While Europe Slept – How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within

While Europe Slept – How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within

The struggle for the soul of Europe today 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, rapidly 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.

User Ratings and Reviews

4 Stars great insight at a perfect time
This book is excellent insight into how the European elite media and academics are spinning the reality from the consequences of Islamic, shariah law, ways of life. This is a perfect time, with the inside ATTACK on Fort Hood and how American media is moving toward Europe's failed political correctness and "diversity." It's sad what Europe is allowing to happen to their continent, but they are well aware of what's going on and where their desire of being "liked" is leading them, and all European societies. It's absolutely disgusting, the anti-American attitude of a great majority of Europeans, considering throughout history America has saved their freedom and continues to provide their safety from Russia and tyranny. It's as Bawer stated, you would think that America was invading Europe and trying to take over the world in the 1940's and Germany and Russia saved the continent. European society embraces our culture, as far as movies, music, and lifestyle is concerned but hates every concept of American freedom and personal ambition that allows anyone to achieve whatever they desire. They're obsessed with everything America does and criticize our every move, but provide no answers or solutions, other than dialogue and concessions to dissenters, to solve international/domestic problems. I've never cared much about what Europe does, as long as it doesn't pose a grave threat to my freedom and this book further justifies my attitude towards them. The ideas they are pushing of never criticizing anyone for anything they do (in their own countries) is leading them towards Islamic tyranny and complete loss of country and freedom, and I don't feel sorry for them. I just pray it doesn't happen to America. Great book! Everyone should read it and join the movement of preventing America's elites from taking us down the same road.

4 Stars 80 % believable, 20% propaganda
Mr. Bawer' story is very persuasive But once I got through his ringing denunciations of Scandinavian spinelessness toward the Mohammedans … and toward Cuba! (Thor Heyerdahl & Co.) and got to the bits about East Germany, it started sounding like hollow propaganda.

I lived for four years in West Berlin in the late 70s. I must have ridden 50 times through East Germany from West Berlin to West Germany and back, mostly on trains.

And I can assure you that the description he gives of shabby, decrepit buildings, ragged railway employees, etc. is pure fantasy. Either he was on acid or he made the whole thing up.

I grant that Communist East Germany was by no means as spiffed up, prosperous or trendy as West Germany. And the political system sucked, too. But the buildings were almost without exception in good repair, streets were clean, people wore clean, attractive clothing with no patches or holes, or stains.

That reminds me, by the way, that around 2005 I was living in Washington, DC, which has quite a lot of fairly shabby, not to say dangerous, neighborhoods. I once chanced to venture into an area called Santa Cruz. Part of me said "Dostoyevsky", part of me said "Hitchcock", part of me said "Night of the Living Dead". Its grunge was mind-boggling! Never in East Germany – and very seldom, as far as I can recall, in any of the 40-odd countries I've visited – have I EVER, EVER seen anything remotely as dismal, ghastly, shabby, abandoned, dirty and demoralizing as that Washington, DC neighborhood. The only country where I may have seen that degree of decay was India, or the rougher parts of the shantytowns around Mexico City. Like Ciudad Netzahualc

Sphere: Related Content

Related posts:

1. Reflections on the Revolution In Europe – Immigration, Islam and the West
2. The Fight for Jerusalem – Radical Islam, the West, and the Future of the Holy City
3. My Year Inside Radical Islam, A Memoir
4. Secularisation in Western Europe, 1848 – 1914 European Studies
5. Female Genital Mutilation Spreading in Europe
6. Religious America, Secular Europe – A Theme and Variations
7. Religious America, Secular Europe — A Theme and Variations
8. Modernist and Fundamentalist Debates in Islam – A Reader
9. Islam and Secularism in the Middle East
10. Scheherazade Goes West

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Leave a Reply

Click here to cancel reply.

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

IMPORTANT NOTE: We welcome and encourage comments. However, we are receiving many 'junk comments' from people looking for back links. As of noon, November 16, 2009, comment submission authors must use a name. For example, names such as 'Payday Loans' or 'Home Accessories' will be deleted. You may continue to link to your website, but we want names (pen names are all right). Additionally, only substantive comments that have to do with the content of the article will be accepted. Comments such as 'Nice post, thanks,' will be deleted. Comments that link to pornographic or hate sites will also be deleted.

Website

By submitting a comment here you grant this site a perpetual license to reproduce your words and name/web site in attribution. While we offer immediate approval of comments that are not screened as spam, we reserve the right to delete your comment pursuant to the site's terms, conditions and policies. GOD DISCUSSION RESERVES THE RIGHT TO DELETE OR EDIT COMMENTS FOR ANY REASON, WITHOUT NOTICE, including without limitation grammar errors, "trolling" and spamming.

Security Code: