Pyrrhic Victory
The Brussels Journal has a long post describing "multiculturalism" as the "Communism of the 21st Century". Its basic argument is that a kind of fuse-delayed bomb went off in Europe; that although the West resisted Soviet Armies from without it was ultimately subtly subverted from within by socialist ideas. The very moment of Western triumph was simultaneously the moment of its de-legitimization. But the de-legitimization took this most clever of forms: a proclamation that all ideas were equally legitimate and that therefore, no idea was better than the other. The Brussels Journal calls this multiculturalism, the Communism of the 21st century.
As a concept it was devilishly clever. Perhaps because freedom was achieved through choice it became possible for sophists to substitute the notion of indeterminacy for liberty. Freedom was redefined as a process of never arriving anywhere. History became a endless Road trip. So the argument went, one with a kind of mystical appeal. The swindle was to make all journeys on all roads one and the same. As the Brussels Journal points out the hidden assumption lurking in the details was that the choiceless road was the road of choice.
The Brussels Journal more or less stops at this point. But what if we go further? Outside the "West" exist ideologies and cultures which never succumbed to the precepts of "multiculturalism" and for whom the "Communism of the 21st Century" not only lacks appeal but is anathema. Islam, for example, is largely resistant to "the Communism of the 21st Century" and yet it has been imported into Europe on a large scale. Consequently it relates to multiculturalism in a curious way. It is its prime foe at the same time that it is multiculturalism's prime beneficiary. This curious relationship implies that in actuality multiculturalism is playing a losing game with itself; and that the eventual outcome of Western multiculturalism advancing side by side with a confident and ascendant Islam will not be multiculturalism at all but simply a form of Islamic society. The Brussels Journal sees this absurd result and explains that multicultural theorists, having lobotomized themselves have already forgotten their lobotomies.
I have heard individuals state point blank that even if Muslims become the majority in our countries in the future, this doesn’t matter because all people are equal and all cultures are just a mix of everything else, anyway. And since religions are just fairy-tales, replacing one fairy-tale, Christianity, with another fairy-tale, Islam, won’t make a big difference. All religions basically say that the same things in different ways.
But there is another dynamic which is perhaps worth exploring. The most disturbing consequence of accepting the analysis that multiculturalism is abetting the advance of a hostile non-Western culture is that it makes one hope, almost perversely, for the whole ludicrous enterprise to come a-cropper. A kind of wishing for the worst in order to better the situation. Conservatism acquires a mirror image of the bizarre relationship between multiculturalism and Islamism, only flipped. Conservatism is Islamism's main foe at the same that it is Islamism's greatest beneficiary. An almost absurd tableau has been set up where the more the Left pushes multiculturalism, the greater the benefit to radical Islam, while simultaneously the more the Left benefits radical Islam, the greater the benefit to conservatism. This strange engine has already been at work in France. Ironically it was probably Royal and her ilk that elected Sarkozy but only through the agency of the banleius. They raised the negative energy that was by inversion, Sarkozy's positive energy. Someday the Left may wise up and realize that they have more to gain by opposing radical Islam than pandering to it. One day they may sweep American politics by actually leading the war against terrorism; by deciding to win it the way they decided to win against Hitler. But then they've already had their lobotomy.
posted by wretchardthecat at 5/14/2007 10:33:00 PM
87 Comments:
The "multiculturalist" claim there is no truth greater than any other effectively paves the way to the "imaginary friend" school of religion and political philosophy, where the desire of people for a deity can effectively summon Him, where the desire for a political utopia can effectively create it. (Who are you to tell me I can't have what I want?)
A "multicultural" assertion that there is no rational means to prove the superiority of one philosophy over another creates the basis of fideist religion, fideist politics, and fideist culture. If all ideas are supposedly equal, then the most effective means to promote an idea is not through showing its superiority but rather through cranking up the volume so nobody else can get a word in edgewise. Where rationality is deemed irrelevant, the most effective means to promote an idea is to do whatever is necessary, ethics be damned. If killing people is deemed the most effective means to promote an idea, who is to oppose this unless one asserts there is some better idea than proselytizing at the point of a gun?
Still, I think the emotional roots of multiculturalism and the modern Left go all the way back to the Cathars. Why? Albigensianism created an alternate universe where the normal world for Catholics was inverted, and more importantly, where it hardly mattered whether Christianity or Islam triumphed because they were part of the same spiritually polluted material universe in any case. And in the name of spiritual purity, Catharism allowed the faithful to become debauched until the consolamentum.
One wonders if the Albigensian Crusade merely postponed the flowering of the "Multicultural Left". On the surface, the Inquisition was able to destroy a religion. And yet, perhaps the presupposition that no idea can better than any other can be seen as casting all ideas and culture into the realm of some inherently damned material world that contrasts with the utopian purity of the perfecti.
There is nothing sillier than Americans (or foreign wannabes) whining about that great ideological chimera in the sky “multiculturalism”. What we never hear about are the joys of its supposed opposite (and therefore correct dogma) monoculturalism. As far as I know the only adherents that that philosophy and Jihadists and North Koreans.
But that is all besides the point, for one must for the sake of honesty pose the question, if multiculturalism is a crime, which culture is its worst offender? In other words which country aggressively imposes its culture upon other people?
I believe the answer to that is self evident, why American culture is the greatest mass murderer of other cultures; it is the most invasive of all cultures in the history of mankind.
So what are the great crusaders for global monoculturalism doing to save the planet from the rapid spread of obesity, ignorance, and rap music? Have they set up a Kyoto-like organization to set quotas on the spread of US sitcoms on foreign television networks? A limit on the number of hydrogenated fat infested fast food joints? Naw, they just whine about some whack-job Marxists.
Marvelous analysis Wretchard.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
The Bible, says not to call it a conspiracy but the target of all these isms is to blot out Christianity. Multiculturalism is just another attempt to blot out the truth of man's naturally corrupt condition which requires a Savior. A Savior of Devine proportions is required because sin is ugly beyond our ability to remedy.
Islam is a pagan cult of death. They love death. They practice suicide by G.I. When we kill them they are grateful.
Jesus Christ is the truth.HE is the way, the truth, the light, and the LIFE. Not death. HE rose from the dead and has the keys of death, hell, and the grave. HE alone has the words of eternal life. Heaven and earth will pass away but HIS word will not pass away. HE changeth not. Jesus is not an Idealist. HE's alive which is an afront to Islam.
alexis:
The catholic organization used the term "Albigensians" to hide the fact that the people they were murdering were born again Christians with some kooks mixed in amongst them. They accused the Christians of being the kooks and murdered all they could get their hands on, kooks and Christians alike and took their property. Rome is the Multi-Culti gold standard.
To be sure there are Christians within Catholicism and especially so here in the United States but they are at heart a Universalist monotheism cult. Christianity is Christianity and "Roman" Catholicism is "Roman" Catholicism. That's why they have two different names. It's the old worldly wise Roman Empire still trying to take over the world for the Darkness.
It is no accident that sodomy and child molestation and other men's wife humping flourish at every level of that organization. That's them to a tee. They have added poison to Christianity.
FYI
I believe the answer to that is self evident, why American culture is the greatest mass murderer of other cultures; it is the most invasive of all cultures in the history of mankind.
Kevin,
US population =
~ 300 million (all immigrants)
Jihadi population =
~ 1300 million (all conquered and converted by the sword)
But that is all besides the point, for one must for the sake of honesty pose the question, if multiculturalism is a crime, which culture is its worst offender? In other words which country aggressively imposes its culture upon other people?
