# Debate Newsweek's 2010 World Predictions **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 29, 2009, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942 "2009-12-29T19:25:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2010, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/101 "2010-01-04T21:06:06Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > But the bottom line is the Old Guard of the Cuban regime has ten years more at most, and the Old Guard of the Iranian regime has 15 years more at most. But, since the Revolution, the [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Revolutionary_Guard_Corps) has evolved into an **economically** important and privileged entity. Even without any ideological zeal, it will fight tooth and nail to preserve its existence and its wealth and privileges. Military kleptocracies are very, very difficult to dislodge – see Burma and Zimbabwe. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2010, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/102 "2010-01-04T21:21:41Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > But, since the Revolution, the [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Revolutionary_Guard_Corps) has evolved into an **economically** important and privileged entity. Even without any ideological zeal, it will fight tooth and nail to preserve its existence and its wealth and privileges. Military kleptocracies are very, very difficult to dislodge – see Burma and Zimbabwe. Yes, but the existence of the revolutionary guard does not ensure that old guard thinking will continue to be the thinking that guides the revolutionary guard. You are making the mistake in thinking that because an institution continues to exist that the people who run that institution will think like the people who used to run it. I am not saying that Cuba will change its system or Iran will change its system. Systemic changes are one of the primary 20th century conceits really. People think changing the system is important, it really isn’t. In any system the aspirations of the leaders are what’s important in the running of the government. The Old Guard will not continue due to the basic fact that they are going to die, and they are going to die sooner rather than later. Iran can maintain an Ayatollah, but Ayatollahs are not interchangeable. Had Ayatollah Montazeri succeeded Khomeini, then most of this would be a moot point as Montazeri would likely have been more favorable to the reformers. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2010, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/103 "2010-01-07T01:30:11Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > **5. A Backlash Against European Racism.** More unrest and rioting by the impoverished Muslim minority predicted. A prediction that European Muslims will tear stuff up and shoot off their mouths? Boy, they’re going out on a limb there. I can see it now: - Mahmoud, why did you burn that postal van? - I am participating in a backlash against racism. See, Newsweek said we were due for one. Also, being against Islam is not racism. As any Muslim will tell you, Muslims are of all races and are characterized solely by their beliefs. It is an abuse of language to equate opposition to a set of voluntarily held beliefs with discrimination against a person’s race. There are plenty of Jews and Christians from the Middle East who are racially identical to Muslims, yet do not arouse hostility or throw rocks at the police. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2010, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/104 "2010-01-07T14:39:09Z")
> [@Hyperelastic](#): > > Also, being against Islam is not racism. It is in Europe, you may be sure. You have to make inquiries to find out whether a person who looks like you has a different religion; but in Europe, the Muslims are noticeable by being swarthy. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2010, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/105 "2010-01-07T16:38:05Z")
> [@LonesomePolecat](#): > > Loutish mockery is all you’ve got? When your posts serve as Exhibit A for Mencken’s observation that one horse laugh is worth ten thousand syllogisms, yes. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2010, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/106 "2010-01-07T16:39:47Z")
> [@LonesomePolecat](#): > > I swear, trying to talk to progressives about race and ethnicity is like trying to talk to a sexually repressed old maid about sex. More like trying to talk to a geologist about Pellucidar or trying to talk to a chemist about phlogiston. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2010, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/107 "2010-01-07T16:46:58Z")
> [@Curtis LeMay](#): > > None of those types will ever get into power Thank you for ending this subtread by conceding that Der Trihs is correct – the difference between Christian extremists and Islamic extremists is that the countries where the former live have become sufficiently secularized to keep the kooks under control, not that there is any inherent difference between the two. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2010, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/108 "2010-01-07T23:39:16Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > It is in Europe, you may be sure. You have to make inquiries to find out whether a person who looks like you has a different religion; but in Europe, the Muslims are noticeable by being swarthy. There are plenty of swarthy Europeans. I’m descended from some of them. If people were discriminated against in Europe merely for being swarthy, we wouldn’t be talking about Muslim rioting, we’d be talking about swarthy-person rioting. I’d donate money to Swarthy Liberation, if there were such a thing. Different Muslims believe different things, or so I am told by the cosmopolitan sophisticates who write for magazines like Newsweek. But a guy who shows up in Europe believing the medieval version of Islam that is so popular these days _should_ be treated with contempt, not because of where he was born but because of his stupid and dangerous beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2010, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/109 "2010-01-08T23:46:11Z")
