Heil Mary

The censor has been on the prowl again. Cork city for some reason draws the type in a way that publicises their censorial impulses. A bit self-defeating really given that it serves censors best when their censorship goes unreported. The ideal situation is an insidious one where people censor themselves. In that way the topic being suffocated is all the more efficiently smothered for not having been seen.

In 1999 Cork played host to the thought police as they set about silencing the Nazi history falsifier David Irving. Not that what he had to say was worth listening to in the first place. Just that the mob who hounded him out of the city was assaulting the right of all others to make up their own minds about the Irving drivel. The historian Deborah Lipstadt eventually destroyed him without wielding the cudgel of censorship. Irving was later jailed in Austria for denying the holocaust.

It alone as far as I am aware is the one thing we are not allowed to deny in parts of the Western world. Denying one holocaust in the past is a punishable offence but denying others while they happen is a pretty alright sort of thing. Both the US president and the head of the United Nation's peacekeeping office denied the holocaust in Rwanda in its midst. Denying something as it unfolds seems a much worse crime than denying something that happened years ago. In the here and now denials, as they did in Rwanda, can have terrible consequences for living beings. Neither Bill Clinton nor Kofi Annan, unlike Irving, were ever jailed for their genocide denial.

Anyway, back to Cork where, muttering their Hail Marys, the reason-hating faith mob converged on the city’s University Hospital as Professor Len Doyal, a leading figure in the world of medical ethics prepared to give a talk on euthanasia. The Mary mob rushed the stage as the talk was about to begin, causing it to be abandoned after Garda intervention. One of those opposed to Doyal speaking protested, ‘who would hold a meeting on Holy Thursday in Catholic Ireland to murder people?’

Perhaps a read of Malachi O’Doherty’s book Empty Pulpits might have helped him understand that Ireland is becoming much less Catholic and considerably more secular. Then again that type tends to read the bible and find in it only what they want to reinforce their prejudices. That debate on a very important topic should plunge into the depths of nonsense reflects badly not only on the bigots but also on the public authorities who have failed lamentably in protecting freedom of discussion.

The Mary mob shares much in common with the Mohammed mob of three years back. Then it sought to intimidate artists who depicted its prophet in cartoon form. Narrow minded bigots the lot of them who think they can act as a self-appointed filter determined to impose its sound proof paraphernalia on the rest of society lest it might decide for itself on the merits or otherwise of any suggestion.

Euthanasia is a subject that any civilised society should seek to discuss openly and at length. If it is concerned with ensuring that the terminally ill die with the maximum amount of dignity and freedom from pain, then it cannot allow discussion of the matter to be trampled into the ground by religious bigots. Anyone who has followed the work of groups like Dignitas in Zurich or even viewed the film A Short Stay in Switzerland will appreciate that the problem is much more complex than the solution suggested by prayer.

The Mary mob it seems would prefer that people die as they did under the reign of Mother Teresa in Calcutta without the aid of proper palliatives or analgesics before they would consider allowing their fellow human beings to go down the road of assisted dying. All the wretched of Calcutta seem to have got was the offer of a free ticket to Heaven if they converted to Catholicism. The Catholics already had their ticket so presumably they got nothing. Their sole consolation, a sign on the wall of Mother Teresa’s morgue proclaiming ‘I am going to Heaven today.’

Conned to the last.

58 comments:

  1. Never marry a Neo-Con10:43 AM, April 26, 2009

    “The Mary mob shares much in common with the Mohammed mob of three years back. Then it sought to intimidate artists who depicted its prophet in cartoon form.”

    Whilst many Muslims object to the prophet Mohammad being represented in illustrations the cartoons you refer to and which you shamefully reproduced showed him as a terrorist and were racist in form.

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  2. Never marry a neocon

    Muslims can object all they want. If that is what their religion demands of them and they want to freely submit to that religion, fine. But they cannot be allowed to make anyone else submit to it. Those not of that religion are not bound by its strictures whether on images or anything else. Not a particularly difficult concept to master for secularists.

    There were many shameful aspects to the cartoons issue. One was the falsification and inclusion of new cartoons not amongst the original 12 which were hawked around the Middle East by Danish theocrats for the purposes of whipping up racist hatred. Another saw sections of the left following Jack Straw and submitting tamely to what Tony Cliff once termed clerical fascism.

    There are many interesting interpretations of what Westergaard inferred when he sketched the cartoon in question. Some like yourself argue it was designed to depict Mohammed as a ‘terrorist’ but others see it differently. I can live with different views of what was meant so long as they are not rammed down my throat. The problem for the totalitarians was that they failed utterly to have their interpretation adopted as the only one, and that enraged them.

    The racism of the day was the racism displayed against the Danes by the theocons.

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  3. Never marry a Neo-Con6:36 PM, April 26, 2009

    If one wanted to argue satirically against Ian Paisley’s objection to homosexuality would it be a good idea to draw a cartoon which depicts Jesus being buggered by St. Peter? Undoubtedly it would goad Paisley into further displays of homophobic bigotry and whilst that might ‘prove a point’ it would also unnecessarily insult most Christians as well as falsifying the teachings of Jesus Christ (incidentally I am an atheist).

    How sad it is that the great hope of post Good Friday Republicanism turned out to be little more than a Bernard Manning with a PhD.

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  4. Never marry a Neo-Con,

    I suppose you would need to ask the Imans about the buggering cartoon. They reportedly manufactured one of a Muslim at prayer being raped by a dog for their foray into the Middle East.

    Bernard Manning – great comedian; drove the PC bores wild. Nearly as good as Wolfie Smith or the Life of Brian. Great film but I always wondered if Brian was a spook.

    Love the way some of my critics still take to hiding behind anonymity. What is it that so frightens them? I don't bite. I even let them post rubbish on this blog. Maybe that's the reason. Always hard to stand up and say 'yeah, that rubbish is mine.'

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  5. 'Never marry a Neo-Con' is an uptight idiot and The Blanket's decision to publish the cartoons was admirable, but Bernard Manning a great comedian? Wasn't he just a Paisley with punchlines?

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  6. Alfie, 'Paisley with punchlines'? Never found him that bad. All a matter of taste I suppose. It is so long since I saw him that I have vague memories of him but do recall him as someone I found very funny. I am not much into comedians so my experience of them would be limited. Thought George Carlin was great. Probably thought he did the same as Manning in a much more sophisticated manner – put it up to the PC bores.

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  7. Surely the people who stopped Irving in 1999 did it not because he has 'crap' views or because they found what he says repulsive, but because he is an ideological fascist and nazi sympathiser. The denial of the holocaust merely gives him a medium to share platforms with people such as Nick Griffin and David Duke.

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  8. Never marry a Neo-Con11:16 AM, April 27, 2009

    You have developed an argument that says an objection to racist cartoons is totalitarianism; I see parallels between this and Israel calling its critics anti-Semitic. Jack Straw’s objection to the publication of the cartoons was motivated by his Muslim constituents and his fear that they might do a Galloway on him. He is in an awkward position he is a Muslim baiter but he needs their votes. On his watch as Home Secretary he introduced new repressive anti-terror laws that arbitrarily targeted Muslims and foreign nationals and gave his support to foreign wars, this man has done more than most to further the cause of Jihad. You mentioned Tony Cliff in an earlier post and his clerical fascist terminology, Cliff supported the CIA backed Mullahs against the secularists in Afghanistan in the 80s just as he supported the CIA backed Catholic clergy in Poland, the guy was not one of the greatest thinkers on the left, the SWP has slightly better politics now that he is dead. Facts can be mere grubby things at times.

