Hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing the chronically strife-torn Muslim world and flooding into Europe.
Their destinations are the rich, advanced nations of northern Europe, where they hope to take advantage of strong economies, generous welfare systems and stable societies. These European nations — some grudgingly, some graciously — are accepting the migrants as a moral obligation.
Not to be outdone by the big hearts in Europe, big hearts in America are claiming that the United States also has a moral obligation to accept a share of these migrants.
Consider, however, that having in effect accepted 11 million — and counting — economic refugees from Mexico and Central America, the United States already has been morally generous enough. Nevertheless, President Barack Obama has decreed that the United States will accept 10,000 Syrian refugees.
Whether these migrants are war refugees or economic refugees, most are people whose religious beliefs and cultures are uncompromising. They are not much interested in changing their ways to assimilate into their new countries.
Indeed, many stridently insist that their cultures and beliefs be unconditionally accommodated by their new countries.
Existing Muslim communities in Europe have long eschewed assimilation. They tend to remain aloof and concentrated in distinct areas where their cultures and religious beliefs can remain unsullied by the influences of the broader “infidel” community. And, as some European countries have seen, these cultural citadels are to terrorists what swamps are to mosquitoes.
While only a small percentage of Muslims are terrorists, all devout Muslims insist on the singular truth of their faith and on enforcing a rigid single standard of behavior derived from that faith. That standard, particularly as it relates to females, is often antithetical to Western values.
Europe has been struggling with this for years. Meanwhile, the United States has plenty of its own homegrown religious hardliners insisting that the entire nation bend to their beliefs. The United States certainly doesn’t need to import more people who demand that God’s law supersede secular law.
Not to be overlooked in all of this is that much of the strife in the Muslim world is internecine — Muslims killing Muslims over various confounding complexities of politics, ethnicities and which version of Islam is the one, true religion.
These complexities explain why rich Arab countries, like Saudi Arabia, are not taking in more Muslim refugees, or doing more to aid them.
How much of the internecine conflict flows in with the deluge of asylum-seeking Muslim refugees?
Europe is not much of a melting pot, and, America, with its exaggerated emphasis on accommodating diversity, is becoming less a melting pot and more a cauldron of conflicting ideologies, theologies, ethnicities and economic classes less likely smelted into the alloy of unity.
Obsessive political correctness is the choking perfume attempting to mask the stench of the resulting disharmony; so don’t dare question bilingual education, or why election ballots are printed in Spanish, or why Congress is fractured and feckless, or why your kid’s science textbook reads like the Old Testament, just celebrate the diversity.
America should be very cautious about accepting Muslim migrants into this cauldron of diversity. These folks aren’t all like the quaint Amish, harmlessly self-segregating into quiet religious communities.
From their Muslim ranks arise the homicidal religious zealots who are why Americans now endure erosion of their constitutional rights and personal indignities at the airport.
In a symbolic gesture intended to motivate others to do the same, Pope Francis has volunteered to take two refugee families into the Vatican. Yet, on the streets of America and Europe there are already significant numbers of mendicant homeless people. If folks are being called upon to offer up their couches and spare bedrooms to the world’s huddled masses, shouldn’t they first take in their own less fortunate fellow citizens?
History is replete with massive migrations of people who covet their neighbors’ greener pastures and would rather resettle on them than endure their own less desirable homelands.
Massive migrations always result in considerable changes to the nations receiving them — new cultures, new languages and new religions. Just ask any Native American — nations that wish to remain intact must be careful about who and how many they let in.
The simple rule for visitors, guests and immigrants is, “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.”
Unless the refugees fleeing their Muslim homelands are willing to conform to the larger societies in which they settle, and respect the practices and beliefs of the local cultures there, Europe is making a huge mistake letting them in. America should not make that same mistake.
Finally, there are endless millions of people around the world who would eagerly migrate to America or Europe. But, we must face the reality that not everyone can live in the same place at the same time.
People must get their own house in order rather than barge into someone else’s.
— Randy Alcorn is a Santa Barbara political observer. Contact him at randyalcorn@cox.net, or click here to read previous columns. The opinions expressed are his own.