The one that’s come up in particular is sexuality, after a long and rather roving conversation with a friend on the subject. Western society is obsessed with sex, or at least the part that we get to see in the media on a regular basis. This obsession with sex is alleged to be an enlightened view, a liberation from teh sexually repressive attitudes of yore but it’s still an obsession with sex. Everything is seen through the lens of sexual intercourse, or is tinted by the believe that every single human activity is ultimately about sex. This isn’t surprising, when you realise how sexually obsessed the people creating and sustaining this belief are.

The reason I’m bringing this up is because of how damaging it is to relationships. Most obvious is the idea that every relationship is about sex, which makes it hard for men and women to be mere friends. I know from experience of the “behind the scenes” life of media types that the general perception in the media is that when a man seeks any sort of relationship with a woman, it’s because he’s ultimately or primarily after sex. One could spend hours blaming this or that mode of political thought (especially the whole Freudian interpretation of relationships that permeates the collective mind of the media class) but that might be counter-productive – and, to be honest, I don’t have any papers or books to reference on the subject, which makes it a little hard to produce a coherent and well-founded argument.

As I said, the concept of relationships-as-sex is damaging to the individual in obvious ways, but also less obvious ways. The same misunderstanding of the motivations for human behaviour influence the understanding of sexuality as well. This will take a little while to explain, and on top it necessitates putting out a little bit of information that I’ve tended to keep secret up until now because of the misunderstandings that surround it:I am bisexual.

It might not surprise some people who know me but I’m damn sure it’d surprise others to learn this. But what do I mean by bisexual? The popular (and, as far as I’m concerned, wrong) understanding of the term incorporates a wide gamut of definitions and behaviours but, as far as I’m concerned, bisexuality means that a person wants to experience a sexual relationship with both men and women.

Now, being a Christian I wouldn’t want to engage in promiscuous sexual behaviour. Being married, I have vows to maintain, and because I love my wife completely, I can’t really countenance having an intimate relationship with anyone else. Absent those conditions I’d have a slight interest in sex with men, but then absent those conditions I wouldn’t be me.

By this definition bisexuality is fairly simple. It’s about sex. The problem is, relationships more often than not aren’t about sex but about closeness and intimacy. Not “intimacy” in the modern understanding, which is again coloured by the assumption that it necessarily requires a sexual component, but intimacy in an older, more defined meaning of the term that would have been familiar to the writers of pre- and early-post-renaissance romances. The crude term often used is “platonic” or idealised love but that doesn’t really cover it; the word “platonic” is thrown around as often as the word “love” these days, without any real understanding of it’s meaning. Intimacy as I’m trying to define it is the sort of knowledge of the inner soul, the intimacy of life-long companions who know each other’s needs and desires and motivations so implicitly that they often don’t have to speak to communicate. The intimacy of Frodo and Sam from the lord of the rings is often given as an example, but in more general terms the intimate closeness of any partnership that has survived adversity, either of events or simply time.

The post-modern, sex-obsessed world of the media considers such intimacy to be obviously homosexual in nature, because for all their talk about enlightenment they can’t see past their genitals. At one level it’s fun to joke about a gay relationship between Frodo and Sam but, at the same time, it reduces something that is very powerful down to the base and carnal. The idea that two men can be affectionate towards each other without there being some level of homosexuality underpinning the affection has distorted society’s view of relationships to an enormous degree, to the point where you have a lot of people who have accepted the false label of homosexuality or bisexuality for what are perfectly natural, non-sexual behaviours, or who suppress any sort of intimate behaviour, towards both men and women, out of fear of being perceived as “gay”, or less masculine.

It is actually possible to find the male form attractive without being sexually interested in it, and it’s possible for men to be affectionate with other men at a very intimate level without ever having any sort of sexual involvement. The problem is that society, as arbitrated by the media, assigns these behaviours to a sexual foundation rather than one of innocent intimacy.