    Muslim opposition to the cartoons is ‘clerical fascism’ socialist objection is ‘fascism of the left’ the real fascists of the BNP however supported the publication and not because of some admirable commitment to facilitating free speech. I was wondering whether you consider the anti-fascist protesters at the Battle of Cable Street to have been fascists engaged in an act of totalitarian censorship.

    The best and most intelligent stand-up comedian at the moment has to be Stewart Lee, a man who was on the receiving end of calls to censor him by Christian fundamentalists over his involvement with Jerry Springer The Opera. However, he refuses to become an Islamophobe as he sees it as being part of the politics of the right; he is also concerned that he may end up with the same audience as Al Murray The Pub Landlord.

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  9. By the way, Anthony, the search function in the online archives of The Blanket is not working: no matter what word you search for, you get no results.

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  10. It is regretable that the post re the euthansia episode is used as a pretext to demonstrate overt hostility to a faith,namely the Catholic Faith.
    Be that as it may, I suggest if you want to know what the Catholic Faith means to people, read a book entitled "Testimony of Hope" by Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan, a Cathoilc bishop who did 13 yrs in a Vietnamese Jail, 8 in solitary because of such Faith.

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  11. Alfie, a search engine for the Blanket's archives has been added to the Pensive Quill and will be added to the Blanket website shortly. Not that I know anything about it - just passing it on!

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  12. "Denying one holocaust in the past is a punishable offence but denying others while they happen is a pretty alright sort of thing."

    I sympathise with your opposition to this hypocrisy. Where I am now, the holocaust of the Jews is referred to as the Shoah, and the word holocaust is thus liberated from the definite article which denies those others, such as in the DRC, which involved Western complicity, or indeed Sudan, which seems to involve all three superpowers. Without removing anything from the realities of totalitarianism under Hitler.

    I see no reason why this couldn't be the case in English.

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  13. It's a pity the Euthanasia debate didn't get more air time. Thats the problem with protests they highlight an issue but give no depth to the general public as to the complexities of the debate. I actually attended one of these talks and didn't find their arguments convincing. On the contrary, I found their arguments weak and the real issue that underlined the whole talk I attended was that people simply didn't want to be a burden on society or their loved ones, which I don't believe is a reason for any type of assisted suicide.

    As for the cartoons I knew when I saw the first one on the blanket that it was a mistake, not wrong but a mistake. The free speech issue is an admirable one, and one the blanket had a right to be involved in, but the mistake was getting involved in that fight in which the blanket, nor republicanism had a dog.

    I know what is going to come back at me for saying that, but in politics as in life I think we have to pick our fights and I think this fight was not one that should have been picked by the blanket. Ultimately it led to the blankets destruction imv. I think by getting involved in the fight you (Anthony) shot yourself in the foot with the left, and the left do not allow thinking outside the box, and it's not the first time you have thought outside the box so a dispute with the mainstream left over something was always on the cards. Pity it happened over the cartoons. I listened to you when you were interviewed, and you said you were given advice to publish them, it was bad advice, pity you took it. This was too big a blot for your copy book with the left, a smaller and more insignificant blot would have been easier for them to have over looked.

    Thats why I've moved away from the left myself. it's a bit like the argument surrounding SF. Once you point out their contradictions within republicanism you are automatically labelled a dissident, even if you believe as I do that the contradictions in SF's position within republicanism are independent of the dissidents, they share the argument but it's not theirs. It's the same through out the whole of the left, here is an argument about free speech, but if you agree with the publishing of the cartoons then one is labelled almost as right wing.

    I think for too long people (especially here in WB) have been told how and what to think and anyone who thinks outside the box is viewed with suspicion. (I mean look who I'm talking too... as if you didn't know that.) But things are changing.

    In a very complex world issues like free speech should not be labelled as left or right, or 'owned' by any person or group, they should stand or fall on whether or not you believe in fundamental freedoms of expression and thought.

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  14. Damian, I have the three DVDs called Shoah. Watched one and will get to the others at some point. I have no opposition to the term holocaust being used in relation to what the Nazi did to the Jews. I just dislike the way the denial of it is an offence only for that particular genocide

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  15. Bigred,

    The euthanasia post is about the right to discuss euthanasia free from censorship by bigots or zealots. Am I at odds with the Catholic faith? Absolutely. As at odds with it as I am with all religious faiths.

    I will at some time try to read Testimony of Hope. I am not averse to reading books of a religious orientation. Recently finished one by Hans Kung. However I am not sure that imprisonment of clerics says much for faith per se. It says more about this man in particular. But you will appreciate that he is one of the few who have served time in prison for something other than child rape.

    Anonymous, Irving is without doubt all the things you say he is. The problem is that some of those trying to silence him have a history of trying to silence people who are not any of those things. And when you try to silence Irving it is not an assault just on his right to speak but an assault on the right of others to hear.

    Never marry a neo-con

    A change of tone and an interesting comment.

    ‘You have developed an argument that says an objection to racist cartoons is totalitarianism … Muslim opposition to the cartoons is ‘clerical fascism’ socialist objection is ‘fascism of the left.’

    Where was this argument developed? Can you cite a source where I made the argument? If I have I would withdraw it. I thought I developed an argument that held that a substantial swathe of objection to the cartoons was totalitarian, not that it all was or even the bulk of it. I had friends who disagreed with me and they hardly fitted into the totalitarian bracket. Nor would I characterise Eamonn McCann as a totalitarian even if he is in a party that seems to be. Mick Hall very much opposed the cartoons and he is hardly totalitarian. Same for lots of people. I think that probably answers your question on Cable Street.

    Nor have I ever thought that all Muslim opposition to the cartoons was ‘clerical fascist’. The bulk of Muslims hardly merit the characterisation. But it can hardly be disputed that there was a strong element of theocratic fascism at play in opposing the cartoons and actually fuelling the issue to begin with.

    Whatever the strengths and weaknesses of Cliff – and I take your point on him – his characterisation of the phenomenon seemed more right than wrong.

    You assume that the cartoons were racist and state that as a matter of fact. I was insistent from the outset that I did not share the view that the cartoons were racist. I would not have assented to them being carried on the Blanket in the context that they were had I thought them racist. I think I would have agreed to displaying them as illustrations of racism and let people criticise them to their hearts content, or alternatively make their own minds up about them. For my part I simply refuse to allow others to dictate to me what is or is not racist. I know others took the view that the cartoons were racist or that some of them were. But I also realised that there were some who simply could not tolerate a refusal to accept their imposition of the racist tag.

    What you really say about Straw is he is an opportunist. He might not have been as worried about the Galloway effect as you suggest given that he introduced some very repressive measures which you refer to. But was he any more opportunist than the SWP?

    I must confess my ignorance and own up to never having heard of either Al Murray The Pub Landlord or Stewart Lee. But as I said elsewhere my knowledge of comedy is limited.

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  16. Nor would I characterise Eamonn McCann as a totalitarian even if he is in a party that seems to be.Why do you think the SWP seems totalitarian, Anthony?

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  17. So we have the Mohammed Mob, the Mary Mob and the Moses Mob. A mob is a mob is a mob. The thing is not to get swept up in mob morality. Easier said than done in these tricky times.

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  18. Sophie, euthanasia boils down to a question of freedom of choice. There would seem to be an undermining of choice in the scenario you outline; people feeling obligated to do something.

    As to the question of the cartoons, the Blanket did what it always did - got involved in an anti-censorship issue. It was not the first time it actually raised this type of issue in relation to the theocrats suppressing liberties. The Blanket always had a dog in any issue around censorship. As a journal it might have arisen as a challenge to SF censorship but its remit was always wider.

    As to the view that it led to the destruction of the Blanket, I have heard some strange views about why it shut up shop but this is the quaintest yet. Out of all the things discussed at the time, that never entered into any consideration, either tenuously or nebulously. If anything it would have been an incentive to continue rather than a disincentive given that it provided new ground at a time when the republican side of the Provisional project which the Blanket traced had collapsed.

    Without reference to any sources I will try and work from memory. If I am wrong on any it I stand to be corrected. True, at the outset I was not an advocate of publication, thought the left had a point, thought it even more so after talking with Eamonn McCann who asked me to speak with someone from the Islamic Centre in Belfast which I did. I was absolutely open to persuasion on the matter. After listening to the latter for an hour I felt he had no case to make other than emotional blackmail.

    After discussing the matter with two people both of whom were strong in their anti-racism, I accepted their advice and assented to the publication. Then I spoke with two members of the SWP separately and their argument left me with even fewer misgivings than I initially had. And by the time I had finished a series of exchanges with people working in the Palestine committee I felt there was no choice but to publish. The arguments against were hopeless. All pure emotion and little logic. Apart from a teenager and a Palestinian Christian none of them had anything worthwhile to say on the matter. I was disappointed at the time with the sheer lack of reason.

    As for blotting the copybook with the left it was of no consequence whatsoever. It meant nothing. I had long since lost any confidence in that particular left to do anything. I couldn’t even persuade people to go to a meeting with me if the left were there. People who had risked life and limb, did years in jail, faced down the screws and all the oppression couldn’t face those meetings.

    When they did go to meetings at the start the abuse (good humoured) I took for ever bringing them along to begin with was wild. I got some stick. One night coming out of an anti-war meeting a few shinners standing outside the room slagged me mercilessly. They had heard all the ranting and raving and denouncing of each other in the place and were shouting to me that I must have been at the war meeting. What could I do but laugh?

    A left unity meeting – I went to a few – was excruciating to go through. I took a former republican prisoner up to one in Derry. He had worked with me earlier on canvassing for Eamonn up there. After the meeting he swore ‘never again.’

    I have stuck some things in my life, including years on the blanket. I found a day on the blanket less trying than one of those meetings. And that is not said as a joke. So blotting a copybook with them meant nothing whatsoever to me. I suppose it was like escaping from jail.

    Yet on a personal level I like many of them. But when they get together in those circumstances it is a different world.

    I can deal with virtually any argument whether I approve of them or not. I can be persuaded to adopt a position or drop one if the argument is strong enough. But the censor immediately rouses my suspicion and will invariably find me in the opposite camp from them on the issue of free inquiry.

    The left are generally correct on the great issues of the day. But it has a tendency to draw people who like it not for its ideas, but for its authoritarian structure. Perhaps this is why some on the left sided with the religious fundamentalists who sought to dictate what people could and could not see, instead of siding with those who advocate free inquiry.

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  19. Never Marry A Neo-Con11:03 PM, April 29, 2009

    You highlighted some of my previous post:

    ‘You have developed an argument that says an objection to racist cartoons is totalitarianism … Muslim opposition to the cartoons is ‘clerical fascism’ socialist objection is ‘fascism of the left.’

    And asked “Where was this argument developed? Can you cite a source where I made the argument?”

    In May 2006 you were interviewed by Martyn Frampton in an interview which appeared on the Henry Jackson Society website http://www.henryjacksonsociety.org/stories.asp?id=273

    He asked you “When the initial controversy erupted over the cartoons were you surprised by it?”

    You replied “Well, no, because I have come to expect that this is the way that totalitarians operate.”

    Neither of you specifically differentiate between Muslim or non-Muslim opposition to the cartoons or opposition from individuals or groups. It comes across as all opposition to the cartoons per se is totalitarian in nature. Am I joining the dots here and reaching the wrong conclusions or is this an accurate interpretation of what you said? Others should read the interview in full and judge the tone for themselves.

    Alfie asks why you feel the SWP seems totalitarian and I sense he feels that you play loose with the term. In the same Henry Jackson Society interview you say of the SWP:

    “Sections of ‘the Left’ have actually become reactionary – that’s the reality of it. I mean, if I had to identify the two most racist parties in Britain at the moment I would say the BNP and the SWP.”

    You really think so? The SWP are more racist than Labour who lock up foreign nationals without trial and invade other people’s countries? More racist than the Conservatives with their views on immigration? Even the Liberals play the race card from time to time. When you say the cartoons don’t contain an ounce of racism but the SWP are a racist organisation then I feel you come across as foolish.

    In my original post I said:

    “Muslim opposition to the cartoons is ‘clerical fascism’ socialist objection is ‘fascism of the left’ the real fascists of the BNP however supported the publication and not because of some admirable commitment to facilitating free speech. I was wondering whether you consider the anti-fascist protesters at the Battle of Cable Street to have been fascists engaged in an act of totalitarian censorship.”

    You will notice that you were not named in the first part of this observation although I ask you whether you feel if anti-fascist protesters are the real fascists and give the example of Cable Street. This observation is aimed at people like Amis, Cohen and Hitchens and many of those who signed up to the Euston Manifesto. It is a position which basically says anyone we don’t like is a fascist except for the authentic fascists of the BNP who the left should leave alone, all in the name of free speech. Your comments on the SWP being racist could however be construed as ‘fascism of the left’. You are in danger of becoming a fellow travelling of this troupe unless that is your intention.


    The term ‘fascism of the left’ is a way of talking politics without the politics or reference to class, which these people believe no longer exists. Communism and fascism are both the same they say because they both kill people and are governed by a single mass party led by one man. Some go further trying to blame the left for fascism believing that the Nazis and Mussolini had some core socialism to them or that the ‘extreme left’ encourage the extreme right. The Manifesto against Totalitarianism is itself reactionary whilst claiming to be crusading against reaction. It states, “After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism.” There is no mention here of capitalism or imperialism. Thirty thousand children die every day because they drink dirty water, a problem that could be resolved in a blink of the eye. That represents fifteen twin towers every day of the week against children but according to them the threat comes from a publicity seeking Imam. Strange priorities.

    The creeping fascism that we see in Britain comes from the state itself, not Islam, with the BNP getting stronger as a consequence of society’s shift to the right. The whole free speech for fascists argument is like shitting on one’s own doorstep.

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  20. And then, with perfect comedic po-faced timing, in steps 'Never Marry a Neo Con' to perfectly illustrate Mackers' point. Genius execution!

    Thanks also to NMANC for that link to the interview - very illuminating -
    ‘The Blanket’ and the Cartoon Controversy: Anthony McIntyre InterviewedReading it, NMANC, as you suggested, it does appear you have gotten the wrong end of stick on the Q&A cited as the question appears to be sequential. The Q&A itself differentiates between Muslim and Non-Muslim response, which is made even more clear by the following question which moves from initial (Muslim) onto subsequent (Non-Muslim) reactions. Your point or your use of this Q&A to bolster your argument is more nit-picking than accurate. Mackers can answer for himself what he meant but it seems to me from reading that article he already did quite clearly. Just because you don't like his answers doesn't mean you can come back and change his argument to suit yours, which is what it looks like you're doing. More so now after reading that interview which you so kindly provided the link to!

    You know it strikes me that the repeated desire to shove a square peg into a round hole no matter how it doesn't fit - and constructing all sorts of meaningless arguments to do so again and again that have nothing to do with the square peg and everything to do with attempting to make it round, to bend the square peg to the shover's will, so to speak, is sort of, you know. Totalitarianish?

    Just reading your comments put me in mind of that....no idea why. Weird, huh!

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  21. Never Marry a Neo-Con12:56 AM, April 30, 2009

    Anonymous said

    “The Q&A itself differentiates between Muslim and Non-Muslim response, which is made even more clear by the following question which moves from initial (Muslim) onto subsequent (Non-Muslim) reactions.”

