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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 305.6
EAN num: 9780767920056
ISBN number: 0767920058
Label: Broadway
Manufacturer: Broadway
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 272
Printing Date: September 11, 2007
Publishing house: Broadway
Release Date: September 11, 2007
Sale Popularity Level: 10457
Studio: Broadway
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The struggle for the soul of Europe yesterday is every bit as dire and consequential as it was in the 1930s. Then, in Weimar, Germany, the center did not hold, and the light of civilization nearly went out. Today, the continent has entered yet another “Weimar moment.” Will Europeans rise to the challenge posed by radical Islam, or will they cave in once again to the extremists?
As an American living in Europe since 1998, Bruce Bawer has seen this problem up close. Across the continent—in Amsterdam, Oslo, Copenhagen, Paris, Berlin, Madrid, and Stockholm—he encountered large, quickly expanding Muslim enclaves in which women were oppressed and abused, homosexuals persecuted and killed, “infidels” threatened and vilified, Jews demonized and attacked, barbaric traditions (such as honor killing and forced marriage) widely practiced, and freedom of speech and religion firmly repudiated.
The European political and media establishment turned a blind eye to all this, selling out women, Jews, gays, and democratic principles generally—even criminalizing free speech—in order to pacify the radical Islamists and preserve the illusion of multicultural harmony. The few heroic figures who dared to criticize Muslim extremists and speak up for true liberal values were systematically slandered as fascist bigots. Witnessing the disgraceful reaction of Europe’s elites to 9/11, to the terrorist attacks on Madrid, Beslan, and London, and to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Bawer concluded that Europe was heading inexorably down a path to cultural suicide.
Europe's Muslim communities are powder kegs, brimming with an alienation born of the immigrants’ deep antagonism toward an infidel society that rejects them and compounded by misguided immigration policies that enforce their segregation and empower the extremists in their midst. The mounting crisis produced by these deeply perverse and irresponsible policies finally burst onto our television screens in October 2005, as Paris and other European cities erupted in flames.
WHILE EUROPE SLEPT is the story of one American’s experience in Europe before and after 9/11, and of his many arguments with Europeans about the dangers of militant Islam and America’s role in combating it. This brave and invaluable book—with its riveting combination of eye-opening reportage and blunt, incisive analysis—is essential reading for anyone concerned about the fate of Europe and what it portends for the United States.
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Rated by buyers 
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Bruce Bawer, who is writing from the capitol of Norway, Oslo, is an american immigrant to Europe. He portrays himself as being at very first infatuated by the continent, then disillusioned in equal measure, while experiencing the excile`s common rediscovery of the virtues of his land of origin.
He describes all of Western Europe in this book, but he has a particular focus on the Netherlands and Norway/Scandinavia. The Netherlands because it was the very first european nation he moved to and mastered the vernacular of, and also because the country has come such a far way down the road of multiculturalism.
Bawers accounts of european flaws are harsh, and somewhat painful for a european reader, but they are also mostly accurate. His description of the european public`s "parroting" of public truisms as presented by the media and the political elite, is painfully on the mark. His remarks that european statesmanhood is not based on a life of character, vision and boldness, but a lifelong service to party and bureacracy while presenting the same politically correct regurgitation year after year, is spot on. Equally interesting is the hypothesis that scandinavian lack of constructive critique of immigration and of immigrants,is based on our previous lack of firsthand contact with the "excotic". The white scandinavians have simply been to afraid of their own feelings of unease on seeing their previously white streets fill with colour, that they have become zealous multiculturalists in order to convince others (and themselves) that they are not racist.
Also painful, but sadly true, is his portrayal of the particular type of antiamericanism that is permeating the european leftist elite, and even members of the right at times. Especially bitter is his account of speaking with two western german girls before the fall of the Wall. They are pouring out anti-american retorics while american troops are based on that very same soil in order to protect their right to speak their minds freely. What Bawer can be criticed for, is that he sometimes portrays european antiamericanism and anti-israelism as being universal among the elite and people alike, and that is still very far from the truth. That said, it stings, and there are several biting observations of european flaws that are worth taking into account. If I remember correct, he had an image of Europe as the cranky, old mother of the strong, and vital american son. The mother constantly nagging at and putting her son down, but is still dependent on his support, protection and patience with her peculiarities. I very much enjoyed that image.
His accounts of the islamization of europe is also uneasy reading, but a lot of this might already be known to many readers. Its also worth noting that things, in Oslo at least, are even worse than in Bawers accounts. Maybe he`s afraid people won`t believe him if he tells the full scope of deterioration?
