group."? What feeble logic, and spineless argumentation. Isn't it the job of a journalist, who has the benefit of freedom of the press (so far), to make stringent demands on leaders and politicians? In every little way, the liberalism of Canadians, even within the so-called right-leaning National Post, becomes painfully evident.

Freedom in Denmark?

I've had a hectic, but thoroughly enjoyable, trip to New York City, where I attended events relating to the Danish cartoonist, Kurt Westergaard, who drew the satirical portrait of a turbaned Mohammed with a bomb. The events I attended were at Princeton University, and later on at a private Manhattan residence mentioned here.

Westergaard is an elderly man in his mid-seventies, who walks with a cane, and who has a soft-spoken voice and a gentle demeanor. He is the last person one would expect to be embroiled in this kind of affair. Yet, that fateful day, which he calls "just another day at work," sealed his life forever, with armed guards now protecting his every move.

I would just like to comment on the Manhattan event. The group I was with in Princeton kindly asked me to join them after the Princeton trip to the Manhattan residence, which was right in front of the grand Plaza Hotel at the entrance of Central Park. The view from the apartment was spectacular - it was not facing the park, but rather the twinkling lights of the New York skyline (we arrived there when it was dark, and later than expected because of awful traffic getting into the Lincoln Tunnel). There was nice wine, delicious hors d'oeuvres and a beautiful home, but the topic was extremely serious.

After Westergaard made is introductory speech, there were the usual comments and questions about freedom of speech, the bravery and persistence required of Westergaard to refuse apology for what he "did," the terrible state of events with the ever-growing numbers of Muslims, and hence possibilities for retaliations like the one against Westergaard, etc.

I'm afraid I lost my patience at one point and interrupted a concerned woman who kept dwelling on the awfulness of everything. I started asking if there was any figure like the Netherlands' Wilders who has emerged in Denmark. For some reason, the gist of my question was not understood, so I succinctly asked what Denmark was doing about preventing Muslims from entering the country.

And here is the shocker. Denmark has been cutting down on immigration levels into the country even before the cartoon incident, which by 2004 had been reduced to 80% of its 2001 levels. On top of that, other restrictions have been made, including banning Danish citizens from bringing in their non-European Union wives into Denmark. This policy was mostly aimed at Muslims from bringing in their spouses from arranged marriages, who generally entered the Danish welfare programs once they came into the country.

Well, the Court of Justice of the European Communities (ECJ) has been repealing or amendings these policies to the advantage of the (mostly Muslim) immigrants. It was shocking to hear this enunciated during the meeting, when clearly the answer to my question had already been worked out, and to some extent the problems solved, by the Danish government. And the EU made unequivocal decisions to undermine and dismantle, or at least render innocuous, the policies of the Danish nation.

That is the current state of affairs in Europe, something unimaginable (yet) here. There is really nothing more to say. However brave and resilient Westergaard is, however much he espouses freedoms (of speech, of expression, of the press), there is the behemoth of the EU which can step in at any time and clamp in its restrictions, and demolish anything the Danish people and their goverment have decided.

There is no freedom in Denmark.