Scary: 16 percent of the French support ISIS

The folks over at Vox.com are reporting on two startling polls that “ask a question that you would hope wouldn't need asking” … Do you support ISIS? After all who could possibly support a group that engages in mass murder, beheadings, rape, torture, burying people alive and, just overall, genocide?

Well these polls show the answer is a whole lot more than zero people.

The scary number here emerged from France where 16 percent of those polled support ISIS. In the 18 to 24 age category, approval is at a stunning 27 percent.

Vox points out that the numbers in the chart below reflect that a growing number of Europeans, mostly those in Muslim immigrant communities, are not just expressing support for ISIS, they are traveling to Syria and Iraq to join up.

Here’s the bigger picture, as explained by Vox’s Max Fisher:

“… It's no secret that far-right politics have been on the rise in Western Europe, which includes a growing willingness to embrace extremism and greater intolerance of all kinds. It is ironic but by no means impossible that far-right Islamophobia would rise in Europe alongside a greater approval of the Islamist group ISIS. Extremism is often reactive and ideologically contradictory.

“The growth of European intolerance has brought a rise in hate toward Jews in Europe, as well as Muslims. It's more complicated than extremism festering within predominantly Muslim immigrant communities.

Fisher then quotes British writer Kenan Malik, who explained recently in the New York Times the increasingly ugly politics in Europe:

 "There is no clear correlation in Europe between the level of popular anti-Semitism and the size of the Muslim population.

"The rise of identity politics has helped create a more fragmented, tribal society, and made sectarian hatred more acceptable generally.

“At the same time, the emergence of ‘anti-politics,’ the growing contempt for mainstream politics and politicians noticeable throughout Europe, has laid the groundwork for a melding of radicalism and bigotry. Many perceive a world out of control and driven by malign forces; conspiracy theories, once confined to the fringes of politics, have become mainstream.”

Here's something else that's scary: If you read that passage closely, you hear echoes of the birthers and tea party Obama haters here in America.