What Changed?

by Mark Steyn
Clubland Q&A
September 11, 2017

https://www.steynonline.com/8104/what-changed

Audio Recording

If you missed our livestream Clubland Q&A earlier today, here's the action replay. Simply click above for an hour of my answers to questions from Mark Steyn Club members around the planet on everything from the 9/11 anniversary to whatever happened to the "B sides" of "singles", by way of hurricanes and cocktail waitresses, deals with Donald and duets with Dinah.

The 16th anniversary of Osama bin Laden's attack on New York and Washington provoked some gloomy reflections from me. I find it harder to mark as the years go by. If this is a war, there's no agreement on what we're up against: Terrorism? Islamic terrorism? Islamic extremism? Islam? Whatever it is, a president who, on the campaign trail, mocked his predecessor's inability to use the words "radical Islam" himself eschewed all mention of the I-word today. September 11th 2001 was supposedly "the day everything changed" - if by "everything changed" you mean "the rate of mass Muslim immigration to the west doubled". As that absurd statistic suggests, we are not where I thought we would be 16 years on: We run around fighting for worthless bits of barren sod like Helmand province in Afghanistan, while surrendering day by day some of the most valuable real estate on the planet, such as France and Sweden.

We're still experimenting with different formats for these Clubland Q&As - print, audio, video - so let us know whether you like or dislike this version. We have fun in The Mark Steyn Club, so, if you're considering signing up, you can find out more info here - and don't forget, for any Steyn fans among your loved ones, our new gift membership.

We didn't get to all your questions, so I'll pick up a few unanswered ones for our next video edition of Mark's Mailbox. I'll be back on the radio on Thursday, with the great John Oakley live at 5pm Eastern on Toronto's AM640, and back on the telly with Tucker Carlson Wednesday night at 8pm Eastern/5pm Pacific.

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10 Reader Comments

Bernard Hill • Sep 17, 2017 at 22:36

It is a puzzle seemingly shared by many Club members, why people in the West who broadly sympathise with the Progressive/Leftist agenda, (who could well be in the majority on a population basis) are numb to the corrosion of civilisation being meted by Islam and Muslim migration. It is especially chilling that so many feminists are so very silent. Club member Laura C might be right that this arises from the essential soullessness of the Leftist proposition. It may also just be that many westerners are actually adopting the same sort of response as women in Islamic countries deploy when they happily identify with their own subjugation. Virtue signalling in both cases is simply a practical personal strategy on a day to day basis within their different worlds. In the West, such a personal strategy doesn't have huge consequences for individuals, since the Progressive/Leftist agenda, as is mostly quixotic, (i.e. tilting at windmills like climate change). But as Mark's work over many years documents, not so with Islam however. I think this why there is never going to be an awakening in the West, however many are slaughtered in acts of Islamic terrorism, and whatever personal freedoms and icons of civilization are dispatched. As the demographic changes kick in, most people will continue to go along quietly with Islam becoming the official religion, much as happened in Rome in the 4th century, when the empire became officially Christian. I hope to be long gone by then myself.

George Pazin • Sep 13, 2017 at 16:31

Hi Mark -

One of the questions you answered brought to mind a revelation I had awhile back: when you stop "judging" everything, you lose the ability to make thoughtful judgments. So many people have bought into the whole "I'm not judgmental" thing that they have ceased exercising this part of their brain. As a result, they are incapable of discerning the differences obvious to anyone who does actually use his brain. They conflate things that are not at all the same, because they do not possess the judgment to discern differences that are quite obvious to the rest of us.

Zack Jones • Sep 13, 2017 at 12:33

Mark, thanks for doing what you do.

Why dont Gore and Mann call for the cessation of federal flood insurance? If it's so obvious that global warming is upon us shouldn't we start accepting our losses right now as they come? Never rebuild since we'll have to retreat to higher ground later anyway?

The plight of native peoples' failure to sustain control of property and culture when overrun by evil western imperialists seems such an obvious point to connect to today's mass immigration. Why doesn't the the guilt and pity crowd that ceaselessly want us woke to our collective sins, discuss, as a teachable moment, that past history should inform us to be wary of any current cultural shockwave.

