A few weeks ago, I was chatting to a woman who works in an advocacy role for Muslim women in an area that, quite independently of the Bishop of Rochester, she described as a ‘no-go area’ for non-Muslims. Her clients were women in the process of being sectioned into mental health units in the NHS. This woman, who for obvious reasons begged not to be identified, told me:’The men get tired of their wives. Or bored. Or maybe the wife objects to her daughter being forced into a marriage she doesn’t want. Or maybe she starts wearing western clothes.There can be many reasons. The women are sent for asssessment to a hospital. The GP referring them is Muslim. The psychiatrist assessing them is Muslim and male. I have sat in these assessments where the psychiatrist will not look the woman patient in the eye because she is a woman. Can you imagine! A psychiatrist refusing to look his patient in the eye? The woman speaks little or no English. She is sectioned. She is divorced. There are lots of these women in there, locked up in these hospitals. Why don’t you people write about this?’ [..]
And this, I imagine, is what the Archbishop wants for the whole of England.
Hopsan ! Velkommen til idyllistan !
Der har været to mord i Sverige forgange døgn (såvidt jeg lige kan overskue). Det er ikke usædvanligt. Om det ene siger en nabo “det känns jättejobbigt“. Om balkonpigen forleden sagde en polis: “Det känns jättetråkigt”. Ja, det tør da svagt antydes at det er “meget kedeligt”. Med tragediens intog i virkeligheden, er den forsvundet ud af sproget. Det hele minder mig om, når en dansk journalist kalder en trafikulykke med fire omkomne, for et “trafikuheld”. I landet hvor summen af sociale ødelæggelser er døbt “hverdagsforbrydelser” (vardagsbrott), må man nu ikke mere kalde ulykker for tragedier. Hellere dø end at sige noget definitivt. Læg også mærke til svenske nyhedsoplæsere i TV, der kan opremse de forfærdeligste rædsler, så man nærmest tror man overværer børnetimen “Boolibompa”. Det er sand SVT- optimsme, bare på med vanten og gi´ dit humør en gang hårlak. I morgen er der nye mareridt. Velkommen til idyllistan og den sproglige berøringsangst. Det er “jättetråkigt”.
Fartyget Sverige – på katastrofkurs
Det amerikanske hva´ for noget ?
Man kan kigge i vejviseren efter noget om den amerikanske marathon-valgkampagne her på bloggen. Den er lige så kedelig som den danske i november, til gengæld er den 25 gange så lang. Vi overlader beskæftigelsenterapien til DR og en svensker der kalder sig Dick Erixon. Man nyde den hyper- frække Ann Coulter her, lægge en bombe under det hele. Det er sjovere end ti år med DR.
Bernard-Henri Lévy: God bless Ayaan Hirsi Ali
……..On Feb. 10, Ayaan Hirsi Ali will attend a meeting of supporters at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris. She was invited by various publications and associations–Charlie Hebdo, Liberation, ProChoix, la Regle du Jeu (I am executive editor of same) and SOS Racisme–that are not intimidated by Islamist provocations or the warnings issued by those who espouse the policy of appeasement.
The following day, she will be awarded the Prix Simone de Beauvoir in honor of her spirited resistance to all forms of oppression.
On Feb. 14, she will be in Brussels to take part in an initiative by European MPs who hope to pass a resolution that will ensure that all the institutions of the European Union protect this living symbol of Europe. (And it would be a shame if they’re forced to create a special, ad hoc status for her and for all those who find themselves in the same situation.)
France will soon assume the presidency of the European Union and will play a decisive role in this affair.
Last year, in his speech accepting the presidency, Nicolas Sarkozy declared that “Everyone who has been persecuted by tyranny, dictatorship … (and especially) all of the women around the world who have been martyred, France’s pride and sense of duty are on your side.” Clearly he must be affected by this heroine’s battle for human rights and Enlightenment.
I hope he will meet this great woman and use his authority to make sure that she has the inalienable right, as do all European citizens, to come and go as she pleases and to speak in complete safety.
French philosopher and writer Bernard-Henri Lévy is the author, most recently, of American Vertigo: Traveling America in the Footsteps of Tocqueville and Ce Grand Cadavre a la Renverse. Translated from the French by Sara Sugihara.