Europe's Fundamental Political Problem

is that its elites, outside of sensible Denmark, have sacralized opinion on immigration policy as determining the Good Guys and the Bad Guys.

Europe’s fundamental political problem in the 21st Century is that its elites, outside of sensible Denmark, have sacralized opinion on immigration policy as determining Good Guys and Bad Guys. If you automatically take the side of this knife-wielding Afghan maniac, then you are Good. But if you have doubts, then you are Bad. If you are for mass immigration from the Third World into Europe, then you are a Who, rightfully entitled to rule. But if you oppose mass immigration, then you are, and deserve to be, a Whom who should be treated as an object.

You see, while immigration policy might seem like just another government policy, such as the retirement age, that should be rationally adjusted as times change, instead the European establishment uses opinions on the subject to determine its Friend vs. its Enemy.

Consider the assumptions underlying this article in the news section of the New York Times:

Where Germany’s Immigration Debate Hits Home

Since the recent killing of a police officer, Mannheim has become the byword for a hard line on deporting those who are denied asylum and commit violent crime.

By Sarah Maslin Nir and Christopher F. Schuetze

Sarah Maslin Nir reported from the city of Mannheim, Germany, and from the market square where a police officer was killed. Christopher F. Schuetze reported on the political reaction from Berlin.

July 13, 2024

The leafy market square, ringed by Middle Eastern restaurants in a quiet city where nearly half the residents have immigrant backgrounds, seems like the last place that would spur Germany’s latest explosive wave of nationalist backlash.

But it was in Mannheim where prosecutors say an Afghan man stabbed six people in May at an anti-Islamist rally, killing an officer who had intervened. No motive has yet been determined.

It’s a complete mystery why the Afghan stabbed six people at an anti-Islamist rally.

We just … don’t … know.

But the death and the fact that the man accused had his asylum claim denied years ago set off calls for the expulsion of some refugees. Such sentiments were once viewed as messaging mostly reserved for the far right.

Thinking that the government should deport people whose asylum claims are denied by the government is reserved for far rightists.

By definition, what could be more right wing extremist than advocating rule of law?

That this could occur in Mannheim, a diverse community of over 300,000 people known for its sensible plotting along a grid as a “city of squares,” has rattled Germany. It has been particularly painful for the longtime Muslim population of the city, where, according to some estimates, nearly one in five people are of Turkish descent.

Overtly, the political discussion concerns refugees, but in the lived experience of German Muslims, many said they felt like they were steps away from becoming a target. That worry has heightened since January, when an exposé revealed a secret meeting by members of the extreme right during which the deportation of even legal residents of immigrant descent was discussed.

Some expressed fears that what happened in Mannheim may have broken a dam.

Days after the death of the officer, Rouven Laur, 29, Mannheim became the reference point for a flood of anti-immigrant proposals — some once relegated to whispers only among the farthest right but that had now moved to the center of the German political debate.

What’s more anti-democratic than debating policy proposals out loud?

… Some of the city’s placid squares were overtaken by protests from both the far-right party Alternative for Germany, or AfD, which had just earned second place in European Union elections, and furious counterprotesters. The AfD was emboldened, many attendees said, by the fact that its hard-line stance was, after Officer Laur’s death, being taken up by their adversaries, from the chancellor on down.

Who is more of an Islamophobic racist than Social Democratic chancellor Olaf Scholz?

“We said this many years ago, and they said, ‘You’re a Nazi and a racist,’” said Damian Lohr, an AfD state representative, standing at a rally in Mannheim’s Parade Square. “And now they’ve taken over this opinion — so who are they now?”

The important thing in contemporary European politics is not to adjust current policy to current conditions, but to prove that your great-grandfathers were right for all of eternity.

Yet, while this may come as a huge surprise in modern Europe, but World War II wasn’t actually fought over Third World immigration policy.

[Stabber] Sulaiman A. came to Germany in 2014 seeking asylum, a claim that was rejected, according to the authorities. He married a German citizen with whom he had two children, giving him the right to remain in the country but not citizenship.

Even had he not, he most likely would not have been deported because the German government had long refused to return refugees to certain countries considered too dangerous — like Afghanistan — even when their asylum applications were unsuccessful.

After all, Afghanistan is crazy dangerous because it’s full of crazy Afghans.

That hesitation was eroded by the events in Mannheim.

