1. Hitler did his propaganda against Jews and worst genocide in history revealed. I don’t want to say any thing except that lunacy prevails on both sides.
   Rating: 1 / 5

2. Ok, I admit it. I was snookered into reading this book by the Liberal Elite Media. I read the above Washington Post review, and decided not to read the book. Then I read a favorable (effusive even) review in the NY Times, and decided to read it. The book allegedly addresses a question that I think is both interesting and important. How much freedom is their within a free society. How does one balance the right to freedom of speech, with the rights of a religious minority? Even withing the context of Islam in the West, this book really wasn’t that useful. Mr. Bawer has assembled a hodgepodge of episodes, and tied them together with hyperbolic prose and a very superficial analysis of the incidents and their implications. This appears to be at least in part because he comes from a very biased perspective, and in part because he apparently has a facile but superficial understanding of his subject matter. An example of this would be his attack on Andrea Elliott. Mr. Bawer applies his skill as a literary critic to attack Elliot’s profile in the NYT of a Brooklyn Imam. In one instance, he attacks her for portraying the Iman as a “man in the middle” implying that she set out to humanize the Imam, and had she written about his opinions, the image of a moderate would have been destroyed. However, Mr. Bawer does not provide any evidence that the Imam’s opinions would do any such thing. He apparently infers, without proceeding any futher in his analysis or justifying his conclusions (I guess he feels it is self evident, well, it isn’t to me)that any Imam’s opinions would be immoderate and damning. The book is full of this type of sloppy thinking. In addition, Mr. Bawer, who allegedly favors free speech, savages those who attempt to make use of it. Doesn’t she have a right to write and publish as she pleases, in a free society. Doesn’t the New York Times have the right not to publish cartoons that they don’t feel are appropriate for publication. Free speech needs to work both ways. Another aspect of Mr. Bawer’s sloppy work is his use of Arabic words inappropriatly. He writes “Many Muslims obviously saw the cartoons as an opportunity to nudge an already passive Europe a step closer to full-fledged dhimmitude, or underclass status. What he means is underclass status. Dhimmitude refers to protected minority religions within a Muslim state. Why doesn’t he just say it in English, rather than misuse words he apparently doesn’t understand? I’ll try not to belabor the point, but there are mistakes and misunderstandings galore in this text. In the end, this book is a sloppy, poorly argued polemic, that hovers around issues concerning free speech and Muslims in the West. Mr. Bawer is apparently a well respected literaly critic, and knowlegable about homosexuality. He should either stick to these issues, or take some time and effort and learn and think more carefully about the issues he addresses here. So far all he he has produces is a paranoid pastiche of possibilities… (sorry).
   Rating: 1 / 5

3. This is essentially an updating of the author’s earlier book: WHILE EUROPE SLEPT in which he includes the USA. What takes place in Europe is now taking place here in America as well. The title of SURRENDER is a play on a key concept of Islam in which one submits to the will of Allah in becoming a Muslim. The intellectual elite, particularly of the liberal and left varieties, have ideological blindness that ignores the consequences of their intellectual pretensions. They fail to defend the values of democracy, individualism, secularism and toleration as part of a just and a humane society.

   Tolerating or “understanding” efforts at censorship such as the Danish Islamic cartoons has opened the way to suppress these values through action while denying this through words. When some cartoons were published in Denmark, the government and the press defended the cartoonists. The Danes suffered the burning of embassies and boycotts but they would not bow down. In Norway when something similar happened, the government and the journalists declared they believed in freedom of the press but Muslims should not be “provoked” or criticized. Instead of defending dissent, they sought to suppress it. They could not humble themselves fast enough to please the Muslims within Norway and Islamic countries abroad. It is safe to attack Christians and Jews in the press because they don’t riot and burn down things down or assassinate authors, movie makers and politicians that refuse to kowtow to them.

   The unwillingness to defend intellectual dissent has resulted in the unwillingness to secure the safety of the streets. There are sections of European cities in which the native inhabitants cannot roam. In some European nations, the vast majority of rapes are committed by a small Muslim minority. The victims are blamed for causing the wrath of their attackers by the way they dress. Homosexuals holding hands can cause unprovoked assaults. After his partner was attacked unprovoked several times in a major Dutch city, his partner could not rationalize that there could be solidarity between Muslims and gays. This is facilitated by the rationalization that Western civilization is always at fault and the victims are to blame instead of bringing the culprits to justice or demanding the conformance to civilized behavior. The police or society is unwilling to secure safety of people. The press underreports this or uses euphemisms such as “South Asians” instead of “Muslims” n the news stories.