Kevin, again,
As an Israeli now living in Canada, I know first hand the difference living besides Jihadis and living besides Americans. But since you've already answered your question in the paragraph I quoted just prior, let me ask you this. Why not do a little honest experiment. Renounce your American Passport and Citizenship (assuming you're American), and see if anyone cares to come after you as an apostate. Now, do a similar experiment renouncing your Jihadi/Islamists loyalties. I'm sure we'd all enjoy watching that Jihadi porn flick.
Kevin,
Individuals buy into America themselves. We're not competent enough to "aggressively spread" culture and have it stick.
Oh, and America is monocultural? Really? I suppose it is monocultural in the sense that it is has parameters (materialism, jealously guarded freedoms, equal rights, pursuit of happiness). But that's like saying that Blues is a monotonic art form. Or something.
Multiculturalism is the first meta-belief about all cultures, the first attempt to have but one thought about the entire set; because of its inaccuracy and vapidity it will not be the last.
(It really is an interesting dance, as a belief system. On the one hand society makes or corrupts the man; on the other hand, cultures cannot be judged objectively good or bad. Both cannot be true at the same time. See Matthew 7:16.)
Multiculturalism is what I call “Cultural Communism”: from each culture according to its ability, to each according to its needs.
The Islamic Fascists in particular and Muslims in general have demonstrated the consistent ability to cross-thread a bowling ball. There is nothing, but nothing that they cannot screw up royally. The good old WASP/Judeo Christian culture will always be charged with the job of keeping everything running reasonably well enough for the Communists, Socialists, Feminists, Islamists, and assorted one-worlder bureaucrats to maintain their personal fantasies – and if we don’t do it, we will be condemned as racists.
Take a look at Afghanistan before our invasion, the “Palestinian state” of today, a French Muslim-dominated suburb, or pretty much all of Africa if you want to see what the future holds with those people in charge.
Aristides,
Even if I accept you premise that American culture is chosen as opposed to pushed (BTW, I think a few US governmental organizations and corporate marketing execs might disagree with you here) it only means you are making a distinction between voluntary multiculturalism and coerced multiculturalism, it’s still the mixing of cultures. Everyone at BC would laugh if the French really tried to combat multiculturalism and made laws to protect their indigenous culture from incursions of US culture by language laws or something.
On the US being multicultural, I couldn’t agree more and that is my whole point. Only Jihadis and North Koreans are monocultural. Anyone who hates multiculturalism hates America.
BTW, I obviously didn’t read Wretchard’s commentary before posting my previous comment where he does in fact posit an opposite to multiculturalism: conservatism. But the only real justification for this is that he to him conservatism “fights” Jihadis (tell me how handing formerly secular Iraq to Iran and Al Qaida is fighting Jihadis, but whatever) not that it is actually monocultural. Most Algerian immigrants in France and Mexican immigrant in the US are there as a result of conservative efforts to import cheap labor and to break union strength. And for the most part the riots in France can be clearly laid at conservative efforts in France to role back the welfare state and the influx of violent American ghetto culture, although there were also a few Jihadi agitators involved to take advantage of these pre-existing conditions.
Instead it is some museum-piece Marxists and this straw man called “multiculturalism” that get the blame around here.
This comment has been removed by the author.
Kevin,
"tell me how handing formerly secular Iraq to Iran and Al Qaida is fighting Jihadis"
I believe the intention of Wretchard, as well as many commenter’s here, the US Army and the Iraqis that fight with them is that we not had Iran and Al Qaida Iraq. We want to fight them there and whip them, as Grant might say.
With small changes in the rules of engagement, Iraq can become a graveyard for jihadis. All we have to do is follow the practice of the greatest generation and summarily execute combatants not in uniform.
KKKevin said,
I believe the answer to that is self evident, why American culture is the greatest mass murderer of other cultures; it is the most invasive of all cultures in the history of mankind.
So what are the great crusaders for global monoculturalism doing to save the planet from the rapid spread of obesity, ignorance, and rap music?
AND:
And for the most part the riots in France can be clearly laid at ……………………………………………the influx of violent American ghetto culture
Wretchard between you and Brussels Journal most of my day gets wasted, thank you very much. Hehe...but it is time well spent.
Perhaps one day we will concentrate less on the symptoms and more on the cure.
But the only real justification for this is that he to him conservatism “fights” Jihadis (tell me how handing formerly secular Iraq to Iran and Al Qaida is fighting Jihadis, but whatever) not that it is actually monocultural.
Kevin are you deliberately ignorant? I mean is it a conscious decision when you wake up in the morning to be blind to that which you are sure cannot exist? Here let me have Christopher Dickey from Newsweek pull you from your fairy tales.
From my excellent post and he is humble...
Saddam Al Qaeda Collaborations…naturally they collaborated. Saddam himself threatened us with Terror Strikes.
Newsweek article written Sept 2002 Seeing the Evil In Front of Us Christopher Dickey
Its January 1993 So Islamic radicals from all over the Middle East, Africa and Asia converged on Baghdad to show their solidarity with Iraq in the face of American aggression. Chechens in Persian-lamb hats, Moroccans in caftans, delegates who hailed “from Jakarta to Dakar,” as one Senegalese put it, poured into Baghdad’s Rashid Hotel, where Saddam’s minions urged them to embrace jihad as “the one gate to Paradise.” And the greatest holy warrior of all? “The mujahed Saddam Hussein, who is leading this nation against the nonbelievers,” they were told. “Everyone has a task to do, which is to go against the American state,” declared Saddam’s deputy Ezzat Ibrahim. The Americans had colonized Lebanon; they had colonized Saudi Arabia. But the line against them would be drawn in Iraq. Believers would triumph, said Ibrahim: “Our stand now can lead us to final victory, to Paradise.”
That was in January 1993. I was there, and every time I hear diplomats and politicians, whether in Washington or the capitals of Europe, declare that Saddam Hussein is a “secular Baathist ideologue” who has nothing to do with Islamists or with terrorist calls to jihad, I think of that afternoon and I wonder what they’re talking about.
M. Legrand,
Below is a link to wiki on Al Qaida -Saddam, to say the least it would be very difficult to argue that OIF has actually diminished the Al Qaida presence in Iraq.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hussein_and_al-Qaeda
I notice you don't address the fact that Iran now owns at least half of Iraq.
Perhaps someone can explain to me why it seems those touting multiculturalism and globalisation are frequently the same folks.
Those two concepts seem, in a way, mutually exclusive. If humanity were able to form some sort of comprehensive global organisation or state, some sort of representative governmental Pangea, would not the likely outcome be decidedly non-multicultural? I don't mean that in ethnic terms of course, but in ideological terms.
It has always seemed to me that for the globalisation ideology to work, that multiculturalism will have to take a back seat, or confusion and disagreement will render totally ineffective any attempt at global government/cooperation.
And yet, it always seems to be the pro-globalisation crowd that I hear crowing the benefits of multi-culturalism. It's enough to make my head hurt.
Below is a link to wiki on Al Qaida -Saddam, to say the least it would be very difficult to argue that OIF has actually diminished the Al Qaida presence in Iraq.
A WIKI??? Muahaha...no wonder you are so misinformed...wiki's are for children whose medication for ADD has run out. Please don't insult yourself so publicly.