When I say “I am bisexual” I mean that I find both men and women sexually attractive. I have a rather high sex drive and, if not for my faith, would have very little taste or discernment when it came to sexual partners. This has absolutely no bearing on whether or not I love them and find intimacy with them appealing because, despite the contemporary reductionist belief that all human activity stems from the desire to mate (a belief that was hammered home constantly by the media establishment types when I was at university), sex does not equate to intimacy and sexuality is not love. It is possible to know someone intimately without sex ever coming (so to speak) into the equation. It is possible to love someone so deeply that you would sacrifice everything for them, without every being sexually attracted to them. Our impoverished linguistic understanding of “love” cannot really describe the concept without taking up several paragraphs (in fact C.S Lewis had to take up an entire book – well worth the read, incidentally), and even then the definition is cognitively tainted by the subconscious filtration of love through the concept of sexuality as the primary metaphysical urge. To the post-modern mind, the mind that currently dominates our culture, everything is motivated by sex. The concept that two people can love each other innocently, that love and sexuality are actually separate and sometimes contradictory drives, is alien to a psyche so dominated by an obsession with the sensual that it can no longer understand the spiritual. Even those who claim to be seeking a spiritual understanding tend to let slip that they’re seeking a spiritual experience, falling back to their sensual or “soulish” interaction with the world. But that’s another rant for another day.

It’s a done deal. A fait acomplis. No way out of it In the process of this constitution treaty becoming law I learned something about my father that I didn’t really want to learn, but which, perhaps, is inevitable. Brave as he is, free thinker that he is and smart as he is – god knows where that bit went, I sure didn’t get it – he sees no point in fighting. On his sixtieth birthday my uncle and his family came to visit. My uncle is Irish to the bone and a fighter like his forebears, and was in typically rambunctious mood over the possibility that Cameron would backtrack on his promise to hold a referendum on the Lisbon treaty, taxes in general and the terrible fate awaiting politicians he despised, which would be all of them. Dad’s attitude was… knuckle down, try to pay as little as possible and try not to catch their attention. Don’t make an issue out of it and they won’t come after you. And yesterday, I brought up the issue of the treaty and the referendum being called off, expecting at least indignation or agreement that Something Should Be Done. He replied that nothing could be done. It’s law now.

Recently I’ve been feeling a little nagging voice that says it’s not worth fighting any more. It says give up and live your life as best you can. It’s the voice that no doubt millions have heard in the past as they worked around and behind the back of the system imposed on them by autocrats, trying to claw back as much if their pittance as they could from the maw of the state whilst avoiding its notice. I feel… it would be so easy to just go back to sleep. But, I’m young(ish) and still have a long life ahead of me. I think dad has decided to listen to that voice. He no doubt feels he deserves some peace in his life after the constant up and down of the last couple of decades. No doubt he doesn’t want to go back to the days when we lived on the edge of starving and he sees that any resistance to the growth of the EU in our lives would threaten the relative stability we’ve achieved as a family. He’s proud. I’m proud, which is why I hear the same voice.

I have, in the past, encountered people who assume that the country as a whole is populated by sheep who are so dumb they’ll follow any siren voice (mixing metaphors is fun!) but I think I discovered the truth today. Not sheep. My country is proud, far too proud to admit it has taken the wrong path. My people, all the peope who live here, refuse to accept that they collectively made a mistake in joining and remaining in the EU.

It is far easier to manipulate a proud people than it is to manipulate sheep. The metaphorical sheep will follow the loudest voice and can be snatched away by another in moments. A proud people are much harder to set on a course but, once set on it, are harder still to turn away or convince of their folly. In good times such pride will lead to great heroism and accomplishment, the refusal to stand down in the face of total defeat and the “stiff upper lip” of fable. In bad times, it leads to the tragedy of Scott and the rout of the Indian Mutiny, the bloody mess of the civil war and the loss of an empire.

God once called his people stiff-necked. Stubborn, like an ass, which has its good points but made them hard to save. I suspect the Israelites are not alone in this state of mind.

It’s a pretty controversial statement, I agree, but it’s true. We cannot change the world.

We fight, but our governments and their useful idiots ignore us. We protest and they call us “racist” and “haters”. We ask only that we be allowed to share our views and they call us “intolerant”. The way things stand we are not able, and will not be able, to make an effective change. We will be condemned to forever flit around the edges of society, holding aloft the guttering torch of truth as the crowd turns its back on us, preferring the self-inflicted twilight of its own company. In that situation we cannot effect any change because to do so would require overwhelming power, and overwhelming power – the power to force people to take our views – would destroy us utterly.

But that isn’t why we don’t matter.

