Pär Norling wants to ban Islam in Sweden

Who is Pär Norling?

He is the group leader of the Swedish Democratic party in Bollnäs. 

Why does he want to ban Islam?

Let’s look at this from his point of view shall we?

Comparing modern-day Sweden with the 1970s Sweden, violence has been gradually increasing.  Sweden was once a place where almost no violence existed.  Like you can literally count (1,2 ,3 wise) how many crimes occurred in a year I guess.  There weren’t so many people living here either. Now, however, we are exposed to a totally different scenario. 

Let’s say you live in this country and you are heading out to work in the morning.  Once you’re in the station you grab a copy of the Metro or let’s say “Dagens Nyheter” before getting on the train and the bold title displayed on the cover page captures your attention so you start reading about a young innocent girl who got raped, or an attempted bank-robbery that never really became successful.   In most cases, the victim is a Swede and the criminal/rapist is a “jävla invandrare” (immigrant). 

Norling entirely blames Muslims for the crimes. He even went so far to saying that even citizens who practice Islam should be deported from this country.  He thinks that Islam is ruining the Swedish society. Well Norling you overlooked the thousands of Muslims who are mastering the Swedish language, trying to fit into the Swedish culture (struggling) and becoming successful professionals trying to IMPROVE the society.  How about the hard-working Muslims that do most of the dirty work in Sweden?    

By the way, Sweden’s economy is not so great! No jobs anywhere! You expect crimes to decrease?

Supposedly “Muslims” (hypocrites) who are ruining Islamic image.

Honestly, I think Swedes here are very respectful towards women.

I’ve experienced creepy stalkers within the past years in Stockholm, and look, what a coincident, they happened to be Arabs.  One of them I knew was Muslim, apparently.  Now I think to myself, damn Arab?  Some Arabs I encounter in Stockholm are either rude, aggressive, or uncivilized pervs!  With the exception of my husband’s friends, who are ALSO arabs.  With the exception of the Arabs I met during my sfi and komvux classes.  With the exception of the MAJORITY of Arabs I met in the Masjid during Friday prayers or Eid Prayers.  They are also Arabs living in Sweden. So sincere and with good character. In fact, they are more faithful than those perverts I had encountered. 

The Real Muslim

True faithful Muslims will never commit crimes and be so heartless.  Yet Norling and many others around the world blame Islam for the violence?   A few seconds ago I was blaming Arabs for just a few bad ones?

 Arabs, Somalians, Bangladeshis, Bosnians, Pakistanis, Indians, Americans, Swedes, and so many more races…races of every kind practice Islam.  MashAllah! They don’t practice terrorism, violence, rape, domestic violence, and war.  Jihad has a completely different meaning. I’ll tell you what they DO.  They (the true believers) follow the 5 pillars of Islam:  Having faith, Praying, giving alms/supporting the needy around the world, fasting during the Holy month of Ramadan, and performing the pilgrimage to Mecca.  They Read the Quran and practice Islam not by FORCE (forcing is not permitted in Islam) but by free will.  They must repect woman! Be forgiving and humble. They must have good behavior and conduct because on the day of judgement, the first thing that will be judged is how they acted with other people in this world (muslim or not).   They believe that there is one God and he created everything. Laaa ilaha illalah. They love and respect every single one of their prophets and they always say after saying ANY prophets name “May peace and the blessings of God be upon them”. 

That’s called being a true Muslim.  Do not mix personal flaws, tradition and culture, violence,race with Islam. Islam is not a race but it is a religion of Peace.  My Islam.  That’s what the word Islam means, to surrender/submit.   

May God have mercy on us and guide us to the straight path, Ameen.

Two Old Bengali Friends

An incident occurred a few years back ...

so here came two middle aged bengali friends, best friends since childhood, around noon near this venue in ropsten right by the water. One of the bengalis had lived in Sweden for about 15 years, while the other moved here recently, approximately three years ago.