It would be difficult to argue that OIF has diminished Al Qaeda presence because it was NEVER the intention to eliminate their presence except by killing the ones already there and to draw the committed there to kill at our leisure. That we have faltered is more a testament to our cowardly elite than it is to a faulty strategy.
Regarding Iran you don't want to go there with me. See I am not like those folks who see only one enemy...either the wahhabists or the Iranians or the whatever. The Iranian Shia have been attacking us for 24 years. The wahhabists for a long time as well. We are big enough, if we choose, to attack and destroy both of those threats. But we have lost our nerve largely because of folks being lazy and wanting to ignore the threat. People lie to themselves about Saddam being a threat, about Islam being the religion of peace, about their existing something called moderate islam. Anything at all to keep watching American Idol.
Honor the threat is a truism that we forget at our peril.
If I were President Iran and Syria would have been dealt with about 2 hours after Iraq. Then Saudi Arabia would have eliminated and we would have controlled the oil. I would have declared Martial Law and put into jail folks like Plame and Wilson. I would have stood up traitors who gave away secrets either to our press or to the enemy, though I cannot see a difference, and shot them. We would have fought this war like we fought WW2. Kill the enemy wherever we find them.
One day soon after a nuke pops off in NYC or Los Angeles or both my strategy will seem moderate.
We arrest Saddam then hang him and we hold hands with…
Nah Kevin I am not a Bush bot...I am an America Bot. Anyone who gets in the way of my beautiful country goes down.
Trackbacked by The Thunder Run - Web Reconnaissance for 05/15/2007
A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.
“And since religions are just fairy-tales, replacing one fairy-tale, Christianity, with another fairy-tale, Islam, won’t make a big difference. All religions basically say that the same things in different ways.”
The problem is that some fairy tales don’t employ caricatures of Mickey Mouse to exhort the murder and destruction of the other. The West has extolled the virtue of separation of church and state and outside of the Vatican this remains true. Islam itself is a religion that extols itself as a state with its own laws, Sharia, and once inside its labyrinth, all roads lead to the one, Allah.
Yashmak, I think your confusing Transnationalism with Globalization. Transnationalism is the left's utopian dream. One world government (read UN), all countries bound up in international institutions and law (specifically the US), all guns in the hands of the transnational institution, etc.
Globalization had to do more with the economic interconnectivity in the world, as displayed by large multinational corporattions and is anathema to the Left.
"Multi-Culturism" is the logical outcome of moral relativity. Whereby it has become a cardinal sin to stand in judgement of anything.
I think Wretchard is on target but I would replace "conservatism" with Liberalism in the classic sense of the term.
“The most disturbing consequence of accepting the analysis that multiculturalism is abetting the advance of a hostile non-Western culture is that it makes one hope, almost perversely, for the whole ludicrous enterprise to come a-cropper.”
Ironic that this closely mirrors the fatalism of the Palestinian cause; it closely resembles Islamic martyrdom in that it risks all because submission to Allah, not freedom, is more important than life.
Kevin,
“why American culture is the greatest mass murderer of other cultures”
Being a persuasive culture is a lot different than murder. You have murdered your argument. Your stupidity is mass murder. You are a Hitler of petty logic and misguided rhetoric. Strap an F-bomb to yourself and self emolliate in a crowded Hollywood disco.
Monoculturalism is the universal respect for life. Free markets are the fiduciary means for monoculturalism. Telling people what to watch, eat, and listen to is what some whack-job Marxist would do.
Imposition: 1. The act of imposing or the condition of being imposed.
2. Something imposed, such as a tax, an undue burden, or a fraud.
3. A burdensome or unfair demand, as upon someone's time: listened to the telemarketer but resented the imposition. 4. Printing The arrangement of printed matter to form a sequence of pages.
Any time I hear the multi-cultis start up I wait...and in some form the word "imposition" comes up. Any society will impose upon its members. And I support a government--the mechanism of imposition--that imposes least.
But it is only within the culture of a society that dissent can occur. Outside of that culture disagreement is no longer dissent. It is opposition. And at the absurd level, this opposition can be met with the full coercive power of the state. States have a right to defend themselves. Likewise, cultures have a right to defend themselves through the mechanism of the state.
What I laugh at is critics who complain about imposition of democracy. Imposition of tyranny is acceptable to them, obviously. But making the People of a Society responsible for the mechanism which controls the coercive power of the state is unacceptable. The multi-cultis want it both ways. They want their voice to be the dominant voice (read "imposition") while retaining the right to excuse themselves from the rules everyone else must abide by.
Why we tolerate this is also amusing. We tolerate even though so-called multi-cultis espouse anti-cultural beliefs, they can only do so from within the framework of our culture. They may imagine themselves as extra the culture, but if this were the case there would be no arrests of spoiled little ranters when they toss their demos in the face of the culture's adults.
The only ones who can claim any sort of multi-culti authenticity are folks like those who live in Islamberg...and it is "their" monoculturalism that truly defines them as separate and apart. And as such, in opposition to our culture and a probable target of the coercive force of the state. Which they will find imposed upon them since they refuse to become a part of our culture.
So, in the end, it really is their decision. All decisions have outcomes. They may not be the ones predicted or, worse yet, desired, but they will be there nonetheless.
Annoy mouse
Well perhaps you are right about the mass-murder metaphor concerning American culture. It doesn’t actually kill the host culture that it infiltrates but just parasitically replaces as many indigenous cultural traditions with American ones as possible. So it is the eucalyptus tree of cultures. What can not be argued is that the greatest agent of the multiculturalism is the constant spread of American culture throughout the world. I suppose at some point, if American culture were able to completely devour the original cultural traditions of all countries it would then be at some level monocultural but the problem here is that there are many American cultures (black, poor white, Mexican, Jewish, Asian, upper middle class, etc) that no one country could ever be expected to adopt exactly the same American culture as others.
You are wrong about free trade though, it clearly leads to multiculturalism in that most products (outside of perhaps raw materials) produced by a certain country can never be entirely stripped clean of the prevalent culture of that country. And often implicit within the concept of free trade is the free movement of labor, which obviously leads to even more culture-mixing.
Free trade = globalization = multiculturalism
Protectionism = nationalism = monoculturalism
I meant to say confusing Globalization with Transnationalsim.
Forgive me for blatantly pimping my blog, but I previously posted some thoughts that might be germaine to this thread, you can find it and ,here.
I speak of monoculturalism as the application of universal laws, not of nature, but of men. Free markets do not work when the players do not honor the rules of commerce. The currencies of remuneration are set by both participants prior to the transaction being completed. We may exchange goods with the proponents of Jihad, but the transaction itself can only be accomplished when the terms are agreed to in advance. This itself is a kind of monoculture. Globalization is the establishment of rules that governs transactions. What Johnny Jihad does with his earnings is up to his cultures to decide, be it build mosques or missiles. Globalization attempts to encourage free trade and to discourage actions that would diminish it, like closing the Strait of Hormuz. We can respect others cultural themes and not embrace its practice within the territorial confines of our own culture. We as a nation need not cross the oceans to promote our cultural practices, though, if you want to practice polygamy, you’d best stay in a Muslim country or move to Utah.
For further analysis, consider:
Multiculturalism – Tribalism Recycled
"Helmut Schmidt, the former German chancellor, asserted that multiculturalism can only work under authoritarian regimes."
