Prophet Without Honour?

For reasons that seem fairly obvious given recent events, during all the jihadist attacks in europe, the quote ...

Enoch Powell - Prophet Without Honour In His Own Land?

"For reasons which they could not comprehend, and in pursuance of a decision by default, on which they were never consulted, they found themselves made strangers in their own country."

..... was posted a number of times, on numerous debates and forums.

Now of course this is from British Politician, Enoch Powell's, famous (or infamous), 'Rivers Of Blood' speech from 1968, in which he anticipated many of the problems with mass immigration into Britain or indeed Europe, and which it could be said we are reaping now. I won't be reviewing that speech, its intent, or its meaning, as I have covered it in a post already.

No, what I find interesting, is the reaction of a certain breed of politician to what is going on amongst the European general public, who have seemingly largely had enough of mass immigration (legal or illegal) ...... take for instance European leader, Chancellor Angela Merkel, leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party in Germany.

PEGIDA Was A German Phenomena

Not only was she unhappy with some of her populations participation in the Pegida (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamisation of the West) organisation's rallies, in 2015, which had grown larger by the week, but she had announced that she would attend counter protests organised by Muslim groups in Berlin instead.

"Islam is part of Germany," .... said Mrs Merkel ... "I am the Chancellor of all Germans."

Afd - A New Power

However, even as that particular political threat faded in 2016, the nationalist Alternative for Deutschland (Afd) has arisen and eventual taken 12.6% of the votes and more than 90 seats in the 2017 Federal elections. This broke up the cosy coalition which supported Merkel and she has only been able to cobble together a coalition between her centre right CDU party and her Bavarian CSU allies, with the socialist SPD (at the cost of major concessions to the SPD, and with the SPD losing their leader Martin Schulz who has resigned) .... an unholy alliance designed to keep the Afd from sharing power.

Her views on immigration were palpably not shared by all her compatriots .... hence the election results and the 3 months of haggling to form some sort of coalition.

According to a new study released by the Bertelsmann Foundation in January 2015, 57% of non-Muslims in Germany regard Islam as a threat, while 61% believe Islam cannot assimilate to Western lifestyles. It would be interesting to know how many German Muslims have actually joined, or even supported the Christian Democratic Union party? ..... not many I would guess. I would also guess that these immigration poll results would be repeated, or with even higher figures, in many other parts of Europe.

In France for instance, ex- President Hollande treated the terrorist attacks as part of the War Against Terror, rather than a feature of the clash of cultures as many consider it, or even as just non-cultural integration as many are viewing it. His was a complacent view of events that was not entirely in tune with all the French electorate, which is why he's out of power..

So perhaps its somewhat ironic, that many who are not in agreement with the mainstream politicians on these issues, are now quoting Enoch Powell as though he was a prophet, a prophet indeed who had no honour in his own country, but who seemingly may now have relevance in many other lands.