    The point that I am made originally, and I believe the Henry Jackson Society interview clarifies it, is that all responses to the cartoons were considered by AM to be totalitarian in nature regardless of whether its source was Muslim or secular. I was asked to cite the source where I believed he had put forward this idea and I have. You can disagree, and clearly you do, put not in a convincing manner. I also feel that his comments regarding the SWP in the same interview add to my understanding of how he views the left, it is a good source document. The SWP have long been a blot on the landscape of the left and I welcome their demise but racist and on par with the BNP no. I have now been accused of being totalitarian myself, I knew it was coming! As I said in an early post I find this talk similar to Israel calling its critics anti-Semitic. The best way to win an argument is to create a bogeyman in your opponent. Label first, argue later, if at all. Admittedly I have come late to this debate and would rather piss on the embers that pour petrol on them.

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  22. Anthony, I don't remember having seen that article linked in the blanket, it certainly lays things out so that your points here are well demonstrated.

    The creeping fascism that we see in Britain comes from the state itself, not Islam,That nmanc has to be male, the British state don't treat women the way the Islamacists do. I'm not giving up my rights and freedoms to suit a bunch of immams or anybody else. And if you read the article you linked, really read it instead of trying to impose on it something that isn't there you would see that this is about freedoms and human rights:

    And I felt that what we have seen here with the cartoons’ debate is an effort to encroach on that democratic freedom by the imposition of an anti-secularist, religious fundamentalism, which I see as a major threat to democracyMost msulim people who come to the west come for enjoyment of our freedoms not to change it so that we all have to live under a caliphate and have the liberties they came for and the rest of us fought for taken away.

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  23. Never Marry a Neo-Con12:10 PM, April 30, 2009

    Sophie said:

    “That nmanc has to be male, the British state don't treat women the way the Islamacists do.”

    Women in Britain still get paid less than their male counterparts for doing the same job and childcare is difficult to access and expensive.

    “Most msulim people who come to the west come for enjoyment of our freedoms...”

    It's a shame the British state was unable to allow those Pakistani students to experience these wonderful freedoms you talk about. First arrested over a fantasy bomb plot then deported.

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  24. To "Never Marry A Neo-Con",

    The HJS interview does indeed clarify much. What is clarified is that it was yourself who is not differentiating:

    "You have developed an argument that says an objection to racist cartoons is totalitarianism".

    "The point that I am made originally, and I believe the Henry Jackson Society interview clarifies it, is that
    all responses to the cartoons were considered by AM to be totalitarian in nature regardless of whether its source was Muslim or secular" (bold emphasis mine)

    Clearly this was not the case and the HJS source interview you cited showed this to be true; the questions you refer to are about specific responses (the extreme left and extreme Muslims), not any and/or all. It is you who seek to paint a broad brush inferring that the specific is general, as that gives you cover for your own argument against the publication. You are lumping everyone who disagrees with you into a BNP racist smear with the logic employed being "If they disagree with my analysis that the cartoons are racist and should not be published, then they are BNP supporting racists". Whereas the logic you are arguing against posits: "If they are censoring ideas and restricting freedom of thought, they have totalitarian instincts".

    Disagreement does not indicate racism; valid reasons exist for the publication of, and indeed creation of, the cartoons that are not racist nor connected in any manner to the BNP. You are making that association in order to invalidate or discredit arguments you have not yet refuted.

    The contrast is that the action of censorship, the restriction of liberty and the imposition of your will upon others cannot be anything but a form of totalitarianism. It really is that simple; the only case to be argued is a matter of degrees.

    Totalitarianism is as totalitarianism does. (Some) of the left's response to the cartoons and the publication of them were indeed totalitarian, no matter how noble you may ascribe its motives. Every totalitarian believes at some level they are imposing their will for others' own good. Obviously the fundamentalist Muslims who advocated death to the cartoonists and publishers thought they were doing that for good. The motive does not make the action less totalitarian in nature, it merely illuminates its roots. We may be, in terms of comparing the left reaction to the cartoons with fundamentalist Muslim response, looking at degrees of totalitarianism but the instinct is the same.

    You wrote:
    I have now been accused of being totalitarian myself, I knew it was coming! As I said in an early post I find this talk similar to Israel calling its critics anti-Semitic. The best way to win an argument is to create a bogeyman in your opponent. Label first, argue later, if at all. Admittedly I have come late to this debate and would rather piss on the embers that pour petrol on them.Where to begin. Your name betrays your instincts from the start. What would you think of someone who called themselves, "Never Marry A Homosexual"? You would think the person is against gay marriage and therefore is seeking to impose their will on others; you would think, who are they to say who others should or should not marry? You could fill in the blank with any description: Neo-Con, gay, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Black, White, Left, take your pick; it is the instruction that betrays you. And if you really thought about the nickname, you'd see the instinct to restrict the freedom of others plainly. Now, I have no idea why you chose that nickname for yourself or even what you meant by it, but it was you who gave yourself the label it is, no one else.

    As for the creation of bogeymen, you are quite able with that tactic yourself, enough said.

    Even your last comment shows a desire to impose on others - rather graphically, you leave us with the vision that you are here only to piss on everyone else because you don't like the debate.

    Lovely.

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  25. NMANC are you for real? I'm not defending the British State nor any other. I'm saying that in a democracy there are more freedoms than under any other type of rule, particularly the caliphate.

    Being paid less is fightable, women have no rights in Islam and very little in religion in general.

    Pakistani students numbered 44,000 last year to Britain, the recent arrests due to the file being exposed to the photographers was indefensible. I'm certainly not defending it, but if you want to live under religious rule at least you are free to go.

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  26. Sophie, you have to admit, NMANC has a point. Women in Afghanistan completely avoid the thorny issues of equal pay for equal work and child care that is too expensive. The fact that they cannot work or do the same jobs as men, as their place is obviously within the home, means a ready supply of easily accessible and free childcare is always on hand; there's no need to bother about fighting for equal pay since there is no pay for not working. Problem solved! NMANC is definitely onto something here.

    Women's rights, who needs them!! Women have the right to stay at home and take care of their babies! It's Utopia!

    New law rolls back rights for women

    "...the law is believed to contain articles that rule women cannot leave the house without their husbands' permission, that they can only seek work, education or visit the doctor with their husbands' permission, and that they cannot refuse their husband sex..."

    "...Ustad Mohammad Akbari, an MP and the leader of a Hazara political party, said the president had supported the law in order to curry favour among the Hazaras. But he said the law actually protected women's rights.

    "Men and women have equal rights under Islam but there are differences in the way men and women are created. Men are stronger and women are a little bit weaker; even in the west you do not see women working as firefighters."

    Akbari said the law gave a woman the right to refuse sexual intercourse with her husband if she was unwell or had another reasonable "excuse". And he said a woman would not be obliged to remain in her house if an emergency forced her to leave without permission..."

    You see? And child care is far easier to access this way, you have to admit!

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  27. Given that a disproportionate amount of BNP members have convictions for racist violence, including the murdering nail bomber David Copeland, saying the SWP are up there with the BNP when it comes to racism is way off target. I disagree with the politics of the SWP and their opportunistic behaviour but have nonetheless managed a fairly reasonable working relationship with many of their members over the years. I don’t recognise them from this description. They are perhaps guilty of having a utopian liberal view of multi-culturalism at times denying that British society is not fully integrated. Are they totalitarian? To paraphrase Peter Wright they are as totalitarian as a pond full of ducks. I think Anthony applied too much slosh to the brush in the HJS interview which is why I think NMANC feels that Anthony is of the opinion that all opposition to the cartoons has a kernel of totalitarianism to it. NMANC has a point about the manifesto against Islamic totalitarianism is does not seem to think that capitalism or imperialism qualify as totalitarian forms which makes me think that it has a right wing bias.

