A Grim Report
This is a depressing and disturbing article. And of course it’s just the tip of the iceberg. It’s not just France, obviously, it’s women all over the world, who have miserable coerced restricted cramped threatened lives. A thought we don’t like to dwell on, since there’s not a lot we can do about it. But a thought all the same.
Horror stories of what happened to girls who tried to fight their families circulated in the projects. Yildiz knew of girls who had been tricked by their parents into going on a vacation to Turkey or Algeria, only to find themselves being turned over to the families of their new husbands…The French press, with its need to reconcile political correctness and the reality of the new demographics, rarely raises one increasingly critical question: How many women in the country actually live in repressive conditions without access to the full rights guaranteed by the republic? If you ask the question at any of the tiny storefront agencies trying to help these women, you will hear a startling number: 70,000. The figure comes from the High Council of Integration, a government agency, and refers primarily to women in forced marriages.
And the French press doesn’t talk about it much? How very unfortunate…
Occasionally a murder case will make the news, but the grisly narratives of most of les femmes des quartiers slip under the radar of Le Monde and the serious talk shows. From time to time a memoir detailing a brutal gang rape in the cités may get published—Samira Bellil’s best-selling Dans l’Enfer des Tournantes is an example—but, for the most part, the life of the women of the cités remains a mystery, an unpopular cause largely ignored by politicians attempting to win the potentially immense Muslim vote. But it is these women who are on the fault line in Eurabia, a mere 30 minutes from the Louvre.Throughout Paris, women are caught in the maw of cultural relativism as the French hesitate to sound intolerant of another culture. “Given how these women are treated, why does no one make a fuss? There is the danger of being accused of racism.”
The article makes clear that a lot of this is also down to the French failure and refusal to integrate Muslim immigrants, and to the elitism of the culture as a whole, which is not interested in the plight of poor people and has no Oprah to draw attention to such subjects. All very depressing, as I said. Just thought I’d mention it.
I did some armchair statistics on the frequency of references to the Egyptian-born author ‘Bat Ye’or’ and the term ‘Eurabia’ in ‘The Guardian’ and ‘The Telegraph’ online. Since many of Bat Ye’or’s books have been translated into English, she is hardly an exotic hothouse flower.
Score:
Daily Telegraph
Bat Ye’or – 0
Eurabia – 0
Guardian
Bat Ye’or – 0
Eurabia – 2
Bat Ye’or? Bat Who? Don’t ask an ignoramus British journalist.
Eurabia? Well, Guardian – deux points; Telegraph – nul point. But the ‘Guardian’ articles containing the term ‘Eurabia’ were entitled ‘Anti-Islamic books’ success fuel fears of racism in Italy’ and ‘Italy has a racist culture, says French editor (the articles concern a recent book by Oriana Fallaci, not Bat Ye’or).
So watch out, Ophelia! If you criticise the way Muslims treat their womenfolk you are criticising Muslims and if you are criticising Muslims you are criticising Islam and if you are criticising Islam you are saying that Islam is a threat and if you are saying that Islam is a threat you are saying that Muslims are a threat and if you are saying that Muslims are a threat you may soon be breaking the law in the UK and the next thing you’ll be receiving is an early morning knock on the door from the thought police (if you live in Britain) and Guardian pundits will be penning articles entitled ‘B&W’s anti-Islamic hate campaign fuel fears of racism in Britain’ and ‘B&W demonstrates that Britain has a racist culture….’
Arguing that your allegations are fact-based and that you are actually trying to protect Muslim women against aggression on the part of their co-religionists won’t stand up in any self-respecting anti-racist society. [sarcasm mode off]
BTW, try using the term ‘Eurabia’ in ‘Crooked Timber’. I bet you’ll be demonised as a racist troll and end up in the leper colony ….
Anyhow, thanks for the lowdown on this – truly depressing – issue.
If only people had listened to what reactionaries like myself were preaching a couple of decades ago.
The French press has no “need to be politically correct” and likes nothing better than a sensationalist story about les beurs. Brenner is dead wrong on this one.
Cathal: I had no idea that your comments on Crooked Timber had resulted in your being imprisoned in a leper colony. You certainly deserved your ban, but to be honest this does seem a bit harsh and I’ll see if I can get Henry to commute your sentence.