Remember, remember the 7th July?

So fun and games continue on the streets (and here) of Paris and many other French cities. I remember the aftermath of the 7th July bombings, when it was all our fault in the UK, partly for the way we had (allegedly) failed to integrate Muslim immigrants. Many said we should be following similar policies to those in France. How does that look now?

The truth of the matter is that the history and social traditions of France and Britain (or any 2 European countries, for that matter) are so different that what works in one will not necessarily work in the other. No, each must solve the problems of integration in its own way.

Incidentally, a Horizon documentary recently looked at the psychology of suicide bombers, showing how small group behaviour and loyalty to the group could have led to July 7th. OK, but that's not the whole story. The idea to do it must come from somewhere. In France of course, there is rioting rather than suicide bombing, spurred by the same sort of disaffection and feelings of isolation. Horizon also looked at a 2nd generation immigrant effect, but omitted to note the obvious point that almost all the bombers they identified (in Israel, US 9/11 & London 7/7 and 21/7) were under 30. They claimed their "'bunch of guys' theory is a vital breakthrough in understanding the mind of suicide bombers." Sure, but the anomie (a more correct term than "alienation") that leads to violence and self-destruction can also be expressed in by membership of cults or political groups, social group behaviour such as drug-use, gangsterism, football violence, etc or resolved by "normal" behaviour such as joining the army or police or a corporation... It's not new. What is new is the cult of the suicide bomber. This is what must be condemned more strongly, not "understood" (a la Cherie Blair). At the end of the day those celebrating this behaviour are sending young men from their community to die and to kill people from another (or in the case of London, their own) community. This ideology is what must be universely condemned.

While I'm back on all this, the Guardian I see is still repeating... over and over the myth that Blair claims "that the war has not exposed Britain to terrorist attacks". As I keep saying, Blair and Straw have not argued anything of the sort. [What they in fact say is that even without the war we would still be a target, the problem of Islamic terrorism would not just have gone away, there would be another justification for any attacks, which is not the same thing at all]. To deny any link at all would be daft, but then according to the press (and BBC) politicians are all, to a man, stupid, incompetent liars seeking only personal gain. And of course, that's much more likely than that they are a mixed bunch of people (most of whom could earn much more more in business without the ever-present risk of character assassination) with the common characteristic (shared by many journos, incidentally) that they have strong views on how society should be organised.