Writing for The Spectator, Douglas Murray with some uncomfortable truths.

Read the whole thing, but here’s an extract:

In France, Britain, Germany, America and nearly every other country in the world it remains government policy to say that any and all attacks carried out in the name of Mohammed have ‘nothing to do with Islam’. It was said by George W. Bush after 9/11, Tony Blair after 7/7 and Tony Abbott after the Sydney attack last month. It is what David Cameron said after two British extremists cut off the head of Drummer Lee Rigby in London, when ‘Jihadi John’ cut off the head of aid worker Alan Henning in the ‘Islamic State’ and when Islamic extremists attacked a Kenyan mall, separated the Muslims from the Christians and shot the latter in the head. And, of course, it is what President François Hollande said after the massacre of journalists and Jews in Paris last week.
All these leaders are wrong. In private, they and their senior advisers often concede that they are telling a lie. The most sympathetic explanation is that they are telling a ‘noble lie’, provoked by a fear that we — the general public — are a lynch mob in waiting. ‘Noble’ or not, this lie is a mistake. First, because the general public do not rely on politicians for their information and can perfectly well read articles and books about Islam for themselves. Secondly, because the lie helps no one understand the threat we face. Thirdly, because it takes any heat off Muslims to deal with the bad traditions in their own religion. And fourthly, because unless mainstream politicians address these matters then one day perhaps the public will overtake their politicians to a truly alarming extent.

Meanwhile, back in what its participants pretend to be the real world, there was this exchange on Wednesday in Britain’s House of Commons. The participants were two Conservative MPs, one of whom—Theresa May—is currently the Home Secretary (interior minister) and a likely strong contender for the leadership of the Tory party in the event that the Conservatives lose the upcoming election:

Mr Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con): Is the Home Secretary aware that when the Prophet Mohammed moved from Mecca to Medina all those years ago to establish the first Islamic state, he did not set up a sectarian caliphate, such as that demanded by the Paris murderers, but rather, under the charter of Medina, he created a multi-faith society, where Jews and Christians had the right to worship and were able to proclaim their faiths?
Mrs May: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for elucidating that fact for the House. It is very clear — everybody is very clear — that the attacks were not about Islam.

Really? Well, to make an obvious point, it wasn’t that “clear” to the murderers.

More interesting though was Mrs. May’s use of that “everybody”, a word used as a command not a description. Millions of those disgusted by the Paris attacks know that the killings had a great deal to do with Islam, but such thoughts not only don’t count, they don’t, to follow the logic of May’s language, even exist. And the true implication of that (as Mrs. May knows very well what people do believe) is that those who think such thoughts will be ignored until they recognize that they were mistaken to be correct.

Philip K. Dick:

Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.

1984:

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength