While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within is a 2006 book by Bruce Bawer. The subject of this book is what Bawer sees as anti-American sentiments in Europe, Muslim immigration to Europe and the political correctness of some European intellectuals which prevents them voicing concerns about radical Islam. This was the second book Bawer wrote about religious fundamentalism, following Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity, a 1998 critique of fundamentalist Christianity.

Reviews of While Europe Slept were mixed; while a commentator in The Economist states that Bawer makes some strong points, he criticises Bawer for "casting too wide a net", on one page approvingly quoting a Muslim who stated that there was a difference between Islam and radical Islam, and on another using "wildly exaggerated statistics to give warning that Muslim birth rates will soon turn Europe into "Eurabia"".^[1] Similarly, while Walter Laqueur writes that While Europe Slept is "an angry book, well written and well informed",^[2] Denis Staunton criticises it, saying that "Bawer will do anything to discover the dark side of Muslims in Europe, whom he accuses of everything from swindling the welfare system to supporting terrorists".^[3]

Book summary

While Europe Slept compares the situation Europe is now to that of the "Weimar moment." Bruce Bawer believes that "Political correctness", could lead Europe to "self-destructive passivity, its softness towards tyranny, its reflexive inclination to appease."^[4] Mr. Bawer expects that Europe could face "a long twilight of Balkanization with Europe divided into warring pockets of Muslims and non-Muslims."^[5]

He also concentrates on what he perceives as the dangers that Europe is facing because of its tolerance of Radical Islam

A swarming menace called radical Islam, he writes, rings Europe's cities in smoldering Muslim ghettos, provoking everything from so-called honor killings and political assassinations to the Madrid subway bombings and the massacre of school children in Beslan.^[6]

Bawer believes that "In the end, Europe's enemy is not Islam, or even radical Islam. Europe's enemy is itself -- its self-destructive passivity, its softness toward tyranny, its reflexive inclination to appease, and its uncomprehending distaste for America's pride, courage, and resolve in the face of a deadly foe."^[7]

Reviews

J. Peder Zane writes for The News & Observer that although the book "begs innumerable qualifications.", when it speaks about how "European Muslims are hostile to "pluralism, tolerance, democracy and sexual equality"" Mr. Bawer, who in his book makes a noticeable distinguish between Muslims and Islamists, address those qualifications. Zane indicates that Mr. Bawer, who is openly gay, is expressing concern of what could happen to Europe gay communities, if Islamists are to succeed in an establishment of Sharia low that is hostile to homosexuals.^[8]

Although Mr. Zane believes that making conclusions analyzing "anecdotes" "is always dicey", but he admits that "Bawer catalogs many incidents in which officials excuse Muslim rapists because their Western victims "dressed provocatively," attribute gay-bashing incidents to general anger at "oppression" and anti-Semitic violence to Israel's treatment of the Palestinians."^[8] In a review article named First, know thyself; Muslims and the West The Economist says that although the author made some strong points to prove that "Liberals can stand up to radical Islamists or watch as their democracies commit cultural suicide.", the author "weakens his argument by casting too wide a net"; "On one page, he approvingly quotes a Muslim liberal who says, "There's a big difference between a Muslim and an Islamist, just as big a difference as between a German and a Nazi." A few pages later, he uses wildly exaggerated statistics to give warning that Muslim birth rates will soon turn Europe into "Eurabia"".^[1]

Steven Simon, whose review was published in The Washington Post writes that Bruce Bawer was horrified by reports of "gay-bashing Muslim youths" in Europe, to which Mr.Bawer moved in 1998 for its tolerance. Yet Mr. Simon, while admitting that "the book usefully crystallizes, without undue distortion, the apprehensions of many Europeans about what has become a dire cultural predicament", still believes that the author did not presented any new ideas in his book: "With not a single endnote and virtually no data other than the author's personal experiences and conversations, While Europe Slept is not going to ring scholarly chimes, and the spirits of Spengler and Churchill evoked by its overwrought title will alienate many specialists"^[7]

Denis Staunton writes in The Irish Times that "Bawer will do anything to discover the dark side of Muslims in Europe, whom he accuses of everything from swindling the welfare system to supporting terrorists."^[3] The book was harshly criticized by the members of the Circle board of National Book Critics Circle Award. The statement by the president of the Circle’s board, John Freeman, who said about the book that "it’s hyperventilated rhetoric tips from actual critique into Islamophobia" created quite a controversy.^[4] In an article published in The Wall Street Journal, Walter Laqueur writes that "While Europe Slept is an angry book, well written and well informed. And it could not, of course, be more timely. The title is a bit of a misnomer; most of the book deals with the region that Mr. Bawer knows best, the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands. But it is also true that much of what he has to say about these countries applies equally to the rest of Europe".^[2] Eric Weinberger from Boston Globe believes that "Bawer's claims are sometimes eccentric, but his critique of the EU and its elites is bracing and commonsensical, and it may not be a bad suggestion to Americans who run down their country abroad to 'cut it out,' although how salutary to Europeans this will be is unclear." ^[9]

References