On The Sunni Side Of The Street ...

[webtrekker]

No, that's not a misprint in the title! ...

 

https://www.rt.com/uk/326090-british-troops-syria-isis/

 

 

There's no way I'd support any of our troops if they were to join forces with the Saudis. Murdering, backward, mysogenists.

[Canny lass]

Just as a matter of interest Webtrekker - would you, in the event of let's say a heart attack or a stroke, refuse to be treated by a doctor or nurse of the muslim persuasion?

[threegee]

Bit of a Hobson's Choice there CL, the sort much loved by the hard left.   And, to imply that he'd even consider refusing treatment on purely racial grounds would be to presume that which was never intended.

 

Why is a Muslim doctor or nurse here in the first place?  It is understandable that they might come for training, but why don't they then go and treat people of their own persuasion nearer to their homeland?  If he/she has clearly embraced our society fully, and properly integrated, and is - oh yes - fully medically qualified and speak OUR language passably, then why would anyone have any qualms? But there are any one of a number of alternative scenarios that any clear-thinking human being would be mindful of:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Glasgow_International_Airport_attack

 

We won't align ourselves with a huge range of popular yet questionable belief sets in the world, lest we should be identified with their beliefs. Yet are we expected to make an exception with the Saudis just because they are Muslim?

[Canny lass]

I wasn't implying anything 3g but I understand how you are thinking.. After Three years of pedalling my bike around the streets of London, visiting hospitals to interview coronary patients about their very own 'near death' experiences (in order to collect research material for a well known University), I have a genuine interest in any answer Webbtrekker may give.

 

I had thought of following it up with Another question: If a woman in a burka had a heart attack next to you, would you call an ambulance?

 

You ask me "why is a muslim doctor or nurse here , in the first Place". Most of them are here because they are British having been born here, as were their parents. They have been educated here (not trained, dogs are trained, humans are educated) and there must be something seriously wrong with a native English speaker who doesn't understand their language - it's the same as everybody else's. At times it can be spoken with an accent but to a native English speaker it shouldn't present any problems. How's your Italian by the way?

[Symptoms]

This bunfight in the sand dunes is being orchestrated/controlled by the ruling elite in Saudi Arabia who rigourously follow, and wish to export, their Wahhabism brand of Islam.  The Saudis bankroll, supply weapons, give safe-haven to the terror boys doing their 'evangelical' across the region.  The Yankees know this, the Frogs know this, Fritz knows this, and those in control in Blighty know this but none are inclined to lean on King Salman and his extended Mafia family to put a stop to it all.

 

On the other matter being discussed here ... why do an increasing number of folks define themselves as being lesbiongaybisexualtraansgender/Muslim/Christian/black/Pakastani/et al (delete as appropriate) before defining themselves as, say, a doctor, a teacher, a road sweeper or a nurse.  When in harness I never described myself as a devout and practising Atheist ____________ (occupation inserted here) and our Dads and Grandads would never describe themselves as Christian pitmen, or Methodist traindrivers;  yep, they might go to Chapel or Church but what they did in their private lives wasn't shoved down the throats of everybody else. 

[Canny lass]

I know what you mean Symptoms. There are labels everywhere these Days, yet in my twenty years in nursing I never Heard any colleague refer to themselves as a muslim nurse/doctor. Don't know if it's the case today but I'll ask around.

[threegee]

Ah, well you see Sym the extremist "lesbiongaybisexualtraansgender/Muslim/Christian/black/Pakastani/et al (delete as appropriate)" also shove "down the throats of everybody else" that they are delete as appropriates, and try to represent it as the normal state of being. That's what makes more conservative (with a small c) people nervous; the throat-shovers delight in doing so, and damage their own case by constantly overstepping the boundaries of reason.  Apart from that I have to pretty much agree with you - which makes me nervous!

 

@CL:

 

I'm glad we are both thinkers!

Of course we'd all help that woman in a burkah, though a heart-attack in a sack would surely be more difficult to identify than if she were wearing normal Western dress.

 

My Italian is indeed terrible, but then again I'm a buyer not a seller, and my supplementary excuses are that I'm English and old.  Even official and qualified Italian speakers of English are awful too, and if you want a proper English conversation you seek out an illegal African in transit - which there's no difficulty locating these days.  Several times though I've had to restrain myself from intervening in hillarious Italio/German dialogue, where both parties sincerely believe they share a common second language.  That's just another reason why the EU is doomed to political failure, though trade, close cooperation, and mutual respect, will go on regardless.

