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Gates of Vienna has been reporting various incidents in the Swedish city of Malmö for several months now. The problems there started when Muslim youth protested the closure of an Islamic center, and eventually escalated their protests with riots.
Apparently, this is not an unusual occurrence. In 2005, it was fires in two mosques that was attributed to arson. In mosques, mind you, not churches. This means that the town was retaliating against this Islamic presence. But, the city did nothing about it, and in fact allowed absurd policies like Arabic-only preschools to continue.
Fjordman at Jihadwatch relates that as far back as 2005, one of Malmö districts started Arabic only classes for preschool children. The rationale being that if young children know the language of their parents, then they would learn the "foreign" language faster. Surely there is a high correlation between such a tolerant policy towards the city's Muslim (and Arabic) population, and this population's tendency to also want all the other paraphernalia of its culture, including places of worship?
Fast forward to 2008, and as Gates of Vienna amply reports, that is just what happens. The closure of an Islamic center with a mosque, due to expiration of a lease, induced a group of young Muslims to occupy the basement for some 23 days demanding that they have access to the mosque. As the days progressed, the confrontations got worse with riots and burning cars, resembling the Paris banlieue riots of a few of years ago (which have of course become commonplace now.)
But, there is a particular reason why I'm blogging about Malmö.
Malmö is the site of a building designed by one of those "world class", global architects, who make a living out of constructing incongruous buildings around the world. These are architects who have no consideration for the geographical, cultural and even environmental realities of the place, and just use their whimsy and artistry to design their buildings.
Malmö's architect was the Spanish Santiago Calatrava who has designed buildings from Israel to Toronto, which all have that airy, unstable quality about them. He calls the building in Malmö The Turning Torso, based on sketches he made of a turning human body. I have written about it here.
Now, surely, any city which would let one of its most costly (and eventually most famous) buildings look as though it was about to collapse into a spiral heap doesn't really care too much about itself? And how about designing a building that has nothing to do with the historical or cultural context of the city (Malmö was built around the Oresund strait)? A building that towers over the flat harbor in such an ungainly manner?
Tellingly, the wikitravel information for Malmö says:
Malmö has a large part of its inhabitants born abroad, thus contributing to a rich cultural life and many exotic and fine food opportunities.From exotic fine foods (which I seriously doubt) to Turning Torsos to rioting Muslim youths. There is a connection here, and as I showed above, if a city doesn't care about itself, its history and its culture, it will admit anything and anyone - from incongruous buildings to alien populations.