"The purpose of multiculturalism is to extirpate the truly free cultures by asserting that they are equivalent to primitive, Islamic cultures."
"Kenan Malik has demonstrated how multiculturalism and racism share similar traits - both ideologies separate and define groups of people in terms of skin color."
"Leftists need oppressed groups, and Muslims need to explain away their own failures by claiming to be oppressed. It's the perfect match."
"Maybe some of the high regard for the concept stems from mixing up the word “multicultural” with “multiracial”.
"We cannot win the fight against Islam unless we dismantle the ideology that rolls out the red carpet for it. It is no exaggeration to state that this is the most important battle of our age."
RWE said "Take a look at Afghanistan before our invasion, the “Palestinian state” of today, a French Muslim-dominated suburb, or pretty much all of Africa if you want to see what the future holds with those people in charge."
We might also add to the list much of the lands south of the US border, first and foremost Venezuela.
There are two distinct ideas of multiculturalism. The first, and most compelling, is that a certain amount of harmonious variance is good thing. The second begins and ends with the rhetorical, "Who are we to judge..."
Harmony demands fundamental constraints -- first principles like freedom, equality, respect for law, etc. A culture that can harmonize with this baseline should be accommodated. A canceling-culture, a culture which is a deleterious melody, must be excluded.
Unfortunately, for many self-described multiculturalists the concept of absorption has been fetishized at the expense of any concept of outcome. "Who are we to judge?" is moral self-indulgence, made possible by a lack of proximity to reality.
All that is changing, though, isn't it?
Kevin,
Marketing campaigns do not an imposition make. Otherwise, I would be up to my ears with Cialis and feminine hygiene products.
Do American corporations produce, market and distribute regrettables? Sure they do. Unfortunately, the cure for that is worse than the disease.
The concept of free trade presupposes that all cultures are equal by setting rules of commerce that are the same for all players, irrespective of the moral characteristics of each culture. In fact, free trade, demands that we see all the moral aspects of every culture as equivalent, the only aspect we are allowed take into account is the quality and price of products. It presupposes cultural equality setting a level playing field for each culture to ply its wares. The fact that women and children are employed as slave labourers to produce a product, for example, is irrelevant. In the global marketplace, free trade preaches that any moral cultural judgements are in contradiction to economic prosperity. Only meddling agencies, in direct contradiction to the dogma of free trade, such as the UN with trade sanctions or organizations like Oxfam, allow moral judgements to be made on cultural practises and the particular products they produce.
Thank you, Wretchard, for posting this link to The Brussels Journal. It was an absorbing read and really was the highlight of my morning.
On the practical level, most "multi-culturalists" are not the intellectuals who control the textbooks, the law strategies, and the political strategists. They are foot soldiers in the cause of soft-Leftism (useful idiots)who are not in the habit of intellectual rigor. A lot of them are teachers and activists who probably would not understand much of this article, hence introspection is not likely to be precipitated by such a fine article that objectifies and pries apart the strands of development of this ideology.
The promulgators of multi-culturalism are located in positions of influence that insulate them from a searing criticism like this. They have the power and would shrug their shoulders, declaring "So what?"
"Kevin" has made a semi-successful bid to hijack the thread by shifting the goals of the debate, by deflecting the analysis back upon Western civilization and capitalism, setting it up as, from his vantage point, as the more proper object of critique. This is fairly typical of a Leftist debate tactic coming from his generation. Instead of answering for failed and disastrous Leftist ideas, he attempts to focus attention on an alternate target of critique.
Kevin:
There is a difference between being cosmopolitan and being multicultural.
If most cultures were so "multicultural" already, why bother imposing multiculturalism upon the converted? The reason should be obvious -- that cosmopolitanism and multiculturalism are two very different things.
A cosmopolitan person can eat Arab bread, eat Italian pizza, speak French, read Chinese philosophy, and still be American. Meanwhile, a multicultural person vacillates between saying "we are all the same" and "celebrating differences". The modern multiculturalist dogma appears to be a modern philosophical reaction to Heidegger, whereas cosmopolitan people have existed for millennia.
Any dichotomy of "monocultural" versus "multicultural" is a false dichotomy. Moreover, by almost any standard, al-Qaeda is a truly "multicultural" or "international" organization. (And for that matter, North Korean culture has borrowed a great deal from China...)
The key here is not whether people ever borrow cultural ideas from one another, but whether rationality has any place in showing one custom is better than another. Under what criteria would Carthaginian child sacrifice be wrong? Is it just another custom? Under what criteria would suicide bombing be wrong? Is it just another belief? Is "honor killing" just another lifestyle choice? This is more fundamental than whether to have pizza or gyros for lunch.
Last year I wrote about the lack of meaningful measures for and definitions of globalization. For anyone who's interested, you can find it here.
Measuring Globalization
IMHO, there is so much conceptual confusion surrounding the construct of "globalization" that it has ceased to have useful meaning. It can and does mean almost anything that both its proponents and detractors want it to. That said, the way that globalization was operationalized in a recent economics journal (which I cite in the post) is good start in the right direction.
"why American culture is the greatest mass murderer of other cultures; it is the most invasive of all cultures in the history of mankind..."
More invasive than the Romans, who actually, you know, invaded people?
More invasive than the Persians, who raised cities leaving no stone atop another?
More invasive than the Muslims, who erased the previous pagan cultures in the middle east with the thoroughness of the flood of Atlantis, and who went on to destroy the Christian Roman civilization of North Africa, Israel, Palestine, Syria, and Byzantium?
More invasive than the Huns, Alars, and Norse, who overturned and destroyed the civilizations their hordes swept over?
More invasive than the French and Belgians, whose imperium in Africa still causes historians to wince at the thorough-going annihilations?
More invasive than the Spanish in South America, who wiped the Aztecs into nonexistence, and converted the rest to Catholicism?
More invasive than the British Empire, which wiped out the Tasmanians?
More invasive than the Soviet Union invading Eastern Europe, and crushing the steppe peoples under their dominion?
More invasive than the Chinese invading Tibet, and wiping its religion into nothingness?
Are you telling me the US selling hamburgers to Japanese folks in Tokyo is more invasive than all these, and all the others I failed to mention?
The Carthaginians, Mayans, and Aztecs would be stunned to hear this assessment of history.
Why are so many of you operating under the false conviction that multiculturalism means all ideas are equal?
“Only meddling agencies, in direct contradiction to the dogma of free trade, such as the UN with trade sanctions or organizations like Oxfam, allow moral judgements to be made on cultural practises and the particular products they produce.”
This is not entirely true. Believe it or not, the free market is comprised of individual consumers who vote with their wallet every day. Take for instance dolphin safe tuna, or the choice of investors who pulled money out or apartheid. When the principle of transparency has illuminated practices such as slave labor, see Kathy Lee Gifford, concerned consumers (the market) have changed their spending practices. The demand goes away, then the supply. If we continue to buy goods and services from companies that do not exhibit good corporate governance, it is our own fault. But more often than not, when properly informed, we make the right choice. We don’t need no self appointed moralists, on the take, to make our decisions for us. We need but to be well informed and that my friend is why the merits of our system of government and the attendant 1st amendment rights are so important to global free trade.
Why are so many of you operating under the false conviction that multiculturalism means all ideas are equal?
That's not it at all, Ash. The problem is, "multiculturalism" hates the West. You know, the culture of dead white men who oppress the people with their ancient ideas?
