Lidl: the backlash

[asthfghl]

Notice something wrong on these pictures? Well yeah, duh! A famous church in Santorini, Greece, was used to advertise a Greek cheese product in one of the Lidl stores (a German chain). Except, the most prominent feature of that landmark (beside the blue roof) was removed:

Lidl airbrushes Christian cross from church pictured on its Greek food range because the supermarket chain 'does not wish to exclude any religious beliefs'

Well, guess what. You've done just that - excluded a religious belief. And I'm saying it as non-believer. Savor the irony.

There was indeed a huge backlash (mostly around the social networks) about this picture. Lidl even had to come up with an official apology for screwing up on this one. People were shocked, shocked I tell you! Selling Greek products while trying to remove an important part of the Greek identity from sight. People have called for boycott. And probably rightly so. Why?

Because it's one thing to be sensitive to religious and ethnic identities, be inclusive, tolerant, etc. But it's quite another to bend over backwards and scrap one identity for another, for the sake of pandering to a particular customer segment. This is just business, some would say. You're free to go buy crappy food elsewhere. Sure thing, Ahmed! (HA!) And that's exactly what people are doing here. Voting with their feet. And with their wallets. You wanted to appear super-tolerant and super-inclusive, and attract a few Muslim customers? (Hey, Lidl may claim they don't want to offend anyone so they prefer to remove all religious symbols from their shelves, but how do you explain the fact that their German and Dutch stores have entire sections dedicated to Halal food!?) I guess you were prepared for the backlash from non-Muslim customers, then! Being inclusive through exclusion - how does that work, Ahmed?

Removing the cross from a Greek landmark is NOT an act of religious neutrality. It's an act of cowardice. It's removing the very identity of that landmark, the part that makes it Greek. The cross is probably 80% of the "Greekness" in that Greek landmark, like the crescent is 80% of what makes a Saudi, Saudi. And to use Photoshop to delete this, and hope no one notices? Wow. You've got to have balls for that much cowardice (amazing, huh?)

That's cultural castration, sorry to say it. It's multicultural idiotism. It's PC schizophrenia. And no, this isn't just about some food store, or just about a business, one of many. It's a symptom of a much wider phenomenon. The same one forcing German mayors to look their own constituents in the face and advise them to avoid walking near certain areas of town while wearing short skirts from now on, lest they offend the refugees residing there.

I'm all for cultural inclusiveness. But this is not right. It just isn't.

Comments

[abomvubuso]

I've read most of your comments here, and I must say something. Allow me to use this first comment of yours to wrap it up in one place if you don't mind.

I do agree that seeking the middle ground between cultures is always the preferable option to pitching them against each other, the fact of the matter is, uncontrollable acceptance of hundreds of thousands of unvetted migrants, many of them posing as refugees, is dangerous. It's not just dangerous because lots of ISIS operatives are thus allowed to infiltrate European countries and then organise terrorist plots (many terror perpetrators are home-grown lone-wolves who've been radicalised on the Internet after all), but mostly because it puts a tremendous amount pressure on communities - and does so suddenly, in a way that no functioning system can cope with and remain sustainable. It's the same like ecosystems and abrupt man-made changes to the environment. This is especially valid for smaller communities, which become easily overwhelmed by sheer numbers (I'm not talking about large cities that could easily absorb large groups of people, although there's the problem with new enclaves forming there as well, which become almost inaccessible to local people and even to law enforcement). This has happened in Germany, Holland, France, Sweden, Denmark, Britain, etc. A number of reporters have tried to investigate a possible cover-up of these problems by the Swedish government for example. A similar problem is observed in Germany, and most demonstrably, France. An increasing number of people in Germany itself (the country that welcomed the refugees most eagerly) are demanding that their leaders come up with a comprehensive policy of vetting, processing migration applications, and more importantly, a workable policy of efficiently integrating them into their societies. So far this is yet to be seen. And in the meantime, the migrants keep flocking in. So the problem won't be going away any time soon.

