Post-Islam

I.

Have you noticed? No—what? Nobody cares about Islam anymore—it’s just accepted that the West will become more and more Islamic, actually I don’t even blink when I see a hijab on the street today. I used to.

I grew up in what I believe historians will periodise as “the War on Terror era” (2001-2019); it’s a historical period that begins with 9/11, moves to Iraq and Afghanistan, encompasses the 2008 crash (itself partly caused by bad emergency loans connected to 9/11), moves into Occupy Wall Street and the Arab Spring, and begins to end with the 2015 migrant crisis (itself, ultimately, related to the Iraq War). The period concludes with Covid-19, a crisis similar to 9/11 that will, in turn, shape the horizons for anyone who was, as I was in 2001, seventeen at the time—in other words, it sets the context for their adult lives.

If you look at politics between 2001-2019, Islam figures very heavily—and there’s no surprise about that. The cliched newspaper article ran “Can there be a Muslim Reformation?”—and political discussions were dominated by collateral issues such as “rendition”, “water-boarding”, and travel restrictions. In America, “Eurabia” became a popular discussion point on the right—and if immigration was discussed it was usually within the context “the gates of Vienna”, not purely in racial terms.

For neoconservatives, to the forefront in this debate due to Israel’s position as regards Islam, not to be “racist” but to be engaged in a “cultural conflict” was axiomatic (to prevent female circumcision was vital, perhaps—though never male circumcision). It was “Enlightenment values” versus “Islamofascism”: Islam needed to be reformed to be like Christianity in the West—that is to say, the atheistic tool for state projects.

The tenor was usually about “integration” and “assimilation”, with an implicit racial edge—it culminated in Trump’s so-called “Muslim ban”, perhaps the apotheosis for this thought mode (though implemented in the one Western country, America, not deluged by Muslims). On the left, to have Ilhan Omar elected to Congress was emblematic as regards the whole era—herself having, supposedly, shed her “essentialised” and “exoticised” Orientalised veneer (as imposed by the Western gaze). I mean, yes, she’s Muslim—enough to annoy reflexive conservatives—but from an orthodox Muslim perspective there’s not much Muslim about her; it’s pure progressivism, aimed at both domestic conservatives and conservatives abroad—ultimately, it’s about God.

After Covid-19 we entered a new era—“Islam” is just not salient anymore; the knife attacks drip drip on—and perhaps we will reach 2015 Bataclan levels again; yet I suspect that, over 20 years since 9/11, the cultural movement has deflated. London has a Muslim mayor—a nominal Muslim mayor, anyway; and the whole issue seems to be, if not settled, then not the central contention point for politics it once was.

This is in no small part because the 2015 migrant crisis has never really stopped and the immigrants—rebranded “migrants” because, for the left, there is no “im-”; nobody comes into anywhere (except colonialists)—well, the immigrants are largely black Africans, not Muslims. Indeed, over the last ten years what has struck me in Britain is the Africanisation—and I don’t mean Afro-Caribbeans, I mean Malians and Congolese and, frankly, “deepest, darkest Africa”; real Nubian skin (in the cultural, if not the strictly anthropological, sense).

This tells us the dimensions for the new era: Muslims will continue to grow in political influence in Europe, annex more territory (so-called “no-go zones”); but the main thrust will be Africanisation, wave upon wave and boat upon boat—none of which will be stopped, because it is the state’s de facto policy to assist this process; and you can tell that is so if you look at the mass media around you, particularly the state-sponsored mass media. On the international scene, the main axis for conflict is no longer West-Islam but West-Russia—with an actual full-scale war not impossible.

The “Islam issue” has effectively been ceded. Conservatives, as they always have done and always will, have accepted that they have lost. Islam is here to stay in Europe, she will grow in power, and terror attacks really are “part and parcel” of life in Europe—not even something to see as remarkable anymore.

The 2001-2019 struggle was essentially a struggle by neoconservatives and classical liberals against Islam in which “Western values” were the conceptualised as the right for Muslim women to get a divorce, have an abortion, and have an OnlyFans account—and Islam was to be fought on that basis (i.e. because it was backward and did not accept “Enlightenment values”). The high tide of this worldview—very “Judeo-Christian”, with the accent on the Judeo—was the film Sex and the City 2 (2010), in which our liberated gals got their kit off in the UAE (one in the eye for the mullahs—or whatever).