It'd be a crying shame for every soul on Earth (except for the nomenklaturas) to allow totalitarianism to ride the bad old colonial 19th century to control of the 21st.
When will the western left's useful idiots--with their suffrage in western democracies-- wake up, and realize that the only 'false-consciousness' is that there is a settlement due on the "collective guilt" of the past, and that this settlement will ruin the spectacular new world future that is striving--against their reaction--to be born?
Alexis,
Good points and questions.
The key here is not whether people ever borrow cultural ideas from one another, but whether rationality has any place in showing one custom is better than another.
What you seem to be saying then is that a society made up of many different cultures is cosmopolitan if the members of that society make judgements about each other. It is only “multicultural” if they refuse to make such judgements.
Unfortunately that is not the reason for this bizarre concept of multiculturalism. In fact people who refuse to make judgements about others is a myth, Who in their right mind would call child sacrifice or burning women at a stake a “lifestyle choice”?
No the purpose of the mythical conception of multiculturalism is to justify its all too real opposite; bigotry. For you see, next to their straw man in the shape of a goateed Lefty who refuses to condemn anything a Moslem does, a wingnut bigot who condemns the entire population of humans who follow the Mohammedian faith seems downright logical. You know the guys who start their rants with “the religion of peace” and go on from their.
So when you see the multiculturalism chaff being thrown up all around, you know what follows is sure to be bigoted nonsense.
And so it is in the example Wretchard linked to in the Brussels Journal. No such cosmopolitan/multiculturalism distinction is made. The fact that Brussels is more than 50% foreign (I am one of those foreigners and there are many of us here but 50% seems over the top) is evidence enough that it is multicultural. He seems to ignore the fact that most immigrants are not at all afraid to judge the Flemish language as ugly and Neanderthal-like and prefer that their children speak a civilized language like French instead. Indeed there is no shortage of foreigners refusing to judge their local host’s driving habits or willingness to accept the odd bribe. Nor does he mention that many of these foreigners are in Brussels because they work for multinational corporations. The implication is that they are all Jihadis who have been smuggled into Belgium by a cabal of conspiratorial Masonic Marxists who have secretly taken over Europe and smuggled in their neo-Communist foot soldiers to finish off what Stalin started.
Now there is a group of what I call reactionary Lefties who love anything the right hates. They will gladly support illegal immigration just because they believe the Right hates Mexicans. And they certainly are a growing problem.
But what we are really talking about here is the difference between universalism and particularism (sorry about the Frenchisms); about how wide people draw their imaginary “circle of inclusion” which divides “us” from “them”. Clearly at the two extremes a universalist would indeed include baby rapists, women burners, and George Bush in their circle of inclusion while a radical particularist would just include himself. Most people fall somewhere in between these extremes with universalists being open to most of humanity and particularists siding with the tribe class or ethnic group.
But are there really people who say baby killing is just another “life-style” choice. Or do they limit those discussions to sexual orientation? Are there really Leftists who think honour-killing is just alright? Or is this just an excuse to justify extreme particularism? Just a way to cover for bigots who hate all Jews, Muslims, fags, Mexicans, women, etc?
But are there really people who say baby killing is just another “life-style” choice.
Yes, lots and lots of them, Kevin. Israelis have to deal with them on a daily basis. And not just Israelis. Everywhere a group of organized Muslims come in contact with others it's the same story. Why do you try to ignore this?
John Wright,
Sorry that I wasn’t more clear. I was referring to American culture as being invasive, not her armies. So did the Romans sell their leaded wine in more than 200 countries? Did Persian eating habits cause obesity rates to rise throughout the civilized world? Did Muslim sitcoms lower IQ rates across the globe? Did the French and Belgians import monster truck shows to Africa?
Did the Mongols introduce first computers and then internet to world? Did the Spanish make people stop smoking in pubs in Belfast? Did the Chinese ever manage to make their language the de facto universal language of the globe?
One really would need to leave the US to realize this, but the ubiquitous nature of American culture across the globe is indeed unique in human history.
"Globalization" is Leftist code for the spread of capitalism and the shifting of capital and the means of production across more and more countries, integrating more countries into a capitalist network. It is the rationalizing of many formerly command economies and colonial backwaters.
It was a sly move to equivalize multi-culturalism and globalization in order to shift the target away from multi-culturalism.
Let's see who has fallen for this misdirection...
If you cannot tell the difference between worthwhile and stupid - you're stupid.
Why not be honest about the Palestinians and create one moral standard that should be followed in case of any occupation, whether it is the United States, France or Palestine. There is nothing more “multicultural” and hypocritical than people who push one set of morals for their enemies while supporting a completely different set for themselves.
People who are occupied by a foreign power have the absolute right to use violence against their occupiers. Should they target civilians? I would say no. Should they target settlers, that is, foreign civilians who live in the occupied land? I would again say no but this is less clear. If Hillary wins and lets Al Qaida occupy New England (as many here might predict) and Bin Laden sets up Jihadi settlements would it be morally correct to for patriotic Americans to attack these civilian enclaves? It’s a difficult call, many innocent children would be killed, so I would tend to say no. But would American patriots be correct in targeting Al Qaida occupation soldiers? Hell yes. Would American patriots, if they were desperate, be morally correct to launch suicide attacks again their Al Qaida oppressors? If they were hitting military targets then why not? But would they be right in blowing up themselves along with a civilian bus full of old ladies and babies? No.
And so it is with the Palestinians. If they target Israeli military targets they have every right to kill them and themselves if they must. If they are targeting civilians then, no, they are wrong, even if they are settlers.
There you go, one set of rules for all.
I'm fascinated to see the Albigensians invoked in this discussion, on the one hand as protomulticulturalists and on the other as protoevangelicals.
I'm not surprised that they can be interpreted both ways, though, since that's more or less what's happened in the interpretation of the movement through history.
The truth is we don't know fully what the Albigensians actually taught and believed as most of what we know about them was written by their enemies -- their own texts (what there were of them: some argue that the Albigensians had mostly an oral culture) were suppressed and burnt. We largely know only what the Roman Catholic church accused them of teaching (which is more like Manicheism or Gnosticism than evangelicalism). Hence, they can be heroes to John Foxe and heretics to Innocent III -- "worse than Saracens," I think he said.
Which brings us full circle, eh?
kevin,
re: occupation
There is no occupied territory as that concerns the Palestinians.
There is disputed territory, purposefully left disputed by the UN in hopes of a lasting negotiated peace agreement that would create defensible borders for Israel.
Negotiation might resolve the issue of ownership, but the Palestinians and their Arab allies have rejected every overture.
As to Palestinian attacks on military targets, of the 250+ Kassam's launched from Gaza during the so-called cease fire, none were specifically aimed at military targets. Indeed, all were directed at Israeli towns in clearly undisputed territory. In short, the Palestinians prefer attacks on soft civilian targets within the sovereign territory of Israel.
Regarding Kevin...
I think it is a waste of time and energy to engage with the left. We should recognize them for what they are and either ignore them or if they become especially irritating lock them up. They are the self declared enemy of the west and we should believe them. The combination of the left and the Islamists promises to be a potent combination as they use our 1st Amendment laws to "deconstruct" our civilization.
Kevin,
You did not answer the question. Why do you ignore the fact that Islamists, as a matter of lifestyle choice, serve up their children (and their victim's children) in the service of Jihad?