The 2 men had their endless conversation about the beauty of this magnificent country.  They both had a complete family of their own, and were absolutely satisfied with the systematic Swedish lifestyle, in contrary to their own land, Bangladesh.  They did, however, miss the Bangladeshi food a great deal.  Despite the amount of Asian grocery available here in the markets, they still longed for the real rice, the real exotic fruits and vegetables, the fresh fish, the unlimited halal meat in food places, the tea, and just about everything this place did not have.

They decided, before taking a short trip to Ropsten, they would pick up lunch from some other halal place since that particular area near the shore lacked halal restaurants.  They bought hot fresh kebab burgers on the way to their destination.

When they had arrived at the place, they had already finished up half their burgers. The view was serene and just beautiful.  Blue water shining all around them, occasional cool breezes, and a nice classy hotel that had a restaurant on the first floor.

The short dark round-faced bengali asked the tall skinny bengali, who has been living here for 15 years, if he had ever been to that restaurant with his family before.  The tall thin man nodded saying he had never had the guts to go and eat their with his family because he felt intimidated by all the swedes. The round-faced man, who hadn't been living here for long, let out a silly laugh.  "How could you still feel that way after 15 years?  You are a citizen just like them.  This is now your home.  You have just as much right to do anything here as they do, and they know that very well.  Why feel scared?"

He went on and on.  He was a talker.  He looked half his age, full of energy, and he loved Sweden.  He babbled on about everything he could think of to his swedish coworkers, teachers, classmates, strangers, anybody..whether they liked it or not, but it helped him learn swedish fast.  He barely got negative or irritable responses, with the exception of some teenagers who thought he was just insane.

"Let's check the restaurant out.  We can have dessert there," he said, with his empty kebab bag in his hand and a water bottle in his other hand.

"Alright let's go.  We can have some kaffe and a little efterrätt. You can do the order and practice your swedish."  Said his friend with a grin.

They took a seat outside near the balcony where they had a perfect view of the water. They placed their kebab bags and to-go boxes on the table.  A red-haired waitress caught their attention and looked at them with squinted eyes. She looked at them and came towards them not with a smile on her face to give her best service but a disturbed look of suspicion while walking in an abnormal pace as if shes about to catch 2 thieves.

Waitress: Excuse me sir, you are not allowed to bring food or drink from another place here.
round-faced Bengali: (struggling to explain in Swedish, with his heavy accent)  I'm sorry.  We will not eat this. We came here for only dessert and coffee. You have a menu?

It took him a long time to say what he had to say.  But he said it.

Waitress:  Sir, you can not eat here.

tall skinny bengali: what he means to say is, we want to order something from your menu.  Are there desserts available?

he tried clarifying but..

Waitress: (nodding her head pretending to not hear a single word said)  You can not eat here. Do you not understand that? It's an illegal act. I'm sorry, but you can not sit here.

They were shocked.  The 2 men looked at each other.  Was there something they didn't say right? Did she not understand them?  Did she speak correct Swedish?  Or did she have a hard time grasping their accent?  Why did she keep saying illegal? Why articulate it so much?

The leftovers inside the to-go box just had a small piece of bread and salad.  The water bottle was half empty.  They just wanted to enjoy the time having coffee near the water.  Besides, that was the only place where they found chairs.  There were no benches outside of that hotel.

Young Red-haired Waitress: I'm sorry but I can not break the rules.  You can't sit here.

The 2 middle-aged men felt insulted.  The waitress made them leave without giving them any option.  Forget about giving them options.  She didn't even listen to them.

Tall thin man: Oh forget it.  I don't think they had good desserts anyway.

The short round man got upset.  At that moment, his image of Sweden lowered down just a little.  It wasn't so high up there anymore. Then the unfortunate line came out, "Today, if we were two Swedes, we would have gotten our coffee and cake."

Accused of Being a Racist

What's worse than being around racist people is assuming that an innocent person around you is a racist.  That's exactly what happened about 6 months back in my SFI (swedish for immigrants) class in Globen. 

