A reversal of the crusades? Slowly but surely, Islam is steadily gaining control of Europe. What the Lord giveth, He taketh away. Through terrorism by the radicals, to political seats, Islam seems to be on a roll. Not that I;m against anything, but I think a call to order is needed. I hope no other country loses control this easily.

@ Voyager

I have already clearly stated: (a) that there is great cultural diversity within the muslim world, (b) that the subjugation of women is not as severe in south-east-Asia than in the Arab world, mainly because of the presence of large nonmuslim minorities and remnants of 'secular colonial' legal frameworks, and (c) that 'subjugation' is a matter of degree.  Your latest comments are therefore 'superfluous'.

Seeing "girls in tight jeans in Germany" does not say anything relevant about the broad subjugation of women in the muslim world, and neither does the assertion about the presence of "happy women" in that world.   The issue is whether women, IN GENERAL, in the muslim world have the same degree of 'freedom and self-determination' as men.  Any serious observer of the muslim world will have to answer that question in the negative, as indeed serious and honest (westernised) muslims will confirm.  In most muslim countries women do not even have formal 'legal equality' before the law, let alone  de facto 'sociological' equality in cultural behavior patterns.   It is remarkable that there could be western 'observers' who could deny this  observable reality, because of personal individual experiences with 'exciting' women! 

As I do not want to offend my "brother" (Mission Impossible) any further, I will not press the issue further.  And I agree that this may not be "the main issue for critiquing islam". But, it is a powerful indication of the lack of INDIVIDUAL freedom in that world, and of the lack of respect for individual rights in general (versus adherence to 'group conformity'), perhaps even more so than the absence of political 'democracy' in that world.

@ mission impossible

I am quite happy to believe that there are attractive women to be found anywhere in the islamic world, just like everywhere else. But, I also think that that particular opinion-cum-observation has nothing to do with the claim that women in general are subjugated to a degree that it is not comparable to virtually anywhere else.  I repeat that one could specify various criteria to measure the claim about women's subjugation in islam, starting from religious 'edicts' based on the Kuran, to 'explicit legal prescriptions and discriminations' in islamic countries, to COMMON practical behavior and social discriminations in (especially) Arab societies. 

It is too bad that your excitement about "young, attractive...muslim women" seems to blur your vision about the 'big picture' in this matter.  Perhaps, a re-reading of last year's famous UN report by (westernised?) 'islamic intellectuals' on the conditions within islamic countries, might help to restore your sense of reality.

A denial of the 'obvious' is never advisable.  And, the broad subjugation of women in islamic societies is 'obvious', at least to any 'cool' (unexcited) observer.  It is a 'fact' in the sense that it can be backed up with a multitude of indications. One could formulate many hypotheses about the 'why' of this fact. For example, it is typical for totalitarian and semi-totalitarian societies that the 'masters' (political, sometimes politicul-cum-religious leaders) allow some to subjugate others in order to make everybody's subjugation (lack of individual freedom) more tolerable. But this is just a hypothesis which I offer for your consideration, and not a statement of fact.  But, the subjugation of women in islamic countries by 'their' men is a broad 'fact'.

@ voyager

Your perception of the 'big picture' with regard to recent British economic history, and of the functioning of macroeconomics is way off the mark.  Building rigs, OCTG, etc...is not 'free', and the (NET) contribution of oil and gas to British GDP is not as substantial as you seem to think.  Holland had a lot of natural gas, whereas Belgium did not, but their respective per capita GDP's are very close, etc... The wealth of modern postindustrial economies is not primarily based on extraction of natural resources, but the presence of such (exportable) resources will have a big impact on the production structure of their economies and on their (external) balance of payments and exchange rate.  None of these has much to do with the evolution of their respective per capita incomes.  

This is not a practical medium to explain the economic concept of "opportunity cost" w.r.t. oil and gas production, nor the economic pros and cons of running external balance of payments deficits.  Suffice it to point out to you (1) that there is no correlation between bop surplusses and high income levels, nor between bop deficits and low income levels, and (2) that some of the richest countries in western europe today are not particularly rich in natural resources compared to their poorer counterparts.  What is Ireland's great 'natural resource'?  Yet it has had the biggest economic flowering of any EU country in recent decades. 

