See my recent post in the "Challenging Postmodernism" thread. It seems to me that the Fascism of the Left will force the Fascism of the Right... and it seems to me that it is intended to do just that.
Well... this trend has been on-going for a while. If you look at the discussion that are taking place on the Right (on Twitter, Youtube or website like Quillette), you can clearly see the rise of fascism and authoritarianism. Besides, the Right use the same tactics as the left and I don't even think the people on the Right or anti-left are that much different from those bloody liberals. "Free speech" is just a pretty word they use to cover their BS. It's not the left we should, but the backlash of the right, imo.
Well, actually, the Left is way more fascist at present than the Right. That's why the Right types are so slow to get moving and active against it; they are still thinking that sanity might prevail. But there is no sanity on the Left at all anymore thanks to Postmodernism and I would submit that this was intentional to some extent. McCarthy was right: Hollywood and Academia were infested with Communists, it just wasn't the purely Russian kind. A whole generation of teachers were trained in this hot-house Marxist/Utopian atmosphere and they have been teaching the youngsters that are now reaching maturity, so the infection has spread.
You really need to catch up on some reading perhaps starting with "The Righteous Mind" by Jonathan Haidt.
Yes, I'm reading Haidt at the moment and I'm familiar with his general arguments. Indeed the left is more fascist than the right at the moment, but I don't see that much redeeming quality to those on the right either. There's lot of nonsense being spread around on that side too. And I do think that there are some topics that are "forbidden" in a way on the right (i.e no criticism of the US). Though obviously, it's not quite the same as what is happening on the left. What would a movement from the right who is active against the left would look like to you?
Yes, I'm reading Haidt at the moment and I'm familiar with his general arguments. Indeed the left is more fascist than the right at the moment, but I don't see that much redeeming quality to those on the right either. There's lot of nonsense being spread around on that side too. And I do think that there are some topics that are "forbidden" in a way on the right (i.e no criticism of the US). Though obviously, it's not quite the same as what is happening on the left. What would a movement from the right who is active against the left would look like to you?
I think these days it's important to really, really pay attention to what's happening and not fall into simplistic "camp thinking". Since you mentioned Quillette - I don't see a lot of nonsense there, but real journalism and many interesting and sound pieces. It's not "right-wing", at least not yet, but common sense, intelligent discussion and "centrist" opinions similar to the best the mainstream media had to offer 20 years ago. It's mostly a very reasonable crowd IMO, with blind spots when it comes to imperialism, Western meddling and so on.
Now contrast that to the postmodern left - here you have pure fascism, insanity and evilness. To read what's happening in universities, with activists, and the complacent goons in the media and politics that seem totally in the grip of this insanity, makes one's blood boil. And there lies the danger: quite frankly, there IS an evil part in me that wouldn't mind a bunch of stormtroopers storming gender studies faculties and eliminate this perverse, fascist and abusive pest. And I was a leftist most of my life! So better keep those sentiments in check!
So if that were to happen, what would be accomplished? The reasonable critics of left-wing insanity would be drowned out, any genuine leftist idea (such as about imperialism and Western meddling) would become suspect (this is already happening), and the crowd would cheer as the postmodernists are rounded up. "First they came for the postmodernists, and nobody said anything, then they came for the reasonable leftists and nobody said anything, then they came for the Muslims..."
But let's see how this all plays out, we don't know yet. There are a million possibilities. Our job is not to get side-tracked by all these polarizations and fights and emotions, and stay firm in our conscience and form our opinions based on truth as best we can; and the truth transcends all camps.
That is because of this, that I said that for me the backlash of the right is to fear more than the left. *You* can keep it in check. But how many people will? Taking into consideration that there are more people on the right or anti-left. BTW, I did read Detmer. Finished it a few days ago.
See my recent post in the "Challenging Postmodernism" thread. It seems to me that the Fascism of the Left will force the Fascism of the Right... and it seems to me that it is intended to do just that.
Ya'll might want to check out today's post on my FB page:
The more I think about the issue and the historical precedents, and how things "come around again", it seems to me that the experimental trial of the Nazis (as the Cs referred to it, a "trial run") has a few nuances that should be considered.
Back then, it was the National Socialists - basically, Leftists much like those today, though the ideology had a different slant - coming up in a single country and taking over. Then, they began to attempt to enforce their Leftist ideology on everyone around them. That led to a major reaction from the REST of the world, and the result was 65 million dead.
