Active Users:1110 Time:23/11/2024 02:11:19 AM
Definitely not the same - Edit 1

Before modification by DomA at 26/11/2013 03:24:25 PM

I think you mostly just have a lot more Muslims than we have here, because all you describe we also have (families coming later, weddings etc.), but on a much smaller scale, and it's far more recent (the type of immigration you describe, we began to have in a more substantial way only in the last 10-15 years or so).

You accurately describe our earlier waves of Muslim immigration (largely well educated families with some means, refugees from Lebanon or Palestine, immigrants from Maghreb leaving out of fear of fundamentalism in the 70s - mostly academics and professionals etc.). I'm not sure I would describe those immigrants as "progressive" so much as in a majority they're just not religious (like a small majority of people here). Many were also already here by the time fundamentalists made women wear the hijab again.

The more recent immigration is much closer in demographics to that you have in Europe (just far less numerous for now). In fact a lot of the more recent immigrants no longer come directly from Maghreb or the Middle-East or Turkey but have spent many years in Western Europe, leaving France or Switzerland, Germany etc. either because of the social climate or the economic crisis. We also got a whole wave of immigrants from former Yugoslavia, especially Kosovo.

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