Is Europe Doomed?

May 2, 2011 By 38 Comments

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Hege Storhaug, the information director of Human Rights Service in Norway and the author of several books on immigration and integration, forced marriage, women in Pakistan, and related subjects. She is the author of the new book, But the Greatest of These Is Freedom: The Consequences of Immigration in Europe.

FP: Hege Storhaug, welcome to Frontpage Interview.

Storhaug: Thank you, Jamie. It’s an honor to be interviewed by you.

FP: So tell us what inspired you to write this book.

Storhaug: Compassion for the only sacred thing on this earth: human beings.  A deep gratitude for the high level of personal freedom we enjoy in Western societies.  A deep recognition that the liberal values from which I’ve benefited since early childhood – among them equal rights, freedom of speech, and freedom of religion – are under increasing pressure, especially in Europe.  And a deep recognition that our freedoms didn’t come gliding in from nowhere on a surfboard and didn’t come with an eternal guarantee.  On the contrary, we have to fight for them every day – otherwise, we’ll wake up one day to a society we don’t want and don’t recognize.

In this sense, the book is a warning of what’s at risk.  It’s about values.  It’s about freedom.  And it’s about the increasing influence of Islam – especially in Europe, but also in the U.S. and Canada.

Another driving force behind the book is my concern for individuals who are being crushed by extremely patriarchal and inhuman practices that have now become deeply rooted in Europe.  What I’m thinking about are the intolerable acts to which so many Muslim girls and women are subjected: genital mutilation, forced marriage, the denial of divorce to wives in violent marriages, the compulsive wearing of the veil, limited freedom of movement and – most extreme of all – honor killing.

Honor killing, as it happens, is the topic of the book’s first chapter, which is about a heartbreaking crime that took place in Norway in 2002.  Anooshe, a child bride from Afghanistan, was executed by her husband outside a courthouse and police station in the small coastal city of Kristiansund in western Norway.  Why?  Because she wanted to avail herself of a basic human right – the right to break out of a marriage.  Hardly any other event has had more of an effect on me than this one.  This was a remarkable young woman who could have made a difference in my country if only the authorities had done their job – namely, to protect her.

In short, what I do in the book is describe the problems that “the new Europe” faces today, after decades of heavy immigration, and propose specific policy measures to resolve these problems.

FP: What is the main argument of the book?

Storhaug: The main argument is that Europe’s blind faith in multiculturalism as an ideological pillar of our society has failed dramatically.  The academic elite and naïve politicians have bought into the idea that all cultures are equally good, and that the result of immigration from non-Western countries will be that different cultures will take root here and flower side by side with European culture.  This way of thinking has led to the establishment of more and more closed enclaves where Islam trumps personal freedom and where the national authorities, including police and fire fighters, no longer have control.

The first victims of this tragedy are the individuals inside these enclaves – especially girls and women. Over time, the chances are very high that this tragedy can destabilize national states socially and also economically, given the high levels of joblessness and welfare dependency. If this development is not turned around within a decade, and if Europe doesn’t work out an immigration policy that is healthy and sustainable in terms of values, the continent is doomed.  It will be Islamized, and will suffer everything that goes with that.

FP: How is your book different from other previous books broaching this subject?

Storhaug: As far as I have noticed, my fairly broad background differs from that of other authors on these issues. Not long after I started out as a rookie journalist in 1992, I came across the phenomenon of forced marriage among Pakistanis in Norway.  Because I was so shaken up by the situation, and because I also realized immediately this problem would only become more and more important over the years, I decided that I wanted to learn firsthand about this so-called honor culture.  So I went to Pakistan in 1993 and stayed there for over two years.  It was a culture shock.  One of the things that shocked me the most was the lack of empathy for the victim of oppression and assault.  This culture shock led to my book Mashallah: A journey among women in Pakistan (1996).

After my return to Norway, I performed investigative journalism in the Muslim community, with a focus assault and mentality.  My work led to the revelation that young women in Norway were being subjected to honor killings and genital mutilations.  I also showed that imams were speaking out of both sides of their mouths – on open camera they opposed genital mutilation, on hidden camera they were for it.  And so on. I also worked in the grass roots inside immigrant communities in an effort to understand both the mentality and the living conditions of those who are rendered vulnerable in extremely hierarchical social structures.  My work has led to changes in national policy and legislation.