Also, why do you ignore the cultural and real mass murder waged by Jihadis on other peoples? Further, what right do these Jihadis have to Judea Samaria and other Jewish territories? Please explain.
pierre legrand:
Sooner or later, it will come down to an Indonesian solution.
Everywhere the Left becomes too powerful, they bar democratic means for reversal.
They can grow and grow, until a Suharto arisesto fix the problem.
So, Kevin, let me see if I've got you right: It would be okay for Americans to fight the jihadis in New England, but it's not okay for Israelis to fight the jihadis in Israel?
Let’s get something straight, folks. The traditional American process of assimilation is NOT multiculturalism. There is ONE American culture based on the principles of the U.S. Constitution and the documents related to it.
As for other cultures, WE ARE THE BORG. We assimilate the useful aspects of other cultures, but within the American framework. One of my neighbors came from Italy in 1972; you can barely understand him when he talks “English” but he’s American. The neighbor on the other side of the yard came from Liverpool, England in the early 90’s. The guy who lives behind my house is American Indian. At work I regularly deal with people who came here from Vietnam, Malaysia, China, and India. The guys who put a new roof on my house last week were all Hispanic. The one who fixed the sewer pipe leaking in my front yard a few years back came here from Russia.
And Kevin is right about one thing. The American culture is very, very invasive. Back in the 80’s that film “Red Dawn” came out and featured an advertisement that showed Soviet troops with a BMP APC parked in front of the Golden Arches of a McDonald’s. About 5 years later I saw almost that same picture – but it was real, not staged. The difference was that McDonald’s in the real picture was in MOSCOW! The movie was about them invading us; in reality we invaded them.
And Starling, re: south of the border:
You said it, not I.
But I thought it, too.
Ultimately, that is what out immigration problem is about.
PA Rockets Hit Sderot Homes, Three Civilians Badly Injured
BREAKING: Major Injuries In Sderot Rocket Barrage. Children Wounded As Rockets Score Direct Hits On School and Home.
H/T LGF for the thread and lots of video Video: Palestinian Terror Rockets Up Close
And as some predicted would happen:Hamas seizes US weapons
H/T to Dr. Condoleezza Rice
a medievalist,
As you may know, Robert Barclay's "Apology" offers an analysis of the Cathars (as well as every other known Christian heresy).
Barclay was an apostle of George Fox.
Would Foxe have sympathized with Fox?
Did Foxe, a minor playwright and sojourner in Stratford-on-Avon, have any influence on that town's favorite son?
This has been one of the most interesting threads in a long time.(They are usually excellent!)
Matuselah: Excellent rejoinder to Kevin's mouth noise.
Aristides: Matthew 7:16 seems applicable to Kevin; something he can deal with.
RUE:The chaos people depend on us to protect them from themselves. Good point. It can't be said enough. Thanks for taking the time to post it.
bucksmith: "execute combatants not in uniform". Why did the military stop this practice? It was employed in Germany in WW II.
PierreLegrand: Thanks for the 1993 memory hole dredge. Why don't the Pubbies plaster this all over the media. They just don't seem to be fighting the info wars.
Annoy mouse: Seperation of church and state is a communist doctrine. America is more sophisticated; we have the establishment clause. Check it out Dude if you want to make informed comments.
Fred: Wow! Excellent analysis. Your discipline is what inherits the earth.
Kevin changes the subject.
Too many other wonderful comments for me to comment on right now. I feel some backbone forming here in the "WEST". (About time.)
Lt. General Lute, named as the “War Czar”, has already erred: his first advice should have been the demand for two additional, indispensable stars.
A War Czar? America, we have a problem.
***
Allen:
Well, for me history ends sometime around 1400, so I can't give you an authoritative answer.
I assume Barclay had no better primary sources to work with than we do now, though, so whatever he wrote about the Cathars prob'bly has to be taken circumspectly.
As for the plays attributed to that Stratford actor, I have it on good authority that they were really written by a crack team of barkeeps at the Mermaid Tavern. But you might want to ask someone who knows better ...
To many foreigners American culture is a virulent and lethal virus, attacking at their most vulnerable point: their children. We act like the Pied Piper, stealing away their young by offering a different vision of life’s highest values. To gays we say come out of the closet. To women we say throw off the shackles of male domination. To atheists, heretics, and agnostics we say glory in your independence of thought. To all we offer sexual freedom, liberation from the domination of their elders, and opportunities to obtain wealth in non-traditional ways.
buddy larsen,
You are going to love this from Instapundit. The man has a large "see-gar".
Mickey Kaus liked it as well, saying,
“More important, I think: quite apart from its advantages as a campaign tool, the video is itself evidence of Thompson's actual presidential qualifications. You can't make a quickie spot like this unless a) you know what you think (or have a really fast pollster) b) you can react to new situations quickly, and c) you have some sense of theater. Those are all extremely important things for a president to have.”
***
Kevin,
In addition to what Allen said:
Do you have any respect for signed treaties? Do the agreements signed by the PA and Israel mean anything? These are the agreements in which the PA agreed to renounce violence and to resolve all disputes by negotiation.
Your remarks about so-called occupied peoples might make some sense if the so-called occupiers hadn't negotiated agreements with the so-called occupied in the past and if the so-called occupiers hadn't made many concessions to the so-called occupied. What sense does it make for the so-called occupied to attack military targets of the so-called occupiers if the so-called occupiers have already agreed to give the so-called occupied what the so-called occupied say that they want?
The answer to this conundrum is obviously the so-called occupied are disssembling when they say what they want.
Why can't multi-cultis like you see this truth? The Pals lie to you and you believe it.
Besides modern Israel rose from the ashes of WWII, in which the Palis main man, the Grand Mufti, was a staunch and active nazi ally. Attacking a people, and then losing the resulting war, has throughout history had "consequences". For some reason, the west's Krazy Kids don't understand this.
Elijah, That's the picture a third-worlder will likely have alright. He won't ever know about the vast majority of middle-class middle Americans across the length and breadth of the USA that by and large agree, calling that "American culture" instead "Hollywood culture".
Damn you, "Kevin," for subtly subverting the topic from a rich theme with a brilliant analysis and directing it towards a discussion of the Left's pet victims, the Paleosimians.
utopia parkway,
Palestinian apologists keep spouting the same old party-line, oblivious to the fact that Gaza is NOT occupied (although I hope to see that remedied, given today's attacks).
Despite the obvious futility in the face of irrational bigotry, good men have the obligation to set the record straight as challenges arise. To this end, countering the vacuous accusation that Israel pre-meditatively, with malice aforethought, attacked the vessel USS Liberty, I posted the following at another site. Perhaps, you and others will find it useful, when some moron spouts the “same old party-line.”
War is not waged in the comfort of one's home or office. Sh*t happens,
like the [Liberty] accident.