[Canny lass]

3g, recognising a heart attack in a 'burka' is no more difficult than recognising a heart attack in motorcycle gear. In some ways it's easier as you can feel a pulse through a burka much easier than through a crash helmet or leathers, ie normal western dress - for bikers .  There seem to be more of these than burkas in the UK.

 

In bilingualism there are no buyers and Sellers. Language interference works both ways - which is how I can see that you use English more than italian in your Daily Life. When in Rome as the saying goes!

[webtrekker]

Just as a matter of interest Webtrekker - would you, in the event of let's say a heart attack or a stroke, refuse to be treated by a doctor or nurse of the muslim persuasion?

I never said I had anything against Muslims. I work with them 6 nights a week!

I do, however, have a problem with us fighting alongside Saudi Arabians.

[Canny lass]

I don't recall saying that you did, Webtrekker and just for the record I have a problem with us fighting anywhere.

[pilgrim]

i think we may be missing the crux of the matter -- the person is not the state - in the shire there are many folk of the shall we say 'Saracen' persuasion (I struggled for a non insulting or inflammatory word there - but perhaps that puts it into context - this is not a new thing) we know them - but not properly - we talk to them but not properly - we trade with them - and yet as members of the community there is no discourse or even ever question of what the 'other side' view is - maybe that's a starting point.

Saudi -- ah well interesting attitude - I took some very senior types for 6 months -- horrific... oh and its the Royal Kingdom otherwise they get really miffed. (re fighting - look at how the Saudi and Emirates came to power -- UK backed) - and of course look at the trucial oman scouts , BATT, and various other things) on the language thing my mother was professionally capable in Italian and spent 6 mths a yr there for 20 yrs -- and she still spoke loudly and said Si a lot - that's the way to deal with them johhny foreigners!! (accompanied with many hand gestures of course) I have been in many countries and do speak several languages - albeit badly - but would actually prefer to struggle along in English rather than insult my host with  very bad native language. Its give and take and we miss the point of how do the 'incomers' feel because of adverse publicity and hype and of course fear feel?? I should think very threatened.

so............ go out over the xmas - smile sing - get ratted - call in and get a kebab - sympathise  with the greek situation. call in and get a Chinese -- sympathise with the banking issues  - get a kebab/pizza/whatever from a muslim - buy your booze  from the corner shop - but just for once try looking at them as human and actually speak to them as you would a neighbour over the garden fence. that way we can break down all this sh**e that is going on

[webtrekker]

i think we may be missing the crux of the matter -- the person is not the state - in the shire there are many folk of the shall we say 'Saracen' persuasion (I struggled for a non insulting or inflammatory word there - but perhaps that puts it into context - this is not a new thing) we know them - but not properly - we talk to them but not properly - we trade with them - and yet as members of the community there is no discourse or even ever question of what the 'other side' view is - maybe that's a starting point.

Saudi -- ah well interesting attitude - I took some very senior types for 6 months -- horrific... oh and its the Royal Kingdom otherwise they get really miffed. (re fighting - look at how the Saudi and Emirates came to power -- UK backed) - and of course look at the trucial oman scouts , BATT, and various other things) on the language thing my mother was professionally capable in Italian and spent 6 mths a yr there for 20 yrs -- and she still spoke loudly and said Si a lot - that's the way to deal with them johhny foreigners!! (accompanied with many hand gestures of course) I have been in many countries and do speak several languages - albeit badly - but would actually prefer to struggle along in English rather than insult my host with very bad native language. Its give and take and we miss the point of how do the 'incomers' feel because of adverse publicity and hype and of course fear feel?? I should think very threatened.

so............ go out over the xmas - smile sing - get ratted - call in and get a kebab - sympathise with the greek situation. call in and get a Chinese -- sympathise with the banking issues - get a kebab/pizza/whatever from a muslim - buy your booze from the corner shop - but just for once try looking at them as human and actually speak to them as you would a neighbour over the garden fence. that way we can break down all this sh**e that is going on

Aren't there two "i's" in Shiite Pilgrim?

[Canny lass]

Well said, Pilgrim!

[threegee]

OK, I answered your burkah one CL, so how about answering this:

 

You are in the UK and a regular taxi pulls up. A passenger gets out; you try the same door and it's now locked.  You complain to the Muslim driver and he tells you to sit in the back.  But - you say - a passenger just got out of the front seat!  That was a man says the driver, you have to sit in the back or you're going nowhere!

 

What do you do?

a ) Get in the back.
b ) Go nowhere.

c ) Impossible, it could never happen!

