Pubs packed last night as Londoners stick two fingers up to terror
As Europhobia puts it:
I tell you what, if this is an "Islamic" terrorist attack, they're doing a piss-poor job. The pubs are all packed out, people sipping their pints happily, all a tad pissed off, but basically fine with it. Nice one, Al Quaeda - you profess to be from a teetotal religion, and you've given the pub trade a massive mid-week boost.
Hats off to Londoners. Emma and I went by bus to Matt's house last night, as planned, to have bubbly and fajitas, and very nice it was too. We were surprised to find that the busses were free!
Others took the riverboat home from work, and listened to tales of London enduring far worse than what was thrown at it yesterday.
Stiff upper lips and gallows humour were entirely evident yesterday, and still are today.
Every time a bomb goes off the terrorists lose some more. The fact that yesterday's explosions, effective though they were at taking the lives of those unfortunate enough to be near them, were so manifestly ineffective at spreading panic and terror across the capital shows that the terrorists have just about played all their cards. We will endure. Freedom will endure. Hope and love will prevail over hate. These terrorists will never win, their cause is evil. We are now more united against them and we will be victorious.
The world is getting smaller, and these bastards are running out of places to hide. The enemies of freedom must know that we are coming to get them. All this bombing has achieved for them is the certainty that they and their barbaric cause will be pursued and defeated.
It's time for the Islamofascists to join the pit of forgotten religious militancy. Their cause and methods belong in the dark ages in a time when religious extremists were given the time of day. There's no place in modern society for an interpretation of any religion that advocates the slaying of non-believers. That this even needs to be written is ridiculous in this day and age.
Now, as much as ever, it is the responsibility of all clear-thinking people who enjoy the fruits of personal, political, religious and intellectual freedom to use all means at their disposal to ensure that the freedom that we afford to others should not be used to harm us by those who would have us enslaved or killed because we do not share their extremist interpretation of a religion.
Our freedom and liberty is ensured by means that are social, political, and military, though some of these methods may leave a bad taste in the mouths of those who feel that they are "progressive" or "peace loving", I assure you that they are all necessary, as the enemies of freedom will not shirk from violence, as demonstrated yesterday.
Islamic militancy demonstrated some of its fundamental flaws yesterday. Its capacity to kill on a scale akin to that of the World Trade Center, or even the Madrid bombings, has been removed. The militants do not understand the mentality of free people. They planned terror and got unity. They wanted to provoke panic, they encouraged calm. They wanted to cripple a city, London stood defiantly firm. They thought we were weak and decadent, we are strong and proud.
The most fundamentally damaging result for the cause of militant Islam, is that those who had held sympathies for perceived injustices visited on Islamic peoples by US and British forces overseas now have direct experience of the indiscriminate hatred that extreme Islamists hold for non-believers. This hatred will be cowed, we will defeat the forces of evil. Now we see the full horror of what these people are capable of. Now we understand what we are fighting against in foreign lands to protect our freedom and liberty. Now we know that these people don't care about our race, sex, age, political persuasion. They are the enemies of freedom and to protect the lives of the many good people these evil bastards must die.
I tell you what, if this is an "Islamic" terrorist attack, they're doing a piss-poor job. The pubs are all packed out, people sipping their pints happily, all a tad pissed off, but basically fine with it. Nice one, Al Quaeda - you profess to be from a teetotal religion, and you've given the pub trade a massive mid-week boost.
Hats off to Londoners. Emma and I went by bus to Matt's house last night, as planned, to have bubbly and fajitas, and very nice it was too. We were surprised to find that the busses were free!
Others took the riverboat home from work, and listened to tales of London enduring far worse than what was thrown at it yesterday.
Stiff upper lips and gallows humour were entirely evident yesterday, and still are today.
Every time a bomb goes off the terrorists lose some more. The fact that yesterday's explosions, effective though they were at taking the lives of those unfortunate enough to be near them, were so manifestly ineffective at spreading panic and terror across the capital shows that the terrorists have just about played all their cards. We will endure. Freedom will endure. Hope and love will prevail over hate. These terrorists will never win, their cause is evil. We are now more united against them and we will be victorious.