Today, there are camps of Leftists in many countries, and in many cases they are dominant in academia and government - elite enclaves - so clearly there is an ideological switcheroo. But we should not be confused by this because Lobaczewski explains the issues of ideologies quite well. So there are these Nazi/Leftists trying to impose their vision on everyone else and the result will be the same snap-back from the masses of ordinary people, driven into the arms of the far Right in self-defense, and what do you have? Global revolution. Instead of the rest of the world against Germany, Japan, Italy, it will be INSIDE different countries.
Well, I think it will happen in somewhat different ways and to different levels in different places, but in the US, where there has been no war on their own soil for over 150 years, I rather suspect it will be a big, bloody mess.
So, Laura, as you mention it AND live in France, is it true that there were several assaults on butchers in France by vegans/vegetarians? One man even killed by Muslims because of his profession?
_Frankreichs Metzger haben Angst vor militanten Veganern
Headline translated: Butchers of France fear militant vegans
I came across this news today and the comment section was full of "another fake story (although butchers would earn bloodiest deaths)". The hatred and will to harm other people not of ones same opinion seems to be endless, fake news or not.
French butchers have issued a plea for police protection against vegans, whom they blame for a series of attacks designed to “spread terror” among meat-lovers.
The butchers say they are coming under “physical, verbal and moral" attack from vegans and animal rights groups in the land of the “steak frites”, and warn that animosity against their profession is being fuelled by heavy media exposure to the anti-meat cause.
They are asking for the interior minister, Gérard Collomb, to intervene.
Their request comes days after a rotisserie in Lille, northern France, was vandalised - the fourth such incident of its kind in a matter of weeks. In the Hauts-de-France of northern France, seven butchers and charcuteries were attacked and sprayed with false blood in April.
Several other similar incidents were reported in the southwestern Occitanie region, they said.
In a letter to the minister, Jean-François Guihard, president of the French federation of butchers and caterers said: “We are counting on your services and on the support of the entire government to stop as swiftly possible” such attacks.
The 18,000 butchers of France were “worried about media overexposure of the vegan way of life”, said the federation chief.
Butchers were “shocked” by a section of society that “wishes to impose its way of life, not to mention its ideology, on the vast majority” of meat-eating French people, he added.
Besides the rotisserie, animal welfare activists also targeted a butcher, a fishmonger and a restaurant selling meat dishes in Lille in May.
Each time they smashed windows and scrawled the words “No to speciesism” on the shopfront. Popular with animal rights advocates, the term “speciesism” suggests that mistreating non-human species is a form of discrimination akin to racism or sexism.
Martine Aubry, the mayor of Lille, has said the town hall intends to file a legal complain against persons unknown.
With only around three per cent of the population vegetarian or vegan in France, the notion of dropping meat from the menu has been slow to catch on and even frowned upon in a country proud of its boeuf bourguignon and foie gras.
But French butchers have hit the headlines in recent months following a spate of hard-hitting reportages in abattoirs and battery farms - several by the animal welfare group L214 - revealing the apparently inhumane conditions in which animals are being kept and killed.
The butchers’ federation pointed out that late March, a vegan activist had even hailed the murder of a butcher in a supermarket in Trèbes, near Carcassonne by an Islamist terrorist.
The activist posted a Facebook message saying she had no qualms over the killing of butcher Christian Medvès, one of four people killed by gunman Radouane Lakdim on 23 March. "So does it shock you that a murderer gets killed by a terrorist? Not me, I have zero compassion for him, there is justice in it," she wrote.
The activist later received a seven-month suspended prison sentence for “condoning terrorism”.
“Faced with this escalation of violence, what will be the next stage?,” asked the federation.
The French butchers' plea for help comes a month after Britain's Countryside Alliance warned that attacks on small businesses by vegan activists were on the rise.
Death threats, stoked by social media and encouraged by international groups of activists, have caused butchers and farmers to "live in fear," they warned.
French farmers and butchers have been fighting of late to improve the image of the meat industry.
In April, the French parliament passed a law making it illegal for vegetarian food producers to use “steak”, “merguez”, “bacon” or “sausage” - or any other meat-related expression - to describe food that is not partly or wholly composed of meat.
Even vegetarian products promising to have a “bacon taste” will be out of bounds. In what was seen as a victory for France’s powerful meat lobby, MPs vote the change on the grounds that customers were being misled.