Assaults in Cologne and other European cities part VI

[HelpTheAnimalsFirst]

Thread 6.

The alternative is talking to the husband and our marriage is better when we are both on laptops ignoring the other
Not just us, then, glen

Justanother, have you been asking why the German and American posters why their interest in UK democracy because it doesn't affect them? Didn't think so.

You seem to have missed the German posters who are worried about the recent events and are questioning immigration policy, and when an American discusses our democracy yes I will gladly point out flaws in their argument, would you tell people of Pakistan that it is wrong for a cleric to talk a child into cutting his own hand of or is identity politics at play and cultural norms only enforced along cultural grounds?

You see twist, trying to go for the emotional narrative is disingenuous to those posting here as you know nothing about anyone, virtue signalling isn't a nice trait, for instance you don't know know if I have spent time in the 'jungle' of calais, dealing with mostly (I never said all) economic migrants, whilst the clean up is de humanising you are ignoring the shengan and Dublin agreement, no matter how much you say it isn't the case it really is. (And I don't think that my statement isn't controversial either)

Never the less, the issue in Calais is not related directly to the theme of thread, it may get swept up in the narrative if it progresses re immigration, but that still does not make it of limits for discussion.

And being called a troll is insignificant in terms of being slandered a racist. Emily is specifically trying to make it an either/or scenario.

It's a real shame the threads keep being derailed.

If a poster calls you a racist and you know you are not, ignore it. It's simply a tacky way of trying to make people feel bad about themselves.

Arguing with people who call "racist" as a tactic is a waste of time - like trying to nail jelly to the wall.

Justanother

'You seem to have missed the German posters who are worried about the recent events and are questioning immigration policy, and when an American discusses our democracy yes I will gladly point out flaws in their argument, would you tell people of Pakistan that it is wrong for a cleric to talk a child into cutting his own hand of or is identity politics at play and cultural norms only enforced along cultural grounds?'

WidowWadman is German and posted about how similar attacks had taken place for years there with little action from police. She didn't question immigration policy but commented, 'Having grown up in a carnival region, I know that groping and assaults are pretty normal - and if a woman would speak out against it she's probably be told to choose a more modest outfit and/or stay away. Rheinberg's decision to cancel says nothing about the reality of an immigrant threat, but is just a lovely example of double standards and Germany unfortunately becomimg more and more comfortable with open xenophobia again'.

In this thread she also said,

'That the attacks in Cologne have not been dealt with swiftly by the authorities for whatever reason ( including simply not caring about sexual assault enough, victim blaming attitudes etc) is wrong and needs to be addressed. But without demonizing the whole demographic the perps came from as the only reason that these attacks happened, while continuing to ridicule anyone who speaks out against sexism and assaults when not being committed by foreigners. If you just focus on one group of perpetrators you won't protect any one from any crimes'.

She seemed quite worried about the rise of xenophobia, rather than immigration.

Thanks for the hard work done, despite everything.

I really wanted to send something to MP, MEP, german ambassador etc.

Really good to have petition.

Would have rambling writings, so happy to see other peoples formulated ideas.

Not to lose sight of the fact 1000+ men felt they could arbitrarily attack, several hundreds of women and rape and rob them in a public space with police present. And a false statement was issued by police whose response was so inadequate and the paltry attempt to deal with the perps . Thank goodness the wiping of the CCTV is not verified as being other than speculation (as of yet anyway, don't forget the night itself was falsely officially declared to be peaceful). Enough minimising and cover-up went on.

Did you see the two young women on one of the morning tv programmes? They were trapped amongst the marauding men and they were asked where were their parents and why did they let them out alone. As if the perps were not to blame for the attacking, robbery and raping they were engaged in.

I was surprised to hear Widows comments as we have 2 young female friends who are engaged to German men, one living in Germany and one living here but visiting there regularly. Both have commented that they love the fact that it feel safer than the UK and that they can walk home alone without fear of violence or harassment. I'm not doubting *Widow's experience but suppose there must be considerable variations between areas

I don't know how people can accuse other people of being discriminatory and intolerant and be so vociferous in defending discrimination and intolerance when it is under the guise of religion or culture. It is a defence of Fascism. Is it disingenuous?

I don't think Fascism should be condoned in attitudes or practices anywhere, even if under cultural or religious guise.

The majority of people coming to Europe right now do indeed appear to be economic migrants.

Saying "This person is an economic migrant" is not the same as saying "This person is a wicked person." After all, trying to better ourselves economically is what we all do every time we go for a job interview or work to attract a client.

But it's just not factually correct to point at an economic migrant and insist (against all evidence) that "They are a refugee," in the same way that it isn't factually correct to point at an orange and insist that it's a banana.

As for the "They aren't ISIS claims"I think homegrown jihadists are more of a concern, honestly, BUT: we are talking about probably 3 million peopledisproportionately young single men--over the whole of Europe of the next few years, mostly coming from regions where terrorism is a significant problem.

The chances that NONE of these people will be involved in any form of terrorism over the next few years is, I would say, slim.

The regressive-left is setting itself up to look really stupid, to be honest; the moment a refugee is involved in anything terrorism- related (even if we are only talking about a modest number of people out of millions), there will be outraged shouts of "But you said NONE of these people are terrorists! None whatsoever!"

It would have been a lot smarter for the regressive-left to have stopped at merely saying "The terrorist threat from the migrants is probably modest compared with the homegrown threat"--but no, they had to trip over their own shoelaces in their eagerness to shout that ALL these people are refugees, are 100% non-terrorist-y and are probably all doctors and lawyers, and are future Steve Jobs and Nobel Prize winners in the making...