The teachers were amazing.  I was lucky enough to study in one of the best areas of Stockholm for SFI.  Each teacher was so devoted to teaching us the lanugage with all the patience in the world.  They had prepared us in every way.  From conversing with swedes to writing a classy resume and giving a good interview.  From reading newspapers and novels to writing MVG (A +) essays.  Something that seemed impossible to do at first until they started building bridges of hope for us. 

We had a mentor named Eva who would come every Friday to talk to us about career building skills.  About making a proper resume, how to search for jobs, the job environment, and so on.  Also, discussions about the society. She was this very sweet old lady with a round face and short white hair.  I can imagine how hard it was for her to make us shy people try to speak some swedish.  Especially for the students who were in the beginner's level.  Despite all that, Eva had the patience to speak even slower, articulate even more just so we can learn faster. 

There was a Friday when Eva came into the classroom and started discussion.  She mixed up her agenda and thought we were in a higher level class, which meant there were more new words involved.  None of us talked.  So she became confused.  She kept asking the same simple question in swedish "Do all of you understand what I am saying?"
No answer.
Because obviously, more than half the people didn't understand. 
We only knew so much. She finally realized she had the wrong agenda in front of her after she asked us an easier question that we all seemed to have the answer to. So she gave out a silly laugh for her mistake and said "Now I know what level I am in."

That line of her's offended a few classmates.  Some more than others.  To them, it sounded like, "now I know im with the stupid immigrants". 

That day, we discussed about high taxes in Sweden.  Some students, especially the ones from the US were against high taxes.  Our teacher was, however, in favor of high taxes.  She had a very opinionated mind when it came to taxes.  Usually a strong opinion being expressed openly leads to problems.  A student who was against the issue thought that the teacher was indirectly attacking her with words. 

Two things that student hated about the teacher:  The way she said how she can tell what level she is teaching, and that she is expressing her opinion about the importance of taxes. 

The following week when our yearly teacher evlauation sheet came, that student was telling me how she doesn't feel satisfied with Eva.  She wrote down as a complaint that a particular teacher has done acts of discrimination by belittling people and taking advantage of her students because they don't know swedish.  This student turned out to be the only one with this complaint.

A 3 months later, we got this "Likabehandlingsplan".  Basically a school handbook that shows all the rights of equality. Two whole days, there was no lecture.  Instead, we went through the entire handbook, and defined discrimination and racism.  After that, however, there was a big shock.  On the last page of the handbook, there was that old evaluation sheet we got 3 months earlier.  It was a student's handwriting on it.  In fact, it was the student that reported our mentor Eva (No names were shown..niether the teacher nor the student), but i recognized it right away because i remember the student telling me exactly what she wrote, as well as Eva's quote. 

We were asked if any of us felt discriminated at any time.  If we were ever treated badly or differently.  Truth was, there was never a time when we were belittled.  This was a place with nobody BUT immigrants as students.  Why would a racist teacher choose to work at sfi when he/she knows that their full time will be dedicated to people that are completely different from him/her?

The staff were very concerned with this whole issue because this was the first time after a very long time that a case like this had emerged. 

I realized that day, i saw every single teacher going over the "likabehandlingsplan" for the entire 2 days, except one.  I did not see Eva at all. 
She came some weeks later, and she appeared different whenever she taught us.  It always felt like a part of her personality was missing.  There were times when I could tell that she was being a bit too nice just to satisfy us that she would never mean to hate us. 

I felt so sorry for her.  I wonder how she felt when she read that evaluation of her's.  Her simple joke was taken pretty seriously.  In reality, she was one of the nicest most helpful teachers in Globen. 
There was no way she would be racist. 
Her husband wasn't even Swedish. 

This was an evaluatoin gone wrong.

 

Racism in the Metro

It's a huge disappointment to come across an extreme racist, especially when the country is completely new to you.  The last thing you want to see is discrimination.  An old problem that started after the existance of mankind.  We are of equal kind, but some how division tends to emerge within our own kind.