The book is obviously written for an american audience, but is also interesting for european readers. Partly because Bawer has such a good knowledge of both american and european culture, but also because he has a portfolio of languages that most multilingual europeans will envy him, and wich enables him to monitor the newspapers of a handful of european countries. Its also interesting for european readers because, even though we might agree with Bawer pointing out european flawed selfimagery and unjust criticism of America, he unknowingly adds a few american myths to parallell ours. One of them is the never ending american notion that the USA entered WW2 for idealist reasons, leaving out that they did not join the war until they were attacked by Japan, and then declared war upon by Hitler. This of course means that among the great western powers, only the appeasing goverments of France and Great Britain (with the Commonwealth), actually declared war on the totalitarian threats before war was declared on them. Needless to say, european appeasement is a recurring theme in the book, and perhaps rightly so, but the path of american entry into WW2 is not the example of vigour and vigilance that Bawer wants. Rather its a good image of the negligence, ignorance and selfdecieving illusion that one can do business with those that despise you and would like to see you destroyed. That was the case of the american public and media until 1941 and that is the case of the european establishment and media yesterday (like it was until 1939).
I haven`t found the book in the shops in Norway, but i now have to buy another from amazon. I gave the very first copy I bought here to a german friend of mine, who I had to defend from a racist assault by a north african the last time she visited me in Norway. I hope she`ll also benefit from reading about the odd phenonemon where the victims of assaults somehow are also required to bear the guilt of the assailant, as described by an non-european author ... Read More
Rated by buyers -
The material Bruce Bawer covers in this volume is similar to the content of Mark Steyn's America Alone: The End of the World As We Know It, Claire Berlinski's Menace in Europe: Why the Continent's Crisis Is America's, Too, and Melanie Phillips' Londonistan. Maybe you don't want to hear the bad news about the Muslim takeover of Europe from Mark Steyn, who is known to be conservative, and a Bush sympathizer. Well, Bruce Bawer is an advocate of homosexual rights, whose last book was a critique of conservative Christians called "Stealing Jesus." After he wrote that book, Bawer move to Europe with his Norwegian lover, whom he also married. Then he noticed that, despite an almost total absence of fundamentalist Christians, Europe is becoming a difficult place for homosexuals--and other infidels--to live. So those of you coming from a more liberal perspective can read this book knowing that it was written by a mainstream liberal who does not write for National Review.
It doesn't matter; the story is the same: Europe is having a demographic and moral crisis. They are importing large numbers of Muslims who do not integrate (both because they don't want to and the host nations don't want them to) and hold values utterly hostile to Western values such as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion. Or, judging from the reaction of the European elites to the Muslim assault on these values, maybe these are really just American values. Europe is in thrall to a weird form of political correctness that labels any criticism of even the most vile Muslim practices--like honor killing, female genital mutilation, force marriages and rapes, and wife beating--as racism. Even though Islam is obviously not a race, the European elites view any criticism of it as racism.
Some of the problems with this book have been noted by previous reviewers: it is poorly organized; there are only three large chapters covering 237 pages, two of the chapters are labeled "before 9/11" and "after 9/11" but contain many stories from both periods; for the most part there are no references, etc. But this is a work of journalism, not scholarship. Bawer recounts many stories of personal interactions with Europeans, so this is a very personal book, not a scholarly tome. The power of so many personal, first-hand anecdotes cannot be discounted. One of the criticisms is that there is a large section in the middle of the book (about 100 pages) that focuses not on Islam but on the rabid anti-Americanism of the European political and media elites, as well as of many in the country. But the European rejection of the U.S. and its embrace of Islamic culture are related phenomena: both involve an amazing denial of observable reality in favor of a fantasy world of the Europeans' own creation. Most Europeans have a false concept of America as a place of crime and violence, where none but the rich can get health care, and there are no unemployment or social security benefits. They embrace incredibly puerile economic fallacies, such as that wealth creation is a zero sum game, and America's great wealth was somehow stolen from poor Third World countries. Bawer notes that the range of media opinion available to a European is a small fraction of the range of opinion availabe to Americans.
If I have a criticism, it is that Bawer is actually too optimistic. He believes Muslims could be integrated into Western societies if only the Western elites had the cultural confidence to enforce our own norms, and force them to integrate. I doubt it, but it is a moot point. Europe's elites do not have the resolve to enforce Western norms, in part because they have long been taught to believe that these norms have no value, and are really just a form of oppression of the minority culture.
Another problem is that Bawer always refers to the problem as being "fundamentalist Muslims" or "Islamists." There are many moderate Muslims, but there is no moderate, non-fundamentalist Islam. It is not surprising that Bawer would make this mistake, having written a book criticising fundamentalist Christianity in the USA. There is a large segment of Christianity in America that is non-fundamentalist, supported by an extensive theological tradition. Indeed, the overwhelming majority of Seminaries in the U.S. are non-fundamentalist. This is nowhere the case in the Muslim world. There simply is not a liberal, non-fundamentalist theological tradition in Islam. Period. The few Muslim scholars who could be characterized as liberals work in Western universities, and have little influence in the Muslim world and no influence on Europe's radicalized Muslims.