 

Supplementary question:  If you chose a ) then how long before you'll be obliged to wear the burkah yourself?

If you chose c ): http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/628228/Cab-driver-Islam-religious-discriminating-female-passenger-fined

[webtrekker]

OK, I answered your burkah one CL, so how about answering this:

 

You are in the UK and a regular taxi pulls up. A passenger gets out; you try the same door and it's now locked.  You complain to the Muslim driver and he tells you to sit in the back.  But - you say - a passenger just got out of the front seat!  That was a man says the driver, you have to sit in the back or you're going nowhere!

 

What do you do?

a ) Get in the back.

b ) Go nowhere.

c ) Impossible, it could never happen!

 

Supplementary question:  If you chose a ) then how long before you'll be obliged to wear the burkah yourself?

If you chose c ): http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/628228/Cab-driver-Islam-religious-discriminating-female-passenger-fined

 

 

d) Take Anadin Extra!

 

Sorry, couldn't help it threegee! Good question though.

[Canny lass]

An interesting question 3g and i will do my best to answer it later in the day (school hols mean that I have a house full of grandchildren today) and the answer is likely to be long. However, in order to answer the question I need some additional information:.

 

In the situation you describe I, in order to appreciate the full impact of what I was being subjected to, would need to know that the driver was of the muslim persuasion. How would I know this? What distinguishing features of this taxi driver could lead me to believe that he was of the muslim persuasion? I mean, it could, equally hypothetically, have been his brother getting a lift to work who just left the front seat and company policy dictating that customers - men or women - should ride in the back seat. 

 

Webtrekker, I don't understand the fourth alternative you give but I'll offer a fifth:

 

e) Pray that you have your next heart attack right then and there because the chances that the taxi-driver is a highly qualified doctor, not born in the UK, are extremely high.

[mercuryg]

"Why is a Muslim doctor or nurse here in the first place?"

 

Perhaps the money and terms of the job are better; or perhaps they were the best candidate for the job. Or they simply like it here? Or are British?

[webtrekker]

Yes CL, your 5th option sounds great, provided I'm not a woman, of course!

[Symptoms]

How can it matter what a person does when they need to pray and why should that cabbie or any other person be described BY A THIRD PARTY as a Muslim, or a Jew, or a Baptist?  There was a time when if you had to describe a person you'd say Asian or Middle Eastern or Afro-Caribean or Australian WITHOUT taking a guess about their praying proclivities.  The pejoritive use of the word Muslim in describing someone can only be described as 'loaded' and hints (or broadly shouts) at the authors's prejudices perhaps!

[Canny lass]

"and hints (or broadly shouts) at the other person's predjudices perhaps!" Is that Another Word for ignorance Symptoms?

[Canny lass]

3g, are you telling me that it's not only within the health service that there are people of the muslim persuasion WORKING - i.e. those doctors and nurses you mentioned earlier? You mean that some are also WORKING as taxi drivers? What happened to all those stay at home, benefits fiddling, rights demanding people of the same persuasion that we read about so often on the Internet? With all these muslims working, who's left to do the job of "outbreeding the local population" and more importantly, when do they find time to do it?

 

You suggest that I may have to agree to wearing a burka simply because I'm told to sit in the back seat of a taxi. I suggest that you may have a genuine, but never the less irrational, fear that the UK is on its way to becoming a Sharia state - that's to say predominantly populated by people of the muslim faith either through "outbreeding the local population" or by converting the local population by whatever means possible - as you appear to suggest in your question. Let's have a look at these two possibilities and see if I can put your mind at rest. First we'll take a look at the "outbreeding of the local population" and why I think it will never happen.

 

According to the 2011 census there are around 63 million residents in the UK. Of these, some 25.3 million are aged between 15 and 44 - the fertile years. However, they are not all female. Roughly half (49%) are men leaving the 51% , 12 903 000, who are female to man the 'production line' as it were. But, wait a minute - not all of these are of the muslim persuasion! Again, according to the 2011 census, muslims account for only 4.8% of the population thereby reducing the 'workforce on the production line' to 619 344.

 

In order to give these poor women a fair chance of succeeding with the outbreeding job, I want us to imagine that no fertile female of any other religious persuasion ever gives birth to another child. Let's also imagine that there are no multiple births from this muslim 'workforce' (there aren't so many in reality that they would significantly change the outcome of this exercise). To make the maths easier we can keep the numbers constant by allowing one teenager to become fertile for every woman reaching the menopause - a bit like it is in real life. Now, given that a fertile female (perpetually pregnant (give or take the odd hour for giving birth and the odd minute or two for conceiving) can produce max. 4 children every 3 years (multiple births not counted), and is fertile for approximately 30 years, how long would it take for these 619 344 women to outbreed the local population?