This is a serious problem that should be discussed honestly and openly. Not with Trump-like rhetoric or alt-right-like talking-points that poison the discourse, sure. But not with hush-hushing it all like some in the top ranks of power and on the left prefer to, either. It's not all birds and roses, this is a serious problem. And people have become increasingly sensitive to what they perceive as cultural injustice: they've witnessed their lifestyle being abruptly, forcefully and often violently overturned overnight, social rules being treated with double standard for the sake of appearing inclusive (now putting indigenous people in a disadvantaged position, which can be very frustrating) - and this is bound to cause a backlash. German society may've changed a lot since WW2, but I'm afraid those demons are not completely buried yet. They're waiting to come to the surface at any first opportunity. And authorities trying to ignore their people's grievances, or to diminish them, or some people openly advocating the dismantling of what some are calling "traditional" local societies for the sake of cosmopolitanism (while failing to understand that a large chunk of the incoming migrants do NOT actually expect to have their own lifestyles altered even one bit, but would rather impose theirs on the host society because they're too intellectually lazy to adjust to the new place), are not helping in this respect at all.

I think both sides are approaching this in the wrong way. They're talking at each other and past each other. Each is unwilling to look at the matter from the other's perspective, and that's why we're stuck where we are.

We can all exchange another 200+ comments on the subject, but that won't change.

[0rder]

It's inescapable that the influx of migrants puts a substantial strain on the communities where the arrive. I can also see that European governments across the continent have had difficulty finding solutions that will "assimilate" these migrants as productively as possible while resisting political pushback.

And people have become increasingly sensitive to what they perceive as cultural injustice: they've witnessed their lifestyle being abruptly, forcefully and often violently overturned overnight, social rules being treated with double standard for the sake of appearing inclusive (now putting indigenous people in a disadvantaged position, which can be very frustrating) - and this is bound to cause a backlash.

Like the others here, you describe the situation as though it's factual that lifestyles are being "overturned," and social rules are being treated with a "double standard." I don't dismiss that possibility, but so far the evidence provided has been scant. A picture of a church on a package of breadsticks. A juvenile put on probation for rape. A commuted sentence for a rapist whose lawyer made preposterous arguments. Reading news accounts of this same putative phenomenon, it seems to be the same story that we have here in the U.S., when it comes to our own immigrants: Lots of "perceptions," but few real facts.

That might be the inevitable backlash to a rapid influx of migrants, but I don't think that means it's futile to resist it.

(while failing to understand that a large chunk of the incoming migrants do NOT actually expect to have their own lifestyles altered even one bit, but would rather impose theirs on the host society because they're too intellectually lazy to adjust to the new place)

Again I find myself asking - where is your evidence of this "intellectual laziness?" Assimilating is hard, damned hard. These migrants have to learn new languages, develop new job skills, adapt to new daily routines, all while living in societies that distrust them and legally bars them from full participation in civic society. Many of these migrant adult men are also struggling with their diminished patriarchal status, watching their wives get educations and jobs and assume family roles that are wholly novel to them. Many of these families don't know if they're going to set down roots in their new homes or eventually return from whence they came. So even the most committed migrants struggle with a sense of futility and hopelessness, one that isn't helped by heaping on bureaucracies designed to "vet" them and control their lives.

I think both sides are approaching this in the wrong way. They're talking at each other and past each other. Each is unwilling to look at the matter from the other's perspective, and that's why we're stuck where we are.

All I'm asking for is evidence.

[abomvubuso]

How do you measure intellectual laziness? What sort of quantifiable evidence do you expect, how exactly does it look like?