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  28. To Declan

    I feel reading the whole exchange in context is helpful.

    HJS: And in terms of ‘the Left’ specifically, do you think that it has changed in the last decade or so in terms of the values that animate it?

    AM: Sections of ‘the Left’ have actually become reactionary – that’s the reality of it. I mean, if I had to identify the two most racist parties in Britain at the moment I would say the BNP and the SWP. The SWP appears to have taken an attitude that there are some people in the world who are not as human as the rest of us, which makes them sub-human, or what certain people used to call ‘untermenschen'. The SWP has taken a view that they are not worthy of the same rights as other human beings and I think that is a very insidious form of racism. And I think maybe now we need to start redefining racism, so that instead of dressing it up as some form of ‘cultural relativism’, we recognise racism where it exists. If you want to exclude some sections of humankind from human rights then you are a racist.
    (bold emphasis mine)

    I think Mackers' point, when seen in its complete context as opposed to NMANC's intrepretation, is valid. You don't recognise the SWP members you know from the description 'as racist as the BNP' because that induces you to think of terms of White Supremacist Nazis. But racism is not restricted to that viewpoint or expression alone. As expanded on by Mackers in his answer, there is a case to be made that in its viewpoints the SWP is indeed racist - just not stereotypically so.

    NMANC has obviously risen to the winding of the left Mackers has been doing for years, but that does not mean that NMANC is right to misrepresent Mackers' opinion. It only means that the winding has hit a nerve for NMANC.

    Lastly, why does the left think that every statement must conform to their template and reference capitalism and imperialism in order to be acceptable? It is a childish way of refusing to acknowledge any validity of what others may be saying. Was the Manifesto against totalitarianism right or was it wrong? Does the absence of a mechanical, automaton reference to capitalism and imperialism in order to placate the constipated left make it any less right in its defence of human rights and freedom of speech against totalitarianism?

    "We call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all."

    If the focus is on religious totalitarianism, why the demand that it first take a detour through capitalism and imperialism before it can make its focal point?

    Spare us the 4 page treatise on the history of imperialistic oppression using the capitalist model and how it has been applied in countries with an Islamic majority so therefore any totalitarian actions taken by religious leaders are the fault of global multinationals who have exploited the natural order of religious values so that those who are of Muslim faith feel compelled to restrict human rights and how the left thinks the only correct possible action is to support them in doing so and if the Manifesto was written to encompass that viewpoint and also point out how it wasn't racist or coming from a right wing perspective, then the SWP and its members could comfortably endorse it, please.

    For some on the left its all about forcing the square pegs into round holes. Ultimately that is why they are deemed irrelevant and people like Mackers end up winding them up mercilessly.

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  29. larryolurgan@yahoo.co.yk5:17 PM, April 30, 2009

    Have very little experience with muslims..but whilst I was eager enough to learn, my limited experienced was recieved with a type of "brick wall" negativity. In the early 90's trying to find an address to meet friends in Birmingham proved nigh on impossible...none of your British polite manners...the area was populated nearly entirely by Pakistani's and I was apparrently invisible and they deaf...the French reminded me a little of that when a Japanese friend related how she cried in Paris airport trying to connect to Ireland after she couldn't get any help. More recently a muslim student friend of my wife's in Ireland here looked at me like I was diseased when I mistakenly offered to shake hands..so much for respecting host cultures etc..
    Bernard Manning joked he couldn't understand why there was trouble in N. Ireland as we are all white..he suggested a million Pakistani's deposited there would be a 'genuine' problem. I know from Manila that small muslim communities blare out loudspeakers early A.M. in a call to prayer and several times during the day in places that are 99.9% non muslim..if they come here and erect poles with louspeakers goin off early A.M. I suspect plant hire rentals will see a marked increase in chain saw rentals.
    Not being hostile or inconsiderate..but acommodation is a two way street and Muslims seem to have a requirement to insult their host nations. Was Muhamad's first instruction after his visions from God in 600 AD not to go and kill all non muslims until the world accepts there is only one God..Alah?...lovely.
    Pople should be able to live and believe as they wish without ramming it up they're neighbours!

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  30. @ larry o'lurgan, I'm a little uneasy about protraying all muslims as inconsiderate or a problem. My son is in a muslim country, he left west Belfast for college in Birmingham 12 years ago and now lives in a muslim country.

    He's reported no problems to me since living there. AS ex-pats his family enjoys a good standard of living and is not prejudiced against in any way. There was a minor problem around christmas time when a carol service at his child's school was drowned out due to the loud speakers at the mosque a few feet away, but no worse at the noise than the mosques in birmingham.

    I think in a globalised world their societies are challenged by westernism as much as our societies are challenged by multiculturalism....

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  31. Nice to arrive home late in the day and find that others have been doing the heavy lifting on this one. Will do my best to reply to all asap. Just exhausted at the minute.

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  32. “The Mary mob shares much in common with the Mohammed mob of three years back. Then it sought to intimidate artists who depicted its prophet in cartoon form.”

    Whilst many Muslims object to the prophet Mohammad being represented in illustrations the cartoons you refer to and which you shamefully reproduced showed him as a terrorist and were racist in form.

    10:43 AM, April 26, 2009


    "Holy sh**!,this is funnier than a cartoon."
    Having a go at the Mary and Mohammad "mobs" and then trying to sound righteous with a comical well used cartoon retort makes no sense.
    Which is dumber, drawing one cartoon or having a go at two religious groups? I spy the Catholics though wonder which branch of Islam is the Mohammad mob? Obviously the comment is self-serving and has nothing to do with the article.

    If we take the word "Terrorism" or the modern translation and designed use for the word and applied it to any holy book, I would say terrorism is a major part of religion.
    God being one no nonsense type used terror?
    So perhaps describing or depicting prophets as terrorists is not impossible literally.
    Though your comment could be described as terror-able...bad habit word play.
    I came here to argue about Heil Mary, though had to question the comment.

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  33. Did yiz hear that Gerry's really a Prod? Always thought he'd look lovely in a bowler hat....

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  34. 9/11 was a lie. It was the biggest hoax since NASA faked the moon landings.

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  35. Don't worry; not everybody anonymous is an idiot.

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  36. Alfie, you asked why I felt the SWP was totalitarian. There is probably a book in that topic alone. Firstly, I think it goes with the turf for parties rooted in the Leninist tradition and those that subscribe to a totalising metanarrative that its adherents think can explain virtually all social phenomenon. I have found that democratic centralism is rarely democratic and for the most part centralist. The SWP in my view exhibited this trait. Its history is one of pulling power and control to the centre and keeping its own activists woefully misinformed and marginalised from decision making processes. There is an intellectual and ideological absolutism about the set up. This is something we frequently find in the criticism of the party levelled by those who leave it or its critics who through engagement with it find this to be so. There is plenty of written material out there about it. It is always worthwhile to talk to former SWP members or read their writings as they provide insight on the totalitarian tendencies within the party. Or for that matter with those on the left who have had the experience of being in alliances with the SWP both in Ireland and the UK.

    The SWP were very quick off the mark to defend me when the Provisionals started a serious campaign of intimidation as was Socialist Democracy. Eamonn McCann was brilliant and we were appreciative of his interventions at the time. But at a local level in Belfast they became increasingly intolerant of differences of opinion. They sought to have material suppressed that they did not like. SWP people would come to me and try to argue for nothing to go up on the Blanket about theocratic Iran. They would even get upset about an article critical of the theocratic killing of a four year old Irish girl on one of the 9/11 planes. They were wasting their time but the impulse towards censorship always irked me. I have always found that impulse totalitarian I character. I quickly saw signs of a totalising control on how the membership behaved and thought.

