Editing Pim Fortuyn (section)

===Islam and immigration===
When asked about his opposition to Muslim immigration, Fortuyn explained that, "I have no desire to go through the emancipation of women and homosexuals all over again."<ref name=BedellBookReview>{{cite news|last1=Bedell|first1=Geraldine|title=To face the facts beyond the veil|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2006/oct/29/biography.islam|access-date=27 January 2016|newspaper=The Guardian|date=28 October 2006|archive-date=3 February 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160203035025/http://www.theguardian.com/books/2006/oct/29/biography.islam|url-status=live}}</ref> In August 2001, Fortuyn was quoted in the ''Rotterdams Dagblad'' newspaper saying, "I am also in favour of a [[Cold War|cold war]] with Islam. I see Islam as an extraordinary threat, as a hostile religion."<ref>{{in lang|nl}} Original quote in {{langx|nl|Ik ben ook voor een koude oorlog met de islam. De islam zie ik als een buitengewone bedreiging, als een ons vijandige samenleving.}} (''"I also favor a cold war against Islam. I see Islam as being an exceptional threat, as a society hostile to ours".'')</ref> In the TV program ''Business Class'', Fortuyn said that Muslims in the Netherlands did not accept Dutch society; he believed that the religion of Islam was fundamentally intolerant and incompatible with Western values.<ref name="douglasmurray">{{cite book|last1=Murray|first1=Douglas|title=The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam|date=2017|publisher=Bloomsbury|location=London|isbn=978-1472942241|edition=Kindle}}</ref> He said that Muslims in the Netherlands needed to accept living ''together'' with the Dutch, and that if this was unacceptable for them, then they were free to leave. His concluding words in the TV program were "...&nbsp;I want to live together with the Muslim people, but [[wikt:it takes two to tango|it takes two to tango]]." Fortuyn also maintained that he did not object to Muslim immigrants because of their race or ethnicity, and was not against a multi-racial society, but opposed what he saw as lack of integration and unwillingness to adapt to Dutch standards of modernity and [[social liberalism]] within Muslim communities.<ref name="auto"/> 
  
[[File:Rotterdam kunstwerk beeld Pim Fortuyn.jpg|thumb|right|220px|After his death a statue was placed at his home in [[Rotterdam]]. The statue has since been removed from the property and auctioned off]]

On 9 February 2002, additional statements made by him were carried in an interview with ''[[Volkskrant]]'' during his leadership of the [[Livable Netherlands]] party. Fortuyn argued that Islamic culture would deem him "less than a pig" for being a Christian and a homosexual.<ref name=controversy/> He said that the Netherlands, with a population of 16 million, had enough inhabitants, and the practice of allowing as many as 40,000 asylum-seekers into the country each year had to be stopped. The actual number for 2001 was 27,000, down slightly on the previous year. Fortuyn also argued that he would not allow any more Muslim immigrants into the Netherlands if it were legally possible.<ref>[http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/bevolking/publicaties/artikelen/archief/2002/2002-1019-wm.htm Asylum Immigration Statistics] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071023061927/http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/bevolking/publicaties/artikelen/archief/2002/2002-1019-wm.htm |date=23 October 2007 }} and [http://statline.cbs.nl/StatWeb/table.asp?LYR=G1:0&LA=en&DM=SLEN&PA=03740eng&D1=a&D2=a,!1-39&D3=4,9,14,19,24,29,(l-8)-l&STB=G2&HDR=T Asylum Requests Statistics] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070911000740/http://statline.cbs.nl/StatWeb/table.asp?LYR=G1:0&LA=en&DM=SLEN&PA=03740eng&D1=a&D2=a,!1-39&D3=4,9,14,19,24,29,(l-8)-l&STB=G2&HDR=T |date=11 September 2007 }}, Netherlands Bureau of Statistics Retrieved 21 July 2007</ref> He claimed that if he became part of the next government, he would pursue a restrictive immigration policy while also granting citizenship to a large group of illegal immigrants, saying that he did not intend to "unload our Moroccan hooligans" onto the Moroccan [[Hassan II of Morocco|King Hassan]].<ref name=dl120510/><ref>{{cite news|language=nl|date=2 February 2002|access-date=21 July 2007|url=http://www.volkskrant.nl/den_haag/article153195.ece/De_islam_is_een_achterlijke_cultuur|title=Volkskrant interview|archive-date=8 July 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070708042525/http://www.volkskrant.nl/den_haag/article153195.ece/De_islam_is_een_achterlijke_cultuur|url-status=dead}}</ref> Hassan had died three years earlier.<ref>[[Hassan II of Morocco]]</ref> He considered Article 7 of the constitution, which asserts [[freedom of speech]], of more importance than Article 1, which forbids discrimination on the basis of religion, life principles, political inclination, race, or sexual preference. Fortuyn also distanced himself from [[Hans Janmaat]] of the [[Centre Democrats (Netherlands)|Centrum Democraten]], who in the 1980s wanted to remove all foreigners from the country and was repeatedly convicted for discrimination and [[hate speech]].