In 2002 I helped found a think tank called Human Rights Service.  Our focus is on the living conditions of Muslim girls and women in Europe and on the struggle for values posed by the rise of Islam in Europe.  During my years with HRS, I’ve uncovered scandalous problems, put them on the national agenda, and collaborated with politicians at the highest level, in Norway and elsewhere, to work out solutions to these problems.   During my 19 years on the job, I’ve worked on pretty much every level of this crisis imaginable.  This has given me a profound understanding of the challenges we face and it has won me professional respect from politicians – even though this has been an uphill battle because of the power of the politically correct elite and its determination to deny and distort the facts.

FP: What do we need to do to defend our civilization? Tell us some steps that need to be taken and tell our readers who want to make a change what they can do.

Storhaug: It would nearly require a whole book to answer this question satisfactorily.  It’s exactly the question that I try to answer in this book, and my answer is on two levels.  I take a larger, more abstract view of issues of freedom, self-knowledge, and the understanding of what makes a democracy strong.  But I’m more specific when I address the types of abuse that are being imported mainly through immigration from the Muslim world.

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About

Jamie Glazov is Frontpage Magazine's editor. He holds a Ph.D. in History with a specialty in Russian, U.S. and Canadian foreign policy. He is the author of the critically acclaimed and best-selling, United in Hate: The Left’s Romance with Tyranny and Terror. His new book is High Noon For America. He is the host of Frontpage’s television show, The Glazov Gang, and he can be reached at [email protected] Visit his site at JamieGlazov.com.

  • http://www.abigailesman.com Abigail

    As the author of a similar book, "Radical State: How Jihad is Winning Over Democracy in the West," I congratulate Ms. Storhaug for her work, and her courage in speaking truths so many in Europe still refuse to say aloud. More important, it is crucial that Americans be awakened to the situation in Europe, and what it portends for the USA. Hopefully her book will aid in the efforts to make that happen.

    • Steve

      Or perhaps the greatest threat to the US are the Mexican illegals who are actively working to subvert the integrity of the Republic's commitment to a cohesive national culture based on the English language and the European Enlightenment.

      • LastAmerivan

        lets not forget their roach-like behavior as it bankrupts us state by state

    • Causality

      "Courage"

      When did it become an act of bravery to write a book? A book about a subject that has already been widely covered?

      "truths so many in Europe still refuse to say aloud"

      1+1=2

      There, i said it. Do we really need to kick in open doors and make a lot of noise while doing so?

      • Abigail

        Evidently, you've never written a book. Evidently, courage is something you know little about, since you hide behind a false identity. And evidently, you, too, have trouble speaking truths that no one else is willing to speak, preferring, rather, the ones they are. More of these, we don't need, thanks.

  • Tommo2

    Good luck with your book Hege. Unfortunately I think the only people that will read it will be those already acquainted with Islamic creep and unbridled Muslim arrogance and crime in their own countries.

    We are really looking for solutions to the problem and not more case studies of Muslim aggression on their children and their wives. We would also like to know how to deal with governments who know that third world immigration is against the wishes of the people but continue to import them. Daily our towns and cities are being filled up with black faces but all the government do is legislate to prevent anyone talking about the situation on the grounds of racial prejudice and Islamophobia. Under these conditions our nationhood and childrens' futures looks very bleak indeed.

    • nina

      Vote.

      • Tommo2

        A change of government has done nothing to halt the flow of rampant immigration. There would seem to be a desire amongst the elite and liberal left to flood the country with Muslims to weaken nationalism and to bring about a social change that will deny Christianity a place in our culture and our heritage along with it.

        • Causality

          Are you talking about the elite and liberal left that also eats human babies?

    • fmobler

      The way to address this is to put the best books of this kind into the hands of your more naive friends and relatives. I'll read this one and decide if it is well-enough argued to give it to others. I have found that it is not even to recommend a book to someone. Everyone has an over-ambitious reading list. If I think it's important, I buy extra copies for targeted audiences.