    They would through entryism move into groups and seek to control them while denying it. And opposition to the line of the day was suppressed. This is something you can read about in accounts of the SWP almost anywhere. When a person with considerable insight approached the Anti Racist Network in Belfast about abuses against women linked to the Islamic Centre in the city which the person concerned had documented they were urged vigorously not to tell anyone. This to me constituted a totalitarian sentiment. And it gave me a certain view of the minds of the people involved.

    I had always a leaning towards the radical left, feeling that even what limited reforms were achieved through parliamentary politics and the like, always hovering there were people in the radical camp making the arguments and acting as the brake on the impulse towards the right. In prison when I would make the case for the left it would be listened to up to a point (I was hardly alone in making it). What turned matters round was those volunteers who had left prison and returned. When we discussed with them why they did not push left politics the response was invariably the same – ‘have you see what the left is?’ They were regarded as incessant squabblers who had no interest in anything other than sectarian infighting and having a go at each other. These were guys whose activities risked their lives and freedom pitched as they were in the front line against the British state. They weren’t toy town revolutionaries and were serious about the business. Their view that the left lacked any gravitas was not one to be easily dismissed. Nevertheless, I would still write for their journals and read their stuff but could not afford to ignore the advice of experience.

    When I got out I was happy to meet with the left and go to their events although it became a challenge. However over the years all their activists seemed to churn out the standard line whatever it was that came down from on high. And it would go through young people very quickly who I felt quickly came to the conclusion that the party existed for the leadership rather than the other way round.

    At a meeting in Dublin of the left in general when the main movers were referring to themselves as the radical left or the revolutionary left I proposed they call themselves the irrelevant left in a bid to get them to reflect on their complacency and how out of touch they were with wider society. Needless to say it is not title they opted for, being somewhat reluctant to give up their sense of self importance. And at the end of the day that self importance combined with the penchant for controlling others I think drew many to the SWP rather than the politics of the party.

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  37. Declan, I will pass on this if you don't mind. Anonymous answered it in a way that I would. Thanks for the comment.

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  38. Never Marry A Neo-con
    I think this is more or less reaching its denouement so I will try and wrap it up from my end.
    ‘In May 2006 you were interviewed by Martyn Frampton in an interview which appeared on the Henry Jackson Society website http://www.henryjacksonsociety.org/stories.asp?id=273

    He asked you “When the initial controversy erupted over the cartoons were you surprised by it?”

    You replied “Well, no, because I have come to expect that this is the way that totalitarians operate.”
    I think this goes to the point. What response was he talking about when he posed the question other than the violent one that sought to intimidate and burn and in some cases kill? It was clear to me, if not to you, that the only people I could see involved in the racist violence against the Danes and demanding the suppression of the cartoons were Islamist totalitarians and not Islamic believers. Throughout the range of articles I wrote on the matter, which you chose not to cite, Muslims per se were never attacked but were robustly defended against the human rights abuses inflicted on them by the theocrats.

    This interview in fact was what clinched the issue for many people. It was so clear from it that the Blanket was not into the business of backing racists or racist imagery but was defending people against theocrats.

    In my view the left that did seek the censorship of the cartoons – much of the left did not – had one reason for doing so. It had nothing to do with anti-racism but with outreach work to the Muslim constituency in Britain which was linked to the building of the Respect coalition. The imans set the pace by fuelling the issue to begin with, and some in the left rather than face them down in defence of secularism (a left position for as long as …) the left tailed them. And in order to mask its abandonment of the secular position had to come up with the fig leaf that it was an anti-racist impulse that was governing its stance.

    Whatever about you joining the dots and reaching the wrong conclusion I think you inferred too much from too little. Even if you felt the interview did not give you what you specifically required the whole ambience surrounding the publishing exercise provided enough to allow a much more accurate inference to be drawn.
    ‘Others should read the interview in full and judge the tone for themselves.’
    Probably the one item of agreement that we will reach on the matter.
    Maybe Alfie does think I play loose with the term ‘totalitarian’ but he will have to answer for himself.
    On the racist nature of the SWP I think anonymous answers it in a way that I would. But it all depends on a different way of conceptualising racism and one which you probably don’t agree with so you would not see the criticism of the SWP as therefore valid.

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  39. Anthony, I appreciate that you have good reasons to be critical of the SWP, though I don't think 'totalitarian' or 'racist' are words I myself would use to describe it. Personally, I did not think the cartoons were racist though many people, including the SWP, honestly saw them as such. In a way, the arguments they made were similar to those of the Jewish organisations who contended that Mel Gibson's film The Passion of the Christ was anti-Semitic. Nevertheless, I saw the cartoons controversy as a freedom-of-speech issue, plain and simple. By the way, you seem to conflate the SWP with 'the left' in your critique: are you fed up with the left in general, or just the SWP?

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  40. AM wrote: "I just dislike the way the denial of it is an offence only for that particular genocide"

    Well, if you took the trouble to research the topic, then you'd see that the laws primarily relate to two special countries: Germany and Austria.

    The laws are aimed at the resurgence of Nazism.

    As such they treat the minimalising of the Nazi's crimes as part and parcel of an effort to re-create National Socialism and present a sanitized version of it.

    It is hardly a coincidence that the most active Holocaust deniers/revisionsists are either neo-nazis, Hitler lovers or their close mates.

    I hope you see the connection? and why those particular countries might want to have exceptional laws in this case?

    PS: with the growth of the Far Right in Germany/Austria there has been an increase in attacks on immigrants, etc. Even the fire bombing of hostels by neo-Nazis.

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  41. Alfie, fine. There is nothing which compels you to think as I do. But at least you can live with people thinking differently from you. I accept fully that some in the SWP saw the cartoons in a racist context. But not all. Shortly after the issue blew up I had a drink with one of them and asked how they ended up in such a position making the argument that the cartoons were unambiguously racist. I put it to him that it was not about racism but about building Respect. His candour disarmed me. He made it very clear that racism was not the issue but the building of Respect. Then he went on to vigorously defend adopting the stance on the cartoons in that context. I could see a sense in his logic although it wasn’t mine. He did however, think, that the signatories to the manifesto were reactionary and did not want to support them in any way.
    Overall I thought there was an honesty to his position so lacking in the public discussion.
    It is not that I get concerned about the SWP to the point of being angry at them or dwelling on them. They never loomed in my life like the way Sinn Fein did. Having them as critics or opponents hardly figured. I expected better from them overall rather than see them confirm the Peter Wright type characterisation.
    I don’t collapse them and the left in general into one phenomenon. I think this is made clear in the HJS interview. I think their good people will continue pushing left through other avenues and fora. I think the totalitarian left or vanguard left are a lost cause. So I don’t see any strategic relevance emerging there. I believe that left ideas are the only ones worth pursuing. The challenge is to disarticulate those ideas from their current carriers and have them promoted through a new project.
    This was something I always found when in the Provisionals. It was not left ideas that repelled many of us – it was the people who made up the left. It was impossible to get anybody to take them seriously. Time out of number I was asked ‘if there was a socialist armed struggle how many of them do you think you would find in jail?’ There was just this lack of belief in the seriousness of the left.

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  42. ‘Well, if you took the trouble to research the topic, then you'd see that the laws primarily relate to two special countries: Germany and Austria.’