Islam has that power. Islam has the power to overthrow governments at a snails pace. It has the power to discredit dissent, emotionally and reputationally destroy its opposition. It has the power of government and keeps the people in darkness, by telling them that the light of truth is a lie. It hides behind tolerance and screams “racist” at the people who oppose it, and uses that same government and those same useful idiots to do the hard work so it doesn’t get its lilly-white hands dirty. It enslaves and ensnares and is at the point, now, where overthrow by the means we employ is virtually impossible, or would take so long that it cannot hope to succeed in time.

But that isn’t why we don’t matter.

Several events happened this year, largely unremarked, that dictate how the world will be shaped for the next 20 or 30 years.

First, we reached a new record of “spotless days” for the sun. The sun is at a solar minima not seen since modern records began, and estimated as similar to that preceeding the Maunder Minimum, which coincided with the little ice-age. Though the mechanism is not fully understood there is a definite causal link between sun-spot activity, cloud-cover and temperature.

Second, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, or PDO, did what in the parlance would be called a “flip”. It reversed. The PDO is a well-known cycle of currents and temperatures in the pacific ocean that periodically moves through warm and cold phases. The most recent flip has brought it into a cold phase.

Third, the push for “green energy” has finally resulted in the application of CO2 emission controls being implemented in EU member states. The significant part of this is that many power stations are now no longer operating at anywhere near their peak capacity. In order to comply with the new regulations many large coal-fired energy producers are required to effectively switch off for up to half the year.

The result is that we are facing an effective energy capacity shortfall just when we are apparently entering a period of global cooling. In the UK, there is no margin in our capacity. One power station going offline will result in a shortfall large enough to see a city the size of nottingham without power. Given the fragility of the UK’s power distribution it is unlikely that such an event would be isolated. Sudden drops in supply tend to create conditions that trigger other generators to cut themselves off, in a cascade event similar to the New York power cuts several years ago.

The last time such a production shortfall occurred the British government fell, bringing in the Thatcher government. This time we face potential shortfalls across the entire continent of Europe, within and without the entire European Union, already destabilised by the global financial situation.

This is why we don’t matter. In a year or or two, or three from now the EU will be collapsing, the current order will be falling apart. Our efforts to foment change are going to be overtaken by worldwide events. As civilisation appears to collapse Islam will attempt to wrest control, far too soon.

The devil and Islam both play their hands too soon. And then the truth will be out there, finally.

I’m saying this for two reasons: First, so that we don’t get hubristic about the changes that will occur and try to say that it was all down to us. We can take advantage of the situation to reveal the truth but we cannot claim credit for it. The people I consider my friends won’t do this, but there are others who will.

Second, I say this in order to encourage hope, that once these events occur our efforts will matter, we will be able to effect change. People will listen. The light of truth shines brightest in the dark.

Yeah.

Seriously though I realised withdrawing myself from the conversations was actually arrogance, assuming I was better than people simply because I didn’t agree with them. Then I spotted my quite up top and remembered myself again. So that’s that out of the way.

Recently I have noticed attempts to frame the current conflict in terms that make it “pro”. The naming of things is an important step in a man’s attempt to deal with those things. We name diseases because we want to know what we’re facing. We name foes. We find out the name of our enemies whenever possible. We even name the weather. Hurricane. Storm. We anthropomorphise it too, with gods and spirits and the like. Loki and Thor, Hurricane (again), Jove. The angel of death. We humans desire concrete enemies with names because a named enemy is easier to fight.

I’ve found, generally, that man stands a far better chance of fighting against something than for something. A minority will have the noble ideal of fighting for freedom, for justice but the vast majority couldn’t give a flying fig. They fight for money, and they fight against the bad guys. The current attempt to frame our fight in terms of “for civilisation” or “fir the west” might work for the noble few, but the majority want a baddie they can take pot-shots at. Why else would Bush Derangement Syndrome be so prevalent on the left if not for the fact that people need a bogey-man to blame their ills on? What did Bush do to them? Not much… but he’s symbolic.