      • http://www.abigailesman.com Abigail

        Then I hope that you will read mine ("Radical State: How Jihad Is Winning Over Democracy in the West") as well. Some of the top people in this field (Steve Emerson, Robert Spencer, Pam Geller, Phyllis Chesler, and more) have found it "important" – so perhaps you would, as well.

    • abigail

      I find your reference to "black faces' more than offensive. That said, I think you're right that she is speaking to the choir. Unfortunately, some members of that choir are racist pigs, not reasonable people, which won't help anything.

      • Tommo2

        How would you describe these coloured people then? Are you pretending they are the same as us in all respects? Or are you also one of the naive liberal left that condemn criticism of Islam as racism?

        • Abigail

          That's pretty funny. First of all, you clearly don't do your research, or you'd know what I believe, who I am, what I write, what I stand for. And you'd also know that being Muslim has nothing whatsoever to do with the color of someone's skin.
          Or are you one of the racist fascist right that believes that blond former choirboys from Long Island who convert to Islam and attempt to bomb American landmarks are actually black men in disguise?

          • Tommo2

            The racist/ fascist card is old hat and used consistently when the argument centres around personalities and not issues.

            Personally I couldn't care less about colour but the truth is that Muslims, almost without exception in my country, are black and you cannot hide the facts. Known Muslim terrorists cells operating in the country are all black. The large majority of race attacks are black on white. Grooming of underage white girls for sex is endemic and being carried out by gangs of Asians of Pakistani origin throughout the whole of the country. There are more black Muslims in jail per capita than non-Muslims. This has nothing to do with racism on my part but the facts speak for themselves.

            It concerns me that while Americans concentrate on the Islamic threat, the actual takeover of their country will be from Hispanics whose numbers are rising so fast as to be totally out of control. Your children better learn Spanish because that is what your new government will be speaking.

          • abigail

            I used the "racist/fascist" thing because I wanted to point to the silliness of your "liberal" one.

            I don't know what country you're in. I can tell you that many known terrorists in England, Belgium, the Netherlands, Canada, Germany, and the USA are white. The number of British women converting to Islam from Christianity is astounding.

            As for the Hispanic issue in America – you're about 40 years late on this one. We've been dealing with this a long time. It's been handled well, and will continue to be handled well. Of course, if you hate anyone who isn't Christian, white, and blonde, you wouldn't understand that. Let me guess: you think Obama is a Muslim and the Jews perpetrated 9/11.

          • Tommo2

            Why are you doing this? Stop applying labels to me. You couldn't be more wrong.

            I am for America and Israel. I promote free speech and counter anti-semitic propaganda everywhere. I am also in favour of selective immigration from the third world but not the open door policy that we are experiencing.

            I am glad to hear that the US are tackling mass Hispanic expansionism. We don't get to read too much about it. Perhaps that could be the subject of your next book.

  • Fred Husby

    Hege is a knowledgeable and interesting woman to listen to. She is a great resource for us Norwegians.

  • LindaRivera

    Hege is doing wonderful work! I also agree with her about the Persians!

    The huge problem is no matter how many laws are passed now, they will all be rendered null and void once Muslims via the massive Muslim immigration invasion and HUGE families achieve the numbers in Europe and the UK that will transform Europe and the UK into Islamic countries ruled by Islamic sharia law. It is predicted this is only years away. G-D help Europe and the UK.

    Either take action now or face a living hell in Europe and the UK where civilization is annihilated and the defenseless indigenous people live in moment-to-moment daily fear. The god of Islam is the complete opposite of our loving, merciful, awesome and glorious G-D – Master of the Universe.

  • Anita

    It may very well be too late for Europe to turn this situation around, since the poplulation is growng and influence is expanding with every generaration. Add to this the growing numbers of unemployed Arab youth and the powder keg gets closer to massive explosion. Too many so-called progressives asleep at this wheel…Eurabia, here you come…
    Anita

    • nina

      Add to this the huge amounts of petro-dollars that buy up universities fund chairs, and make up the curicula, and you have got a tragedy in the making.

    • Causality

      Explosion? 5 billion years from now the sun will explode.