The current relative strength of Britain's economy is based on Thatcher's structural reforms, which were maintained under Major and Blair, particularly w.r.t. the flexibility of labor markets and constraining the 'dead hand' of everexpanding government (relative to GDP).  These reforms have dramatically improved overall efficiency in the British economy.

@ mission impossible

You are not the only one here who has spent years living under muslims, and I am very well aware of cultural differences within the islamic world.  I also wrote that "subjugation" is always a "matter of degree", both in the islamic world and elsewhere.   It is too bad - for you, that is - that the existence of "real, life, young and sexually attractive Muslim women" seems to have blinded your perception of the 'big picture' w.r.t. the islamic world as a whole.  One of its major distinguishing characteristics is precisely the subjugation of women to a degree that is not comparable to the rest of the world today.  Also, what you seem to fail to realise is that these attractive muslim women in south east asia live in societies with very sizable NONmuslim minorities (and in the Philippines with a christian majority) wich, at least in the past, has attenuated somewhat the subjugation of women and which has helped preserve somewhat longer the secular and democratic facade of the states bequeathed by the former colonial powers.  

I am not interested in a stick to beat islam over the head with.  But I do want to make factual observations and I am concerned about the subjugation of women AND men.                     

...heads in the sand.

Incredibly, there are people here who can deny the 'subjugation' of women in islamic cultures.  Does this really need a response?  In the face of such refusal to make actual BROAD (not singular individual) empirical observations, should one even attempt to develop criteria to actually measure 'subjugation' (clearly always a matter of degree), and further to make the distinction between legal and social discrimination? 

And then there are people who want to load all Israel's sins on the shoulders of Margaret Thatcher.  How ridiculous!  Her primary focus was on breaking the exorbitant  power of the unions in Britain, and to make structural changes in Britain's economy.  The results are there for everybody to see.  In the 1970's per capita income in Britain had dropped to about 75% of the level in France and Germany.  Today it exceeds that in France and Germany.  Her secondary focus was on strengthening western unity and values in geopolitics.  Read her last book ("Statecraft", 2002), and learn something.  It is utterly ludicrous to blame Thatcher for the cultural changes (towards naive-leftism) that occurred in western Academia and media during the past quarter century.          

@Kapitein
Not easy to debate with someone, such as you, who is highly emotional and likes to flit around the intellectual universe like a moth around a lamp in the dead of night. You don't come across as someone who has had much life experience, yet has strong views on so many issues. People with your credentials are part of the West's problem, not its solution. You have a recipe of stock comments that you pluck from here, there, and nowhere in order to support specious or overly-complicated arguments. You'd get farther if you simplifed your thinking processes and stuck to the basics. If we followed your logic, the list of oppressed groups would be longer than a bus timetable, and no more dependable.

@Imhough 1
Margaret Thatcher was an aberration, and not representative. You overlook the immense contribution her husband Denis made to her sucess. He was her best advisor, and I think she has admitted this in her memoirs. It was during Thatcher's 12(?) year Premiership that the cultural Marxists ensconced themselves deep into the media/educational fabric of British life: Law Schools were both feminized & politicized also. It has already been said, Thatcher won the economic war, but lost the cultural one (because she & her Cabinet failed to look behind the scenes to read the tell-tale signs). For this simple reason, she cannot be truly desribed as a great PM.

There are many western males who believe, just like you, that women are the Calvalry, waiting just over the rise, for the chance to blow their bugles and come sprinting down the hill to our rescue! Sadly, you are living a fantasy and a delusion. We don't need to consider Islam at all, when deciding how to place women in our culture. It is not being "anti-female" to recognize their biological limitations and plan accordingly: it's called maturity mixed with realism. Using feminism to fight Islam is a foolish policy. You might as well shoot rubber bullets.

This is the first time in history when European men are by and large not coming to the aid of their women.

Certainly, a cadre of homosexual Feminists is supportive of non-White immigration, ostensibly to: (a) "get back at" European/White men, and/or (b) increase competition over and harassment of future supporters, and/or (c) use radical Muslim men to drive women away from all men in general.

However, the vast majority of women are disturbed by the non-White men in Europe, especially by their constant harassment. One German girl commented to me that the slang for Turk meant "criminal." Her and her friends had to flee the advances of Africans, Arabs, and even some South Americans who were even willing to praise Hitler (sieg heil and salute incl.) to get their attention.

