"Trevor Phillips says that getting Muslims to integrate will probably be the hardest task the UK has ever faced, firstly because of the reluctance of a significant number of them to change their attitudes, and secondly because of the blasé approach of a significant number of the rest of the population who refuse to acknowledge that a problem exists. Quite simply the question is how do we get it across to those people that they are mistaken?"
I did say a while ago that I'd try to answer your question, Naomi. I've been thinking about that answer. In one way, of course, it's very easy.: those whom our Trev describes as blasé would stop being so if they knew some basic facts about Islam - its origins and core teachings, ,the character of its Prophet, what the Sharia is, and its historic relationship with the West. You and I know that traditional Islam is as much a political ideology as a religious one, and that this ideology is fascist in nature, that is to say supremacist, aggressive, authoritarian, intolerant of criticism and contemptuous of non-idealogues. This raw Islam is incompatible with liberal Western societies, and the presence of a large Muslim community which adheres to Islam in that form is a threat to those societies. . But you, I and others have advanced these points many times on this site - and have failed as many times in getting the bien pensants to question their delusion that Islam is "just another religion" and that the average imam (beard apart) is much like the vicar of Dibley.
So how do we persuade the blasé to show some curiosity about the religion which ( for all the wrong reasons) is in the news daily? (I find this lack of curiosity a curiosity in itself. When the latest murder - often of his fellow citizens - is perpetrated by a bloke shouting "Allahu Akbar" surely the normal response should be to ask why he's doing it, and especially why he thinks what he's doing is an act of piety, not respond as people on here do, as the media do, as the politicians of all parties do by saying (on no evidence whatsoever) that these acts "are nothing to do with the true Islam", or "a perversion of Islam".) Well, the omens aren't good, are they? Of the many AB bien only Jim has considered the survey results and discussed their possible implications.
Anyway, I'll have another go. I'll start by pointing out that, while never a multi-culturalist, I didn't until fairly recently see Islam itself as a threat. For instance, when the fatwa soliciting the murder of Rushdie was issued by Khomeini in 1989 I too was "blasé". The demonstrations and book burnings which followed I attributed to a few ill-educated fanatics rather than a predictable consequence of Muslim immigration. My view then was that second generation Muslims originally from conservative Muslim countries, but born here and better educated than their parents, would soon reject these traditional attitudes in favour of Western freedom and tolerance. Well, I was wrong about that, wasn't I? Mr. Phillips' documentary only reinforces what we can all see with our own eyes.
What changed my view was not just the unfolding of events; I started to look at Islam itself. So, I say to bien pensants everywhere: "Do a bit of research. Read a biography of the Prophet. Pick up a Koran, read a few random chapters of it and see what it really thinks about non-believers (you won't have to look hard or far). Check out the web site of the Muslim Council of Britain. Check out the web site of your local mosque or Islamic cultural centre. And look up the human rights records of the countries which are providing most of today's 'refugees'"
And finally a couple of links which suggest that the task may be even harder than Trevor thinks:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/7497906/Baroness-Deech-Risks-of-cousin-marriage-not-discussed-for-fear-of-offending-Muslims.html
http://www.spectator.co.uk/2014/07/the-bradford-head-teacher-who-got-it-right-on-islam-and-educat