The self-sabotaging is actually a bit pathetic, to be honest.

Statesman, I thinkyou need this.

www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/europe-refugee-migrant-crisis-myths_55f83aa7e4b09ecde1d9b4bc

Statesman that all sounds good to me, lot of common sense in there

Hmmm - I wasn't volunteering to start a thread in chat for the petition -but I can - unless anyone else wants to?
To start getting everything together -

Gif - I can't get it to upload? Previewing it says it has to be at least 90 pixels etc - and I've increased it to something like 30 cm wide and 5 cm high and it still won't load ....has pink(?) got the original one?

Twitter (which I don't do!) we can't use the female symbol because it won't be searchable? so the tag is#cologne2016

Letter template is Lumela's? I know there are a few versions but struggling to find them -think we need to change a bit to say about the petition...anyone good at English?

Women’s Rights and Immigration
As you will be aware, on New Year’s Eve in Cologne over a hundred women were sexually assaulted or robbed (or both) by a crowd of about 1,000 men, described as being of North African or Middle Eastern ethnicity. Similar things happened, on a smaller scale, in other German cities, in Helsinki and perhaps in Austria: the reports are varied.

That is, of course, part of what makes this whole story so concerning: that the press coverage and the political response have been so halting and uncertain that it is very difficult to establish exactly what happened. I can only assume that this is because nobody wants to be accused of being a racist – but if nobody in mainstream politics discusses this issue, it becomes even more of a gift to the far Right.

It is a huge issue. It’s part of the cultural clash between some immigrants and liberal western society, a clash that doesn’t only affect women, and which it is evident that we need to tackle. It worries me that this is such a problem in mainland Europe already, and I’m concerned that if we just sit back, it will become a problem here as well.

What happened in Cologne is appalling, and the press and political response is too. Women’s rights are put behind immigrant rights, and that just isn’t good enough. I want to know that my country, and other countries in Europe, can play their part in resolving the refugee crisis without my rights, my daughters’ rights, my friends’ rights, being downplayed or debased. If immigrants come from countries where women are subjugated – like many of those in the Islamic world, where the refugee crisis is centred – they must be made aware that things are different in Europe. As I understand it, immigrants who obtain citizenship in other European countries are then free to come here under current European laws. How long before something like Cologne’s New Year happens here?

I would like to ask you to tackle this issue head on, to raise it rather letting it be ignored or minimised. We need, as a country, to have an open debate about this issue, to establish that women’s rights are a key part of our culture. The solution is not, as women in Austria have been advised to do, to remain indoors at night. The solution is to bring this issue right into the open, and insist that our social norms and expectations are not diluted.

I hope to hear from you.

We need a list of people in the public eye to contact
(I think definitely Sairia Khan) - think we said Allison Pearson? Anyone else?

How to find your MP
www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/mps/?search_term=fife
How to find your MEP
www.europarl.org.uk/en/your-meps.html

Link to these threads

What have I forgotten? Any comments?
(I'm off to bed now - trying to get that gif to load took ages ...I will be around on and off tomorrow (do have to do some work!)

Emily, that article presents an awful lot of estimates, suppositions and downright misleading statements as the truth. It's also out of date. It scoffs at the idea that any migrants might be ISIS combatants using exactly the sort of warped logic, opinions presented as fact and partisan 'evidence' that statesman refers to. We know post Paris that in fact, ISIS operatives did enter the country under the guise of refugees and then commit attacks. So that really leads to the question of how reliable the rest of their 'evidence' is and how accurate the rest of their claims are.

I think rather than disproving statesman's point it rather supports it.

There are lots of things that are dubious in that article. I haven't got time to list them all, but a big one is their apparent assumption that what refugees need isn't a place of safety, but the right to select a country whose legal systems, living conditions and economy is what they want and have the right to go anywhere they choose. A refugee can become an economic migrant when they are no longer seeking safety, but economic benefit. Something which that article overlooks.

Seeing the story today on the BBC
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-35338413
perhaps the Prime Minister should be included in the letters.

calmyoubadself I'm German, from a region were Fasching/Carneval is celebrated, have lived in Munich for many years and been to the Oktoberfest many times and Widowwadman's Germany is not the one I recognize either.
I assume many of the women attacked on NYE also celebrate Karneval and the fact they went to the police to complain about this rather shows that they felt it was very different to what happens during Karneval.

Interesting timing from Cameron. At least Women's rights are being focused on, now.

Cameron's initiative is to be welcomed. If it requires women-only classes in English, so be it. On a related note, I was looking for articles on Muslim women's representation in community organisations, and found this one. While it shows that women have largely been sidelined in such organisations, there are now heartening signs of change.

www.publicspirit.org.uk/the-gender-imbalance-in-british-muslim-organisations/

The article is one of a series relating to Muslim women, and the whole website looks very interesting.

Trying the gif yet again -and yay seems to be working now!

That's great unlucky.

testing if you can 'save image as' from that.... and you can't and repost on MN.
But you can and view in other places (photo editing software, attach to emails emails etc - not sure about on facebook yet - don't really know how to test that!

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-35338413

Interesting article about integrating Muslim women in uk

"This is Britain. In this country, women and girls are free to choose how they live," he said
Cameron

Have you viewed the Times article? He used our language.

I name changed. I am one of the supporters of the petition.

What did it say Petition? won't be able to read due to paywall

@ThePetition, can you like to the Times story please? TIA