While women are more forgiving and nurturing than men on average, I believe that when the time comes, they will be alongside their men. But how much Islamism, bombings, rapings, murders, theft, arson, marauding gangs, etc., will we tolerate before we take action? If European men won't stand up, why should the women?

And those that end up with illegitimate mixed children from different men will have to wait in the welfare line as they have always done.

"The oft-quoted American Constitution was never drafted to ensure equality between the sexes. The Bible defines the proper way to achieve "equality." "

I am not interested in what the American Constitution and Holy Bible have to say. I am generally against constitutions, and regard Christianity as an important mythology in Western culture.

"...these...and others who are similarly quoted, only appear great because their presence coincided with great times."

This arguably applies to nearly all historical figures.

"Women are not oppressed my friend."

Really? Nor were non-Russians in the USSR, or Black slaves in the United States, or aboriginals in Australia and the Americas right?

Women's subordination to men is virtually universal throughout human history, not bounded by ethnicity/race, religion, geography, or socio-economics.

Your industrial worker vs. housewife example is a narrow one. This issue is far too complex and multi-faceted to cover in a single or even in a dozen posts here.

And I am not arguing for the substantive equality of Affirmative Action, but the formal equality of equal wages for equal work.

Women are an integral part of any society, and those that marginalize and/or discriminate against them truly suffer for it. 

@ Saharian

You too are engaging in wishful thinking.

The "New Belgians" were NOT created by the "stroke of a pen".  In fact, their "creation" was the end-result of a cultural process for which the ideological and political foundations were built over several decades.    Cultures do not change overnight, and cultural 'reversal' is exceedingly rare.  The more common phenomenon in history is that cultures evolve over time in ways that contain the seeds of their own destruction. In other words, history shows that civilisation does not resemble to an upward slope, but rather to cyclical movements of rise and decline.   

@ Imhough 1

You are engaging in wishful thinking.  It is almost the opposite of what you say.  Indeed, there is little doubt that the naive-left agenda - including multicul illusions and immigration policies - of the past quarter century was greatly strengthened by the growing 'feminisation' of western politics.  If all those "educated capable women" were not able to resist such illusions when it was still 'safe' to show some backbone, what makes you believe that they will be able to do so today when it is increasingly personally dangerous in Europe to do so.   A much more likely scenario is that those western women, AS A GROUP, are much more likely to support appeasement policies than their male counterparts, thereby hastening the demise of their own democray (and thus their democratic freedoms). 

In the US, sociological research shows a distinct 'gender gap', i.e. that men are more likely to support 'conservative' (or 'strong') foreign and defense policies than women.  It is not likely to be much different in Europe.

By the way, Margaret Thatcher was never popular on the 'continent' in Europe, and not among British women either.  She was the exception (a strong conservative among women) that confirms the rule (of women being IN GENERAL more 'liberal' (in the north-american sense) ).

You are also 'grasping at straws' w.r.t. Islam's demise. Islam has virtually always 'subjugated' the female half of its people, at least in recent centuries. That hasn't stopped its 'recent advance' in a political sense. Societies need to belief in something to survive. By contrast, those who believe-in-nothing face 'decadence', i.e. they are not willing to sacrifice for anything and will inevitably 'decline'.

Funny enough, have you known that even socialists in Austria attempted to pass suffrage for foreigners in Austrian capital Vienna? It was in 2002/2003 and in fact the coalition from Greens and Socialists succeeded against the oposition of Austrian Freedom Party and People's party (conservatives).

But to great grief for red - green comrades Austrian Supreme Court shot their child down in flames. Unconstitutional!

The story is here

According to Austrian Freedom Party politician who cites Flemish sources it has been 'created' 90.000 new Belgians in Antwerpen by perverting both electoral and citizenship laws since 2000. The overwhelming majority of those new voters are from Maghreb and equatorial Africa.

Freedom Party article in German

While I believe that Feminism is as destructive as chauvinism to Western society, except in the area of wage-parity and formal gender equality, I do not share your visceral distrust of women in positions of authority.

Certainly, lesbian Feminists cannot comment with any vestige of neutrality or fairness on matters of gender equality or heterosexuality, any more than a Muslim can effectively represent a Christian democratic party. However, Europe (esp. the Nordic countries) have a rich history of relatively good (compared to other regions) gender relations, and of great women in positions of authority e.g. Joan of Arc, Queen Elizabeth, Catherine de Medici, Katherine the Great, etc. Formal gender equality, though far from perfect, is a European value or at least a Northern European one.

