To Antonia_Tiger: Why It's Not OK for British Rebels to Behead British Soldiers in Britain

[jordan179]

In response to antonia_tiger in Radicalising LanguageThe forces the British are fighting against in Afghanistan are the ones who approved of the attempt to and cheered on the successful murder of three thousand civilians, including British ones, on 9-11-2001. You have lost sight of the context of this war, as if America and some other countries just decided to

Comments

[ford_prefect42]

The part that you are missing is that leftism is inherently *identity* based. It's not a matter of what is being done, what matters is that the "good guys" win. So, when Mao kills 100 Million chinese in horrible, brutal ways, that's okay, because he's got "noble ideals", however, when the tea party kills no one, and simply asks for spending to be reduced, that's monstrous, because they are the "bad guys".

It's a remarkably black and white view of the universe, moreso than anything W was guilty of, in which there are "angels" defined solely by their affiliation with the left, and "devils" defined solely by their affiliation with the right. Nothing else matters. Those that are theirs can do literally anything and be applauded, those that are ours can do literally anything and be derided.

And that affiliation is why the left sides with the Islamics. Bin Laden voiced support for Obama, so therefore, it was wrong to kill him, according to the true believers on the left.

http://www.npr.org/2011/05/03/135927693/is-it-wrong-to-celebrate-bin-ladens-death

That's part of why it's so clearly the case that the old saying "scratch a conservative, and you'll find someone that wants to stand athwart history yelling "stop". Scratch a liberal, and you'll find a closet aristocrat." They don't want a leader, they want a king. One that rules by divine right, and for whom any possible action is by definition, "right".

[marycatelli]

Who, whom? in other words.

[jordan179]

What she's missing even from her identity-based view of life is that the Muslim fundamentalists are still her enemies. She claims to be female and she claims (in her post) to be "educated" -- that alone, in a Taliban Afghanistan, or a Sharia-formed Britain, would make her a potential target.

[philmophlegm]

There's another element to this which we see all too often among British leftists, but which is probably rarer among American 'liberals'*, and that is this:

Many British leftists are anti-semitic.

To many on the left in Britain, there is no worse crime than racism**** - as long as the racism is against blacks, Asians etc. Racism against Jews, is perfectly acceptable to many of those people though. The leading left-wing newspaper, The Guardian, is notoriously anti-semitic**. While the Guardian only sells a few hundred thousand copies, it has an influence far in excess of its numbers because the BBC and Channel 4 largely take their news agenda from it.

This anti-semitism colours the Left's attitudes to many issues. Muslim fundamentalists must be sticking up for the Palestinian Arabs being oppressed by the evil Israeli government. The credit crunch was caused by the evil banks who are all run by Jews. That sort of bollocks***.

* I use the term 'liberal' there in the the sense in which it tends to be used in the US, that is, someone who believes in a powerful state, big government and political correctness over free speech. 'Liberal' in its proper sense should mean someone who believes the exact opposite, in my view.

** See the excellent blog cifwatch.com for examples of Guardian anti-semitism.

*** British term. Actually means testicles, but in this context the translation into American English is more like 'bullshit'.

**** And if you are racist, then by their argument, you're automatically right wing. The most obviously racist political party in British politics is the British National Party. It opposes "laissez-faire capitalism", "globalism" and "economic liberalism", wants policies to reduce income inequality, advocates higher rates of corporate taxation, especially for large companies, and wants the government to take over much of the financial sector. It wants "workers' cooperatives". In short, it is a left-wing (arguably very left-wing) party. Yet, because (and seemingly only because) it is anti-immigration, it is commonly referred to by leftists and the mainstream media as "far right".

[cutelildrow]

What you describe resembles the Labour party over here in Australia. I'm still learning about most of it, since I only migrated here last year. In the time I've been here, I've learned to very quickly dislike Gillard, with her various policies which have been more in service of interest groups, eco-weenie pandering and the freaking refugees, powerful state and anti-business.

I regret that I can't vote yet on my permanent resident visa, but when I am able to, I'm sure my friends here will chuckle to learn that I'm very likely to vote Liberal Party. ^_^

[philmophlegm]

I think there's something of a tradition of Australian politicians being inspired by British politicians. That's even more likely with Julia Gillard since she was born here. Admittedly, there is little coverage of Australian politics over here*, but she seems to be very similar to the likes of Harriet Harman and similar British Labour politicians - a politically correct careerist rather than a conviction politician. (For all his faults, her predecessor as Labour PM, Kevin Rudd, always seemed more genuine to me.)