To get a feel for the tumult, consider:
___Amicicide At Sea: Friendly Fire Incidents During WWII; Naval Opeations
Defense Technical Information Center
http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA278291 - DoD Document
___US Navy attacks 144 C-47s, downing 24, resulting in 318 casualties
82nd Airborne: Operation Husky
___RAF attack off Cap d'Antifer
HMS Britomart sunk
HMS Hussar sunk
HMS Salamander irreparably damaged
HMS Jason minor damage
Link
___June 17, 1968, US fighter aircraft attack
USS Boston
USS Edison
USCGC Point Dume
HMAS Hobart
PCF-12
PCF-19 sunk
___1943
USS Iowa (battleship) attacked by USS William D. Porter (destroyer)
President Franklin D. Roosevelt was aboard the USS Iowa at the time
Link
___”This article does not blame anyone for the past. Rather, the charge to our present and future leaders is clear: We need a solution to this problem. Had alleviating fratricide been possible during this century, the effects would have been tremendous. If a conservative US fratricide estimate of ten percent is used for 20th-century conflicts, the following fratricide casualties result: 5000 killed and 23,000 wounded in World War I; 19,000 killed and 72,000 wounded in World War II, 5400 killed and 10,300 wounded in the Korean War, and 5800 killed and 36,500 wounded in Vietnam.”
Realistically Dealing With Fraticide
___“The Ark Royal’s aircrew were thoroughly familiar with the Sheffield; the two ships had steamed thousands of miles together in company. Moreover Bismarck was five times the cruiser’s tonnage, was nearly 300 feet longer and had one funnel as opposed to the Sheffield’s two. It might seem impossible for the aircrew to fail to identify Sheffield but they only saw what they expected to see. (Kemp, 1995, p. 48)”
___“Thus, two destroyers and almost 600 men had been lost because of the appalling lack of communication between Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine commands exercising control of forces in a common area.” (p. 45)
Analysis of Fratricide in United States Naval Surface and Submarine Forces in the Second World War
http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA374561
Whether any Israelis, Zionists, and/or Jews were involved in any of these incidents or the hundreds more of record remains unreported.
Fred,
Let's not make this a phallic victory. Palistan is the spear tip our adversaries use to gauge our eyes with. If we manage to take that away from them, they are left exposed and without a defense. I'm sick of hearing of Palistan as anyone else, but I understand that if we take that weapon away from them, and understand how to take that weapon away from them, then time works in our favor.
Fred, I hope you've had a chance to read Elijah's most excellent link @ 06:45:00 PM
gauge -> gouge
Multiculturalism isn't communism, though it is like communism. Like communism and socialism, multiculturalism is strictly speaking a form of fascism.
Sprinkle writes on Skarbutts
The term fascism has its origins in the ancient Roman Empire where the fasces was created as a symbol to represent the elitist ruling class and its many divers subordinates. The concept of this system was based on principles of collectivism. By using specific criteria to define members, a fascist movement determines to incorporate conforming members into one body under the control of an authoritarian ruling class with the objective of assimilating, eliminating, or bringing under subjugation all others.
Traditionally the identifying criteria to define members of a fascist entity has been based upon nationalism, imperialism, or race; nevertheless, physical attributes can be ignored and the operational principles of fascism may be put in application using a common ideology or religious belief to qualify members.
The accusation here is that the latter is being done presently by secularists and liberal elitists on a global scale. The result is a politically aggressive movement embracing a cosmopolitan ideology with aspirations for a collective authoritarian society; but this movement is unique only in its outward manifestations.
Although not all of the ideas embraced by the Fascist Party of the 20th century are espoused by progressives today, their concepts of government structure are built upon the same designs and they share a number of philosophies, if only applied somewhat differently. Of all forms of government historically speaking, the form presently proposed and propagated by modern liberal progressives is fascism.
The voice of multiculturalism shares its thoughts for the day.
This “analysis” in the NYT demonstrates how “multi-culti speak” makes communication impossible.
“But if Hamas believes that it was wrong to choose the path of politics, it could return to all-out violence against Israel, setting off another round of intifada.”
[“if” – like there is some question as to the motives of Hamas]
“Hamas has made it clear that while it generally respects a cease-fire with Israel…”
[Hamas has made clearly only its implacable hatred of the “Zionist entity”]
“Majorities of Israelis and Palestinians say they want peace and a division of the land into two independent states.”
[Palestinians overwhelmingly support the desire of Hamas to destroy the “Zionist entity”, as every opinion poll taken since January 2006 proves.]
The only substantive observation made by the author is the increasing probability of Jordan reasserting some control over the West Bank.
Reality Overtakes the Illusion of Unity in Gaza [but not the NYT]
As Wretchard observed recently, we are all becoming "Israelified". Multiculturalism heads the top of the list causitive factors.
pangloss and elijah,
Thanks for the links.
u r welcome
Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information on it.
- Samuel Johnson
and sometimes a combination of the 2
Pangloss's quote is the truth. It's the same old enemy. It re-emerges today in slightly different form than its previous intense global crystalization in the first half of the 20th century, but it's the same old enemy. Coming back together like Terminator II.
Elijah,
4th Gen war strategists say that the era of successful colonial and neocolonial wars is over. In my view, this is a serious and possibly fatal error. It's not about electricity, it's about land. Everything else flows from that. And this is where the Islamists have them beat.
Kevin - And for the most part the riots in France can be clearly laid at conservative efforts in France to role back the welfare state and the influx of violent American ghetto culture, although there were also a few Jihadi agitators involved to take advantage of these pre-existing conditions.
Right, the rioters naturally blame the people they riot against for the riots. As for the French "youth" just being an extension of American ghetto culture, sorry. Blacks and Arabs set up their own "mini-paradises" wherever they settle with no help from America. In most cases, those neighborhoods are unsavory, squalid, and crime-ridden. From Melbourne through Detroit and NOLA through Gaza's slums all the way down to black-run Zimbabwe and SA's "New Era" cities.
Alexis - Meanwhile, a multicultural person vacillates between saying "we are all the same" and "celebrating differences". The modern multiculturalist dogma appears to be a modern philosophical reaction to Heidegger.
Nice point. Wretchard described the multicultis as doomed by internal contradiction but for now, a comfortable place to be for many affluent guilty young whites and various "victim groups" drawn to the oppositional, anti-western civ nature of multiculti. They find the post-Marxist poison intoxicating.
But as you note, it would be impossible for multicultis and like-mided Lefties to run a country or Empire of Toleration on notions "we are all the same" "we cherish our differences". The only structure dominant multiculti could work in would be totalitarianism or a temporary caretaker role where they see their mission as transition from the oppressor white or Asian culture to the worthy victimized and oppressed people of Islam or Africa who will replace the western culture with - to multicultis - a better Islamic or African culture "untainted by western atrocities or racism".
Multiculti then envisions the final outcome as "A Better Soviet Union than the Soviets Were" or as facilitators so a better Victimhood-based culture of other peoples can best invade, triuph over, and replace the West with a single better, dominant culture.
The encouraging news is Euros are beginning to sicken of being bashed and demonized..and the Lefty multiculti-banuiel thug-Islamic Alliance
Legrand - The combination of the left and the Islamists promises to be a potent combination as they use our 1st Amendment laws to "deconstruct" our civilization.
Won't happen. The dream of the Left has long been to use the ACLU Jews and other forces to impose on America what they can't through democratic processes by the courts, control of academia, media, and cultural institutions - and wave a copy of the Constitution in the face of anyone that objects to court-ordered abortion, affirmative action, open borders, and terrorist rights. Allying with other anti-West, anti-Christian, anti-American forces - especially the Islamoids - may prove a catastrophic mistake for the Left when their Muslim allies begin another bloody conquest or commit a terrorist act greater than the scale of 9/11.
It's then that the rifles will come out in the existential clash, and all laws and Constitutions (as spun by Lefty judges) waved in the face of the people - will do - is get bullet holes through them or an invite to take them with you as you are expelled to Camel Land.. The law and the Constitution are tools, not ends in themselves or the orders of a Higher God. If they need to be, they can be scrapped and revised - a common pattern in other democracies.