Surely the few marginalized Feminist lesbians advocating for the removing of urinals in male WCs cannot compare to the historical oppression that women have faced in Europe (e.g. witch burning), or the the current disparity in wages, divorce settlements, single motherhood etc.?

of indigenous people, is what i predict will happen the coming years, out of city centers such as Antwerp. And on the other hand an influx of poverty and criminal activity.

I am at the same time very much amused and sad, when i think about how the socialists & friends will counter these trends in the coming years...We'll see each other again around 2012 (if i'm still here that is).

I went to university and worked there.  It was a boring but peaceful country.  I left for USA for "opportunities".  I think I wouldn't go back to Belgium for a visit, leave alone living there.  I visited Munich and Vienna last year.  They're very nice cities.  Much nicer than Strassbourg and Paris.  Wake up Europe!

Keep in mind the political 'sea changes' with respect to Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy, and Stalin's Russia. A few years after being considered part of the "new wave" by various Western politicians, Germany and Italy were at war with Great Britain and the United States, and strong National Socialist and Fascist movements were suppressed in both countries e.g. Oswald Mosley and the B.U.F.

Similarly, Western politicians and the intelligentsia had praised 1920s Moscow as the future of humanity, allied themselves with Stalin during the 1940s, were terrified of the Red Army in the late 1940s-1950s, and finally started comparing Hitler and Stalin's rap sheets by the 1980s.

Already, the majority of Europeans are frustrated with the masses of non-Whites (esp. Muslims) permeating their borders. Instead of assimilating and seizing power gradually, the Muslims are far too aggressive and are merely sowing the seeds of a future Thirty-Years War, Rwanda, Yugoslavia, or whatever.

@Coldsack: at this stage, I agree that armed force or at very least the threat of it, is necessary to curb Islam on European soil. However, that must be done by the law enforcement and armed services of each European state - not by vigilantes. Paramilitary forces would be a necessary evil until such time as the State can meet the "challenge." Despite the African and Arab gangs, I am still generally opposed to "the right to bear arms" being given to any person or entity other than the State.

Bureaucrats, policemen, soldiers, businessmen, analysts, advisors, and political representatives are all "normal people," and when enough crime, violence, nepotism, ghetto-ization, political interference, terrorism, etc., has been committed, the pendulum will swing. 

@MI: I believe Sonomaca's example was merely hyperbole to illustrate that the power of Europe - be it economic, military, political, or some combination thereof - is to be found solely its various peoples, and the individuals who comprise these groups. If the concept of a European citizen became a non-White and/or Muslim individual than Europe would cease to exist e.g. if Turkish immigrants and their descendants were to outnumber ethnic Germans in Germany than "Germany" would lose its national identity and become merely a name on a map.

As far as a mass exodus of Europeans is concerned - it will never happen, for the peoples, lands, and cultures of Europe are inalienable short of genocide. While naiive E.U. bureaucrats may scoff at the idea, jus sanguinis and jus soli are alive and well in Eastern Europe.

So when were are up to our ears with Islam, we either leave or live the life of Dhimmitude. When the Muslims become the majority, they will do what they have always done continuing waring among them selves. What foreign friendly country will come to our aid. "China"?

Democracy with the broad suffrage we have at present is not compatable with the nation state. Why? Political parties are profit maximizing organizations devoted to remaining in power. If the easiest way they can do that is by encouraging mass immigration, they will always do so, even though it has horrifying consequences for the nation they ostensibly represent.

Since the Socialists have managed to immigrate so many into Antwerp, I am afraid that Belgium is doomed unless the Belgians can manage to find it in their hearts to muster armed resistance ASAP.

Unfortunately, J.F.K. did the "same thing" with the Peurto Ricans as the Belgian government is doing with immigration, to gain votes for short-term electoral gains.

I'm afraid that Western democracy is not based upon compromise or consensus, but upon a select few who engineered it, from which everything else follows e.g. Kemal Ataturk (Turkey), the Founding Fathers (US), Cromwell (England), the Allied Control Commission (West Germany), etc.

Every now and then, Western nation-states have needed a strong leader to halt the factional infighting and reset the nation on its correct course - often up the centre.