[0rder]

I'm not necessarily asking for anything "quantifiable." I'm just saying that, when reasonable people make an assertion like, "a large chunk of the incoming migrants do NOT actually expect to have their own lifestyles altered even one bit, but would rather impose theirs on the host society because they're too intellectually lazy to adjust to the new place," they typically have some reason for concluding that the incoming migrants in question actually are "intellectually lazy" and not just, say, overwhelmed by the trauma of their migration, the bureaucratic inanities of living as a dispossessed and distrusted immigrant wholly dependent on state aid because you're not legally permitted to work, struggling but failing as best they can, etc. Some reason that the person making the assertion can point to, to an outsider like me, that would lead me to conclude that "intellectual laziness" is really the best explanation for what we're seeing.

It would also help to be clear about and justify what entitles us to speak of "host societies" and the obligations of migrants to adapt to them. It may seem perfectly intuitive to some, but it isn't to me. But that's more of a philosophical question, one not served by producing "evidence."

To be clear: when I read these stories and articles about the lives of people living in places I've never been to, my framework for understanding begins by asking: Well, what would any reasonable person in these circumstances want or do? What would drive a family to migrate thousands of miles, through strange lands, past corrupt border patrols, utterly dispossessed of everything they've ever worked for? What would such a family be like, once they found relative security? What would they yearn for or want? Reading the comments here, one might think that these people want nothing more than to bomb grocery stores for featuring products with crosses on them, when they're not too busy raping 10-year-old boys with impunity, while living off the government teat. (And to be clear, no one has actually asserted this all at once; this is just a collection of things that have been said.) That's just utterly incomprehensible to me. Why would migrants work so hard to escape such abject suffering and violence, only to be scum where they actually land? What reason do we have to actually think this is an accurate portrayal of who these people are?

[abomvubuso]

Overwhelmed by trauma? Wow.

> I'm not necessarily asking for anything "quantifiable."

Then what kind of proof would that be? You want an opinion as evidence to support another opinion. That's a fallacy.

[0rder]

Overwhelmed by trauma? Wow.

By the trauma of migration? Yes. They're not taking luxury cruise liners out of a Syrian or Libyan port. These people have uprooted their entire lives in search of something better for themselves and their families. Don't you think that would be traumatic? Do you read the interviews with and profiles of migrants, to get a sense of what they're experiencing?

Then what kind of proof would that be?

I've described it: whatever it is that you're thinking of (or that someone is thinking of, at any rate), when you (or they) conclude that these migrants are "intellectually lazy." The mere fact that they haven't learned the language yet isn't enough, since it could be the result of other factors.

It's simply not true that anything that is less than "quantifiable" is merely an "opinion." That's not what evidence is, or how reasoning works.

[abomvubuso]

Right. In that case I shall conclude that you have no idea about your particular standards for "reliable proof", and you make it up as you go. Unless you could, ahem, prove otherwise of course.

[asthfghl]

If it's not quantifiable, it would just be another subjective statement - which you would then of course soundly dismiss as just that - subjective.

Yours is quite a slippery way of conducting a debate, isn't it?

[0rder]

A non-quantifiable, non-subjective bit of evidence tending to support the sorts of claims made here would be something like a story where a judge says, "Having considered the defendant's Muslim beliefs, which I believe has a more lax attitude to rape [NB: it doesn't], I have concluded that the defendant could not have had the requisite intent to rape this woman, so I hereby acquit him." Instead, the non-quantifiable, non-subjective evidence provided is more like: the victim suggests she might have consented to sex; the judge muses that the man's Turkish heritage might have something to do with how he perceived her signals; the judge's full legal rationale is ultimately left unclear; and the man was acquitted against the background of an abysmal rape conviction rate that suggests that disbelieving victims and being a little too "understanding" of rapists is something of a systemic problem in Germany.

Where the subjectivity comes in is when people "connect the dots" and misremember details, asserting in a conclusory fashion here that German courts are bending over backwards to accommodate Muslim rapists, just because that lines up with how it's been framed in some recent news. It's when they assert - repeatedly - that based on their own personal experience, they know the private motivations of German grocers and Bulgarian ghetto residents, without the need to point to anything specific that would pass muster with any person who doesn't share their experience or who already agree with their conclusions.