  • ObamaYoMoma

    The only solution for the West is to ban and reverse all Muhammadan immigration ASAP, as mass Muhammadan immigration is demographic conquest, which is the most prevalently employed form of stealth and deceptive non-violent jihad in the world today. Indeed, everywhere in the world where mass Muhammadan immigration has occurred, without a single exception, the vast overwhelming majority of Muhammadan immigrants have flat out refused to assimilate and integrate and have formed instead Muhammadan no-zones ruled by Sharia as parallel societies within a society and in direct contravention to the laws of the states in which they reside. This manifestation is not by accident. It is by design, as it is demographic conquest. Indeed, devout Muhammadans never migrate to the West to assimilate and integrate, but instead to eventually subjugate and dominate.

    The world needs to become un-transfixed only on terrorism (violent jihad), because not only is it the least prevalently employed form of jihad in the world today, but also because the Islamic world can never hope to defeat the West via hydra-headed terrorists. However, through stealth and deceptive non-violent jihad, which is exponentially far more prevalently employed today as opposed to violent jihad, the Islamic world can and will eventually conquer the West. Indeed, the Ivory Coast was just recently conquered by Islam thanks primarily due to demographic conquest, stealth, and deception.

    • stevehayes

      Imams in these western countries have to be held accountable and deported as well as the mosques heavily fined or closed if they are found to be teaching any practices that are against the law.

      • ObamaYoMoma

        Indeed, you sound like the Steve Hayes with the Weekly Standard, which is the magazine of record for the country club establishment RINO Republicans. You know the liberals masquerading as conservatives that have managed to hijack the Republican Party and turn it into the second coming of the Democratic Party.

        With all due respect, you can deport all the imams you want, but you will just be spinning your wheels. The problem is not with radical Imams or even with radical Islam, the problem is with mainstream orthodox Muhammadans and mainstream orthodox Islam. Indeed, the notion of a radical Islam and radical Muhammadans is a politically correct myth being sold by the government and the media, as their can only be one and only one Islam, since the texts and tenets of Islam are immutable and any Muhammadan seen as changing just one word, would instantly be charged with blasphemy, which under Islam is a capital offense. Anyway, if you believe that Islam is a Religion of Peace being hijacked by a tiny minority of extremists, then, by all means, please explain why unbelievers living in every Muhammadan majority country in the world, without a single exception, are violently oppressed and systematically persecuted, when not outright slaughtered altogether.

  • steven l

    The EU govts will sacrifice their own people for the……….OIL they desperately need and to keep POWER.
    Unless the US …..

  • Frank

    I cannot agree with the emphasis of Miss Storhaug's book. By her reckoning, we are given to believe that preserving the abstract values of the Enlightenment and protecting non-European peoples from the depravations inflicted on them by their own peoples and backward cultures is to supersede in importance the very continued existence of the blood-peoples native to Europe. This is self-evidently absurd. Interests must logically precede rights in importance.

  • Frank

    There is no more fundamental interest than the continuity of life itself, from which all rights must logically flow. It is the continuity of the life of the blood-peoples native to Europe, indeed of the entire European diaspora globally, which is now under an existential assault. Those of us who love our people, and would see them live and not perish from the earth, must necessarily reject any talk of "assimilating" "immigrants" not of our blood as it is a thinly veiled way of saying Whiteness can tolerably be bred out so long as some measure of cultural compatibility can be achieved. I would be entirely shocked if anyone could gainsay what I have above said one iota as they would have then revealed themselves as fundamentally hostile to the continued existence of European-derived people.

    • Causality

      All homo sapiens sapiens are of african descent. Knowledge and culture are maintained in brains, not in blood or skin color.

  • Mike

    Way to go Europe. You''ve slowly boned yourself. The world has spent thousands of years fighting each other and separating itself into groups that get along the best with each other. And here we are years later with certain men and their "superior knowledge and understanding of mankind" telling us that we should all come together again and that multiculturalism is always a good thing. Ha! Yea right.

