Word: europeanate
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Once upon a time, Microsoft bestrode the software world like a ruthless cartoon villain, gobbling up rivals and defying pleas for restraint from regulators. But the once impregnable giant has now been humbled: following an acrimonious 10-year antitrust battle with European regulators, Microsoft on Dec. 16 finally agreed to open its Windows operating system to rival Web browsers in Europe...
...Such suspicions have boosted support for far-right politicians like the Netherlands' Geert Wilders, whose Freedom Party won 11% of the Dutch vote in June's European elections with an anti-Islam platform. The OSI report says the chilling political climate has alienated Muslims, often making them feel unwanted. Several European countries are tightening their immigration laws, imposing citizenship tests and setting strict rules on wearing headscarves and burqas. Last week, reacting to the Swiss minaret vote, French President Nicolas Sarkozy called on religious practitioners to avoid "ostentation" and "provocation" so as not to upset others...
...Douglas Murray, director of the London-based Centre for Social Cohesion think tank, insists that European Muslims face the same discrimination as any newcomers. "All societies are unwelcoming to outsiders, but Europeans have been far more welcoming to Muslims than their critics allow," he says. "The onus of these claims of discrimination always seem to go the same way: to show that Europeans are innately racist. Which is a gross insult." (Read "The Islamic Divide at Work: Advice for French Bosses...
...levels vary. The report says that Muslims may be better integrated in the U.K. than in other parts of the E.U.: an average 78% of Muslims identified themselves as British, compared with 49% of Muslims who consider themselves French and just 23% who feel German. (See more about European politics in "The March to the Far Right...
...Many factors are thought to be behind this. France's troublesome history with its colonies, like Algeria, could explain the greater alienation of its Muslims, many of whom are descended from the colonies. Britain accommodates more cultural needs of its Muslim citizens than any other European country; for example, it allows Muslim policewomen to cover their hair with a headscarf. And in the Netherlands, controversies like the murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a Muslim extremist have "convulsed public opinion," making Muslims "scapegoats for public anxieties over security," the OSI report says. (Read "Minaret Ban Challenges Tolerant Swiss Image...