As often happens, there was a dialectical movement: the West won all the battles—Iraq, Afghanistan (at first), death of bin Laden—but ultimately lost the war; the war concluded with mass Muslim movement into Europe and American defeat in Afghanistan. This was because neoconservatism and classical liberalism could not elaborate a traditional Christian nor a racial response to Islam (the Jewish influence in America precludes both, since to activate these cultural tropes would threaten Jewish power there)—hence the progressive liberals, always the avant-garde in America (in control at Harvard, the NYT), were able to push back against “Orientalism” and call for open borders.

Since classical liberals and neoconservatives are ardently “not racists” and are “not religious” (Enlightenment legacy) the progressives were permitted to open the gates (with their view being “Muslims will become just like us” naturally, i.e. every Somali girl in Britain will use Tinder and become a “hojabi”—many will, though very far from all).

So where are we now? We are in a more directly racial phase. The major issue in the next decade will be African immigration into Europe, much of it will be Christian—the cultural angle will not be so salient; and racial changes will become the obvious issue. At the same time, this will not have the urgency associated with the 2001-2019 confrontation with Islam; the Africans are not as organised as the Arab Muslims, lack their organisational flair and oil money. The gradual “Brazilification” trend in the West will be more relevant—expect complaints about the hijab to vanish but videos of Africans pissing against cars to increase. At the same time, the energy invested in the “War on the Terror”—along with the Enlightenment versus religion dynamic—will be shifted to the Russia-West confrontation (ironically, two blocs that are dying in their racial cores).

II.

What are the implications? The main problem is that the West is recessional. Trump’s headline policy, “build the wall”, actually reflects the problem—brilliant slogan as it was. The wall will never be built and its remnants will instead be left as a cutesy tourist spot, much in the same way there is a current craze to paint angel wings on walls and have your photo (if you’re a girl or a homosexual) up against them. Couples will take pictures next to the spot where the wall ends, its remnants will be fodder for “abandoned places” sites in thirty years (if that craze lasts), and, finally, the wall will be a sidebox in history books centuries hence (one crazy emperor tried to stop the barbarian invasions with a wall—but Emperor Trump’s prized project was never completed).

If America had the spirit she had in 1901 in 2016, she would not have contemplated a wall—she would have invaded Mexico to “restore law and order—and to establish civilisation”. The wall itself showed recessional mindset: America is a decadent country that wants to hunker down and hang on to what she has—the last sweet, sweet dregs from the Sunny D bottle (and very sweet they are). It’s already a cautious old man’s thought pattern. Teddy Roosevelt would have invaded Mexico, the “lawless land” on the frontier, annexed it, and run it like Puerto Rico or the Philippines. Southern border status, secured—narco wars, ended (a good deal for even the Latinos, who would grow rich under gringo law).

Instead, the US Army was in Iraq and Afghanistan—exactly the places where there was no crucial threat to America’s security; and that’s just late empire nonsense—the one country America needed to fight a war with to secure her national security, she never entered (though she sold quite a few guns to narco terrorists through various “brilliant” intelligence service schemes). The fact is that America hasn’t been able to guarantee safety in her own cities since the 1970s, never mind “spreading civilisation” (a dirty word for many colleges) south of the border.

General Patton had a simple approach to war and life; it was just the old folk saying, “Attack is the best defence”. Patton was so committed to that view that he wouldn’t even let his men create defensive positions when they were ordered to by a higher command; they had to have a “creeping defence”. To dig in, Patton maintained, destroyed a soldier’s morale—he “hodled”, to use crypto speak, and then in fact became static; then he lost—as with Nietzsche, he should’ve been involved in constant growth. President Patton would never have “built the wall”—only faggots “build a wall”.

The Western right is totally defensive, totally hunkered down. It just wants to hold on to what it has—“Just 150,000 immigrants a year,” they say; although they have no intention to deliver on that promise, never really have, and never will. When London is 43.3% African, an Asian politician will get up in Parliament and say, “We have never been more committed to a common-sense immigration policy with a cap at 150,000 per year,” and they will say that because that is what has been said for centuries—it’s a parliamentary tradition, like Black Rod, and some people come all the way from China just to watch the annual “immigration speech”.

Patton was right. If the West is to regenerate it will require men—not conservatives—who think that attack is the best defence. The mindset has to be expansive and aggressive—not the old man’s idea that we’ll “hang on and enjoy the last dregs of the summer wine”. The right tends to attract people with a defensive mindset, hence Western restoration will not come from the right as such—it will come from an aggressive, expansive minority. "Everything under heaven is in utter chaos; the situation is excellent."