Double Platinum Record [Level 9]
I heard the stuff in France is spreading to Belgium. Any truth to that?
*** Forum Leader / Moderator ***
Yes Paul, I'm afraid so, there are fires in Antwerp, Brussels, Brugge, Gent, St-Niklaas, Lokeren, Hoboken and Luik, where I am now with the Bumpercars. Me and my collegues are patrolling here during the nights and we place our cars and trailers under strict surveillance.
No real riots till now but the police is on high alert coz' things could get outta hand very quickly. Police also noticed many cars with French plates so the hooligans are trying to stir up our kids too.
Double Platinum Record [Level 9]
Johan, why would it happen in your country?
*** Forum Leader / Moderator ***
For the same reasons as in France. We had problems for many years with young people (mainly from Morocco and Turkey).
They all live in quarters in the big cities where they impose their laws (we're talking kids from 11-20 here) and are selling drugs, robbing people and intimidate every one who is not a Muslim. Police in Brussels, f.i., don't wanna go in many streets coz' they are afraid of inciting riots.
Most of them don't have jobs(BTW they are well covered by our Social Security) but they usually refuse to work or go to school because crime pays better (that's what they say themselves).
Now they've seen what their fellows in France are doing and they 're going to try the same here. Uptil now it's only a minor imitation but last nights already 25 cars were set on fire in Brussels so it's getting more serious.
Funfairs in France are under strict surveillance and we are doing the same thing. BTW I have a permit to carry a gun day and night and in public (but I hope I don't have to use it), so that gives you an idea of what's happening in some parts of Europe.
Double Platinum Record [Level 9]
Well, it sounds like the gang problems you find in some of the cities here. Some of 'em were into this color thing. Anyway I would have to believe the majority of the population perhaps even some who call themselves Muslim would favor swift arrests of criminals. Period. Liberals hate crime too 8)
Do you beleive there is some truth to the argument that Muslims cannot peacefully coexist with other groups if they are not at the top of the hierarchy?
*** Forum Leader / Moderator ***
Your question is not easy to answer. Belgians, and certainly the Flemish part is considered as very racist by many Europeans. The "Vlaams Belang" party is the second biggest and they are right-extremists (they have contacts with neo-nazi's, white power movements and aryan nations). Their former party the "Vlaams Blok" was already convicted by Belgian courts for blatant racism and inciting hatred towards foreigners and inhabitants of foreign origin. BTW, they are mentioned in one of the episodes of "The West Wing" and they have tried to forbid that episode from being broadcasted on Belgian television.
Now, it's a fact that the vast majority of Belgians don't have problems with our fellow inhabitants from African, Asian, Spanish or Italian origin. Even not that much with the Turkish people who are mainly Muslim too. They do have a problem with the Moroccon youth.
Why, I don't know. A fact is that a part of the muslims who live here don't accept Belgian law and say that our legal rules are inferior to the Islamic right. Forced marriages and female circumsicion are practiced here and when those people are convicted we all get threats and are being accused for being unholy and racist.
That's not how it works, Belgian law is for every citizen and there simply can not be exceptions. Church and State are separated here and there's no way they can break that rule.
Other fact is that the Belgian population is mainly Catholic and many people are afraid that when the muslim community, that's still growing, one day will be in power in some cities.
Schaerbeek, which is a suburb of Brussels, already has a majority of Muslims, so it's not unthinkable that there will be an Islamic mayor in the future.
Belgians simply are afraid that they will be confronted with Islamic principles and they will never accept that. That's why the "Vlaams Belang" gets so many votes here. They base their popularity on the fear of the people.
So you see Paul, there's a growing hostility between the Belgians and the Muslims. The fact that many of the crimes and harassments that happen in the larger cities are committed by young muslims is not a positive evolution either and I hope, and I stress, I do hope that there will not be a terrorist attack on Belgium coz this would open the gates of hell and it would be very hard for the (big) part of Muslims who want to live peacefully here.
Coz' then you can bet that "Vlaams Belang" will be in power and that we are going to face some serious business, comparable to Third Reich politics.