Likewise we really need something to fight against. The ates of Vienna post I linked above contains an attempt (derailed, sadly) to discuss what we should collectively call ourselves. The most popular term up to now has been counterjihad. Against Jihad. We fight to counter it. It works, it creates a unifying common purpose. Unfortunately there are always people who try and frame the fight in terms of what are we fighting for? High ideals, of freedom, of western civilisation and the like are wheeled out. People start to argue over what, exactly, these things mean. What is freedom? What ios freedom in the United States, vs freedom in France, or England? What is western civilisation? Is it McDonalds? Is it Ikea, or Barcelona, or the louvre? Is it the highlands of Scotland or the walls of Byzantium?

Deciding what we’re fighting for is perhaps something best left for when we’ve beaten what we’re fighting against.

Gates of Vienna, more than any other blog, got me into this whole blogging thing. The Baron and Dymphna, and many of their commenters, are fine, upstanding, intelligent, witty – all those lovely descriptions you want to give to people but never really have the time, or if you do have the time it doesn’t quite seem appropriate, or… well, I’m rambling again. The short version is: they’re great. Unfortunately I feel I have to withdraw from regular commenting on GoV.

Two reasons. First, and probably foremost, my comments were getting long. We’re talking essays. I only did a few of that length but, each time, I was aware that they were pushing the limit of politeness. One or two transformed into posts here at the Muse, which is always nice. At some point it becomes impolite to keep using another’s blog for your own posting, so I’m setting a fairly strict word limit; anything over the top comes here as a post.

Second, and I have to be frank, the commentary has degenerated into a howling, vicious mob. GoV has always been about unity in the face of a common enemy and for a while that was understood, but it seems that the attack by LGF has had a profound psychological effect on everyone involved. We’re bickering. We’re arguing, picking each other apart and for what? To prove that America is the best, or that europe is the best; that some race or other is inferior; that x version of christianity is the truth faith and y is the spawn of satan. How in the hell are we meant to face our enemy when we make enemies of each other wityh such ease? The mullahs must be laughing their arses off at the sight of such disarray. It angers me up quite thoroughly. It’s another example of the ignorance I’ve ranted about here in the past; carrying on with a stupid idea or quest in the face of overwhelming evidence. Having knowledge and ignoring it. Ignorance.

Baron, Dymphna and the sane denizens of GoV, I thank you for everything, but it’s time I moved on for a while. Frankly if I stick around I’ll just make a complete tit of myself. I can only assume that this is a temporary thing, that the bickering will die down again when people reach an equilibrium, but until that happens I just can’t be involved, as I would only make things worse with my presence.

LGF is curiously silent on the matter. Possibly Charles is observing his 24 hour rule but it’s been a bit more than that already, and at last one commenter has decided to use this as an example of why LGF is so morally superior to us european anti-jahadist types.

Quoted in full from a comment on LGF

#749 Syrah 1/04/08 8:25:28 am reply quote report 0

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Re:

British blogger faces arrest for “inciting racial hatred” instapundit.com
Former Belgian (Spinoff)

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This link takes us to Instupundent, then to Gates of Vienna, where the Baron Discusses the case of Lionheart who is apparently “going to be arrested by British detectives on suspicion of Stirring up Racial Hatred by displaying written material” contrary to sections 18(1) and 27(3) of the Public Order Act 1986.”

Islam is not a Race.

Those of our former allies who have allowed the Anti-Jihad effort to be associated with racialism are now being caught up in the snares of their own making.

By associating their cause in Europe with racialists of the likes of Vlaams Belaang and the BNP, they have rendered themselves unable to offer up any kind of credible defense against this type of charge. They have put themselves in the position of having little more to say in the witness stand accept “yes, but. . . ” which is about the shittiest defense a person can have.

Snares of our own making…

As if the VB issue somehow allowed the government of Europe and its provincial representatives the excuse to start prosecuting people against who they had no power. Bullshit! The provisions of the act are just loose enough to allow “race” to mean whatever the prosecution wants it to mean, and this has been known since the most recent update to act was first mooted. In fact in its original form this amendment specifically outlawed criticism of Islam as a religion, and was dialed back to be about “race” (as defined by the prosecution, remember) after a huge outcry by just about everyone except muslims. This idiot thinks that the VB drama is providing an excuse… Sorry mate, they never needed an excuse, and a lot of people have already been prosecuted under this act for “race hatred” after criticising muslims, because they, Muslims, call it race hatred and the fucking legal system agrees with them!

Ignorance! God help me, you people, RESEARCH before you start spouting off for christ’s sake…

See? Nazi salute!

