Alain Touraine on Europe and Islam - interview

The French sociologist Alain Touraine recently chaired a Council of Europe session on Islamophobia. He was awarded the Prince of Asturias prize for his work in communication and humanities this year, Briton Zygmunt Bauman as well. Alain Touraine is the author of 40 books. He describes the evolution of the post-industrial era, shedding light on our world of today.
 

Cecilia Cacciotto, euronews: If we say Islam and Muslim today, it's automatically taken to mean terrorism and terrorists.
 
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[MsCATHOLICSTATE]

CATHOLIC STATE must return ......or secular governments will Islamise the very ground you stand on!!

[megamarsvin]

@WanDeRingLunaticc People always say that, and they're always wrong. The Romans thought the northern tribes could never be civilized. The Persians thought the westerners could never understand culture. The ancient Chinese thought people outside their own country were ghosts without souls.

In the end people are people, no matter what culture they come from. Better to learn to live together, as we have in so, so many cases before this one.

[edichkaa]

can you believe this guy saying "every little thing like one indevidual suicide bomber gets the news",like suicide bombing is something that should be trivial and we all should just go on and not mention it.and there is no such thing a one suicide bomber,its always a network of people cooperating,and is a suicide bomber is not worthy news to this guy?there are whole programs dedicated to whether or not britney spears farted today,but a guy blowing himself up is nothing special to this old idiot?

[20000sc]

Ok, you just made me cry, WHY F*CKING CATHOLIC STATE ?

[sejid94]

He was awarded the Prince of my Shit : it's because of pigs like him that people are making wars...

[megamarsvin]

@canteluna But just to be clear, I do see your point. It is equally dangerous to whitewash any problems from the Islamic side as it is to let the "right" run away with our political system.

The reason it may seem like I'm ignoring those issues is that I see more concrete political problems coming from "our side" than I do from actual Islamic activism. (Terrorist attacks notwithstanding but I don't think those are very effective in pushing the "Islamic agenda" in Western nations.)

[megamarsvin]

@canteluna I don't really like the Islamophobia term either. I think it exists but much less than we are told.

As for the ground zero mosque (which as I understood is not on but rather somewhat close to ground zero), to ridicule people just for protesting the idea (or any idea) is of course never productive. But at the same time denying these people the right to build their place of worship is clearly religious discrimination isn't it?

[megamarsvin]

@canteluna Of course, any ideology unthinkingly taken to extremes is harmful. But I don't see how that is the case today, at least as far as policy goes.

Whereas the "right" (to use a sweeping generalization) has gotten their policies through very effectively (at least where I live and I believe in the U.S. too) the so-called "left" is an empty shell.

And while people still pay lip service to "political correctness", generally it's pretty acceptable to discriminate against Arabs these days.

[megamarsvin]

@canteluna That's fair enough, but I'm not even talking about the immigrants civil liberties (although those are no less important) but our own. My understanding of American politics is limited but here in Holland we've gone way overboard.

The obvious factors are things like those TSA scanners but beyond that police are now allowed to do random searches of pedestrians, it's now mandatory to carry identification at all times, there are govt. internment camps for immigrants, the list goes on.

[canteluna]

@megamarsvin Islamophobia is a tricky term & must be used responsibly. It exists in the form of hate & racism but not in the form of thoughtful criticism. Islam's Sharia law is simply incompatible with democracy & that fact needs to be embraced by the Left as well.

Jon Stewart, whom I usually enjoy, did a naieve & condescending piece on the Mosque @ Ground Zero issue, portraying those that oppose it on par with Palin, Beck, Hannity, et al. Liberals need to look into Islam more thoughtfully.

[canteluna]

@megamarsvin I am also concerned about the paranoia on the Left. That is to say that we (I am a Leftist) value tolerance & diversity to the point where such virtues run the risk of becoming platitudes & we don't bother to think critically as individuals but passively adopt a party position of tolerance when we are not sure what it is we are really tolerating.