   There is a false multiculturalism in which efforts are made to understand the imagined Islam of tolerance while not requiring Muslims to accept Western values of individuality, tolerance, and quality. This results in appeasing the demands of a minority without getting anything in return. This allows the radical Muslims to set the agenda. A perfect example was the recent decision by British government no longer to teach the Holocaust in its school system because this offended some Muslims. Women are treated are treated as second class citizens, suffer from honor killings, and are not free to choose their husbands or to get an education.

   There is a false toleration in which anti-tolerant acts of Muslims are tolerated because of imagined wrongs against Muslims. Some doctors imported from Pakistan decided to repay this hospitality by trying to bomb some British airports. The radical preachers calling for the overthrow of Western civilization through their sermons is unanswered. They are allowed to spread their hatreds and intimidate non-radical Muslims. There is the false expectation that tolerating non-tolerant acts by radical Muslims will win them over. This is further abated by turning a blind eye in which they make their agenda of intolerance very clear in native languages while saying something more pleasant in the language of the host country. The New York Times had a series of an Islamic cleric that it idealized as a “man in the middle” but he still not know English. In the course of the interview, the cleric does have the dilemma of whether or not should he report terrorist plots to the US government. As the author points out, if he was a good American he does not have the dilemma because it would be his duty. The author suggests that some of the Islamic spokesmen engage in Taqiyah , a shiah Islamic practice, in which one is permitted to lie to other people and deceive them for the greater good.

   Finally, what is most astonishing is willingness of intellectuals, particularly liberals and leftists to rationalize all this. The author, a gay, is even more astonished that gay activists make common cause with the Islamic extremists as a fellow oppressed group. These Islamic extremists have made it quite clear that they will kill gays once they come to power just as gays risk death in almost all Islamic countries. Of course, one should not generalize that all Muslims are like this but the voice of “moderate” Muslims are lacking in counterbalance the extremists.

   In conclusion, the European and American intellectuals fail to realize that the radical Islamists that they are nurturing in their midst have no desire for dialogue and understanding but demands the acceptance of Sharia and their inferiority as dhimmis. The American and the West European intellectuals will have the peace of the grave they have dug for themselves if they fail to heed the warnings that turn an ideological blind eye.
   
   Rating: 5 / 5

4. Bawer’s book should be a must read in every university and college in the country. Buy it, read it, and pass it on. He says what many of us are thinking, and know to be true.
   Rating: 5 / 5

5. I love Bruce Bawer so much I would marry him….except a)I’m already married and b) he’s gay. But seriously: the guy is incredibly smart and totally fearless–a true warrior in the fight to preserve our civil liberties against political Islam.

   Bawer’s status as an openly gay man (who has written on a broad range of subjects) gives SURRENDER a level of insight and authority shared by few other books on this issue. He can’t be dismissed as a right-wing, redneck nut job, because he isn’t. His writings on this topic don’t stem from blind hatred of “the other,” but from his conviction that our culture is worth preserving. If he had been writing in Europe during the 1930’s, he would have launched cogent, compelling arguments against the Nazi party’s growing influence.

   Bawer paints a disturbing picture of what happens when we allow political correctness and self-imposed ignorance to dictate what we know about militant Islam. The worst moral offense, in the American mind, is to appear biased. But what’s wrong with being biased against totalitarianism?

   Bawer backs up his arguments with facts, and he never resorts to shrill name-calling or wild unsupportable accusations. He’s very reasonable and well-informed. His message is clear: if those of us who value Western culture don’t learn about our enemies, and how to defeat them, we will have no choice but to give up all of the freedoms we currently enjoy.

   Much has happened since the publication of this book (the Fort Hood massacre and the Christmas/Underpants bomber are only two of the better-known examples); Bawer could probably publish annual revisions of SURRENDER for years to come. His focus in this volume is on the U.S., but he has also written about what’s going on in Europe (WHILE EUROPE SLEPT). He is like most reasonable people in that he has no quarrel with individuals who embrace Islam as their chosen spiritual path. Unfortunately, the way Islam is set up, countless Muslims (including “moderates”) are dedicated to creating a worldwide Muslim empire that is run according to the rules of shari’a.

   Bawer’s title is perfect: to embrace Islam is to “surrender.” We hear over and over again–so often that the uninformed are inclined to believe this–that the definition of Islam is “peace.” “Islam” actually translates to submission, and it is the duty of every Muslim to encourage (or force) non-Muslims to “submit.” When the entire world “submits to the will of God” ie, converts to Islam, peace will result. The non-Muslim world must cease to exist. In other words, if jihadis can’t persuade (by reason, fear, or force) their adversaries to join them, then we must be eliminated.

   Americans have a hard time accepting that the rest of the world isn’t as tolerant, or secular, as we’ve become. We’re also quick to give apologists for militant Islam a forum in our media. Denial is comfortable because then we don’t have to face a cruel reality.

   If you’re brave enough to take off your blinders, read Bawer’s book.
   Rating: 5 / 5

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