Monday, August 29, 2005

What holidays are good for

I recently spent nearly three weeks in Portugal. My parents have moved there after their retirement, and I went there with my family for holidays.
It was a great vacation. The wether was fantastic, the ocean was Atlantic, the people are so nice in Portufal. Not for the first time I gave moving there serious thought.

It wasn't long before my wife noticed the complete apparent lack of Muslims. I went to Lisbon, and various smaller cities, and although I am sure they exist in Portugal, there were no Muslims to be seen.
I talked about this with a friend, who told me that Portugal is a 'racist' country (his words). Portugal has its colonial past, and blacks live there, but they are only 'tolerated'. "If there's any crap from them, they get in trouble, both from the police and from people in general. And there's virtually nobody who then takes the side of the trespasser". I was told much the same goes for Muslims.

There is exactly one (1) mosque in Lisbon. Lisbon is a much bigger city than Amsterdam, but the latter has 57 mosques at the latest count, small and large. The other three larger cities have similar numbers of mosques.

Racism is not a solution for anything, certainly not for Islam, which is not a race to begin with. But the attitude of not taking any shit is a sensible one, PARTICULARLY in the case of Muslims.

Holland is slowly waking up to Muslim extremism, but it is trying to use existing laws to fight the radicals. This does not work, because anything that targets Islam specifically (which is what is needed) comes down to a form of discrimination, which is (rightly) illegal.
But Islam is a special case. Just as membership of neo-Nazi groups is prohibited, so Islam can be made a special case. Groups like the Rote Armee Faction (AKA Baader-Meinhof) were declared illegal, mostly because their purpose was in fact to overthrow the democratic countries, and replace it with socialist or anarchist entities.

Their aim was to destroy the host countries.

Islam has that same goal.

The moment mainstream politicians can get themselves to admit this, openly, the door is opened to a solution. Islam is not just another religion. It is an ideology that seeks to dominate the world, and supplant all other ideologies, like capitalism, socialism, communism, etc. If this is undesirable to the West, they should act accordingly.

I make nice money in Holland. I could not easily find a job in Portugal that even comes close to paying what I make now.

But once back in Holland, it struck me more than ever before how many traditionally dressed Muslims walk the streets. People who speak very little Dutch, and who do not in any way participate in Dutch daily life. Who want to change Dutch society into another version of what they - or their parents or grandparents - left behind. It doesn't occur to them that (consciously or not) they're trying to destroy what attracted them to this country in the first place. The freedom, the capitalism, in short, Western society. They want to have their cake and eat it.

I don't really want to leave Holland. But if Holland allows itself to be transormed more and more into a dhimmi country, the choice won't be that hard to make.

3 Comments:

Blogger Unknown said...

I'm completely shocked by this post. Not only by the comments you do to Islam but also by the comments you do about Portugal (although understandable due to lack of knowledge). Firstly let me tell you I'm Portuguese living in Coimbra (a small city between Lisbon and Porto) and that I'm agnostic.
I'm sure you saw Muslims while in Portugal. The reason you didn't noticed them it's because the Muslim community it's very small (34.000 in Portugal). Besides Portuguese muslims come mainly from Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau. Only recently Portugal saw an immigration flux from the maghreb countries (mostly Morocco). The number of Mosques in Lisbon is only one (I doubt it but couldn't find any reference to more than one) because most Muslims don’t live in Lisbon but in surrounding cities like Odivelas and Laranjeiro where more mosques are situated. And Lisbon is not bigger than Amsterdam. Lisbon has 560.000 habitants and Amsterdam 800.000. If you were talking about the metropolitan area which has about 2.4 million people then you have dozens of mosques although less than 57. Here in Coimbra (about 100.000 habitants) there is at least one mosque and if you travel south to Alentejo and Algarve (notice the names, they're Arabic) you'll see many more mosques. These regions have a strong Arabic influence and the traditional architecture and many of the cities names are Arabic.
I personally don't think we're a racist country but I don't think is up to me to say it.
The comments you do about Islam shows why the Israel/Palestinian conflict will never be completely solved. I'm not saying is all Israel fault, I believe extremist positions only lead to more and more violence. Yes there are extremist Muslim groups that advocate violence, as there are Judaist extremist groups we also advocate violence and they are both wrong.
Try to read Al Qur'an and you'll see that these groups are not acting in the name of God which is the same God you pray to and the same Christians also pray to.
The Israel/Palestinian conflict will only be solved when both parts figure that what joins both religions is more than what separates them.

4:44 PM  
Blogger Unbelonger said...

Dream on.

9:13 PM  
Blogger slanwar said...

I'm Portuguese not racist but I don't tolerate Muslims and their culture. We have an open culture but we Portuguese lack of discipline and respect for any culture that looks strange, and will be funny if we see a woman walking with her face covered in Lisbon, I can see what the gypsies would do to her, anyway I live in Lisbon and I don't remember the last time I saw a Muslim, I go on vacation every year to Algarve and the mosques you are talking about must be on peoples basement since besides that big one in Lisbon I never saw any. The Muslims here work in construction and normally have their family back in Morocco.

5:26 AM  

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