This weekend an excerpt was published in Sun papers across Canada…
Taken together the openly stated views of Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel and Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron, the decision of the French government to legislate the banning of burka, and the acquittal by the Netherlands Court of Appeals of Geert Wilders of all charges of inciting hatred and discrimination against Muslims as a visible minority group, showed that despite nearly half-century of official multiculturalism the political philosophy of liberalism as the keystone principle of the modern West was not entirely eroded.
At a minimum Britain, France and Germany together as the three largest members of the European Union let it be known that containment, or pushing back, of official multiculturalism needed to be publicly discussed.
PLUS — A review in PajamasMedia:
Mansur points out that multiculturalism weakens the nation state and focuses on distinct ethnic cultures at the expense of a shared national history and culture. The exclusive attachment, loyalty, and shared commitment required to sustain a liberal democracy is threatened by identity politics. Cultural integrity and unity are undermined by sustaining these ethno-cultural distinctions. According to Mansur, what is best for the nation as a whole becomes subsumed by how best to pander to identifiable groups or cultures within the country.
UPDATE — Here’s an interview with Salim Mansur:
If the multiculturalists keep pushing away at our western civilization as they are doing then it will be the slow subversion of freedom. The evidence is there. It happened only the other day at McGill. They hosted the 2nd Global Conference on World Religion, and one of the first declarations coming out of it is that there must be no criticism of religion, which is basically taking away free speech. The entire development of the modern world in Europe began with the criticism of religion, that is what Martin Luther was all about. To say that you cannot criticize religion – which religion, Christianity? Christians have been criticizing each other’s religion for 500 years.
It is a question of Islam and Sharia, you cannot write a book like Salman Rushdie or you will be killed. A person like me saying what has to be said will be killed. That is what these people are doing, the evidence is there and it is a subversion of freedom. And once you start subverting freedom you are on a slippery slope, and you will lose the values that we fought for and protected and defended.
What were your Grandparents going to the Second World War for? Was it to get somebody’s oil or to get somebody’s gold, or was it to fight to protect freedom? This is what it is all about, at the end of the day.