    Perhaps if you took the trouble to research the topic you might have come up with the following

    But a string of European countries already ban it, including France, Belgium, and Poland, as well as Austria and Germany, arguing that such views have no place in societies which reject outright the crimes of the Nazis.All of which weakens the thrust of:

    ‘I hope you see the connection? And why those particular countries might want to have exceptional laws in this case?’

    Your argument sounds more like a case for censorship and less one of making a case against the Nazis. The Nazis become a useful hook to hang the censorship argument on.

    People should be free regardless of what country they live in to believe or disbelieve what they want. If people want to deny the existence of god they should not be jailed or stoned for it; same with holocaust denial. In the case of the latter they merely look stupid.

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  43. The original anti Nazi laws originated in Germany and Austria.

    There was a reason for those laws, as imperfect as they are, they keep the resurgence of National Socialism down.

    Now you might ask why that is important?

    Or maybe you don't give a shit one way or the other, be that as it may, when you have a significant rise in Nazi activity you have associated racial violence.

    Please do search the Web, you will see how they go hand-in-hand.

    If that doesn't trouble you, then please acknowledge the fact that you don't care if the Nazis firebomb immigrant hostels, attack people in the streets, etc

    Your choice.

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  44. There was a reason for those laws, as imperfect as they are, they keep the resurgence of National Socialism down.

    Now you might ask why that is important?


    Or you may ask why it has not worked as a solution to violence or to keeping people away from the ideas that birthed the Nazis?

    Arguing against censorship is not arguing for racism or Nazism or to say that the Nazis were correct or to agree with Holocaust deniers. Obviously the Holocaust happened; obviously it was also not the only act of systemic genocide which is what the argument of this blog was about, not denying the Holocaust but pointing out the hypocrisy of defending the denial of the Holocaust as a means to prevent racists while at the same time remaining blind to other - and in some cases contemporary - Holocaustic acts of genocide.

    To quote the relevant paragraph of the blog:

    "It alone as far as I am aware is the one thing we are not allowed to deny in parts of the Western world. Denying one holocaust in the past is a punishable offence but denying others while they happen is a pretty alright sort of thing. Both the US president and the head of the United Nation's peacekeeping office denied the holocaust in Rwanda in its midst. Denying something as it unfolds seems a much worse crime than denying something that happened years ago. In the here and now denials, as they did in Rwanda, can have terrible consequences for living beings. Neither Bill Clinton nor Kofi Annan, unlike Irving, were ever jailed for their genocide denial."

    Or maybe you don't "give a shit" about the actual point, and would rather -- somewhat like Never Marry A Neo Con -- continue to pound a square peg into your dogmatic round hole?

    Or maybe you don't give a shit one way or the other, be that as it may, when you have a significant rise in Nazi activity you have associated racial violence.

    If that doesn't trouble you, then please acknowledge the fact that you don't care if the Nazis firebomb immigrant hostels, attack people in the streets, etc


    In other words, "If you don't agree with me then you are a racist" - is that your only logic?

    How does it follow that someone who is pro-free speech and anti-censorship, and clearly not supportive of Holocaust deniers, must also be a racist or "not give a shit" about immigrants being firebombed, because they disagree with the effectiveness of laws against denying the Holocaust?

    I understand the reasoning behind the origins of the law in Germany and other places ravaged by the Nazi's, and the need to not forget what was done in order to not repeat it.

    But I also am capable of understanding an anti-censorship argument against such laws, or at least the application of such laws in countries where the Nazis did not rule, without resorting to knee-jerk assumptions that the arugment is pro-Nazi, or the person making it a racist.

    As someone who supports the concept of free speech I much rather that the cockroaches be brought into the light and challenged, where everyone can see them for what they are, than to let them continue to scurry and breed in the dark, away from public eyes, where they are never challenged and the public has no idea how widespread they actually are.

    An argument ill founded should be easily defeated in the open.

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  45. ModernityBlog, do you specialise in rubbish and guff or is it just something you do in your spare time?
    Having first tried and failed to bamboozle readers with an assertion that criminalising or outlawing holocaust denial (despite the threadbare cover of the word ‘primarily to conceal the fact that you did not research it as well as you tried to dupe people into believing) was specifically an Austrian and German thing and rooted in the specific Nazi history of each country, you have shifted position to tell us that ‘the original anti Nazi laws originated in Germany and Austria.’
    ‘There was a reason for those laws, as imperfect as they are, they keep the resurgence of National Socialism down.’
    Torture, shooting the believers of Nazi ideology, sending Nazi adherents off to death camps and gulags, arguably might keep the resurgence of National Socialism down, but we don’t argue for them to be used. At least I don’t. You might think it all a good idea.
    I am aware of what Nazi ideology does and hardly need to explain to someone driven by censorial impulses seemingly dressed up as anti-Nazi sentiment my deep hostility towards it. So hostile that when Israel perpetrates Nazi-like acts of racial violence against the Palestinians of Gaza and elsewhere I am not found silent but rather speak out strongly against it. But if people who support the policies of the Israeli state wish to be war crime deniers then I don’t advocate that they be denied the freedom to deny what they do. I certainly abhor it. But that is something different and most likely escapes you. They should be pulled out into the open where their arguments can be demolished.
    Is Holocaust denial any worse than Rwandan genocide denial? That genocide, fuelled by the hate ideology of Hutu Power took more lives in a much shorter period of time than the Holocaust against the Jewish people did. But perhaps you think that Rwandan blacks who experience genocide should not have the same protection as white Europeans who experience holocaust. If that is not racist …

    When I do search the web I sincerely hope I find something more coherent than you.

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  46. Those curious re: religious tolerance or its lack by a late Corkonian, the poet and Examiner journalist Seán Dunne, may be interested in an agnostic Catholic's acceptance of what can be salvaged from the Church for one who cannot believe its tenets. I reviewed his "The Road to Silence" (1995) recently:

    "REVIEW"

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  47. Dear Anonymous

    Have the courage to admit that you are none other than Carrie Twomey. It is hard to know what is worse your pro US imperialist politics or your adolescent prose. You will of course not publish this which only shows that your whole free speech no to censorship is a load of reactionary prattle.

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  48. You fell for my bluff and posted my comments but still do not own up to your handy work!

    Posts no 20,24,26,28 are the work of Carrie Twomey. Not only do they mysteriously contain highlighted links to other articles, Big Mac tells other posters to refer to them rather than answering questions himself. A dead giveaway!

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  49. My friend Stan is a funny old man oh yeah

    I guess if you are as old as me Stan you will know where the lyrics of that one come from. Its appropriate because this is a funny old post.

    ‘Dear Anonymous, Have the courage to admit that you are none other than Carrie Twomey.’

    This would appear to hoist you on your own petard. Does Stan not have courage? What else am I read into it? Whether we call ourselves Stan or Anonymous the difference hardly amounts to something other than standing behind a cloak of anonymity. I have found that some anonymous posters are cowardly but most are not. They merely get their argument out without sniping at someone who does not avail of the same cover.

    ‘You will of course not publish this which only shows that your whole free speech no to censorship is a load of reactionary prattle.’

    Having allowed yourself to fall hostage to fortune and ending up being proved absolutely wrong on this one you assert:

    ‘You fell for my bluff and posted my comments but still do not own up to your handy work!’

    I doubt if anybody is falling for your bluff Stan. The bluff is that having walked into the trap you set yourself you are trying to bluff your way out of it by pretending you were bluffing to begin with.

    It is me that decides to publish. It is my blog so I choose what goes up – just about everything I imagine. So why would I ‘of course not publish’ you? You said nothing that was libellous – you didn’t call anybody a thief or a drug dealer or a sex offender or any of the other things that might constitute libel. You expressed an opinion. So what? Had you said Eamonn McCann was the anonymous poster I would still have published you provided you did not libel him. And if you continued to bible thump citing verses 3:1, 3:2, 5:1 ad infinitum that it was him I wouldn’t be enlightening you one way or the other. That’s the point about anonymity; on this blog people are entitled to use it just as you do yourself. What is the point in allowing it and then screaming at those that use it, ‘I know who you are.’ It’s a blog, not Cluedo.