Anyone can make any symbol mean anything they want if they try hard enough. It is very easy to prove that the US is becoming fascist if you dig just a little.

And what does all of that prove? That the US is really the new nazi germany? Or that, just perhaps, people should step back and try to get a bit of context before passing judgement on an entire continent. Of course Fred isn’t a nazi, and of course the United States isn’t the new fascist oligarchy but, then, neither is fascism making a comeback over here. The “evidence” is a bunch of and out-of-context video and still images and commentary from people who have a vested interest in proving that fascism exists and is ready to take over the whole of Europe – so they can discredit any movement that tries to strip power from the state and return it to the people by characterising it as “fascist” and “nazi”.

So willing are certain parties to prove their point that they completely ignore the reality of the situation in Belgium, siding with the socialist waloons against the free-market flemish in an argument that has very profound repercussions for the whole of Europe and, in many ways, the entire world. Again, I have to stress that I have always tried to dispell accusations of ignorance and whatever levelled at Americans by people I know – accusations themselves often based on ignorance – but when I see such profound ignorance as that displayed by the commenters at LGF I do sometimes wonder if it’s worth the effort…

As I said, the Web2.0 generation. It’s a moniker that was originally adopted by technologists for the next generation of network architecture and infrastructure, but it’s quickly turned in to a farce, in which any company wanting to sound “new” and “fresh” and up-to-date simply has to slap a bit of Ajax onto its website, digg it and slap a “beta” tag somewhere on the page. So much of this technology recreates what was already there, but it does it with nice rounded corners. It ignores history. It ignores people. Ultimately it ignores everything that doesn’t agree with it.

In that context, I suppose, it’s no surprised that LGF has a similar mindset. Like me, Charles is a programmer (though he’s more proficient than I am, I suspect) and, like me, he’s quite keen on the technology involved. Unlike me he doesn’t seem to be able to see past shiny and new to the historical underpinnings of what he’s doing. Web2.0 is trying to divorce the web from its roots. LGF is trying to divorce the defence of the west from its roots. Those roots, here, on this side of the atlantic, run very deep and very wide. Culture and the national ideal are far more important for Europeans than they seem to be for Americans. This is fine. America was built like the original internet, loosely, from what was available, improving what needed to be improved and leaving the rest as is. It was very simple and very clever, like TCP is simple and clever. It works.

It isn’t Europe, though. The US cannot understand Europe. I can barely understand Europe and it’s “only” 300 miles away but, I think, I understand it better than Charles and his minions at LGF. Their lack of understanding becomes obvious when they start to equate any expression of a desire for self-determination in a european context as automatically being national socialism. They seem to view Europe as an older version of the US, as something that can be moulded to be identical. It can’t. You lot need to understand, history runs deep here. I’m sitting in a house that is nearly two centuries old and it sits on the foundations of houses that stretch back almost a millennium. My mother’s family have worked the mines and mills of Lancashire for as long as those mines and mills have existed, and before that they worked the land and farms of the same area for hundreds of years. My father’s family has a similar story, split between Stockport and Scotland. History runs deep. History binds us to these lands.

I’m not proposing a “blood and soil” definition of nationalism but it has to be appreciated that so much of European nationalism is based in a continuity of culture and history. The sense of place is as important as the sense of purpose. The US is built entirely on purpose and isn’t yet old enough to have developed a sense of place, but it will develop and is developing. Places like Texas and Virginia seem to have it in spades.

People develop this sense of place if they stay in the same area long enough. I don’t personally have it as such; my family have been highly mobile for most of my life so I tend to identify with the family rather than the house, but I understand it because in the wider context I do have it. I’m English. To be English is as much an identification with England the land as it is with English culture and English moral values. The Yorkshire dales, the hills of derbyshire, the vales of the Thames, the cliffs at Dover, all of these are as much a part of being English as magna carta, the bill of rights and the ancient freedoms they preserve.