Double Platinum Record [Level 9]
Well, if there is a part of me that is inclined to agree with the goes on the other side of the political spectrum, the Muslim/anybody else would be one of them. Perhaps I need more enlightenment but it seems whether it's South Asia, Africa, Europe, these folks apparently want to inject there religious beliefs in a violent way. There seems to be little regard for the laws that govern the respective regions that everyone else has to adhere to.
*** Forum Leader / Moderator ***
In Belgium it has been a rather calm night but Brussels Police were in the highest state of alert because they discovered that groups of hooligans are planning to attack the city of Brussels.
This hasn't happened yet til now but it shows that trouble is far from over.
France is also calming a little bit and let's hope that all of this will fade away in the days to come.
And when I hear the people here react it is clear that my fear is becoming reality. They say Islamic religion is to blame for all of this and this is not a good thing for all the muslems that are trying to integrate in our society. The Belgian Federation Of Islam has already strongly condemned the violence and has said that they demand the parents of those youth to take responsability.
Indie Release [Level 4]
The sham that France has become is being exposed. A truly racist country that makes backroom deals with Islamists and terrorist groups. France's un-assimilatable immigrants have erupted. Nothing will save France from this explosion, and it will surely get worse.
Even scarier is the fact that many of the rioters are 2nd and 3rd generation. (That would be like Italian-Americans like myself rioting here today, 50 to 100 years after our families' arrival in America.) The only sad thing is that the average French cop and fireman is taking the brunt of it while the French elite sit on their asses.
America has to rethink it's alliances in western Europe. Spain is gone, France and Germany may be next, Italy is a question mark. The future of Europe lies in the former east-bloc countries, which is where America will be be directing it's miltary and economic resources in the future.
The generally left-leaning American media has been covering the French riots, but your post is the first indication I've had that Belgium has been hit also.
I was speaking to a neighbor who emigrated to America from Italy in the 1960s. He was recently back there and said the muslim immigrants were slowly becoming a problem, even in Naples and Sicily.
Double Platinum Record [Level 9]
I guess you don't remember what happened in LA after the Rodney King incident?Originally Written by dfc99bb
*** Forum Leader / Moderator ***
And it has happened.
A few hours ago hundreds of hooligans attacked Brussels and smashed everything they could. Riotpolice has charged en masse and is using watercanons, helicopters, dogs and teargas. Also the suburbs from Brussels got their part.
Mass arrests are in progress now.
Indie Release [Level 4]
The Paris (and now Brussels) riots are based on the un-assimilated Islamist identity of the rioters, who have been chanting stuff like "God is Great" and "This is Baghdad". They want a separate society within France and aren't afraid to say so.I guess you don't remember what happened in LA after the Rodney King incident?
The LA riots were a reaction to the specific event of the verdict in the trial of the police accused in the beating of career criminal Rodney King. A riot is a riot if it's your car that's burning but the causes were very different.
Double Platinum Record [Level 9]
That's not what I've heard. Where are the reports of the youths spewing Islamic extremism coming from? Not from any of the European sources that I've seen. By all accounts, the majority of them aren't fundamentalists at all. I've even come across interviews where people living there complaing that all the government does is build mosques, when they need the real issues of racism and unemployment tackled. They aren't upset because they can't have their own society (they would never have had to leave their ancestral homes if that were the case) but because they have never been accepted by French society. No jobs, lousy homes, no future: I believe that this is the underlying cause of the unrest. People with decent jobs don't riot, because they've got too much to lose.
BTW, I think that claiming the Rodney King riots was the result of a 'single event' is a gross misunderstanding. The Rodney King event was a trigger, not the underlying cause.
There are many parallels between the riots in LA and France: a large number of people who are a visible minority, living in the most undesireable parts of town, with long-standing complaints about economic discrimination and police harrassment. This, despite living in a country that constantly champions itself as a free and egalitarian democracy. Enough years of this go by, and it's not hard to see why people become disillusioned with authority and embrace more extreme ideologies. It's also interesting to note that the trigger (police brutality) is the same for both.
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