> [@Hyperelastic](#): > > There are plenty of swarthy Europeans. I’m descended from some of them. > > If people were discriminated against in Europe merely for being swarthy, we wouldn’t be talking about Muslim rioting, we’d be talking about swarthy-person rioting. I’d donate money to Swarthy Liberation, if there were such a thing. > > Different Muslims believe different things, or so I am told by the cosmopolitan sophisticates who write for magazines like Newsweek. But a guy who shows up in Europe believing the medieval version of Islam that is so popular these days _should_ be treated with contempt, not because of where he was born but because of his stupid and dangerous beliefs. My point is, there are many circumstances where ethnic and religious identity become so commingled as to be, for all practical purposes, indistinguishable. E.g., an Irish Protestant who converts to Islam or Buddhism will remain an Irish Protestant, in an ethnocultural sense, until the day he dies. Likewise with an Iraqi Shi’ite who converts to Methodism. In the context of contemporary Europe, “Muslim” seems to have become a catchall designation for all first-, second- or third-generation immigrants from any North African or Near Eastern country, regardless of the content or zeal of their actual religious beliefs; and the prejudice against them is based on that designation, not on their headscarves or minarets. Or so it appears from this side of the pond. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2010, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/110 "2010-01-09T02:48:53Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > In the context of contemporary Europe, “Muslim” seems to have become a catchall designation for all first-, second- or third-generation immigrants from any North African or Near Eastern country, regardless of the content or zeal of their actual religious beliefs; and the prejudice against them is based on that designation, not on their headscarves or minarets. Or so it appears from this side of the pond. That _could_ be the case, but is it really? Are Lebanese Christians getting hassled by people who actually know they aren’t Muslims? Or are they getting hassled because people _assume_ they are Muslims based on their appearance? Anyway, quoting the Newsweek article itself, “Political discourse in Europe took an ugly, even racist turn, in 2009, with the Swiss voting to ban minarets on mosques, the French investigating a burqa ban, and other well-publicized instances of prejudice.” Banning minarets and burqas has nothing to do with race. People of all races worship in mosques with minarets and wear burqas. Banning those things may offend the American conception of _religious_ freedom, but so does the existence of established churches, which are all over Europe. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2010, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/111 "2010-01-09T03:26:54Z")
> [@Hyperelastic](#): > > Banning minarets and burqas has nothing to do with race. It was a racist organization that came up with the minaret ban. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2010, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/112 "2010-01-09T18:57:07Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > It was a racist organization that came up with the minaret ban. It was a racist organization that invented the Volkswagen Beetle. Would you refuse to ride in one on those grounds? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/113 "2010-01-09T19:08:45Z")
> [@Hyperelastic](#): > > It was a racist organization that invented the Volkswagen Beetle. Would you refuse to ride in one on those grounds? If it was one of the ones made by slaves, I’d have it destroyed. And at any rate, your comparison isn’t relevant. You are trying to pretend that racism isn’t one of the motivations for the ban; the fact that it was created and driven by a racist organization proves you wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2010, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/114 "2010-01-10T00:53:12Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > If it was one of the ones made by slaves, I’d have it destroyed. > > And at any rate, your comparison isn’t relevant. You are trying to pretend that racism isn’t one of the motivations for the ban; the fact that it was created and driven by a racist organization proves you wrong. I don’t need to pretend, because the root of the word “racism” is “race”, which has nothing to do with Islam. European Muslims are Turks, Arabs, Bosnians, Albanians, Kosovars, Bulgarians, Tunisians, Algerians, Moroccans, etc. Most or all of those ethnicities are considered Caucasoid. Not racism. Not even close. Anti-immigrant? Maybe, but somehow I’d guess that a Swiss person opposed to minarets would not favor making an exception for mosques composed solely of native converts. My understanding is that a number of organizations promoted the ban. They are not racist simply because you say they are. For all I know you consider the International Society of Arboriculture to be racist. Also, I don’t want to upset you, but the computer you are using right now contains billions of transistors. One of the inventors of the transistor was a rather notorious racist. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2010, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/115 "2010-01-11T01:49:35Z")
> [@Hyperelastic](#): > > That _could_ be the case, but is it really? Are Lebanese Christians getting hassled by people who actually know they aren’t Muslims? Or are they getting hassled because people _assume_ they are Muslims based on their appearance? Doesn’t make much difference, does it? Which is my point. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2010, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/116 "2010-01-11T03:28:14Z")
> [@Hyperelastic](#): > > I don’t need to pretend, because the root of the word “racism” is “race”, which has nothing to do with Islam. Irrelevant, since the racists in question DO associate it with a race. > [@Hyperelastic](#): > > Also, I don’t want to upset you, but the computer you are using right now contains billions of transistors. One of the inventors of the transistor was a rather notorious racist. But it doesn’t have an agenda, nor was it made by Nazis. You’re really reaching. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2010, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942/117 "2010-01-11T06:00:52Z")
> [@Hyperelastic](#): > > Maybe, but somehow I’d guess that a Swiss person opposed to minarets would not favor making an exception for mosques composed solely of native converts. And just mentioned in the [original thread on the minaret ban](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=541850&page=9): > [@](#): > > But the new minaret is not attached to a mosque; this small town near Geneva doesn’t even have one. And it’s not the work of a local Muslim outraged by Switzerland’s controversial vote to ban the structures, which often are used to launch the call to prayer. > > Instead, Bussigny’s minaret is attached to the warehouse of a shoe store called Pomp It Up, which is part of a Swiss chain. It was erected by the chain’s owner, Guillaume Morand, who fashioned it out of plastic and wood and attached it to a chimney. The new minaret, nearly 20 feet high and illuminated at night, is clearly visible from the main highway connecting Lausanne and Geneva. > > “The referendum was a scandal,” Mr. Morand said recently at his cavernous warehouse, near pallets piled high with shoe boxes as pop music played on an old stereo system. “I was ashamed to be Swiss. I don’t have the power to do much, but I wanted to give a message of peace to Muslims.” > > \< snip \> > > Claudine Wyssa, the town’s acting mayor – who called Mr. Morand’s action infantile – doesn’t think the do-it-yourself project qualifies as a minaret and plans no legal action. > > “It doesn’t violate the law,” she said in an interview. “It has nothing to do with Islam. A minaret needs a mosque. In this case, there isn’t one. There’s just a shoe warehouse.” Because you see, the minaret ban has nothing to do with minarets. It’s about persecution, and nothing else. Pure bigotry. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/debate-newsweeks-2010-world-predictions/522942.md?page=5)