Wes Riddle’s Horse Sense #381

Who Lost Europe?
Wes Riddle

Geert Wilders, Chairman of the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands, recently addressed immigration and the cultural crisis in Europe at a symposium sponsored by the Hudson Institute in New York. His thesis was that Muslims were taking over Europe and were on their way to Pretoria, USA. Obviously the Dutchman had his hand out for some American moral support and private donations. As if we would, or should feel sadly responsible somehow, he said “In a generation or two, the U.S. will ask itself: who lost Europe?” To my way of thinking the answer to the question, if we even ask it, is easy: Europe will have been lost by the Europeans if it is lost. Jimmy crack corn and I don’t care.

On balance it is probably encouraging as Wilders tells us that an Alliance of European patriots has formed to resist so-called Islamization of Europe. That said one might wish it to resist socialism, or secular humanism, or laziness, and all sorts of other cultural ills that afflict Europe. His remarks at length shed more light on Europe than on Islam. Even if immigrants are acting like settlers and don’t care much to assimilate, his remarks still shed more light on Europe than on Islam. If Muslim immigrants have more kids than Europeans, one could as easily say Europeans have few kids and millions more abortions than do Muslims living in their parallel communities. The fact does not mean there is a conspiracy, even if European elites have weak knees facing the cultural implications as a threat. The reality that demographic weight of Muslims will result increasingly in a feeling of political intimidation on the part of the majority doesn’t mean that headscarves were designed to make real Europeans feel uncomfortable.

There are a total of 54 million Muslims now living in Europe, and 25 percent of the population in Europe is projected to be Muslim by the year 2020. In England, sharia courts are now officially recognized as part of the British legal system. One may wonder who would let millions of Muslims settle in European countries and then become citizens, and what idiot would let them set up a dual legal system? Answer: Europe will be lost by Europeans and also by Brits (the latter hate to be called Europeans) if it is lost. The saddest part about Wilders’ bemoaning the obvious is that he seems oblivious to the fact that forces killing Europe are similar if not identical to those destroying the United States. The Hispanicization of the American southwest is a case in point, and even if that is not as sinister (real or perceived) as the Islamization of major U.S. cities, the phenomenon represents the same ineffectual, impotent, and unwilling nature of modern democratic societies to defend their preexisting cultural identities or to separate their polities from mere residents coming in to work. It tells us more about the condition and moral fiber of Americans than it does about Islam or Hispanics avenging for the Mexican-American War.

The same social democrats in Europe, who steal from Peter to pay Paul with high taxes in order to fund their nanny states, concede freedom everyday to ensure “domestic security” to behave irresponsibly. Then they blame Islam, rather than their own foolish immigration policies, failure to enforce the law, or the gross debasement of their moral character. They love democracy if it doesn't mean holding their lawmakers accountable, or altering the sanguine consensus they have about human nature and the unreality of sin. That kind of self-governance would be a lot of work, and anyway they aren't sure what they're supposed to believe beyond the nothing they’ve proved so far. All things being equal, nothing is worth to die for, or live for either. Europeans these days don’t have the slightest idea what their high culture is, or what it takes to maintain Western freedom.

Meanwhile, the United States (if we weren’t talking about it already) frightfully acknowledges words like “eternal vigilance” while cheating the very concept—having ceased to govern itself according to the strictures of its Constitution. The Supreme Court even quotes international law to explain what the Founders must have meant. Yes we no longer think clearly, or even chronologically. All things being equal, truth and error are more or less the same. Pontius Pilot asked, what is truth? We may as well add, “and who is to say it’s better?”

Truth is that migrations and technology are tearing up social and cultural fabrics globally, though not necessarily equally. With somewhat less sympathy, I would argue that a similar process is changing the face of Islam both where it enters and where it currently resides. The liberalizing influences changing the Arab world for good and for ill are hard to miss if you travel there. It is hard therefore to say just who shall be the proverbial last man standing—or indeed, whom he shall resemble most. Perhaps it is one of many false dichotomies. It will probably be some unfortunate hybrid and evolutionary result of inevitable Darwinian natural selection. Mention Intelligent Design and you begin to discover how little intellectual freedom there is anymore, and how the West possesses its own intellectual nightmare to rival that of the imams. In a generation or two the world may not even bother to ask itself, who lost America? The answer will be self-evident, even if our rights and sovereignty no longer are.