Fortuyn proposed that all people who already resided in the Netherlands would be allowed to stay, provided the immigrants adopted the Dutch society's consensus on human rights as their own.<ref name=dl120510>{{cite news|url=http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2012/05/10_years_after_pim_fortuyn_was_1.php|title=10 years after Pim Fortuyn was murdered: what the papers say|date=10 May 2012|newspaper=Dutch News|archive-date=9 May 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120509000309/http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2012/05/10_years_after_pim_fortuyn_was_1.php|url-status=dead}}</ref> He stated: "not integrating means leaving" and "the borders have to be hermetically closed".<ref>Oudenampsen (2018), p. 188</ref> He said "If it were legally possible, I'd say no more Muslims will get in here", claiming that the influx of Muslims would threaten freedoms in the liberal Dutch society. He thought Muslim culture had never undergone a process of modernisation and therefore still lacked acceptance of democracy and women's, gays', lesbians' and minorities' rights. 

When asked by the Dutch newspaper ''[[Volkskrant]]'' whether he hated Islam, he replied:

<blockquote>I don't hate Islam. I consider it a backward culture. I have travelled much in the world. And wherever Islam rules, it's just terrible. All the hypocrisy. It's a bit like those old [[Dutch Reformed Church|Reformed Protestants]]. The Reformed lie all the time. And why is that? Because they have standards and values that are so high that you can't humanly maintain them. You also see that in that Muslim culture. Then look at the Netherlands. In what country could an electoral leader of such a large movement as mine be openly homosexual? How wonderful that that's possible. That's something that one can be proud of. And I'd like to keep it that way, thank you very much.{{efn|Original quote in Dutch: "Ik haat de islam niet. Ik vind het een achterlijke cultuur. Ik heb veel gereisd in de wereld. En overal waar de islam de baas is, is het gewoon verschrikkelijk. Al die dubbelzinnigheid. Het heeft wel iets weg van die oude gereformeerden. Gereformeerden liegen altijd. En hoe komt dat? Omdat ze een normen- en waardenstelsel hebben dat zo hoog ligt dat je dat menselijkerwijs niet kunt handhaven. Dat zie je in die moslimcultuur ook. Kijk dan naar Nederland. In welk land zou een lijsttrekker van een zo grote beweging als de mijne, openlijk homoseksueel kunnen zijn? Wat fantastisch dat dat kan. Daar mag je trots op zijn. En dat wil ik graag effe zo houden".}}</blockquote>

Fortuyn used the word ''achterlijk'', literally meaning "backward", but commonly used as an insult in the sense of "[[Retard (pejorative)|retarded]]". After his use of "achterlijk" caused an uproar, Fortuyn said he had used the word with its literal meaning of "backward".<ref name="douglasmurray" />

Fortuyn wrote  ''Against the Islamization of Our Culture'' (1997) (in [[Dutch language|Dutch]]).<ref>''[https://www.amazon.com/dp/9022983382 Tegen de islamisering van onze cultuur: Nederlandse identiteit als fundament]'', A.W. Bruna, 1997, {{ISBN|90-229-8338-2}}</ref>

During its brief time in government, Fortuyn's party the LPF attempted to introduce a proposal to grant a general pardon to asylum seekers who had been in the Netherlands for more than five years combined with a temporary stop and restrictions on further immigration.<ref name=dl120510/>