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from the oh-good-stronger-copyright-laws-/s dept.
French president challenges 'inward-looking nationalist selfishness' in Europe:
Emmanuel Macron has outlined his vision for the future of the European Union in Strasbourg. The 40-year-old, who secured the French Presidency in May on a pro-EU platform amid a populist surge in the bloc, delivered his highly anticipated speech to over 700 MEPs in the European Parliament on Tuesday.
Macron challenged "inward-looking nationalist selfishness" amid populist sentiment in the bloc and pushed for a more united and reinvigorated Europe. "Nationalism will lead Europe into the abyss. We see authoritarianism rising all around us," he said. "The response should not be authoritarian democracy but the authority of democracy."
Macron also sought to tackle the "poisoned debate" on migration, proposing the creation of a European programme that could subsidise local authorities which host and integrate refugees.
In a speech which touched on a range of issues, Macron recommended that copyright law be tightened to protect artists' "genius" and reiterated his support for tougher environmental legislation.
Meanwhile, Macron wants to "reform" Islam:
Speaking alongside the flag-draped coffin of a police officer killed in a terrorist attack in southern France, President Emmanuel Macron last month lay blame on "underground Islamism" and those who "indoctrinate on our soil and corrupt daily." The attack added further urgency to a project already in the works: Macron has embarked on a controversial quest to change Islam in France — with the goal of integration but also preventing radicalization.
He has said that in the coming months he will announce "a blueprint for the whole organization" of Islam. And those trying to anticipate what that will look like are turning their attention to Hakim El Karoui, a leading voice on how Islamic traditions fit within French culture.
It's hard to miss that the man who appears to have Macron's ear on this most sensitive of subjects cuts a similar figure. Like the president, El Karoui is an ex-Rothschild investment banker with an elite social pedigree who favors well-tailored suits, crisp white shirts and the lofty province of big ideas. The latest of those ideas is this: that the best way to integrate Islam within French society is to promote a version of the religion "practiced in peace by believers who will not have the need to loudly proclaim their faith."
Also at BBC.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday April 19 2018, @04:47AM (12 children)
Down this path, you may also encounter the next fall of Constantinople [wikipedia.org]. Are you sure want to follow it?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1) by tftp on Thursday April 19 2018, @05:17AM (2 children)
If you were Constantin, would you surrender?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday April 19 2018, @05:45AM
You are missing the point.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Thursday April 19 2018, @03:05PM
Hell yes, I'd surrender, and hope for mercy and generous terms. Constantinople was doomed. It had been on borrowed time for about an entire century by then. There was no conceivable path to a military win, or even a standoff that would allow the city to continue as it was for many more years. No Crusade, no friendly navy (sure, the Venetians wanted to help but they weren't enough, not by a long stretch), nor anything else capable of doing so was on the way to lift the siege, and there was no hope of raising a Byzantine army, not with almost all the former Byzantine territory lost. Walls have never lasted long. They are only good for buying a little time for relief to arrive, or for ill prepared attackers to run short of supplies or be distracted by some other problem and have to leave or never even show up in the first place, and that had already happened a couple of times and saved Byzantine asses for several decades. It wasn't going to happen again. Walls hold only a few months at most, and then the attackers will be able to do anything they want. Sure, the attackers might refuse to honor the terms of a surrender and slaughter everyone anyway, but history records that they didn't negotiate in bad faith if anything it was the Byzantines who did that. They were infamous for their treachery. And the attackers would soon be able slaughter everyone regardless, and without being guilty of breaking an agreement.
Constantinople was a capital without an empire. The writing was on the wall, had been on the wall for decades by then, decades in which the Byzantines totally failed to find or take any way out of their predicament. By then, holding out was stupid, fanatic refusal to give even one inch, worse stubbornness and fanaticism than that displayed by the Muslim attackers. They were too wrapped up in their Christian dogma, and the pride of being the capital of one of the greatest empires in history, the Roman Empire.
For a contemporaneous comparison, consider the Fall of Granada in 1492. The Muslims surrendered, and walked out.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 19 2018, @12:15PM (1 child)
Your options are:
1) Be enslaved and raped, possibly to death
or
2) Set yourself on fire
Which do you choose with muslims outside your city walls about to come in?
Sadly, the fate of civilians in war has often been harsh, perhaps even more so in the past. Men would invariably be killed, and children were often sold into slavery. As for the women, they might be raped and then killed, or sometimes taken as prizes by the victors. One practice was developed by the Rajputs of India in order to prevent such a fate from befalling their queens and noble women. This rite was called Jauhar
(Score: 4, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Thursday April 19 2018, @05:43PM
1) Be enslaved and raped, possibly to death
or
2) Set yourself on fire
We're talking about the Christian persecution of the Buddhists in Vietnam here, right? [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 19 2018, @01:43PM (6 children)
Are you catching on? History repeats itself, often enough. Those who fail to learn from history, are condemned to relive history - or words close enough not to matter. Look around you. All over the world, all over Europe, you can see the vanguard of the next Muslim armies. Evicting the Muslims from Europe - or most of Europe - the last time around was costly. But, you don't even recognize those vanguards.
The majority of Muslims "immigrating" into Europe are military aged males. That means nothing to you?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday April 19 2018, @02:11PM (5 children)
Absolutely nothing. Should it?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 19 2018, @02:24PM (4 children)
HINT: The American west was settled primarily by military aged males, of European stock.
(Score: 4, Informative) by c0lo on Thursday April 19 2018, @02:52PM (3 children)
Those "immigrants" got in Europe as the result of USA pumping, in the Middle East, discontent and arms to go with it [independent.co.uk]
This happened after a certain ape alpha female bumped her flat chest following the destabilization of a country and eliminating the only non-tribal government, by propping up US own enemy [telegraph.co.uk]. Yeap, the Italians should know who to thank for the extra refugees.
The above coming after the idiotic US-led finance engineering wiped out a good part of the world economy.
Of course, this coming on top of the war in Afghanistan and Iraq before that.
HINT: perhaps those military aged males should have better stayed in the American west they settled. As a matter of perspective, facts suggest that US interventionism and adventurism is a higher risk factor for this world than Muslims.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 19 2018, @03:13PM (2 children)
You're coming around, slowly. You have just admitted that Islam is indeed a risk factor for the world we live in. Given time, we might arrive at some sort of agreement regarding the relative risk posed by the Five Eyes nations, and Islam. Of course, about that time, we'll have to weigh those risks against other risks, like China.
Can we at least agree that those clever upright simians are fucking dangerous? A few are less dangerous than others, but they are all dangerous.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday April 19 2018, @04:38PM (1 child)
Fucking? You wish, old man, but long gone are the times for fucking.
Dangerous? Salmonella is dangerous too, and believe it or not, I haven't soiled my pants neither on Salmonalla's account not on the account of simians danger.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 19 2018, @07:27PM
Runaway has. He's kind of the Ted Nugent of Arkansas.