The denizens of LGF don’t understand this. A lot of Americans don’t understand this. They see nationalism appealing to love of a place and start to think of German national socialism in the 30s. They see nazis everywhere because nationalism in Europe is based as much on a sense of location as anything else. This is a fundamental error, though. The reason Nazism appealed to the german people was because it consciously identified itself with pre-existent national feelings. It consciously identified itself with the sense of place that already existed, and then tacked on the racist elements afterwards, elements that weren’t extant in nationalism prior were attached in order to take advantage of Germany’s resentment at its treatment after the great war; Germanyh’s national pride had taken a huge dent, perhaps rightfully so, but at that point they were seeking a nationalist leader. They got Hitler, who took their nationalism and attached his own frightful abominations to it.

The point of this is that nationalism alone is not sufficient cause to claim someone is racist. The use of symbols associated with nationalism is also not sufficient cause to call someone a racist. Sufficient cause would come from, say, VB running on a platform of authoritarian socialism coupled with ethnic cleansing or oppression of the undesirable ethnic groups. That thesis falls apart when it’s realised that VB is calling for smaller government and is a party that is only calling for a control of immigration, not a dportation of naturalised citizens.

In fact, the Wallonian leadership fits the bill much better, what with their historical policies toward the Flemish people and language, and their socialist exploitation of the Flemish economy… but they don’t have Odin’s cross on their bookshelf so they must be fine.

I’M A FUCKING COMMUNIST!!!

Or at least I am if you apply the purity tests at LGF. Last time I checked the six degrees of association was an interesting theory about how everyone is only six contacts away from someone famous or noteworthy, not a test of their idealogical cohesion.

Someone better hide all those pictures of Bush shaking hands with saudi princes and chinese communists cos that makes him a rat-bastard communist muslim! At least according to the tests applied by LGF…

If you can’t already tell, I’m jaded. My pro-american sentiment has plunged rapidly over the past couple of weeks largely because of the sheer ignorance displayed by LGF posters. The historical integrity of national boundaries is called “isolated factions“, one of the founding organisers of Vigilant Freedom and SIOE is called “that ‘christine’“, and she’s “at it again”, as if having the temerity to defend against slurs and libel is somehow, well, wrong. They regularly attack Paul Belien and the Brussels Journal for “racism”, apparently taking the Belgian legal definition of that term which was designed to squash freedom of speech. So yes, my opinion of Americans has gone down rather rapidly in recent days. For a while I was willing to forgive the lack of knowledge about European history as just that; lack of knowledge. How many people would be interested in what this king did to that king in the 1500s after all?

But, then, that was from people who weren’t dictating policy to us. I don’t consider myself to be “European”. I’m British; more to the point I’m English. We’re different to them, separated by dint of geography long enough to evolve a radically different society, that forms the basis of much of the United State’s legal and societal mores today. However, we are often considered to be “European” by Americans, so when I see unqualified references to Europe from American posters I tend to assume they’re including us as a matter of course. And this pisses me off. Why? Because of what they say. Terms that would have Jesse Jackson up your arse so hard he’d pop out of your nose if they were applied to blacks are casually thrown at “us” from across the Atlantic with an arrogance I can only assume is brought about by that same lack of knowledge. The recent controversy over Vlaams Belang is an example of this; we’re all racists, nazis, white supremacists and bigots simply because we stand up for a party that, yes, has some controversy in its past. The guilt by association thing…

I have doubts about several members of VB, but their policies are about as unlike national socialism as you can get. Their own policies, if implemented, would prevent them from carrying out the kind of racial slaughter Charles and the LGF crew seem to be envisioning.

The comments I’ve been reading today have put my blood pressure up something rotten. People who have very little knowledge of the history of this place are pronouncing on recent events as if they know everything. Well, again, it’s forgivable if they’re willing to listen to some of the explanations. It’s unforgivable when they aren’t. It becomes not mere lack of knowledge, but willful ignorance, which might best be defined as being unwilling to learn. I despise ignorance. Despise it. Lack of knowledge can be remedied by a little education, but ignorance, the act of ignoring knowledge, cannot be forgiven.

The irony of this is, it’s that exact sort of ignorance that Americans are often criticised for – wrongly, in many cases, as lack of knowledge is assumed to be ignorance. But, again, why would they care about old kings if they aren’t getting involved? But now LGF is involved. Its commenters are trying to shout down the first attempt at organising a resistance to the Islamic threat because their lack of knowledge about the situation prevents them from making a proper assessment. That lack of knowledge became ignorance when they refused to listen to reason, when they started rejecting counter-arguments out of hand, when they started throwing accusations of racism and bigotry at people who only want to see their culture saved. These… people, are the very stereotype of ignorant, loud, obnoxious Americans that I have spent so many years trying to demonstrate didn’t exist.

