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He complains about the traditions of the French labour movement without considering that, hey, people are pretty happy with the way things are. I am worried by the implications of EU demography, which suggest that unassimilated Muslims will soon wield immense political power in a couple of countries (if, as Bawer notes, they don't already). European prisons are too comfortable, Bawer says, even when the incarcerated person he uses as an example isn't even a Muslim extremist.Too often he depicts the US as if it doesn't suffer from the very same problems. I found particularly informative his explanation of "fetching marriages", an extremely common custom where the daughter of Muslim immigrants, never allowed to assimilate herself as a girl, is married to someone brought over from her country of origin, ensuring that these communities are never integrated as intermarriages with locals would accomplish.But Bawer isn't just a gay man wanting respect for his lifestyle, he's also a strong supporter of American ideals and disillusioned with Europe.
America has all the same problems with immigrant ghettoes and limited assimilation that the EU does, it just doesn't have the demographic problem because it draws enough immigrants from other sources.Nowhere in the book does he discuss the possible solutions that EU expansion to the mainly Christian nations of Eastern Europe may offer. So much of the book is taken over by ranting about aspects of European society that have little to do with the problem of growing Islamism. He damns social services and calls the continent to adopt the American-style free market. As Bruce Bawer begins his book WHILE EUROPE SLEPT: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from within, he introduces himself as a gay man who moved to Amsterdam and Oslo and became appalled at how European countries are undermining their own fabled tolerance of gays and freedom of expression by condoning growing radical Islamist sentiment that is anything but tolerant. And he is strangely enthusiastic about the American invasion of Iraq, which from a Realpolitik perspective probably ended up helping Islamism by removing a brutal but mainly secular dictator. He claims that Americans are so friendly that they often invite foreigners to their homes, without acknowleding that most invitations to strangers in the US are hollow and folks would feel pretty awkward if the person did drop by.
For example, he points out the limited range of viewpoints in the Norwegian press, claiming that the entire spectrum from left to right would fit within the American left. Nonetheless, the American media itself has a fairly limited range and is reluctant to directly confront the growth of Islamism, one of the reasons for the rise of the much more varied blogosphere.
At one point, he even claims that the invasion of Iraq was such a shining blow for freedom that it singlehandledly inspired the people of Ukraine to launch their Orange Revolution, which is completely out there.As concerned as I am about the fate of Western Europe over the next few decades, I cannot really recommend Bawer's book. Certainly Bawer's long, long series of quotations from European media on the rise in Muslim violence and the problems of integrating immigrants into European values can serve to show just what the scale of the problem is.
It's as if the EU stops at Germany. He thinks European customer service sucks and wants it to be like it is in America.
(For my part, when I go back to the US, I find everyone's fake smiles annoying; I know low-paid employees aren't really that happy to serve me). Rather, he even calls for EU countries to withdraw from EU ideals and boost their own national consciousness, which I don't think would be very helpful.
I'm still searching for a suitable introduction to the issues.
Much of this material was new to me. His main points are buried in pages of verbose writing. There is no coherence to the presentation of the material. While there is no reason that he could nevertheless write an accurate and critical book, his apparent bias means that he is facing an uphill battle to come across as objective and to convince the readers of his main points. It is verbose and incoherent, and the author fails to provide any underlying factual support for his conclusions. In summary, my major problems with this book are:1) It is poorly written. This is easily the worst book I've read in the last decade.First, let me say that I thought the author's description of Muslim immigrants in European welfare states was informative. The author is biased -- he is a gay male writing a critique of a radical Islam.
He fails to support his conclusions with reliable statistics, scholarly articles or other such sources. As a result, not only are his main points obscured, but he takes 5 pages to make a point that would take a good writer two paragraphs.2) The author lacks support for his conclusions. It is clear the book is not researched, and given the author's apparent bias, there is nothing in the book to assure the reader that the author's conclusions are valid. While the titles of the three sections would seem to imply a chronological order to the material, that is certainly not the case. I also agree with many of his conclusions.However, this book should not be confused with journalism or scholarly research. This is his biggest failing.The author derives his conclusions from his own first hand observations and experiences and from second hand information he learned from others through conversations and similar encounters.
The author jumps from anecdote to anecdote, time period to time period, country to country, etc. Moreover, the author rambles in his presentation of the material. While this might be enough in some contexts, it is not enough for the sweeping generalizations about people, immigrants, governments, countries and religions that he makes in this book. Thus, it is really nothing more than the rantings of a madman.
Instead, the book jumps all over the place in vaguely coherent anecdotes. Bawer addresses a very important issue in a rambling diatribe with very little factual support. This could be a fantastic scholarly examination of a current event. From these anecdotes, the author draws sweeping conclusions that may be true, but his poor writing and poor research leave too many questions to accept as such. Do not waste your time reading this garbage.
Effing awful. Badly researched and badly written, although supremely narcissistic. We have a book club of about 12-15 members, and not one of us could make himself/herself even finish it.
This a very well researched and well written book. I hate to admit it but I think it's a preview of coming attractions. I don't regret being old.
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