* Enough though for me to form a positive opinion of John Howard as one of the most effective and sensible political leaders of any country in this century.

[cutelildrow]

From what I hear, Howard's policies had a lot to do with ensuring that the Australian economy was stable and steady, as well as ensured that Australians had employment. I've never heard of a nation having a budgetary surplus, but apparently he had one. He had a welfare support plan (note: support in the actual sense of the word, not the welfare abuser type of the word) for parents that I could see as a way to encourage having families and stable family lives so that the graying population wasn't as huge a threat as it is now to many of the European populations.

Gillard's Carbon Tax and removal of many of the protections that made Australians hireable have driven lots of businesses overseas and quite frankly, that freaking carbon tax makes everything cost more. A lot of her 'budget increases' or 'allocations' involve taking away from existing programs to pay for what she proposes (for example: 'disability support program, but we're going to cut out the baby bonus and schoolkids support, and lessen Family Tax Benefit A to pay for it. Oh and we'll tax the mining industry because they're rich fucks and can afford it.') There's also this weird censorship going on where bad news very quickly disappears from news sites, but news trying to discredit Tony Abbott and fearmongering of the local Liberal Party isn't hard to find.

She also imposed an insanely high minimum wage for certain industries and service sectors, making people trained in IT support, data recovery and similar too expensive to hire, putting more people on the dole as opposed to being employed. Small businesses are also finding themselves unable to operate, or if so, for very long, so there goes that sector of employment too.

And most of her critics find themselves very quickly at an end of their political careers or she outright whimpers that it's misogynist. I have NO respect for her, because damnit if she wants to put on her goddamn pants and swim with the boys, and be treated like one of the boys (which, she wants only at her convenience) she should roll with the punches like any of the boys. She seems to have NO sense of humor as well, which is a feature her predecessors had in abundance.

There's a rumor/conspiracy theory that I hear about a lot that she wasn't an Australian citizen when she came to power, and a lot of Aussies seem to believe that she isn't supposed to be legally a PM. At the very least, she certainly does NOT behave like an Aussie pollie as opposed to a British politician.

eta: fixed a bit of confusion at the end. My only excuse is I feel so very sleepy all the time these days. Mea culpa.

[sianmink]

Not sure how you feel it's rare over here. Many American liberals wear the Palestinian flag like a badge of honor, and are able to 'justify' everything done by Palestinian terrorists as a heroic and desperate stand against the smothering evil of Israel.

[philmophlegm]

Admittedly, that was guesswork on my part rather than knowledge (bad habit I know). Is there any American equivalent to The Guardian in terms of spreading these ideas?

[sianmink]

Does huffpo count? I think it does.

[philmophlegm]

Yes, good point. The UK edition certainly takes the Guardianista line on most issues.

[polaris93]

And that affiliation is why the left sides with the Islamics. Bin Laden voiced support for Obama, so therefore, it was wrong to kill him, according to the true believers on the left.

How do they deal with the fact that Obama gave the order to assassinate bin Laden? That it doesn't tie them in knots means there's nothing there to tie -- i.e., they're idiots.

[ford_prefect42]

He *had* to issue the kill order on Bin Laden, because the EEEVIIIIL:LLLL Republikkkans would have made his legislative agenda impossible otherwise!

[polaris93]

Mapping that idea in its context would give a topologist nightmares. Sort the ancient idea of planetary epicycles, only sillier. I get headaches just thinking about it.

[ford_prefect42]

Well, lest we forget, liberals don't "think", they *feel*. Based on those *feelings*, they reach conclusions, then they go looking for data to match those conclusions. They continue with that even after the data they have found stops matching their conclusions.

Remember, these are the people that are still insisting that this graph

http://fabiusmaximus.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/20120131-uah-temp.png

Indicates an immediate catastrophic warming trend.

[polaris93]

Couldn't acess the graph from AOL. Oh, well. Anyway, you're right about liberals going by "feelings" rather than thinking things through -- the finest products of today's public schools. Damn them.