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Thread ID: 3948 | Posts: 3 | Started: 2002-12-10
2002-12-10 18:44 | User Profile
washingtonpost.com
Watchdog: Anti-Islam, Anti-Semitism Rife in Europe
Reuters Tuesday, December 10, 2002; 11:10 AM
By Marie-Louise Moller
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Islamophobia and anti-Semitism fueled by the Sept. 11 attacks and the Middle East conflict are in danger of becoming acceptable in Europe, the European Union's racism watchdog warned Tuesday.
Presenting its report on racism in the EU, the European Monitoring Center on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) called on leaders of the 15-nation bloc to deal with the underlying social and economic factors it said were fueling racial prejudice.
"Now it seems legitimate to have anti-Muslim and anti-Semitic views on some issues because people have mixed up the whole issue," said Bob Purkiss, chairman of the EUMC.
"The danger is ... how it has now embedded itself."
In the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijacked airliner attacks on U.S. cities, people who "looked Muslim," mainly women wearing headscarves, became the victims of anti-Islamic sentiment, the report said.
The escalation of violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and social and economic problems inside the EU resulted in a wave of attacks on Jews and synagogues across the 15-nation bloc, it added.
EU leaders were quick to condemn racist aggression against both religious minorities and call for dialogue, it said. But Beate Winkler, director of the Vienna-based agency, told reporters: "Immediately after Sept. 11 we had a lot of positive initiatives by politicians, but it did not continue."
FEAR FUELS RACISM
The report said racism and xenophobia were expressions of EU citizens' fears about issues such as globalization, unemployment and Islam, which the media and politicians failed to present in a balanced way.
Mainstream politicians in Europe had allowed themselves to be pushed into a negative debate on immigration by far-right populist parties, Purkiss said.
"People are playing politics with the immigration issue rather than dealing with the real questions that need to be addressed," he said.
Purkiss said the EU needed to deal with the broader context of immigration, which he said it needed to spur economic growth because of labor shortages as its population ages.
"We need that wealth to pay for pensions," he said.
The report also focused on problems faced by immigrants in the labor markets, saying they were often paid less and given less attractive jobs than EU citizens with the same skills.
Migrants faced problems ranging from direct racism such as verbal abuse in the workplace to indirect discrimination in the form of unrealistic language requirements.
On average, the unemployment rate for immigrants is twice as high as national rates in EU member states, ranging from 22 percent in France to 5.3 percent in Portugal, and many migrants worked in the informal labor market, the study said.
é 2002 Reuters
Someone tell me again how diversity is a strength. Seems to me it's yet again proven true what the nationalist Right says: multiracial societies are inherently unstable. The mixing of all these cultures and peoples appears to have set them at each other's throats. Go figure! Good fences do make good neighbors, and all that. Take this article as Exhibit #258,745,320,069.
2002-12-12 03:47 | User Profile
** Someone tell me again how diversity is a strength. Seems to me it's yet again proven true what the nationalist Right says: multiracial societies are inherently unstable. The mixing of all these cultures and peoples appears to have set them at each other's throats. Go figure! Good fences do make good neighbors, and all that. Take this article as Exhibit #258,745,320,069. **
Forget diversity, the evidence of its impossibility has long surpassed the point of beyond reasonable doubt, never mind balance of probability, for all but the most dimwitted.
** "People are playing politics with the immigration issue rather than dealing with the real questions that need to be addressed," he said.
Purkiss said the EU needed to deal with the broader context of immigration, which he said it needed to spur economic growth because of labor shortages as its population ages.
"We need that wealth to pay for pensions," he said. **
Take the above and the often-repeated phrase: ââ¬Åwe need immigrants.ââ¬Â I know of no western state whose governing body does not echo this sentiment. Has no one in power grasped that implicit in such statements is an admission that our society and way of life is untenable because it cannot sustain itself for the foreseeable future, to say nothing of in perpetuity. Whatever the current in vogue excuses may be: lack of fecundity, need for economic growth, pension funds, ad nauseam ââ¬â all blunt admissions of the non-viability of Aryan homo sapiens (ââ¬Åthe real question [never] addressedââ¬Â). As an aside, I see nothing wrong with declining populations; 200 or even 100 million souls for all of North America would work for me, the Earth would be grateful for it, and with less artificial sustenance would come improvement in the health of the populace. How about the Dutch, for example, with their population per square mile at over 1,000, and they are at it merrily importing Somalis. What are they aiming for, Bangladesh? Pure insanity it is.
Say you really want/need an increase in population. All you have to do is shoot all the social scientists, feminists, and other undesirables. Impose punitive tariffs to discourage reliance on foreign products and learn to accept the fact that the globe was not ordained to serve as the exclusive market/dumping ground for your trinkets. Substantially lower all other taxes, eliminate middle managerial positions and the like (really anything cursed with high estrogen density), and pay the workingman what he is worth. Then watch the population skyrocket. Oh, and no need to burden law books with statutes pertaining to cannibalism. :rolleyes:
2002-12-12 03:58 | User Profile
**Say you really want/need an increase in population. All you have to do is shoot all the social scientists, feminists, and other undesirables. Impose punitive tariffs to discourage reliance on foreign products and learn to accept the fact that the globe was not ordained to serve as the exclusive market/dumping ground for your trinkets. **
Get rid of the nanny state so people will have children again to take care of them in old age instead of relying on government. The reduction in state apparatus will mean taxpayers have more disposable income, and a working man might just be able once again to earn a "family wage" that allows his wife to be a proper mother instead of having to work herself just to help keep the limited shell that passes as "family" afloat in these modern times.