His statement elicited the usual howls of outrage from the Democrats and from the mainstream media (pardon me for being redundant). Even many in the Republican establishment have taken pains to distance themselves from Trump's suggestion.
They point out that not all Muslims are terrorists, in fact only a miniscule percentage of Muslims are, and that the vast majority of them are peace-loving and will fit in well in this country.
But is that actually the case? Take a look at the results of these polls:
http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/pages/opinion-polls.htm
The polls date back to a few years ago, but the last three conducted in 2015, under the category of terrorism, are quite telling:
A full 19% of Muslim-Americans say that violence is justified in order to make Sharia the law in the United States (66% disagree).
25% of Muslim-Americans say that violence against Americans in the United States is justified as part of the "global Jihad (64% disagree).
Following the November attacks in Paris, 1 in 4 young Muslims in Britain (and 1 in 5 overall) said they sympathize with those who fight for ISIS.
One in four, or one in five (depending on which poll you look at) is not a miniscule number.
If just one in ten of those 25% of Muslims-Americans who believe in violent jihad act on their beliefs, we could see a lot more San Bernadinos.
But hey, Obama's right. It would be un-American not to let more of them in.
If just one in ten of those 25% of Muslims-Americans who believe in violent jihad act on their beliefs, we could see a lot more San Bernadinos.
But hey, Obama's right. It would be un-American not to let more of them in.
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13 comments:
John,
I don't think that this is a very convincing argument. I mean, it's convincing to you and me because were already convinced that Islam is a menace, but no one is going to be convinced with polls like this. They're going to dismiss them.
I think a better argument is to tell them to look at Muslim history. Muslim history is a series of military conquests. The hearts and minds we're going after are those of stupid young people. When they argue with you and say Christianity was spread by the sword, you have to respond and tell them go back to the very beginning when Christianity was not spread by the sword, it was spread by ordinary people who wanted a better way of life. Later on when it became the official religion under Constantine, it was spread by the sword but, the original message was completely peaceful.
Not so with Islam. Islam has been a violent conquering territorial religion from the very start. That's what you have to keep hammering home to impressionable young people. Once you get them interested, suggest a few books on the subject and mention all of the Islamic slave soldier empires.
Islamic history happens to be an interest of mine I know what I'm talking about. And I'm not kidding when I say that it is truly a menace. It goes dormant for long periods of time, and then when they get their hands on some power they show their true colors. It would be a nightmare of epic proportions if they became an influential community in the United States.
Lady Bug --
Everything you say is true, and you know more about the history of Islam than I do, but I still think the current polls are a more convincing argument against unlimited immigration than ancient history is. All religions, all cultures, all peoples have war and aggression in their pasts, but it's now that counts. Yes, Islam has historically been about conquest, but it's now that people care about.
The average American is going to be a lot more alarmed knowing what his seemingly peaceful neighbors really think than he is learning about the violent history of Islam
I wouldn't want the Muslim population of Europe to increase too much because even if extremisst are a very small percentage, the actual number of them increases as the overall number increases. Generally speaking, I find plenty to dislike about the religion in its classical and conservative forms and don't think its compatible with liberal democratic Europe. However, I don't take polling data at face value, especially as reported by an explicitly anti-Islamic website.
The Survation poll reported in the Sun asked whether they sympathise with young Muslims going to fight in Syria. It didn't ask whether they supported/sympathised wth ISIS.
5% said they had a lot of sympathy; 14.5% said they had some sympathy.
The same poll was conducted on non-Muslims. 4.3% expressed a lot of sympathy; 9.4% expressed some sympathy. So, 13.7% (non-Muslims) vs 19.5%. (Muslims) had sympathy. 4.3% (non-Muslims) vs 5% (Muslims) had 'a lot of sympathy'.
I would also approach the CPS polls with some skpeticism as they come from an organisation that seems to have an anti-Islamic agenda. That doesn't mean the findings are neccessarily invalid; I'd just approach them critically.
Steven --
Good point about polls being not necessarily reliable, and I agree that the website I linked has an agenda. But many of the sources they link, including Pew and BBC Radio, aren't anti-Muslim sites. ("The religion of peace" site may have only linked to polls which fit their narrative, but they WERE able to link to a lot of polls which showed disturbing results.) I'm not familiar with CPS, I'll take your word on them.
