The Economist surveys the landscape of friction and withdrawal:
"Indifference to Islam has turned first to disdain, then to suspicion
and more recently to hostility ... (due to images of) petro-powered
sheikhs, Palestinian terrorists, Iranian ayatollahs, mass immigration
and then the attacks of September 11th, executed if not planned by
western-based Muslims and succored by an odious regime in Afghanistan
... Muslims tend to come from poor, rural areas; most are ill-educated,
many are brown. They often encounter xenophobia and discrimination,
sometimes made worse by racist politicians. They speak the language of
the wider society either poorly or not at all, so they find it hard to
get jobs. Their children struggle at school. They huddle in poor
districts, often in state-supplied housing ... They tend to withdraw
into their own world, (forming a) self-sufficient, self-contained
community."
This self-imposed segregation has multiple dimensions. Clannish
behavior persists for decades. Marriages are still arranged - reluctant
brides and grooms are imported from the motherland to wed immigrants
from the same region or village. The "parallel society", in the words
of a British government report following the Oldham riots two years
ago, extends to cultural habits, religious practices and social norms.
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