Tuesday, July 26, 2011

"review of the far-right": the shifting sands of politics

In the wake of the terrible massacre in Norway, UK Prime Minister David Cameron has ordered a review of the far-right, which is apparently to include the English Defence League.

Things had been going so well: the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph had dropped the "far" tag and started referring to the EDL merely as "right-wing" (although given its predominabtly blue-collar membership a survey of union membership among EDL members might be instructive). The organisation has been steadily winning a better reputation among the police-forces with whom it consults and cooperates before and during demos; and, almost alone, it has shone a searchlight into the shadier corners of Blackpool, where 14-year old Cheryl Downes was groomed for sex, murdered and disemboweled by kebab-shop owners.

Describing other people's politics is often relative to where you are standing. Remember the fall of the Soviet empire, when Russian communists suddenly became right-wingers, in a clear indication that the term was indication of disapproval as opposed to marking a sea-change in Politburo direction?

Just so, Dave Prentis, general secretary of the public trade union Unison, writes that "violent racist attacks and intimidation by the far-right is on the rise in Europe and we must take that threat seriously". However, an "Islamophobia" resource in the union's website gives the game away: "centre-right politicians across Europe pretend that majority cultures are somehow under threat from Muslim minorities" (my italics). for "centre-right", read conservative parties, ie the socialist shibboleth that to be conservative is synonymous with racist, discriminatory and, ultimately, murderous.

I am not against having a debate about the role of right-wing politics in Europe, because debate is necessary for a healthy democracy. I just wonder how we will fare at the hands of, say, the BBC, which at its most centrist is the cultural wing of the Labour Party and extends leftwards from there, to depths from where anywhere to the right of Ed Balls must seem an awfully long way away.

For the record, I wish to quote what Anders Breivik said about the English Defence League. It would turn my stomach to provide a link to the maniac's document - if you need to find it, you can hardly avoid it. On page 1436, he states:
The EDL are in fact anti-racist, anti-fascist and anti-Nazi. They even have many members and leaders with non-European background (African and Asian). They have worked so hard, and continue to work hard, to keep National Socialists out of the organization, but yet they are strategically labeled as racist-fascist-Nazi-monsters by the multiculturalist authorities. The EDL, although having noble intentions are in fact dangerously naïve. EDL and KT [the murderer's putative organisation] principles can never be reconciled as we are miles apart ideologically AND organizationally. The EDL even rejects taking a stand against multiculturalism which proves that they are even more naïve than Sarkozy, Merkel and Cameron who have all admitted that multiculturalism has been a failure and a disaster for Europe.

...The EDL, on the other hand, IS a democratic movement. They STILL believe that the democratic system can solve Britain’s problems… This is why the EDL harshly condemns any and all revolutionary conservative movements that employ terror as a tool, such as the KT. And this is why, we, the KT view the EDL as naïve fools, wasting all their energy monkeyscreaming to deaf ears while they should instead have focused on means and methods that are meaningful in regards to achieving true political change, in regards to tearing down the multiculturalist regime known as Britain.
I feel sullied for just having quoted him - join the dots yourself. And while you do, if you are in any way counter-hegemonic - a member of the EDL, perhaps, or a home-schooling parent, or a maverick trades-union member who won't tow the party line - keep listening for the midnight knock on the door.

May God be with those who died in Norway, and those left behind.