Possibly the Danes would feel more at home with another movie, "The Man Who Came to Dinner" -- the Hollywood story from 1942 of the lecturer who turns up unannounced in the house of a well-to-do Ohio family, stays on forever and eventually takes over the household. No, that film wouldn't be appropriate either: "The Man Who Came to Dinner" was a comedy, and what has been happening in Denmark and throughout Europe in recent years is anything but funny.
The literary critic Bruce Bawer, who arrived in the Netherlands in 1998 and has subsequently lived for years in Oslo, Norway, was quite unprepared for what he encountered: profound changes -- not for the better -- of old and highly civilized societies, where proud traditions and values were under siege as a result of a massive influx of strangers.
"While Europe Slept" is an angry book, well written and well informed. And it could not, of course, be more timely. The title is a bit of a misnomer; most of the book deals with the region that Mr. Bawer knows best, the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands. But it is also true that much of what he has to say about these countries applies equally to the rest of Europe. Oslo, being the capital of a small country, was probably a better vantage point for the author than one of the larger and therefore more anonymous societies. (The percentage of Muslims in Switzerland, let it be noted in passing, is 5% to 6%, not 20%, as Mr. Bawer states.)
For years, Scandinavian authorities made a practice of accepting just about everyone who wanted to enter their countries from North Africa and the Middle East, including known terrorists and political-asylum seekers who quite obviously were nothing of the kind. Once inside the country, the asylum seekers quickly learned how to work the social-welfare system.
In Denmark, Muslims make up 5% of the population but receive 40% of social-welfare outlays. Their preachers have told them, Mr. Bawer reports, that only a fool would not take maximum advantage of the bounty that Western Europe offers and that it is perfectly legitimate to cheat and lie. The benefits they receive are a kind of jizya, the tribute that infidels in Muslim-occupied countries have to pay to preserve their lives. (The subsidized-radical situation in Britain and Germany is not much different: The four suicide bombers in London last year had raked in close to a million dollars in social benefits before going on their murderous mission.)
With even radical Muslims entrenched in the Scandanavian countries, it's no wonder that their fellow immigrants are feeling rather confident about the future: In Stockholm, Islamic residents have been known to wear T-shirts that say simply: "2030 -- then we take over." These expectations might be a little overstated, but Muslims in Sweden have indeed already taken over much of the city of Malmo and parts of Stockholm, which are becoming no-go zones for everyone else.
The Scandinavian countries are bringing disaster upon themselves. In Sweden, there might be some apprehension in official circles, but they prefer to act, even now, as if there is no problem. The Danes belatedly introduced some controls against forced marriages and other overdue measures, only to be accused of racism and extreme right-wing, if not fascist, practices. In Norway (with fewer immigrants), the authorities have not yet reached this stage, and social and cultural workers still take pains not to offend Muslims by criticizing even the slavery and female genital mutilation practiced in some Islamic countries. Such criticism, after all, would be an incitement against religion and might cause trouble.
Seen in retrospect, how to explain the extraordinary blindness of the Scandinavians in years past? To a large extent, it was simple foolishness and genuine naïveté mixed perhaps with a bit of guilt -- these countries, after all, did not show much liberality toward refugees in the 1930s. The naïveté has been shared by other European countries, and it is of course true that a limited number of immigrants could have been absorbed if the authorities had handled them appropriately: providing work rather than social welfare; giving strong incentives to learn the language and to respect the customs of the host country; and expelling the hate preachers.
But such policies have been thought to be incompatible with politically and culturally sensitive societies. As in Britain until recently, there was also the naïve assumption that if you leave "militants" in peace and keep them reasonably happy by subsidizing them and their activities, they will not cause harm. Now all of Europe faces the potentially devastating consequences of such misguided thinking.
There is a Kipling poem titled "Dane-Geld," about protection money paid by the British to Danish pirates in the early Middle Ages. "When you are requested / to pay up or be molested," goes one line. "Once you have paid the Dane-Geld / you will never get rid of the Dane," goes another. The poem concludes: "For the end of that game / is oppression and shame / And the nation that plays it is lost."
It may be premature to see Europe as lost. The British, after all, survived 200 years of paying Dane-Geld. But the price will be high, as modern Danes themselves are now finding out.

While Europe Slept
By Bruce Bawer
Doubleday, 256 pages