 

I've never been brilliant at maths but I get it to somewhere around the 80 years mark! And that is in optimal conditions with no competition from any other women and taking no account of reduced egg production forced upon us (men and women) by the biological ravages of time. Not to mention the part played by headaches and brewer's droop, though the latter is not likely to be a problem for the majority of muslim men - avoiding alcohol as they do! Add to that the fact that the UK's total fertility rate has been decreasing steadily since 2008 and was recorded in 2012 as being 1.92 children/woman - somewhat lower than the replacement rate of 2.075 children/woman.

 

RELAX 3g! It's never going to happen. This is not an optimal world. Women of all denominations will continue to lie on their backs thinking of England (when they are not thinking of what to give hubby for his tea) and popping out youngsters at the rate of 1.92 per woman. Some biological clocks will undoubtedly have stopped ticking by the age of 45 while most others will at the very least be going slow but I'm quite sure of one thing - whatever their religious persuasion most women will have drawn the line long before reaching the 40 births in 30 years required to "outbreed the local population".

 

Then there's the question of converting the population to Islam. Again, using the information given by the local population in the 2011 census, I don't think you have any need to be afraid. The majority (59.3%) are still christian bringing with them all that safety in numbers can offer. Another 25.1% have no religion at all while yet another 7.2% haven't bothered to answer the question at all. So, it would appear that a third of the population aren't sufficiently interested in religion to belong to any denomination whatsoever, making conversion to Islam highly unlikely. Ther'e a very good book by Prof.Grace Davies Religion in Britain Since 1945: Believing without Belonging (1994), in which she describes the steady decline of religious affiliation in post-war Britain. Judging by the census figures there doesn't appear to have been any great stampede to fill the void by converting voluntarily to Islam. there simply isn't any interest in it!

 

Neither do I believe that the UK will succumb to conversion under threat of being relegated to the back seat of a taxi. The extremists advocating total Islam are but a minute proportion of a minority group within Islam - the Shia Group comprising roughly 10% of all muslims. They do not represent nor  - sit down if your standing for this may surprise you - do they have any support from the majority of Islam's followers.

 

So, what's my answer to the taxi question? Well, I'm batting in the dark here as I'm still not sure I'd be able to recognise as muslim any unknown man soley by his appearance. Of the first Three alternative answers: get in the back, go nowhere, would never happen, there really isn't any that fits the bill. I have no objections to sitting in the back seat, in fact I usually do. If I'd hailed a cab it would be because I needed to get somewhere and I don't really understand Webtrekker's fourth alternative and I certainly wouldn't want a heart attack. However, I do believe it could happen. I've nursed patients detained under section 25 of the 1953 MHA with less delusional ideas!

 

Given no other choices I would probably have to opt for smartly pulling out the Kalashnikov, which self-respecting girls like myself always carry in their handbags, point it at his head and say "Take me to the nearest police station. I wish to report an act of sexual discrimination" and I'd probably add "Buster", like they do in the movies, just to frighten him a bit.

Edited December 20, 2015 by Canny lass

[Maggie/915]

Forget the Kalashnikov 's let's go for 'Hell's Granny's ' ' and Monty Python.

Maybe people would then die laughing 'On the Sunny Side of the Street'

Eddie Izzard told the Wolves to 'Get in the back' of his little red car when he claimed to be brought up by Wolves.

The problem was that when they caught up with their prey they could not shoot , they did not have guns.

However the Wolves did teach him to fish and cook the fish gas mark 5 !

[webtrekker]

With due respect CL, you glossed over the birthrate figures, giving an average for the whole UK. The Muslim population are doing rather well, thank you, with a higher rate than the 1.92 you quote, which leaves the rest of us in a dire situation, facing inevitable extinction.

Yes, there may be a vast difference between the current pooulations, but when we are talking 'rates' then ignore the exponential function at your peril!

[Canny lass]

No glossing intended. I agree with you Webtrekker. The birthrate among women of the muslim persuasion is marginally higher than the national average. . However, it isn't relevant to the question as we talking about an 'outbreeding' of the whole population. They could have Twins at every one of their 40 confinemets. It wouldn't change the end result. These few women will be able to outbreed the local population. Extinction is not inevitable. We will not be in a dire situation.

[mercuryg]

For what it's worth, I prefer to sit in the back seat of a taxi. Whether I am wearing my burka or not.