Muslims Are Not a Minority

Daniel Greenfield

The most persistent myth of the Western Dhimmi narrative is that Muslims are a minority and must receive special protection and accommodation. But Muslims are not a minority. There are 1.5 billion Sunni Muslims worldwide, outweighing Catholics as the next largest religious faction at 1.1 billion and Hindus at 1 billion. They are still a minority of the overall population in Western countries, but a demographically trending majority. In the UK more people attend mosques than the Church of England, that makes Muslims the largest functioning religious group there. Mohammed was the most popular baby name last year, ahead of Jack and Harry. In France, in this generation, more mosques have been built than Catholic churches and in southern France there are already more mosques than churches. Mohammed-Amine is the most popular double name, ahead of Jean-Baptiste, Pierre-Louis, Leo-Paul and Mohammed-Ali.

In Belgium, 50 percent of newborns are Muslim and empty Belgian churches are being turned into mosques. The most popular baby name is Mohammed and of the top 7 baby names, 6 were Muslim. A quarter of Amsterdam, Marseilles and Rotterdam and a fifth of Stockholm is already Muslim. The most popular baby name in Amsterdam, Utrecht, Rotterdam and The Hague is... Mohammed.

Europe's Muslim population doubled in the last generation, and is set to double again. By 2025, (a decade and a half away), a third of all births in the EU will be Muslim. The demographic writing is already on the wall. A third of Muslims in France and Germany are teenagers or younger, as compared to a fifth of the native population. A third of Muslims in the UK and Belgium are under 15 versus a fifth of the native population. Counting all age groups, they're a minority. But in generational demographics, Muslims are swiftly becoming a majority.

Looking at these numbers it is hard to argue that Muslims are a minority. They are not a majority at the moment, but majorities are not just a statistical snapshot, but a cultural and demographic trend. Countries are not defined by the past, or even by the present, but by the future. By the direction in which they are headed. And Europe's future is a Muslim majority. Most European governments have accepted that and are acting on it. There may currently be more warm European bodies than Muslim ones, but the culture is being steered by the assumption of an Islamic future.

America is not nearly as vulnerable to the Muslim demographic bomb, because it is less socialist and more multicultural. It also has no former Muslim colonies, like England or France. Or at least it didn't have any before. But the liberation of Iraq has touched off a swarm of 'refugees' moving to the United States. While some of them are Christian, the majority are Muslim. By law we are obligated to accept 5,000 a year. The 2008 target for Iraqi immigration was 12,000, far more than most of the former Soviet Union combined. Not significant numbers alone, but they are part of a bigger picture.

In 2005, almost 100,000 Muslims became legal residents of the US. In 2009, it was 115,000. And the numbers continue to rise each year. That means that already they make up around 10 percent of immigrants to the US. The number of Egyptian and Syrian immigrants has more than doubled since 9/11. The number of Turkish immigrants has more than tripled. The number of Afghanis has tripled. Somalis have gone up from nearly 3,000 to nearly 14,000 a year. Pakistan hit a high of 21,000 in 2009 and Saudis are up by 50 percent.

Not nation shattering numbers in and of themselves, but let's look at them in relation to birth rates.

The United States birth rate was 13.5. Pakistan's birth rate is 24.1. Egypt's birth rate is 24.6. The Saudi birth rate is 19.3. The Afghani birth rate is 37.3. The Somali birth rate is 42.7. What this means is that we are importing Muslim immigrants with a birth rate that twice or even three times higher than our own.

The United States birth rate is already inflated by its own immigrants, including large numbers of Latinos and the million plus Muslims already in the US, so the baseline numbers are even worse. But these numbers are bad enough, as the social services departments of Amsterdam or Malmo could tell you. We are not importing 115,000 Muslims a year. No, we're importing as many as 2,500 Muslim babies a year into our demographic pool.

Compare that to the 25,000 Korean immigrants in 2009, from a country with an average birth rate of 8.5. Increase Korean immigration fivefold until they outnumber the annual number of Muslim immigrants, and you still aren't even importing a 1,000 babies a year. A thousand Somali immigrants are the demographic equivalent of 5,000 Korean immigrants because the Somali birth rate is 5 times the Korean birth rate. The 25,000 Korean immigrants represent a mere 212 babies a year, but the 14,000 Somalis represent 600 babies a year.

This is how demographic suicide creeps up on nations. And this also is an incomplete picture. The Korean-American intermarriage rate is at over 50 percent. There are no statistics for Somali intermarriage rates in the US, but Muslims do not leave their religion upon marriage. And in Sweden and Norway, Somali intermarriage rates are very low. Which means the Little Mogadishus growing across the United States are not going anywhere. And given time, there will be a Little Mogadishu in your city too.

Despite all this Mohammed won't be the most popular baby name in the United States any time soon. But a Muslim population boom will sneak up on us. It already is. Yet population-wise Muslims are a minority. But are they really?

There are two kinds of minorities. The first kind come from countries where they were a minority or under foreign rule. The Irish, Jews, Tibetans, Armenians and Norwegians are all examples of that. The second kind of minority isn't really a minority at all. This 'minority' immigrates from countries where they are the ruling majority. They are not persecuted and are not escaping anything except living in a failed state.

These "Majority Minorities" are designated as minorities by political correctness, but they don't think of themselves as minorities or act like minorities. They are used to being the dominant culture and when they are hostile, it is not because of a sense of persecution, but xenophobia. While they are labeled minorities-- they actually behave like majorities.

Think of those immigration rallies where Mexican immigrants wave their flag and taunt and insult passerby, or demand their language everywhere and treat any opposition as a violent attack on their privileges. They are acting like the majority culture-- which in their minds they are. Much like the way pre-state Texans responded to Mexican demands. But the absurdity of PC protocols insists that the descendants of European settlers from Spain with their European language are a racial minority, even though they are a majority in their own countries and on the continent.

Muslims are also "Majority Minorities", who act with all the entitlements and privileges of a majority. When Somali cabbies refuse to carry airport passengers with duty free liquor or almost half of Muslims in the UK want Sharia law-- they are behaving as if they already are the majority entitled to force their culture, their law and their religion on the minority. And in their eyes, we are the minority, because they have no cultural tradition of how to be minorities. The Irish, the Jews and African-Americans have a cultural memory of being persecuted that they retain in song and story. But Muslims have rushed to wipe away the shame of briefly living under European colonialism by casting back to the golden age when they were the oppressors, reviving the Caliphate and lashing out violently at even the slightest criticism of their religion.

Muslims in America and Europe are still numerical minorities, but they act like majorities. And they are doing everything they can to become majorities. Treating them like minorities is a mistake, that Europe has already come to regret and that we are only beginning to learn the folly of. Muslims can either be a minority or a majority. If they choose to act like a majority, imposing their culture, religion and worldview on others-- then they should be treated like one.