The world is getting smaller, and these bastards are running out of places to hide. The enemies of freedom must know that we are coming to get them. All this bombing has achieved for them is the certainty that they and their barbaric cause will be pursued and defeated.
It's time for the Islamofascists to join the pit of forgotten religious militancy. Their cause and methods belong in the dark ages in a time when religious extremists were given the time of day. There's no place in modern society for an interpretation of any religion that advocates the slaying of non-believers. That this even needs to be written is ridiculous in this day and age.
Now, as much as ever, it is the responsibility of all clear-thinking people who enjoy the fruits of personal, political, religious and intellectual freedom to use all means at their disposal to ensure that the freedom that we afford to others should not be used to harm us by those who would have us enslaved or killed because we do not share their extremist interpretation of a religion.
Our freedom and liberty is ensured by means that are social, political, and military, though some of these methods may leave a bad taste in the mouths of those who feel that they are "progressive" or "peace loving", I assure you that they are all necessary, as the enemies of freedom will not shirk from violence, as demonstrated yesterday.
Islamic militancy demonstrated some of its fundamental flaws yesterday. Its capacity to kill on a scale akin to that of the World Trade Center, or even the Madrid bombings, has been removed. The militants do not understand the mentality of free people. They planned terror and got unity. They wanted to provoke panic, they encouraged calm. They wanted to cripple a city, London stood defiantly firm. They thought we were weak and decadent, we are strong and proud.
The most fundamentally damaging result for the cause of militant Islam, is that those who had held sympathies for perceived injustices visited on Islamic peoples by US and British forces overseas now have direct experience of the indiscriminate hatred that extreme Islamists hold for non-believers. This hatred will be cowed, we will defeat the forces of evil. Now we see the full horror of what these people are capable of. Now we understand what we are fighting against in foreign lands to protect our freedom and liberty. Now we know that these people don't care about our race, sex, age, political persuasion. They are the enemies of freedom and to protect the lives of the many good people these evil bastards must die.
Very well spoken, but I don't think htere was any need to tie Islam to it. Muslim, Christian, Jewish, a killer is a killer. There's nothing about a bomb that suggests it believes in Allah, Brahman, Jehovah or nothing at all.
They may well have been muslims, but they were equally probable to have all been male, all between 5'4" and 6'2", all between 20 and 40 years of age. But you made no comment on their gender, height or age.
I feel proud to be a Londoner, especially one who doesn't work for the media.
Posted by
Matt |
Fri Jul 08, 12:35:00 pm
The problem is that the majority of the "moderate Muslims" have not yet stepped up and taken a stand against the extremists. Be it due to fear or complicity, it matters little. The fact is that if the vast majority of Muslims truly opposed the extremists, then they would find a way to put a stop to this stuff. The sad fact is that this hasn't happened.
Posted by
Anonymous |
Fri Jul 08, 04:06:00 pm
I agree that 'the Muslim street' has a lot to do, and that the responsibilities bestowed upon it by the nature of the liberal and inclusive society it occupies in the western world have not fully been delivered. It is right to point this out, too, as moderate Muslim leaders need to ask themselves some important clarifying questions in the near future because it is clear that the status quo is allowing young and otherwise moderate western Muslims to be radicalised at a seemingly alarming rate.
Comments and actions from the likes of Gorgeous George would seemingly aggravate this issue, by polarising it into "you're either a war-for-oil-imperialist or you're a martyr on the way to the virgins in paradise. It should be perfectly clear that the overwhelming majority of people are neither, yet our young are increasingly radicalised against us.
By blaming Muslims as a whole we would virtually guarantee that moderate Muslims would not make a stand against the terrorists. We have a lot to lose by not making the distinction and nothing to gain. We would be playing into the terrorists hands. They want us to draw the battlelines between Muslim and decadent whitey. Their real numbers are not even in that league.
If we continue to point to the separation between the average-Joe Muslim members of society and those Muslims who wish to blow society to smithereens (literally), then we will show them for what they really are: dangerous extremists without common ground amongst sound-minded folk of whatever hue or belief.
Original context noted, though: Muslim Clerics have a lot of actions and words to do to prove that they're not all like the hate-mongers that inspire these young jihadis.
