RE: FRANCE TO STEYN – BACK AT YA
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Mark Steyn
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Kathryn posted on
this story on rising French fertility rates the other day and interpreted it as a refutation of my book. Apparently, Mimi and Fifi and Yvette and Solange are lying back and thinking of la belle France, and in doing so telling Steyn to stick a croissant in his escargot and smoke it.
Au contraire, I think France’s rising fertility rate is confirmation of my thesis – that native Europeans have given up breeding and Islam is inheriting the Continent by default. If that’s the case, then as Muslims increase as a percentage of the population so that country’s fertility rate will improve.
Do Muslims generally correlate with healthy birth rates in Europe? Yes. The only nations on the continent breeding at replacement rate are Turkey, Azerbaijan and Albania.
Do significant minorities of Muslims improve fertility rates? Yes. Of all those Continental nations below replacement-rate fertility, the top breeders are the Macedonians, whose population is 30% Muslim, which happens to be the largest Muslim minority in a European nation. [I’ve excluded war-ravaged Bosnia from the analysis, as, pace Derbyshire, rubble causes (statistical) trouble.]
Well, okay, forget Macedonia and stick to western Europe.
Which country has the healthiest fertility rate? France.
Which country has the most Muslims? France.
Which country has the second healthiest fertility rate on the western end of the Continent?
Denmark.
Which country has the second largest proportion of Muslims? Denmark.
Get the picture? Take France and its neighbors and rank them in order of healthiest fertility rates (2005 official Eurostat figures):
1) France
2) Netherlands
3) Belgium
4) Switzerland
5) Austria
6) Germany
7) Italy
8) Spain
Now rank them in order of highest proportion of Muslims (no central source, but compiled from national data, European Muslim groups, UN and State Dept figures):
1) France
2) Netherlands
3) Belgium
4) Switzerland
5) Austria
6) Germany
7) Italy
8) Spain
Hmm.