It’s been a rude shock. I have friends in the states, from whom I’ve learned a great deal about American cultures, and who have learned a great deal from me about English cultures and history. I supported the Iraq war, and much of Bush’s foreign policy (though not all, obviously; some things, like the constant pressure on Israel to “compromise” with their would-be murderers, are just stupid) and I admired – still admire – the founding principles of the United States and its constitution. Unfortunately I am now faced with the knowledge that the US is full of very stupid people, who prefer to speak from ignorance rather than wait a moment to learn and speak from authority and knowledge.

I had planned to emigrate there at one point. I like the US, I love its culture and even some of the food. Not now… I wouldn’t be able to stand being surrounded by LGF commenters. I can imagine their reaction to this as well: “Good! We don’t want no euro nazi slimeballs here! It isn’t the Reich country for you white supremacist folks! Don’t let the door hit you on the way out!”

Based on insults hurled at Fjordman and other defenders of the SIOE conference.

The absolute irony of all of this is that these people seem willing to believe the European Union’s classification of VB as “far right”, which is just a codeword for neo-nazi. Quite apart from the fact that the Nazi party was not right wing in any way shape or form, they ignore the fact, the fact, that the EU is the real fascist threat. They are taking away our democracy, and yet I see LGF commenters praising the bastards for bringing “peace”. Peace! The EU claims it brought about peace when it didn’t even fucking exist! And now it’s taking away our rights, our nationhood, our freedom and these fuckers praise it!

According to their own reasoning that makes the whole of LGF a fascist organisation.

How’s that for guilt by association?

The blessing and curse of the internet is that things once said can never be unsaid, no matter what your subsequent views. A blessing, because such things can be used to reveal double-talk and outright lies, which LGF excelled at in the not so distant past; but a curse, in that anything you might say will forever be available for others to attack you no matter what decisions you make afterwards.

The whole farago has now reached the point where even Robert Spencer, who spoke at the SIOE conference in Brussels not so long ago, is starting to make distancing noises about some of the people that took part. The problem seems to be that Spencer has not yet examined the evidence presented, and is relying on the word of his friend, Charles Johnson of LGF. This is of course entirely understandable, however it must be pointed out that every objection Spencer has raised has already been answered.

European politics are not the same as US politics, no matter how people might want to think otherwise. Simplistic statements in the vein of “The right in europe is authoritarian” or various versions of the idea that all europeans are racist are, frankly, hogwash. Rhetorical nonsense. It would be so easy to dismiss the last few weeks as politicking by far-right groups who are trying to hijack the anti-jihad movements, but that ignores just about everything that has actually happened on the ground and the historical roots of the movements that are getting involved. There is a wider context than simply fighting Islam. Europe has “history”, in the same way that a separated couple or a criminal and the detective who have played cat and mouse for 30 years have “history”. To simply dismiss a party like VB as racist and far-right ignores their stated goals, but it also ignores the stated and unstated goals of the people that oppose them. VB threatens the entire political order of the European Union by pushing for the secession of Flanders. It threatens the very raison d’etre of the entire project by proposing a national solution to problems that were created by a supranational organisation. The EU is predicated on the destruction of national identity and anything that promotes national identity must therefore be taken out of play; it is deemed racist, xenophobic, hateful. The very concept of patriotism and national pride are opposed by the EU and its camp.

Those people, the ones that opposed VB, also oppose us. The EU is now openly – in its fashion – moving to incorporate large parts of the Mahgreb in to a “Mediterranean” extension of the Union, shifting the focus east and south, away from the old christian centre of Europe toward an islamically oriented centre. The first public inkling of this was proposed by Sarkozy not long after he was elected, as an alternative to Turkey’s accession, but this is like the many non-official institutions and agencies that the EU has been setting up in recent years, many of which form the seeds of governmental institutions, and that will be incorporated as such under the provisions of the Lisbon treaty – the “reform” treaty that is the EU constitution in all but name.

It is this background against which the association with VB and SD must be viewed. They are a means to open up a second front against the threat we face. Shutting them out now won’t doom us, but it will set us back years in the long run.