Posted by
Ben |
Fri Jul 08, 04:24:00 pm
No, I can't agree with that. Everyone in the moderate muslim community (and putting it in speech marks makes you sound like you don't believe in Moderate Muslims) condemned the attacks as strongly as anyone else. It doesn't get reported as it doesn't make good news.
10am - Breaking news: More muslims say killing is wrong!
12pm - Newsflash: Killing still wrong in Islam!
4pm - Headline news: Muslim says bombs are bad!
What kind of stand could the moderate muslims take that the rest of the world hasn't already taken? And if someone is prepared to kill or to die for what they believe is right, regardless of what inspires that belief, can someone who isn't prepared to do either make them say 'Oh, yes, sorry, I was being rather silly back there.'? I don't think that whether or not the moderate person is a Muslim would make the slightest difference to the extremist.
I accept that the majority of terrorist acts are by muslim groups at the moment (if Chris was here he'd start talking about definitions of terrorism and the terrorist attacks that killed 20,000 in Iraq, but I think we'll leave that til he gets back) but in fairness, apart from a property dispute in Israel, they're largely by one Muslim group. Let's focus on them, and not what the rest of Islam is doing wrong.
Posted by
Matt |
Fri Jul 08, 04:26:00 pm
see you later.
Matt - go easy on the Americans, they're our guests :-)
I'm off stagging in the country for the weekend. There don't be internerrt there - that be madness sir.
Posted by
Ben |
Fri Jul 08, 04:33:00 pm
Beo - I've read some of your blog, I reckon you don't want people to go easy on you, cause that's no fun. Having said that, I've said my piece, and I'm without internet all weekend too. I'm appreciating a new voice on here, I'd love to read your thoughts on Monday.
Posted by
Matt |
Fri Jul 08, 04:47:00 pm
Matt,
I appreciate the sentiment. Also the readership! We Yanks and Brits are bound by a common history, a common ancestry, and a similar language. (LOL) May the union between our two nations grow even closer in the future.
And if you guys ever decide you want to part company with the EU, you can always hook up with us. You have a lot more in common with us than you do with France or Germany anyway. ;-)
Posted by
Anonymous |
Fri Jul 08, 04:59:00 pm
Well, I work with a number of Muslims, and they stood with the rest of us a week after 9/11 and observed a minute's silence. They were as shocked as we were. Perhaps I'm lucky enough to work with the only few moderate muslims in the world.
Maybe anti-western sentiment is rife in the Middle East (and who can blame them, as much as anti-muslim sentiment is ok following 9/11) but Muslims in the west are just as concerned as anyone else. Perhaps events in Palestine had more to do with nationality than religion, though I know that in Palestine and Israel the distinction has been severely blurred.
One of the bombs yesterday was at Liverpool Street, practically metres from Brick Lane and one of London's most prominent mulsim communities. There were a lot of people making the same prayers to a lot of different Gods yesterday.
And as for Mohammed being a warlord, certain Christian groups have had their shadier pasts too, and the Crusades are no more ancient history than what Mohammed did when he wasn't writing the Koran. Yet no one questions whether Christianity condones killing.
I think they're already on our side, in the West at least. Many of those who oppose military action in the Middle East have their families back home to think of, it doesn't mean they oppose hunting the terrorists and bringing them to justice. Again, it's nationality, not religion. Like I've said before, I think it's important that if we're going to point fingers, lets do it at the people who planted the bombs, and not the religion they profess to follow. Gods don't kill people, to paraphrase your (well, not yours personally, your nation's) NRA, people kill people. Gods make it easier to justify is all, just like guns make it easier to do.
Posted by
Matt |
Fri Jul 08, 05:34:00 pm
OK, equating the two is wrong, but seeing as London has such a large Muslim community, the bombers knew they weren't just killing infidels. I don't know the religious beliefs professed by the 50 or so people who were killed by the bombs, but I bet there was a Muslim among them. But I'm probably clutching at straws now...
By the way, do you know anything about the Jewish slant on killing non-Jews? As someone who only recently took a serious interest in current affairs, I'm still trying to figure out the Israel/Palestine situation.
Posted by
Matt |
Mon Jul 11, 11:14:00 am