I have to admit, I am surprised -- shocked, actually -- by the results of the Sun poll you cite. I can't imagine that that many non-Muslims sympathize with young (British?) Muslims who are essentially fighting for the enemy. I also wonder how the poll questions were phrased, though I realize that same issue applies to the polls I cited. (I've seen enough instances of polls which are phrased, if not misleadingly, at least ambiguously, which leads to questionable results.)
The Saudi flag is telling:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1a/Flag_of_Saudi_Arabia_(in_order_of_writing,_later_over).png
What looks like drug-gang graffiti is actually the shahada: "There is no god but God; Muhammad is the messenger of God."
Below that is a kebab skewer, for skewering pieces of meat, confirming that Islam is indeed a religion of piece.
Mark --
The thing is, the Saudis are relatively peaceful, at least as a country. I know, I know, most of the 9/11 guys were Saudis, and some of the rich Saudis have sponsored terrorism elsewhere. And Wahhabi-ism is pretty extreme. But as a government, they're pretty much just a family business-run-as-a-government, which has made them a reliable "ally," at least by the standards of that region.
I think the phrasing was the point in this case. It was more about sympathising with young people going to Syria than anything about jihad or specifying who they'd be fighting for (at this point, most of them would be fighting for ISIS but at the start of the civil war, they were going to fight for rebel groups against Assad).
I reckon some people think of it in terms of sympathy with a misguided young person, not the organisations. I bet if fighting for ISIS were explicitly stated, the percentage of non-Muslim sympathisers would drop by a lot, maybe of Muslim sympathisers too. Also I kind of get the impression you sometimes just get a fraction of people agreeing to idiotic shit on polls.
The Sun actually printed an apology for their headline about supporting jihad.
re Saudi Arabia, they have spent vast amount of oil money to propagate their Wahhabi version of Islam. They've funded mosques all over the world, including in the west, installed their imams and disseminated their hateful literature. I heard that they were spending more per year on propaganda than the Soviet Union at its height. Its led to what Chomsky called the Wahabiisation of sunni Islam. There are, for example, North African countries that were traditionally moderate that the Saudis helped spread extremism to.
Steven --
I don't know how the poll questions were phrased, so you could well be right. And it probably is that a lot of people interpreted the question as being about feeling sympathetic for (without agreeing with) the young Muslims. Who knows.
Yes, the Saudis are slyly subsversive, no question about that. The royal family makes respectable noises, but a lot of that oil money flows toward extremist causes, no doubt.
Numerous American politicians, including Pres. George F. Bush, are bought Saudi stooges. Consider F's national address delivered days after 9/11:
"The English translation is not as eloquent as the original Arabic, but let me quote from the Koran itself: In the long run, evil in the extreme will be the end of those who do evil. For that they rejected the signs of Allah and held them up to ridicule.
"The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. That's not what Islam is all about. ISLAM IS PEACE. These terrorists don't represent peace. They represent evil and war."
Unfortunately many Muslims regard killing unbelievers, Crusaders, infidels, Zionists not as evil at all, rather as a positive good and a sacred religious obligation. Bush's quote says as much: "For they rejected the signs of Allah." He who rejects the signs of Allah -- the ultimate sin under Islam -- must be put to the sword.
Shortly after 9/11, on the order of 140 Saudi nationals, including many members of the royal family and relatives of Osama bin Laden, got US government approval to fly back to Saudi Arabia without even being interviewed by the FBI. The FBI's ridiculous response to this was that none of the passengers were on the no-fly list, and the FBI did search the Saudi's six chartered aircraft for explosives.
Here is another good web site with many graphs, polls results;
http://thosewhocansee.blogspot.com/2015/12/why-we-culturally-profile.html#more
One good point about those immigrants, There will be more work for police, prisons, etc etc.
Europeasant --
Thank you for that, that was interesting. Most of it is not really surprising. The one thing I was surprised by is what islands of tolerance and open-mindedness Turkey and Lebanon are by comparison to the other Muslim countries.
Ha, yes. And especially for the FBI.
Here's a youtube video I recently came across that makes the point you're getting at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSPvnFDDQHk
Taylor Leland Smith - Wonderful video, thanks!
The commentator, Raheel Raza, a Muslim, called for a suspension of Muslim immigration into Canada from countries that harbor Muslim extremists, according to the Canadian edition of the Huffington Post. She also wanted a public ban on religious face coverings. "When people come to Canada, we're not coming to the Islamic Republic of Canada," Raza said in 2010 (Toronto Star).
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