In an attempt to claw back voters from the right and center-right, a widening chorus across the political spectrum has embraced the prospect of deportation for those who fail the asylum test, especially those who commit violent crime.

Deporting illegal alien violent criminals? What will these Nazis think of next?

In some of the strongest evidence yet of the shift, in late June, Nancy Faeser, Germany’s interior minister, confirmed that the government was in confidential negotiations with other countries, including Afghanistan and Syria, about taking back people to whom Germany did not grant asylum and who had been deemed a security risk.

If the Germans start deporting illegal aliens deemed a security risk, next thing you’ll know is that they’ll be invading Poland.

Or something.

Nobody seems to be sure, but they just seemed very worked up over it.

… Cem Yalcinkaya, 38, a civil engineer who is the secretary of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Mosque in Mannheim, visited on a recent Friday to pay his respects on behalf of his congregation….

The renewed hostility by some Germans toward the “other” is in his view not an aberration, or even new, but rather an unleashing of the same sentiments that have simmered since Germany’s Nazi past.

“After the Second World War, we didn’t hear them, but they were right here,” Mr. Yalcinkaya said. “They didn’t show themselves, but now they are getting louder.”

Sure, they’re centenarians now, but they’re very loud Nazi centenarians.

It is difficult, if not impossible, to parse the truth about immigrants and crime rates from political posturing. Last year, refugees — from all countries — a group that makes up less than 4 percent of the population — were responsible for roughly 7 percent of crimes in the country, many of which were minor, according to figures released by the federal police.

After all, who is more disorderly than native Germans?

My impression is that Turks, while not particularly amiable, are pretty orderly as well.

But as for for Afghans and Syrians and Somalis?

Asylum seekers are responsible for about 10 percent of “crimes against life,” which includes murder and manslaughter but also illegal abortions. But attacks by them are often given outsized attention, picked up by tabloids and then weaponized by politicians.

In contrast, Politico EU reported:

The number of criminal acts in Germany rose by about 6 percent last year compared to 2022, with authorities attributing the increase to high levels of migration. While foreigners make up about 15 percent of Germany’s population, they accounted for a record 41 percent of all crimes in 2023. Crime that authorities attributed to foreign suspects rose by 23 percent in 2022 and by 18 percent in 2023, according to government statistics. 

“Germany has become less secure over the past two years and that’s because of the rise in crime by foreigners,” said Andrea Lindholz, a Christian Democratic lawmaker, in a recent parliamentary debate. 

Much of the recent attention in the German press has focused on a sharp increase in stabbings. The number of violent incidents involving a knife rose by nearly 40 percent from 2021 to 2023, hitting 14,000.

Back to the NYT:

That complexity

It’s complex, you morons!

Don’t expect us to explain it to you. We’re here to provide nuance, not explication.

has not stopped anti-immigrant sentiment from pervading. “We have here in Germany a very big problem, and the problem is immigration — immigration from Islam, Muslims,” said Michael Heinze, 56, an airport worker at the AfD rally in the Parade Square in Mannheim in June. “This day started a wake up in Germany,” he added, in imperfect English.

If only he had perfect English, he would read the NYT about how complex the crime problem in his neighborhood is.

He raised his voice so that it could be heard over counterprotesters on the other side of the square who were calling his group Nazis. “I’m not a Nazi or a racist,” Mr. Heinze said. “I’m a patriot.”

I.e., Herr Heinze, a voice-raising worker, must be a Nazi.

Not far away in another of the city’s beloved squares were a handful of informational placards. They featured information about Islam,

Information. What’s more objective than Islamic information? It’s information!

and explainers about the faith, an initiative recently begun by Mannheim’s local Ehsan Mosque, in response to amplified hostility, said Adeel A. Shad, the mosque’s imam.

It’s information explaining about the faith! What do you Islamophobic idiots not understand?

Since the attack, the congregation has decided to roll out the placards program across the city.

“We want to reach out to our communities, to our fellow citizens who are living here, so that we can show them what Islam is,” he said, seated in the sanctuary of his mosque after afternoon prayers. “To show them this mosque is not a threat.”

Upstairs in his home, his three children ate lunch and played with an abacus. “The situation I think will get worse and worse, and I am ready for that. I am ready for that,” Imam Shad added. “But I will not retreat.”

After all, who is more anti-Nazi than an Imam?