Foolish Kevin - Al Qaida occupy New England (as many here might predict) and Bin Laden sets up Jihadi settlements would it be morally correct to for patriotic Americans to attack these civilian enclaves? It’s a difficult call, many innocent children would be killed, so I would tend to say no.
That is fatuous. An enemy invader is morally impervious to counterattack if the invading army just brings women and children with it? Shame Hitler didn't think of that and set up kindergartens on the Normandy beach heads and the outskirts of Stalingrad. Or the enemy was impervious to any attack on his soil that might kill "children" whom you seem to assign higher rights than equally innocent adult human beings or hapless soldier draftees.
He and his Nazi descendents would have a pretty big empire today, with the Nazi men targeted, but always a new generation of Nazi children growing up to take their place.
A medievalist:
I’m inclined to take the Inquisition’s depiction of the Cathari at face value. Although there are obvious drawbacks in relying upon testimony given on the basis of torture, and one-sided testimony should be treated skeptically, official Church depictions of the Cathar belief system are at least plausible. Gnosticism has been a major strain in and around Christian thought from the religion’s founding, and the Cathar belief system as described sounds like ordinary Gnosticism adapted to local conditions.
Please note that the Mandean Gnostics are followers of John the Baptist who regard Jesus Christ as a false prophet, much as Simon Magus (another Gnostic, according to non-canonical gospels) is regarded in official Christian texts. It would be useful to compare and contrast Mandean Gnosticism and Manicheanism to the Cathar movement (using admittedly biased reports from the Inquisition).
Admittedly, the Cathars do act as something of a cultural Rohrschach test. Still, my point was that the Cathar doctrine inverted the social order of the time. Cathar doctrine was perceived as a mutiny against the Church, and its popularity could be considered to be a function of a sense of cultural mutiny. An anti-materialist philosophy that equated official Christianity with Islam at a time of Crusades would have been regarded as traitorous defeatism.
More than representing any specific doctrine, the Left of the twentieth century seems to have been led by a Zeitgiest of cultural mutiny against established cultural norms. When cultural mutiny and defeatism come together, established forces tend to be hostile. Although no medieval society was “multicultural” in the modern sense, the modern cultural Left and the Church depiction of the medieval Cathars share a sense of excitement at the prospect of subverting the social order.
On Imperialism
Carthage’s child sacrifice only ended under the boot of Roman imperialism. Indian sati only ended under the boot of British imperialism. It is altogether easy in modern times to condemn imperialism, but there are times when enlightened imperialism is the only means to accomplish a good. There was much Belgian umbrage against British imperialists when moral crusaders based in Liverpool exposed atrocities in Congo Free State. And were it not for the ideology of free trade, King Leopold II may not have been deprived of private killing fields. It was shown that free trade was impeded through the enslavement of the local population, as free trade can only exist between free peoples. And it was British imperialism to ban the international slave trade.
Seen in this light, an unequivocal condemnation of imperialism can be regarded as a condemnation of the entire idea of human rights, for the human rights agenda has been the enforcement of certain cultural norms by some people onto others. Empire has its costs, but it also has its benefits, benefits often better appreciated by provincials in the periphery of empire than by those residing in the center of the empire.
Chavo, thanks for your reply, it was helpful.
Alexis - Meanwhile, a multicultural person vacillates between saying "we are all the same" and "celebrating differences". The modern multiculturalist dogma appears to be a modern philosophical reaction to Heidegger.
This idea too, is one of the fundamental problems I've had with the multi-cultural ideology from day one. If human flaws were set aside, then it's possible. Imperfect beings that we are, it will never be practically possible to reconcile this coincidence of celebration of differences with an embrace of similarities.
Of course, I may just be having a reaction to viewing American History X again last night.
The whole subject of race needs less reaction-forming authority-intervention, and more attention to all the spiritual lessons of the ages that speak of individual need to work on one's own soul, or spirit, or heart, however ya wanna say it. Programmatic society-perfectors like Affirmative Action form reactions that subvert the intent. No, more than subvert--obliterate.
Evidence is everywhere. The left will in time have us all against all, each out for only himself.
Just look at how it has always worked in the past, neighbor against neighbor, in a slough of hopeless cynicism.
It doesn't really matter if you're right or wrong, if your sh*t just don't work.
We all need more prune juice, maybe?
well, any fresh fruit, or fruit juice, will help. It's those harsh laxatives that we want to avoid.
:-\
Really liked your comment above. Most of us only address others' shortcomings to make ourselves feel better-- generosity, honest introspection and self-responsibility being in short supply many places. Harsh laxative leftists would fix us through more government than would the Right, although conservatives also use the state for our betterment. Both sides attempt to use moral persuasion, although my side thinks the other side is factually/ perceptionally in error quite a bit. Old story.
Relieved about the prune juice not being so necessary.
"harsh laxative leftists" --LOL. A poifect phrase!
jane,
re: although my side thinks the other side is factually/ perceptionally in error quite a bit
You are, Jane, too kind; and that is the error that we conservatives continue to make. Our opponents ARE in error most of the time; and, as Bill Whittle advises, their comeuppance is long overdue. At every provocation we need to confront them and say unequivocally, "You are either a liar, or insane, or hopelessly stupid." We must stop giving benefit of doubt to idiocy, which reinforces multiculti equivalency, and call it as we see it.
In short, Jane, we are right and they are wrong. Let us celebrate the diversity.
Allen, just remember, you're dealing with full loads of emotion--lead them, don't drive them, if at all possible.
Think of yearling jack mules. Lead them, they'll see the light; drive them and they balk.
Once they learn to balk, there is no solution but the 2x4 upside the head.
...just kidding--i'm really a horse-whisperer. never whup an animal. well maybe a billy goat if he butts you for fun.
Allen, I've tried my best at comeuppances, but despite my being insufferably right :) I apparently need to take in more fruit (unless the many cases of fermented grape juice now appearing on my doorstep will do the trick.)
You and Larsen, though, can be VERY persuasive. May the rest of us join you in a fig and face-off with the enemy at the Barnes & Noble book counter, DU, over the fence, and at the local hipster theater where we could dispense delicious dried cranberries and the truth? Very few of us here need convincing- we just end up talking way into separate corners of the same room :)
talking *our* way. Those cases are closed, i swear
great--i can see 'em dragging Allen out of Barnes & Noble feet first, with him fighting madly, dragging down stacks of "It Takes A Village" all the way--
buddy larsen,
re: 2X4
I have in mind the launch of the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics (2656 pp) into the lap of Rosie, with the admonition, “Read. This proves you wrong, you ignorant cow!”
Bill Buckley made a fortune conscientiously debating imbeciles. His brilliance changed none. If Buckley’s wit could not succeed, nothing can.
Pardon me, if I seem abrupt. Some days you just have to say, “F’m”.
I dunno about that--some say Buckley and Robert Bartley @ WSJ almost single, okay, double, handedly prevented the first attack on candidate Reagan ("lightweight hollywood") from gathering critical mass. The Reagan Revolution may yet prove to've been a rear guard action--but at least the fight didn't end with a Carter II (which would've meant something worse than catastrophic disaster).
buddy larsen,
re: dragging Allen
You forgot to say anything about my blood pressure. My wife always does;-)
I am still laughing at the vision!
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