Despite its problems, this little volume is well worth reading, and should be read by anyone interested in the dilema facing Europe today.
Rated by buyers 
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I can't believe a continent that spawned the Vikings; and the Roman Empire can't handle a few lazy Muslims . Europe just needs to grow a spine and start rounding them up and deporting them, and if they were born in Europe, tough banish them, just take care of them the same way they got there, stick them on jetliners and send them off to the countries they love. Muslim countries. Simple. Right now the europeons are selling their grandchildren into dhimitued (slavery to Muslims) in exchange for not being called a racist. Well I think that's going to work for a while but in about 30 years the younger generation is going to get sick of supporting good for nothing (and dangerous)trouble makers and theirs going to be a continental wide civil war. And I still think theirs some Viking roman German English Irish blood left in the europeons to handle things.
Rated by buyers -
This book is very well written and an easy read.The subject and supporting facts are freighting and any one that wants to understand what we are up against with radical Islam and has our future in mind must read this book. We better awake in America!
Rated by buyers -
Bawer is a homosexual who found out that gay rights and freedoms are being threatened by the Islamic minority in Western Europe. He also writes about how Islamicists are threatening other values of liberal democracy. Without really knowing Islamic culture very well, Western European leaders brought in Muslims who despise liberal democracy As they grow larger in numbers, they seek to take Europe for Allah.
Bawer explains the European attitudes towards war, America and Israel. Why Europeans are so pacifist? They think that all war is wrong and should be replaced by dialog, inclusion, and elimination of poverty. They have paid dearly for their previous wars and wish to avoid war forever and so they pursue peace at all costs. Europeans are anti-American because their media feeds them a steady diet of knee-jerk anti-Americanism to distract the plebs from their own governments' foibles. Generally, their media is either left-wing or extreme left wing and the only books published there on America are from extreme lefties like Noam Chomsky, Micheal Moore and Norman Finklestein. European media is also often anti-Israel. Bawer is pro-Israel and pro-Bush. Bawer agrees with Bush's war, even though Iraq had no ties to Al Qaeda terrorists and was a secular state.
He explains Western Europe's problems with immigration and integration well. The Europeans have created "separate but equal" parallel societies that are competing against one another. They don't force immigrants to work or integrate into society but fund their Mosques and Islamic schools. They take on immigrants as charity cases rather than have them become full-fledged members of society. They are also forbidden to criticize the newcomers to avoid being called racist. The media will not present anything bad about the Muslims because it would tarnish the image of the multi-racial "utopia" they are trying to create. Europeans are losing their free speech rights because it offends Muslims to be criticized.
Bawer's solution is assimilation in which immigrants will be forced to learn the language and the culture of the host nation. He wants "good " immigrants to come over who are willing to assimilate. Bawer worries about the European extreme right taking over and enforcing mass expulsion of aliens so that the state will return to a mono-cultural state. He fears the loss of freedom in the process, especially gay rights.
I have some disagreements with Bawer, even as informative as his book was. Some radical Islamists are rather well-integrated and educated in European societies, knowing the language and having professional careers. Still they stick to their jihad against the West. This does not bode well for the assimilationist argument that Muslims can made to fit into European society. It may be difficult to screen for good immigrants. A hybridized Europe will not be really be Europe anymore. It is not solely values that make a country great; it is the superior ability of the race dwelling in a nation that makes it great. Besides, different races have different cultural values. Some ethnic groups are better at building great nations than others.
Western Europe should have kept its relative homogeneity within its states and not destroyed it through mass alien immigration and multicultural dogma. You don't need the time, expense, and energy spent on enforcing peaceable race relations if everyone is the same race. Even liberals cannot seem to treat everyone equal under the law in a multi-racial state.
Liberal Western Europe is now importing a decidedly illiberal people and religion. Certainly, this folly will test freedom of religion when Islam threatens the secular state. Europe is so feminized it will not stand up for its own people and culture and will let a stronger one take over. Liberal Democrats created this mess, I doubt they are tough enough to get themselves out of it. Having drunk the crazy kool-aid of their own ideology, they cannot think straight. And besides, it is "racist" to screen immigrants and force assimilation on people. That action would mean that your culture and race are superior and are worth preserving. Cultural relativists loathe such imperialism.
Bawer claims that Western Europe needs immigrants because ethnic Europeans' birthrates are low. He seems unwilling to admit that feminism, abortion, and birth control have lowered the birth rate to the point where the subsequent generation of Europeans is dwindling. Something could be done to get the white birthrate up. He promotes the politics of sterility: homosexuality, feminism, abortion, birth control, and divorce.
Bawer does not care about preserving Nordics as a genetic type; he promotes race mixing and immigrants who will support liberal democracy, a "proposition polyglot", not based on race. He says that Europeans have lost their pride in themselves, but is unwilling to admit that anti ... Read More
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