SEAN POWER • Sep 12, 2017 at 11:31

You're doing a great service, Steyn.

I would not disparage the audio or video versions, but I would like to state a preference for transcripts. I usually access Mark's content early in the morning which could possibly disturb those sleeping nearby.

David Wilson • Sep 12, 2017 at 02:15

A shout out on the Mark Steyn homepage for my club question! Wow, I think my life is complete now! (BTW, I am old enough to remember buying single records, with A side's and B side's.)

BallBounces in Charlottetown

David Wilson • Sep 12, 2017 at 08:21

Listening to the B side of a 45 the first time was always a special moment, hearing it for the first time, the mystery of its contents playing out.

fran lavery • Sep 12, 2017 at 00:29

It's hard to decide what is my favorite feature of The Mark Steyn Club. The gift of today's Q & A covered a lot of ground. It's a sad anniversary day for America, that's what struck me. Will these dead from 9/11 be forgotten too soon? Out walking the dogs the other night, I passed a party event of some sort over on the college campus near my house. It was some kind of Muslim celebration, as I could see the head scarves and at least one burka. A birthday party for a child perhaps, yes, probably with a motored train with blinking lights riding the little ones around the field, and an inflated bouncy castle. At first glance, seemed festive, happy and appropriate. I have good long distance vision but from across the expansive field, I did a double take, several. I could see there were the men, about 40 or more, lined up in formation on one side, 40 yards from the women and children. What was going on, I had no idea. The other side of the field were the women watching the children playing. I kept squinting to be sure I was seeing what I thought I was seeing and perhaps I could be wrong, but no, the men dropped to their knees and then all bowed to the ground and stretched out, and repeated this a few times. Wow, I thought, Ramadan was past, so what was it? Part of a cultural birthday or wedding tradition? I passed a faithful Muslim man once ( fall '08 ) preparing his carpet for prayer in Seville out on the sidewalk near a busy avenue in the afternoon, he got down facing Mecca. I wasn't expecting that at all as I had just come from Madrid and Toledo and saw nothing like it. At first, I thought he was a street vendor selling his carpet. Not a chance, that was probably illegal in Seville, but it was okay to make the public pedestrian pavement your personal prayer space! What an odd sight, but after all, what would someone like me from the desert Southwest know outside here? However, nine years hence, was this aberration of forty some men bowing and bending in worship to be believed? Where do we go now to find our country as I remembered it? Maybe nobody is too worried about bombs any more because they don't need bombs anymore, at least not here.

Tracy Mescha • Sep 11, 2017 at 22:57

So, what's the point of spending endless dollars and American lives on a politically correct war anymore? We've had it this way for some time. 'War' used to mean that we'd go in to kick your fuggin' ass so bad your grandchildren would feel the pain. Now, we have transgenderd troops, and we can't actually fire upon enemies until they fire first, and we don't want to offend any ethnic minorities with our brash Americanism.
America, literally, cannot win...

Skip Roberts • Sep 11, 2017 at 21:05

I've been a Mark Steyn fan and follower for many years and am proud to be a founding member of the club. I'm now re-reading "The Undocumented Mark Steyn" and I highly recommend it to other Steyn fans.

Re: today's post - Mark has so many memorable lines and phrases that it's hard to choose just one (or several) to single out - but from today's post the one that really jumped out at me was:

"We run around fighting for worthless bits of barren sod like Helmand province in Afghanistan, while surrendering day by day some of the most valuable real estate on the planet, such as France and Sweden"

That struck me as so "on target" but unfortunately the irony is completely unrecognized by our "decision makers."

Andrew A

Skip Roberts • Sep 11, 2017 at 23:06

I remember first reading "The Undocumented Mark Steyn" while on vacation in Hawaii. It weighs and costs roughly the same as one full whiskey bottle. To stay under airline luggage weight constraints, bringing it back meant one less liquor bottle in my return luggage. I made the choice and brought it back. No regrets.