[lit-ideas] Re: Europe's future, catastrophic or apocalyptic

  • From: Teemu Pyyluoma <teme17@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Fri, 12 May 2006 00:32:37 -0700 (PDT)

Lawrence,

Thanks for the explanation. As to which scenario is
more credible:

I'd start with the fact that there has been violent
and marginalized young men in all societies, including
European ones, for as long as anyone can remember and
there will be in the future. We can live with that.

Then again, said groups become a serious threat if
they are organized and have lot of members. It is
organizing that makes both Islamic and far right
extremists scarier than your average jobless loudmouth
who hates everything, including himself.

Still, the very decentralization that allows the
organizations to exist without being spotted and
stopped by the authorities is also a weakness. That
structure limits their ability to act collectively,
for example terrorists can at best mobilize dozens of
people for an attack. If they try anything bigger, it
will inevitably not stay under cover. Ability to keep
secrets drops rapidly with the amount of people
supposed to keep them, as intelligence organizations
know.

More importantly, the numbers just don't back the
assertion that various extremists are a threat to
European civilization as we know it. It is impossible
to determine the amount of people potentially
involved, but any reasonable estimate is very low. For
example, I don't see the danger of some extremist
group getting enough votes to have real power, and
when they do get elected they tend to mellow down
pretty rapidly (see Austria for a recent example).
Governing does that, see also GOP.

As to what needs to be done, the local Muslim
community over here has some pretty good ideas. The
increasingly not-so-silent majority of the Muslims is
fed up with being represented by the Imams, often the
most conservative found. As one Finnish Muslim put it:
"If you want to know how average Finn views sexuality,
do you go and ask a Lutheran priest?" The concerns of
the community are racism, jobs and language courses on
top of stuff that concerns Finns in general, depravity
of the West is just not on the agenda. It is very
tempting for political leaders to have someone to call
to when they need to "reach the Muslim community",
nice photo-op at a local Mosque and all. It is also
profoundly silly.

Another thing that I blame on the politicians: After
the Madrid and London attacks there was lot of talk
about pan-European co-operation between security
agencies. It is better than it used to be, but still
nowhere as good as it should be. Trust is the key
issue, and this is something the leaders could build.
Instead we get useless PR stunts like bio-id
passports.

In general, asked "What is your vision of a "secure"
world?" Bruce Schneier replied: "One without people.
That is, one that will never exist. Life is
insecurity, and the sooner we get used to that, the
better."


Cheers,
Teemu
Helsinki, Finland

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