The time for true leadership has come again in the face of globalization, over-population, and environmental degredation. Indeed it was Churchill himself who once remarked that if Great Britain ever found itself in the state of 1920s Germany, that he would welcome "someone like Hitler" to bring it out of those depths.

The Parti Socialiste has proven once again that socialism, in its classical sense, is far removed today from its real purpose. The party is more interested in perpetuating its power than it is in the greater good of the Belgian people.

By having extremist Muslims run and be elected on the Socialist slate, the party not only subverts the traditional Socialist agenda, not only bring about its own eventual destruction, it irresponsibly endangers the Belgian majority and eventually the rest of Europe. So much for corrupt politics, so much for political greed!

_____________________________________________________________

Freedom isn't just the right to do as one pleases, freedom carries responsibility and maintaining freedom is a never ending job.

Can democracy work when parties conduct such reckless actions to gain votes? In order to gain votes to stay in power for 15-20 years, the Belgian socialists are selling out the future of the country.

Basically, the Socialists are supporting an immigration and welfare system to undermine the country, knowing that the course of action that they are taking is a complete disaster.

Maybe if VB stops insisting on separation of Flanders, it could stop this. The natives have to be unified to stop the Socialist Quislings.

When "rights" are bestowed on those who put in jeopardy the cultural integrity of our society and by their presence impair its cohesion, there is deliberate erosion of the sense of nationhood.

In this light, to confer " hassle-free Belgian citizenship " on those immersed in their own cultures is a violation of the purpose of the law!

We may think that we have no option. But once launched on this course the perversity becomes total when laws are passed on behalf of  Muslim immigrants to take away natural rights from indigenous citizens. We are then plainly in the presence of arbitrary rule.

That is indeed very worrysome development. As just many other cities Antwerepen is close to be turned into slum. 

But to the overal results: to my knowledge parties like Vlaams Belang usually attract significantly less votes from female voters. This was the case of Austrian Freedom Party one week ago.

And maybe Vlaams Belang should modify its strategy and seek more cooperation with democratic and non-violent parties emerging in Europe ( Sverigedemokraterna, British National Party). I believe that Vlaams Belang could not change the future of its country even in case of victory in the next elections. We all know what happened to Austria after Freedom party electoral success few years ago.

As long as the "Cordon Sanitaire" exists, the Vlaams Belang party will never succeed. They have to prove themself by becoming part of the governing bodies  (towns, cities etc..) Their strategy should be more aimed at "breaking up" this corrdon sanitaire..Don't they have enough courts in the EU to get that resolved one way or the other..?

By their example, the "average voter" will understand that the VB is more then just an "extreme" right wing party..Only then the voter will support the VB platform..

Free money and easy jobs from the Goverment!!! Always a vote getter!  As in Sweden when everyone is on the dole in some way they have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo.  In the US this seems to be changing as more and more people quit the office world and start small businesses.  Even so, pro-business low tax agendas are difficult to get through Congress.

Last Year it was 1934, according to Paul Beliën. It is now clearly 1935.

congratulations, Alexandra Colen, with your results in and around Mol.

I see a new evolution: Where up to some time ago, some people foresaw a 2-party system emerge in Belgium from the Cordon Sanitaire, by all politically correct parties being forced to coagulate against the Vlaams Belang, the possibility now emerges that not a coagulation of traditional parties will form 1 party against the Vlaams Belang, but that all traditional parties except the socialist party will evaporate and that the Vlaams Belang will see itself opposed to only the socialists, which, on top, will not be able anymore to be secular and ecological socialists the way they want and hope according to their post-cold-war ideology in which they still claim the highest morality, but will be transformed into an Islamic party forcing dhimmitude from the indigenous population by just doing that what both socialists and muslims have been doing since their conception: robbing the productive class from 50% of their revenue.

That's what I'm thinking. There's a scary element to the evolution which I will refer to as the Balkanisation. Most likely the term doesn't quite cover the load. In essence the indigenous population retreats, their numbers decline whilst the government allows more immigrants to poor into the region (populations that expand rapidly). It will 'disrupt' the balance and quite possibly lead to ethnic violence on a larger scale. Immigration as a control weapon, works in Brussels and it will work elsewhere and it will protect the Belgian state as well. The question is: was a battle lost or is the war being lost.