My first look at a hardcore racism case happened around the middle of last year in the metro.  Though i wasn't targeted, it still hit me to see the fact that 2 young muslim girls were put on the spot and insulted, cursed at, and with abusive words kicked off the train by a crazy bald, buff white Svensk in his late 20s.
This man, however, wasn't only showing hatred towards Muslim girls, but first, towards Muslims, then towards immigrants, after that comes women, most specifically towards young women who were alone.  If i wasn't with my husband that evening in the train, he would have made an abusive remark to me as well, and that really would have ruined my entire day.

It all started when the 2 young students got into the train and started normally talking and giggling just like teenagers do.  They wore hijabs on their heads, which made it obvious that they were Muslims.  Few seats in front of them sat a completely wasted couple who were creating this big disturbing scene in the Metro.  They moaned and cried out loud and had bad odor, they wore ripped up clothing, the woman wearing hardly anything, showing whatever she pleased.  The 2 students tried ignoring the scene just like everybody else, but they couldn't help but send eachother the look that they were absolutely aggrevated. 

Apparently, a man sitting behind them, facing one of the students noticed the aggrevated look.  Out of the blue, we all heard angry yelling wich transformed into roaring and yelling of dirty words addressed to the Muslim girls.  The man did not stop.   The girls first seemed shocked, then insulted as he kept telling them to dare to look him in the eye, that he would show them where they really belong, that they don't belong in this country, niether do their nasty parents.  Tears started coming out of their shameful eyes as they heard the racist talk turning into inappropriate sexually perverted talk.  It was probably their first time hearing things like that.  They were probably questioning themselves, "what did i do wrong to deserve this in front of so many people?".  The entire metro was quiet with the exception of the psychotic white man who kept trying to get the girls' attention by saying "you bitch" and after every harrassing remark, he would bang the window or shake the chair, sometimes tighten his fists and grind his teeth as if he were about to take some grewsome action towards the girls, as well as every other muslim girl that matched the character. 

The 2 muslim young girls had their books held tightly against their chest, looking down at the floor, and as soon as the train stopped for the next station, they left with tears running constantly down their red face. 

After that, people left one by one, trying to avoid the man before he started again.  No single lady got away without a remark however.  Some had it worse than others. But not as harsh as the Muslim girls. 

Funny thing was, the drunk couple became sober as hell after that man's act. 

My husband was so disgusted at the abusive violent man that he couldn't take his eyes off of him.  I hated that.  I didn't want us to get in some kind of nasty trouble for this psycho.  Somehow my husband held his anger, feeling terrible for the young little girls, and as soon as we got out of the train, i let out a huge breath with relief.  "Boy do I feel sorry for the people who will get off with that psycho."  I told my husband.  He agreed.  Somewhere inside, i could sense his fear of the man too. 

As we approached the bus stop, I couldn't believe my eyes.  I had to pinch myself to see if this wasn't a nightmare, but my heartbeat kept getting faster as i saw the man passing us by with his eyes looking directly at us, with an odd smile that i will never be able to explain.  "what the fuck" thought my husband.

I prayed for the bus to come faster, and hoped that he would leave us alone.  That he wouldn't end up living in the same street as us, not get off at the same stop.  It was getting darker and i kept praying, until suddenly, the man disappeared. 

It was a place where it was impossible to hide, but somehow in seconds, he disappeared. 

I thanked Allah and kept praying for protection. 

That night, I thanked Allah for all the protection I had.  For giving me guidance.  And i prayed for all the people that suffer through abuse in daily life.  I prayed for the oppressed, for the poor, for the hungry,for the women who had no shelter, who become used and thrown away to give them guidance.

Those might be simple dirty remarks the man made, but his words hit me deep.  It made me think of his capabilities and of the people that commit crime to the innocent.  

We should be thankful for what we have.  And we should appreciate our life, the things around us, the PEOPLE around us. 
If you don't like someone, avoid them.  But end racism in your hearts.