    • Causality

      A globalized world requires an all inclusive morality … or WW3

  • jacob

    In all honesty, I don't feel a bit sorry for what is in storage for Judeophobic Europe

    Let it feel in their own flesh from Muslims what they have been inflicting for
    centuries on the Jewish people, culminating with the monstrosity of the Holocaust which too many of them WILLINGLY helped the Nazis to perpetrate, Judeophoby
    that even today is alive and kicking…

    If thanks to their own stupidity they get the Muslim boot on their necks, then so be
    it…

    What more proof is needed, than a moronic Dutch court is judging WILDERS….??

    AFTER ALL, IT WILL AMOUNT JUST TO POETIC JUSTICE

    • Causality

      "Muslims what they have been inflicting for centuries on the Jewish people, culminating with the monstrosity of the Holocaust"

      It was national socialism (single-culturalism) and religiously fueled (christian) anti semitism that resulted in the Holocaust. Keep up the preaching if you want the next holocaust to be on muslims.

  • SwampFox2U

    Control of the population seems to be the objective of the Left. It seems those of multi-culturism live under the delusion they will gain the support of the Muslims in their Socialist objectives. Anyone who can read should know Islam has a different objective and in the end will control the Multi-culturalist of Europe under Islamic Culture and Law.

    • Causality

      Control of the population seems to be the objective of the Right. It seems those of single-culturism live under the delusion they will gain the support of the Christians in their Fascist objectives. Anyone who can read should know Christianity has a different objective and in the end will control the Single-culturalist of America under Christian Culture and Law.

      O wait … this already happened and probably explains your post.

  • Jay

    Obviously, a large percentage of Muslims who choose to gain European citizenship do so knowing that any and all promises to abide by Western standards of law are an act. It's part of the game that their immigration lawyers tell them how to play. Ms. Storhaug probably knows this since she's listed the Muslim no-go zones, along with all their imported anti-Western cultural attributes, many of which are against everything the West stands for.

    Ironically, these Muslims also enjoy Western freedom, but in the worst way – to be allowed to trash Western philosophy as a right of their freedom. They see "freedom" not as a "human right," but as a right to dehumanize others, especially women. And we won't even mention their Mosques where weekly calls for genocide against infidels is already known. Freedom can work to strengthen the country, or to demolish it from the inside if that is what they want. Sharia and any semblance of respect for its rules will destroy whatever Western nation allows it, directly or indirectly through tacit consent.

    How can Europe handle this black hole it's slipping into? One way would be to create laws allowing for the revocation of citizenship under certain circumstances, especially fraud. A Muslim who becomes a citizen takes vows to abide by their country's laws. Any act that implies a respect for Sharia is tantamount to a fraudulent obtaining of citizenship, and should be revoked. Even the aiding and abetting of such anti-Western or national law breaking would be included, such as helping bring immigrants into their country knowing that there is a likelihood of criminal activity.

    A specific list of the types of crimes prohibited should be part of citizenship, and even visa, documents. It can include many crimes, not just those allowed under Sharia. One thing is certain, upon learning of many families sent back to their former homes in the Middle East, tens of thousands of Muslims will feel the fear.

    It will have a direct impact. Much more than putting criminals of honor killings in prison, which, by the way, costs $100,000 (in U.S.) per year per prisoner. Europe will eventually go broke imprisoning this growing criminal menace and in trying to police it before hand. Arrests, trials, witnesses, investigations, etc. will become overwhelming for the growing Sharia-inspired crimes, and will kill both the economy and culture at the same time. Revocation of citizenship and visas should be considered. These are not normal times for Europe.

  • Tommo2

    I listened to Dr Taj Hargey on BBC Newsnight programme last night who is chair of the Muslim Education Centre, Oxford and is probably the first moderate Muslim I have heard who describes how the export to the West of a backward and 'highly toxic caricature of Islam' , known as Wahhabism, has been peddled across the world spreading sectarian poison.

    Dr Hargey advocates the reforming of Islam from the pristine teaching of the Koran and ignoring the Hadiths which, he says, were compiled by non-Arabs 250-years after Mohammed's death. The reformation of Islam is still in its infancy but finding opposition in reactionary clergy and their supporters. Perhaps the government should be funding Dr Hargey's efforts and not the Muslim Brotherhood which continues to support Sharia Law and the oppressive forms of Islam.

    Please read more: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnis…