It would indeed be good to bring Hitler's second career to a close. His contemporary status must make followers of Pol Pot jealous. I suppose 'that's Pol Potist' lacks impact and resonance here in Europe even though it would be a better rebuke to the year zero, reset cultists in eco-loonery projects.
'Nazi', 'fascist' and 'like Hitler' etc., have been overdone, perhaps, in that they are losing impact. Snarl words and slurs do cease to have effect eventually. As an active campaigner for Brexit I was called a racist, xenophobe etc (particularly in middle class Lib Dem wards) and intially found this disturbing. By the end of the campaign I was immune.
A higher level example is the re-election of Trump. It seems a large number of Americans saw through the tactic of delegitimising through slur. A sufficient number of voters were unconvinced by the Democrats. The tactic was exposed as and understood as a substitute for argument and debate. And that is the problem.
Those of us on the right want debate for we realise that there can be legitimate reasons for holding an opposing view and they are worth exploring properly. The left when it tries to shut down debate deny that useful exercise and frustrate refining and improving what we do or decide. During Brexit my wife and I did not attend the many debates led by Brexiteers - we had already researched our own view - but attended the debates organised by Remainers. We wanted to see what arguments they came up with and genuinely consider them. Of course, the level of debate was so poor there was little chance we would change our minds. We were never offered good reasons to change our minds.
The worrying lesson from Brexit, and subsequently, is the moral simplicity of political debate. Too many people frame everything in terms of good and evil, blinding people to necesary debate and blocking out any humility in argument. I lost my naivety during Brexit.
Schopenhauer was right when he said ""The majority of men...are not capable of thinking, but only believing, and ...are not accessible to reason, but only to authority".
The antidote to this is education not indoctrination as has been happening in our schools and universities, when reason is elevated as authority not ideology, which is why Labour's curriculm review is so worrying. It suggests things are going to get worse. Everyone wants to feel a sense of purpose, of acting for good, of belonging to the side of good, but when what is good is defined ahistorically and ideologically we have the decadence of Western civilisation as it turns in on itself and loses confidence. This appears to be the project of the left which has achieved a moral inversion labelling the West as intrinsically bad and deserving of self-immolation.
In America Hitler's ghost was laid to rest on 5th November but not yet here. We still have much to do.
Well said. Same malaise is present down here in NZ. One would think we would learn from the latter day folly of our colonial forebears, but sadly, no we are well down the same stupid pathway.
Excellent article thank you. I especially appreciated the Camus argument regarding the anti-Hitler brigade's consequent justification of their extreme behaviour. If they are against 'Hitler', then surely they are allowed to expand the boundaries of what may have hitherto been morally acceptable. In my own country, NZ, we have seen our Supreme Court claiming that Parliament has no right to impose unjust laws (well, actually here, our democratically elected Parliament does indeed have that right), and our seditious, race based 'Maori Party' behaving in ways that runs roughshod over years of accepted parliamentary protocol. Their most egregious conduct is 'justified' in their eyes because colonial oppressors, traditional males and indeed evil white folk in general are lauding Luigi Mangione as some kind of modern day Robin Hood for 'executing' United Health CEO Brian Thompson. (I get the anti-corporate thing, and am no fan of big Health Care, but surely street murder is a step too far?? For some, apparently not, but then Bonhoeffer would have been a hero if he had succeeded right? Well, yes, but...)
Consider also the actions of the Trans brigade or the BLM rioters. Then compare to the double standard punishments handed down to those demonstrators in the UK for whom the awful murder of three beautiful young girls was the final straw.
Btw, 'genocide' is another of many words which the 'left' fire off so inappropriately. Whether ignorantly levelled at at Israel, or colonial British in NZ, such use waters down what is actually the among the most heinous of crimes. Your point was most valid, that such terms should be used appropriately, lest they lose their historical significance and weight of meaning.
It would indeed be good to bring Hitler's second career to a close. His contemporary status must make followers of Pol Pot jealous. I suppose 'that's Pol Potist' lacks impact and resonance here in Europe even though it would be a better rebuke to the year zero, reset cultists in eco-loonery projects.
'Nazi', 'fascist' and 'like Hitler' etc., have been overdone, perhaps, in that they are losing impact. Snarl words and slurs do cease to have effect eventually. As an active campaigner for Brexit I was called a racist, xenophobe etc (particularly in middle class Lib Dem wards) and intially found this disturbing. By the end of the campaign I was immune.
A higher level example is the re-election of Trump. It seems a large number of Americans saw through the tactic of delegitimising through slur. A sufficient number of voters were unconvinced by the Democrats. The tactic was exposed as and understood as a substitute for argument and debate. And that is the problem.
Those of us on the right want debate for we realise that there can be legitimate reasons for holding an opposing view and they are worth exploring properly. The left when it tries to shut down debate deny that useful exercise and frustrate refining and improving what we do or decide. During Brexit my wife and I did not attend the many debates led by Brexiteers - we had already researched our own view - but attended the debates organised by Remainers. We wanted to see what arguments they came up with and genuinely consider them. Of course, the level of debate was so poor there was little chance we would change our minds. We were never offered good reasons to change our minds.
The worrying lesson from Brexit, and subsequently, is the moral simplicity of political debate. Too many people frame everything in terms of good and evil, blinding people to necesary debate and blocking out any humility in argument. I lost my naivety during Brexit.
Schopenhauer was right when he said ""The majority of men...are not capable of thinking, but only believing, and ...are not accessible to reason, but only to authority".
The antidote to this is education not indoctrination as has been happening in our schools and universities, when reason is elevated as authority not ideology, which is why Labour's curriculm review is so worrying. It suggests things are going to get worse. Everyone wants to feel a sense of purpose, of acting for good, of belonging to the side of good, but when what is good is defined ahistorically and ideologically we have the decadence of Western civilisation as it turns in on itself and loses confidence. This appears to be the project of the left which has achieved a moral inversion labelling the West as intrinsically bad and deserving of self-immolation.
In America Hitler's ghost was laid to rest on 5th November but not yet here. We still have much to do.
Well said. Same malaise is present down here in NZ. One would think we would learn from the latter day folly of our colonial forebears, but sadly, no we are well down the same stupid pathway.
Excellent article thank you. I especially appreciated the Camus argument regarding the anti-Hitler brigade's consequent justification of their extreme behaviour. If they are against 'Hitler', then surely they are allowed to expand the boundaries of what may have hitherto been morally acceptable. In my own country, NZ, we have seen our Supreme Court claiming that Parliament has no right to impose unjust laws (well, actually here, our democratically elected Parliament does indeed have that right), and our seditious, race based 'Maori Party' behaving in ways that runs roughshod over years of accepted parliamentary protocol. Their most egregious conduct is 'justified' in their eyes because colonial oppressors, traditional males and indeed evil white folk in general are lauding Luigi Mangione as some kind of modern day Robin Hood for 'executing' United Health CEO Brian Thompson. (I get the anti-corporate thing, and am no fan of big Health Care, but surely street murder is a step too far?? For some, apparently not, but then Bonhoeffer would have been a hero if he had succeeded right? Well, yes, but...)
Consider also the actions of the Trans brigade or the BLM rioters. Then compare to the double standard punishments handed down to those demonstrators in the UK for whom the awful murder of three beautiful young girls was the final straw.
Btw, 'genocide' is another of many words which the 'left' fire off so inappropriately. Whether ignorantly levelled at at Israel, or colonial British in NZ, such use waters down what is actually the among the most heinous of crimes. Your point was most valid, that such terms should be used appropriately, lest they lose their historical significance and weight of meaning.
The ‘unjust laws’ needed to be written like this, ie ‘laws that don’t fit the woke, activist judges’ narrative’.
Poor Reform UK are merely a "threat to democracy".
So far