Fighting back against Islamization

A BBC reporter in Baghdad threw the Arabic expression “inshallah” (Allah willing) into his report, and a viewer, Brian Gilbert, complained about it—with logic, clarity, and persistence—to the BBC. Here’s the entire exchange.

If Britain had a few thousand Brian Gilberts it would be a different country.

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[Deleted Name] writes:

With regard to the BBC reporter’s use of inshallah, I have heard British people use the phrase on occasion, treating it as a mildly humorous foreign import. If one were actually in an Arabic speaking country it would not be surprising to drop the odd Arabic phrase into one’s reports to the people back home. Likewise a lot of Brits love using Hindi words like “pukka” (and would be most likely to do so if they were writing home from India) and do not, I think, mean to imply thereby that the Indians are world’s best judges of quality. When American gentiles describe something as “not Kosher” it’s just a bit of fun, not a sign that we are subjugated to our prominent Jewish minority.

In answer to Mr. Gilbert’s question—“Can ‘inshallah’ be so used—drained of religious content?” the answer is yes, absolutely. The Arab world is not populated solely by devout and pious Muslims. Actually Arabic speakers are known for their constant casual swearing. I was taken aback when I learned Arabic in college at how often the people in our homework dialogues took the name of their god in vain. A devout Muslim would inject his personal piety into a phrase like “inshallah,” just as a devout Christian would mean “Oh my God!” as a prayer, but both of these phrases are, to the majority of people, just casual phrases with no special religious meaning or power. The BBC employee’s explanation (“As I am sure you are aware, the phrase is used constantly, very often fatalistically, as an expression of hope that a certain course of events comes to pass and is not necessarily religiously loaded.”) is spot on.

I will grant, however, that under current circumstances Arabic phrases, especially those that make reference to God, could be received on our side as a sign of sympathy with the enemy rather than fun little pieces of exotica.

Do you speak Spanish, by the way?

LA replies:

Yes, I speak some Spanish. When I first moved to New York City in the late 1970s, I was initially enthusiastic about all the minorities, and I liked to use my Spanish with shopkeepers. But after I realized that the minorities were not just an interesting sprinkling at the margins of society, but were changing America into something else, I felt that using Spanish was to be implicitly supporting that transformation, and I stopped using it.

So my point is the same as yours. Enjoying exotica and diversity within a secure culture is one thing; adopting the language of one’s adversaries or conquerers is something else.

Howard Sutherland writes:

I’m with you. I’ll speak Spanish all day long in Spain—even Mexico. Never here, except perhaps at a party where there are guests from Spain, Argentina or somewhere similar. As for speaking it as a language of business in America—never again.

Ken Hechtman (who was arrested by the Taliban in 2001) writes:

There’s another sense in which foreigners in Muslim countries use the word “Inshallah.” I used it myself that way in Pakistan—as an expression of frustration and sarcasm with the way very few things work at all and almost nothing works on time.

You can’t plan to get something done by the end of the day if it means counting on anyone else. You can only say you’ll get it done by the end of the day, Inshallah.

P.J. O’Rourke said it best: “‘Inshallah’ means the same thing as ‘manana’ in Spanish—but without the same sense of urgency.”

LA replies:

Did this same P.J. O’Rourke, having wittily pointed out how incompatible Mexican and Muslim cultural attitudes are with America, then suggest that mass importing Mexicans and Muslims into the United States was not a good idea? Of course not. What’s missing here? No follow-through logic, and no loyalty to America as a country.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 15, 2007 10:35 AM | Send