Friday 4 April 2008

A Degraded Symbol

Susanne Winter, a politician for the Freedom Party of Austria, has been charged with incitement and degradation of religious symbols. She profaned a crucifix and called Jesus some horrible names. I’m only joking, of course: in Europe, such deeds might win you a prize, if they are done with sufficient effect. No, Ms Winter offended against the religion to which the secular authorities of Europe pay deference, the one whose founder Ms Winter called “a warlord” and “a child molester”. [1] It is because of these words that she may get up to two years in prison, not a harsh sentence for sure, for this is still Liberal Europe after all: a place where a transgression of one of its many laws is met with leniency, indeed a place where one can torture and murder a man and reasonably expect only four years in prison [2], and a place where, against the degradation of European civilisation as a symbol and as a reality, there is little will and certainly no law.


[1] As reported by Thomas Landen, “Dispatch from the Eurabian Front: Austria, European Parliament, the Netherlands, Belgium”, The Brussels Journal, 1st April 2008. (H/T: Malcolm Pollack, “Silence!”, Waka Waka Waka (weblog), 2nd April 2008.)
[2] For example, see the recent case of Ryan Palin and Craig Dodd: “Jail term cut for ‘feral’ killers”, BBC News Online, 8th November 2007.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's enough to make a mild man don chain mail and a white tabard with a red cross embroidered on it.

There might, of course, be a few local useful idiots we would have to deal with first before decamping Eastwards.

Robert Mabblethorpe anyone? Or is it because he was an artist with important things to say?

Anonymous said...

But if the Koran is the inerrant word of God, has the court just committed a terrible crime by denying part of its message? Perhaps we should hang the judges by virtue of the Precautionary Principle.

Anonymous said...

Thirty years ago, an imam asked the British government why Rusdie couldn't be prosecuted under the British law against blasphemy, only be to be told the law only applied to Christianity. The law was eventually repealed. Now it's been replaced by laws which don't mention blasphemy, but prosecute it just the same, and the law only applies to Islam. The EU will go on to implement all of Sharia in my lifetime.

James Higham said...

Yes, undoubtedly tongue in cheek the opening charge.

Anonymous said...

English self-loathing is truly amazing. Is this a symptom of some sort of "Crusader's Guilt," akin to Slavery Guilt (or White Guilt as it is more usually denominated) in the United States?

Anonymous said...

Start learning Chinese, because Western Civ's days are numbered.

Anonymous said...

Fear and loathing.

The greatest sign of moral weakness.

Malcolm Pollack said...

D.,

You've been mentioned in a comment over at my place.

There's something for everyone on the Internet.

Anonymous said...

"Unio Europaea delenda est."

I do wish Deogolwulf would correct his mistake. That should be Europae, not Europaea! To show genitive case in a first declension noun, you only need to add an e, Deo.

Deogolwulf said...

It's not a noun, it's an adjective, and it's not genitive, it's nominative (from europaeus, a, um — european; not from europa) to accord with unio, taken to be a feminine noun.

(Tim Worstall is the originator of the phrase, with a little help from Cato the Elder.)

Sky Captain said...

A little help from MI5 more like; their motto is very close.

Anonymous said...

Thank you! A little knowledge is a dangerous thing in the hands of those who don't know their ignorant - like me. But at least I've learned a little more about Latin and, I hope, a little humility to go with it.

Deogolwulf said...

Well, "europaea" does look odd.