All that I'm doing is noting that those dots are being connected. And maybe they should be connected, but on what basis? It doesn't work for us to approach these current events with preconceived notions about how Muslims and migrants behave, and interpret snippets of news stories about gang rapes and breadstick packaging in a way that supports those preconceived notions. That's not rational.

[asthfghl]

I get it. You want evidence that you can then arbitrarily dismiss.

[luzribeiro]

In the neighboring post, you used polls as evidence.

Here are some polls across the EU on immigration. Have a close look at them.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/09/16/european-opinions-of-the-refugee-crisis-in-5-charts/

What does that tell you about Europeans? Would you conclude that they're bigoted racist islamophobes as well? Are their concerns irrational and ungrounded? Should anything be done about it?

[asthfghl]

This is becoming rather tedious. Conversely, where's your evidence that lifestyles have remained the same across Europe since the migrant crisis started? The way I'm seeing things (from inside, mind you), the whole continent is buzzing right now. And you just dismiss this as a non-issue!?

[0rder]

I have never asserted that "lifestyles have remained the same." I'm just asking for examples of lifestyles being "overturned."

[asthfghl]

The opposite of overturned is unchanged. Provide me with proof that they've remained unchanged, or I shall consider that you're being a devil's advocate here just for the sake of comment count.

[0rder]

The opposite of overturned is unchanged.

No, it isn't. "Overturned" means a radical change, so the opposite would mean anything less than that. Lifestyles may have adapted, but I haven't seen any reason to believe that people's lifestyles have been "overturned." Not even the examples provided here support that view. A mayor suggesting, "Well, be mindful of how you dress when you walk through that neighborhood then," isn't "overturning a lifestyle," particularly where that statement was so easily rejected out of hand as absurd by the community to which it was asserted.

Provide me with proof that they've remained unchanged, or I shall consider that you're being a devil's advocate here just for the sake of comment count.

I'm not the one asserting, without basis, that lifestyles have been overturned. My asking for evidence that they have been does not shift the onus to me not only to reasonably disagree with that assertion, but somehow prove that it is wrong.

[asthfghl]

I see. You've got nothing then.

[luzribeiro]

You're like a broken record. Do you ever tire?

[mahnmut]

What use is any proof if you're going to dismiss it anyway?

[0rder]

If you provide real proof, I won't dismiss it.

Every time someone has provided me a link or an example in this discussion, I have examined it. Even if it's from a disreputable source (which it has always been). And each time I've found the example to be wanting, I've explained why I felt it to be so. But no one has ever responded to this - no one has ever explained why I'm wrong to dismiss their evidence, when I have done so. They just change the subject.

So, sure, I'll dismiss "proof" that people aren't prepared to defend when it crumbles under the slightest bit of scrutiny.

[mahnmut]

"Real" proof != the one that agrees with your premise.

[0rder]

Like I've said, I've been quite clear throughout in why the examples provided were insufficient, and it wasn't just because they didn't agree with my premise. It's because they weren't probative of the conclusion they were provided to support. If, for instance, the claim is that German courts are withholding the full application of Muslims, out of sympathy for their beliefs, then an example where a group of boys who engaged in a gang rape - boys who aren't even identified as Muslims - received probation rather than jail time, on account of their youth (where, incidentally, the one adult in the group did receive jail time) is not relevant.

Most of the examples provided in this discussion have been similar in that respect. They didn't identify the wrongdoers as Muslim, or they didn't explain the rationale behind the "favorable" treatment (or clearly explained it as something other than deference to their Islamic beliefs), or there's something else about the example that doesn't square with the present discussion.

[mahnmut]

Yawn.

[asthfghl]

Yes you will. Provide proof that you wouldn't dismiss it.

[0rder]

The proof I would offer are the numerous examples where someone has provided a specific example of the phenomenon they're complaining about, where I have indeed examined the example in good faith and considered it fairly. The fact that the examples provided in this discussion have all been off-base is unfortunate, because I can't now point to a case where someone has provided relevant evidence that has required me to change my position.