Monday, November 27, 2023

Ten Inconvenient Truths about anti-Semitic and anti-Islamic Hatred

1. The shooting of three Palestinians in Vermont emphasizes the most inconvenient truth about antisemitism in America. We Jews are going to have to come to terms with the fact that even after Pittsburgh, it is still more dangerous to be a Muslim in America than it is to be a Jew. If it were as dangerous, we'd have more than one Jewish murder by now. This leads us to point 2.

2. The statistics say that 60% of all hate crimes in America are committed against Jews. Antisemitism is as bad as it seems, but let's face it, we Jews have easily the most efficient process for reporting the hate crimes that happen to us. We are probably the only demographic for whom a large amount of the hate crimes against us gets reported.

3. No topic gets European conservatives riled up more quickly than the issue of Islamic immigration, and yet according to the Pew Research Center, Muslims will only make up 10% of the European population by 2050.

4. At the moment there are roughly 3.5 million Muslims in the US, and there are twice as many Jews as Muslims, but thanks to birth rates and immigration, there will probably be more Muslims than Jews by 2050. It is naive to expect that their interests will not have political representation in one of the two major party platforms.

5. Whatever the statistics currently demonstrate, global warming can cause an unprecedented wave of immigration to temperate countries from more tropical ones. Every demographic projection would be thrown out the window. This leads us to point 6.

6. Just as in Europe, half of what we currently think of as the 'left' might turn sharply right when they realize that a massive number of immigrants will be religious fundamentalists: be they Islamic or Christian, who passionately advocate to end progressive freedoms.

7. There is no conflict between the values of Islam and the values of democracy, except among Muslims who claim there is. There are countries, like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan, where the support for imposing sharia (Koranic) law is over 84%. However, enormous parts of two those countries are ruled by sharia law, so people polled in Afghanistan and Iraq (take note which two...) cannot be counted on to speak their mind - though, it should be noted, in Afghanistan, the figure was 99%, and this was in 2017, before the Taliban took over again - though by 2017 every Afghan knew a Taliban restoration was likely.

In more secular countries that are majority Muslim, like Turkey, the figure stands around 10%. Imposing sharia takes a jihad war in any country, so if you want to impose it on your own country, you almost undoubtedly want to impose it elsewhere too. That probably means that out of all immigrants, roughly 10% would support imposing sharia law on other countries as well: that amounts to about 800,000 Americans and 7.5 million Europeans by 2050, and that number is only by current demographic trends, not counting the chaos that world affairs always brings.

These statistics speak both to how common support for a theocratic dictatorship would be in the Islamic community, and also how little freedom such a dictatorship would afford its citizens.

8. Since October 7th, anti-Islamic incidents seem to have gone up roughly 200%. Since October 7th, antisemitic incidents seem to have gone up 400%. Given the attention these issues currently get, these numbers are probably pretty reliable.

9. One half of Muslims report other Americans expressing solidarity and care for them. Only one-third of Jews do.

10. Antisemitic hatred from leftist champions of Palestine will only radicalize both Jews and the right against Islam. Anti-Islamic hatred will only radicalize Islamic people who otherwise could be of benefit to Western societies - the committed are people of action, after all. Viewing it practically, not sentimentally, then however much rage Israel-Palestine engenders, the only workable solution is to set aside the fury about this issue when dealing with each other's communities; and address together the situation that impacts our lives much more directly than what happens abroad.

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