North Africa, Islam and the West

Islamic protesters in the UK

There seems to be a mood of positivity in certain quarters at the events in Tunisia and Egypt, a naive mood that Johnny Foreigner is finally throwing off the shackles of dictatorship and is about to embark on the road to western style freedom and democracy. I don't share that view and feel extremely pessimistic about events in North Africa.

Perhaps people have short memories but it was only 1979 that there was an uprising against the Shah in Iran, and look what happened there. Fine, that revolution was largely influenced from the start by the Ayatollah in exile, whereas Tunisia and Egypt appear to be more spontaneous uprisings by the population against unpopular and authoritarian regimes. But Islam, and the Muslim Brotherhood are in the background biding their time.

Egypt in recent years has moved much nearer to embracing fundamentalist Islam, and it will only take a nudge in that direction for another dangerous Islamic state to come into being. Within five years one side of the Mediterranean could consist of Islamic states much more hostile to the liberal democracies on the other side of the Med than we have seen for centuries. How long before fundamentalist Islam takes power in Turkey? We should be very worried.

Islam is as much a threat to peace, freedom and democracy as Communism was after the Second World War and Fascism was before the Second World War. The difference is that for decades we in the West have had our belief and ideals eroded by political correctness. We have been told by the political and social elite that every belief, ideology or philosophy that we hold dear is either wicked or outdated.

There is no longer any self-belief in Western Europe. We have opened our doors to masses of people who loathe our way of life and we have been forced, by law, to accept and tolerate these views in the interests of 'diversity'. The elite have told us that 'diversity' is good and that we must accept, indeed embrace, new cultures in twentieth and twenty-first century Britain because that is wholesome, enlightening and good for us. At the same time the liberal elite deride our own history, culture and beliefs. Dare stand up for them and you are labelled a crank, a nutter or worse.

We can no longer question Islam or, God forbid, oppose it without being accused of Islamophobia. Implication being that we have no powers of reason, just irrational fear. There are any number of other topics declared off limits by the elite because people are scared of being tarnished as being guilty of an 'ism' or a 'phobia'. Question immigration levels and you are immediately branded a racist. It's the tyranny of the liberal left, control thought by controlling speech.

If, as I am convinced, Islam will continue to expand elsewhere, how long before there are serious problems in this country and other countries in Europe? My fear is that when that time comes we will have neither the belief nor the means to defend ourselves or our culture. Political correctness has seen to that.