Posted on 11/29/2009 8:22:28 PM PST by Steelfish
NOVEMBER 29, 2009 Switzerland and the Minaret Sunday's vote keeps European heads in the sand about Muslim immigrants.
Nearly 58% of Swiss voters Sunday cast their ballots in favor of banning the construction of new minarets in the Alpine republic, a surprise result that led at least one Swiss member of parliament to declare that "the foundations of Switzerland's direct democracy have failed."
That is clearly wrong. Swiss direct democracy shows its mettle when Swiss voters use it to stand up to their political elites, as happened here. Having said that, Sunday's vote, for all the hand-wringing leading up to it, was a decidedly mild-mannered sort of protest. The construction of new minarets is banned, but the building of mosques is unaffected, and the vote does not affect the four existing minarets in the country. Nobody's freedom of worship is threatened, but a symbolic message has been sent.
But what message, exactly? The vote betrays an undercurrent of fear among the Swiss—a fear that is not without cause. There is no denying the connection between radical imams and terrorist acts. Nor should anyone look away from the fact that too many European Muslims flatly reject the norms of their host countries, sometimes in ways that are criminal: honor killings, child brides and the like.
Yet banning minarets does nothing to address that fear. It merely makes it less likely that the average Swiss will be confronted by a visible symbol of Islam upon his skyline. Thus, even as a symbolic gesture, it seems to encourage a head-in-the-sand approach toward the 5% of Swiss who are Muslim. In much of Europe, this is the norm anyway, the result of political correctness and cowardice.
Rather than being a blow against that attitude, Sunday's vote seems only to reinforce it.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
In the sand? I think they have their heads in another place, one that I cannot say on a friendly-friendly site, but one that is far more enclosed.
The Muslim ghettos that are found everywhere in Europe show them all they need to see, if they deign to look.
Hopefully it sends a message to the ruling elite that not everything is acceptable. And second, hopefully it emboldens the electorate to do the same for on related fronts. i.e. ban the words “Sharia Law” from ever being written or spoken.
Europe will maintain its culture and history whatever it takes. I doubt we will do the same. We would rather commit suicide in the name of respect for the law. We are now being colonized by Latin America.
They’re just lucky to still have their heads attached to their bodies.
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