Agreed.

In my oppinion up to a point they should be helped as far as it is possible without reverse discrimination.
But this is besides the point. It is not a problem of inability but of unwillingness. The Netherlands have done a lot for immigrants up to the point of making immigration a net monetary loss. As far as the Dutch policy failed, it was not a matter of insufficient resources used.

If a minority of a given nation’s population is unable to participate in wider society for whatever reason, then the individuals who belong to the minority should be empowered to participate. Yes, this involves targeting a disadvantaged minority. Shouldn’t it?

Please take note, non-Dutch readers, the strongest advocates of a Muslim pillar can be found among the democrats-democrats.
Among conservatives some nostalgia can be found to the time of “pillarization” (not a correct English word I think; maybe that’s the reason of the little number of references). Until very recently in school hours pupils from Turkish and Moroccan descent were taught Turkish and Arab. Even more absurd: most Moroccan children were taught Arab while most of these children have Berber parents for whom Arab is NOT their mother-tongue!

In September 2003 I wrote a post at my blog: ?Backwardedness of the Islam? or backwardness of the macho-culture?
( http://www.fransgroenendijk.nl/reactieding.php?id=122_0_1_0_C )
It still holds.
There are good arguments to view the murder of van Gogh and the plans to kill two mp’s as a new stage in a terrorist war.
I am still convinced that the right approach to this terror is to focus on the insanity of these young.
“Lock up the walking time-bombs before they kill” (http://www.fransgroenendijk.nl/reactieding.php?id=P433_0_1_0)

But that is not a development initiated by the state. Nor is it beneficial to the state. If you want to prevent it, you need to target some minority and force it to integrate. This will need laws that are in practice are affecting very disproportionately a minority.

Its the ?about these people? phrases I am wary of. What people? Those that plant bombs? The families of those that plant bombs? The fellow church / mosque members of those that plant bombs? The communities in which bombers hide? Or, all members of a particular religion? And, ?cultural engineering? just sounds like a politically correct phrase for ?civilizing the natives.?

No one’s talking about that, no.

But.

Doesn’t talking about pillarization as an option–in this case, the construction of a self-contained Dutch Muslim community inside the Netherlands, existing parallel to the remainder of the rest of Dutch society, with its own norms and institutions–imply the acceptance of the idea that Dutch Muslims are “different,” so different in fact that regular institutions and basic assumptions about individual rights won’t work for them?

Dutch Muslims are Dutch. They should be treated as such. No one’s served well at all by treating them alternatively as a despised out-caste or as, well, a respected out-caste. Each alternative is IMO equally racist.

Eleven of September 2001 did change nothing in fact, except the silly presumption of some in the USA that oceans put then apart from commoners.

To keep with my metaphor of forest fires, do you remember Afghanistan? Their Mujahidin and Al Qa’ida, the Taliban, and quite a few other such terrorists were the “controlled” fire set by the USA against the URSS.

DSW

Spengler, over at Asia Times, wrote about this:
In Praise of Premature War.

But Europe’s measures to integrate and assimilate immigrants are poor. We’ve allowed a kind of alternate culture to grow and get into conflict with the main stream. I don’t believe that segregation, which pillarization would come out as would work.

So some stronger measures are needed, such as breaking up traditional and patriarchial social structures using the full force of the law, ending the worst cases of ghettoisation and use of the secret services even against religious organisations.

I said that you need to be harsh, not genocidal, or to be precise, to be harsh or gentle, but nothing in between. The current strategy of ignoring the problem has failed.
In Europe immigrants too often live in bad quarters and get bad jobs. To be sure immigrants have always lived in worse conditions than the indigenous population, but that will not convince any disenfranchised youth, nor could anyone expect it to.

To me after 9/11 it is too late for gentleness and there will be wars, but none of them has to be genocidal in nature. And I must add, the sooner decisive action is taken, the less victims there will ultimately be.