    So as I posted your comment, what ‘handywork’ is it that I should own up to?

    ‘Big Mac’ – haven’t been called that from school. But if anybody thinks I am going to sit and obsess that you might be someone from my long forgotten school days they will be a long time waiting on a conclusion. I simply don’t care who you are. Doesn’t interest me in the slightest. The same with every other anonymous poster whether they are supportive or critical. Over the course of this blog – it is running about 18 months - I have been criticised by posters. I suppose I could accurately guess at who some of them are but what does it matter? It’s a blog that allows anonymous comment. So anonymity is what I am going to get. It gets a bit rich however when one anonymous commenter tries to out another, thinking that wins them an argument. There is a certain parallel for one anonymous commenter trying to out another. What are we to think of one gay person trying to out another? Sounds like bullying to me. It has been suggested to me that ‘Anonymous’ under various cover names has carried on some sort of personal obsession that now borders on the creepy.

    And if you really think I am going to answer every comment you must think I have little else to do with my time other than sit at a keyboard all day. The blog is something I do in my free time of which there is very little. And if it is a chore rather than relaxing I couldn’t be annoyed. And where a commenter puts an answer that would explain my position – great - saves me having to reinvent the wheel. And some of the anonymous posts you refer to were so well argued it seems a bit self defeating for you to flag them up again. I’m tempted to say I wish you had have accused me of being the author of such well constructed posts.

    Away from that altogether, your post raises an interesting dimension – on the issue of free speech. Can free speech really be inhibited or prevented in the blogosphere? If, for example, I don’t let you on my blog for whatever reason or you don’t let me on yours are we interfering with each other’s free speech? The blogosphere is so wide that the ability to speak freely comes with the ability to get a blog. Everybody as far as I am aware can do that. For someone to be denied free speech requires more than simply denying them access to one of the many blogs out there. It would also require intimidating them out of speaking and denying them any platform. I might have a right to free speech but I can’t march up to your door and read out the bible to you. Well, I could but you could rightly tell me to clear off and I could hardly claim I was being denied free speech.

    When Sinn Fein would say that certain articles could not be carried in the AP/RN they could have denied using censorship if they were prepared to allow the same articles to be submitted elsewhere. Problem is they didn’t. They sought to prevent anything critical getting out in any forum and used intimidation to achieve that end. That’s what made it censorship. I suggest it is the same with the blogs. They are personal things. If somebody does not want to carry me on their blog I can hardly claim to be denied free speech. I could if I was attacked and then denied the right to reply.

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  50. Sean from the Murph2:31 AM, May 10, 2009

    Is Stan short for Afghanistan? The other day Obama said it was in America’s national interest to be fighting in Afghanistan. It only took a hundred days for him to show he is the same as what went before. America really is a land of equal opportunities, blacks can be imperialists as well now. I was wondering what people on here feel about the racist totalitarianism of the US airstrikes in Afghanistan and the Sinhalese racist totalitarian genocide in Sri Lanka? I feel this is perhaps the last place to raise such questions as most seem to be on an extended holiday from history. Hail to the thief!

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  51. I agree with the comment regarding "...the racist totalitarianism of the US airstrikes in Afghanistan and the Sinhalese racist totalitarian genocide in Sri Lanka..." However it isn't objective to conflate Obama with US imperialism. Obama is contending with a vast machine that encompasses the largest military with enormous financial interests. If he were effective they would kill him. Bush was able to subvert the process because the money was on his side. Obama isn't as lucky and has to tread very carefully.
    Obama is not "... the same as what went before." It cannot be done all at once or in 100 days. It takes time and patience to build a solid movement to reverse American foreign policy of the past 100 years. To think Obama could do it in 100 days is just wishful thinking. Keep protesting US policy and keep the pressure on Obama, but don't expect miracles.

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  52. Sean from the Murph3:32 PM, May 10, 2009

    Saying Obama is not an imperialist is what I mean when I talk of those who are on a ‘holiday from history’. Obama is in many ways a puppet of the military-industrial complex you seem to be saying this yourself when you say “If he were effective they would kill him”.

    Obama is a tailor’s dummy of a politician, the election was nothing more than a popularity contest like high school kids choosing a home coming queen but the politics of the man are undeniably imperialist in nature.

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  53. I have been an activist for over fifty years. I voted for Obama reluctantly. But I understand, as I think you do not, that one inch of forward momentum is better than none at all. Call names if it makes you feel better. But it's a shame to let your vision of the perfect obscure the good, or even the better.
    Do you think anybody who works within the system is an imperialist? You should read Chomsky's "Imperialist Ambitions" before you alienate your natural allies.

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  54. Sean from the Murph7:45 PM, May 10, 2009

    You had illusions in Obama but the reality shows him to be the opposite of what you thought or as it seems still think. There are obvious parallels between Blair and Obama, Blair like Obama was young and charismatic (if that is how you like your politicians) and like Obama replaced a discredited government. The Blair government quickly showed that they were fundamentally the same as the outgoing government and in some aspects even surpassed them with their right wing policies. Even Chomsky himself as said that both the Democrats and the Republicans are well to the right of the people. When Obama says that fighting in Afghanistan is in America’s national interest then what can that be other than imperialism? He is not the first US president to talk like this.


    There are still some in Britain who believe that Labour is the more progressive of the two main parties. The imperialist wars and occupations, the widening gap between the rich and poor, the open corruption of Labour MPs, it’s as if it never happened. Holiday from history or should that be reality.

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  55. Your dogmatism and your rhetoric makes it difficult to respond. You are red-baiting from the left. You are alienating your natural allies. You want instant change and make life much harder for those who are in it for the long haul. You are worse than in-effectual. You are counter-effectual. Your apparent purity of motive comes across as holier-than-thou ranting and serves no purpose.
    Chomsky is right when he says that the major parties are to the right of public opinion. But the difference between Obama and Bush, to the unwed mother or the homeless or the pensioner in need of medical care, is too obvious for me to spell out for you - even were you to stop ranting for one minute.
    You haven't read enough Chomsky or you'd know that he talks about change as gradual, and improvement as incremental.

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  56. I’m not sure whom you mean when you talk of natural allies, not Obama surely? I am not being dogmatic here just pointing out that Obama has quickly shown that he is up to the job of being no.1 imperialist in the world and with the same relish as his predecessors. The question here is how we engage ourselves politically, is it a case of participating in politics on politics’ terms, being forced to decide which is better Democrat or Republican, Labour or Conservative, Fianna Fail or Fine Gael when in reality the difference is an illusion.


    One is reminded of the words of the 17th century philosopher Geulincx when he said “ubi nihil vales, ibi nihil veils” which roughly translated reads as: “Do not invest hope or longing in an arena where you have no power.”
    In Ireland, Republicans, (some, not all) have invested hope and longing into a process where they have no power, the power they once held had to be surrendered as an entry requirement.

    We should not be afraid to aim high. Don’t have hope in the hype that is Obama.

    I hope this clarifies my position non-dogmatically.

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  57. Sean, good to see you have finally settled on a fixed ID for the purposes of posting. Moving from Never Marry A Neo-Con to Stan to Mick to Sean From the Murph was good crack for me to watch if tiring for you to maintain. If you had taken the hint from as early as my second reply to Never Mary A Neo-Con you might have saved yourself a lot of trouble. You were certainly causing me none.
    But ultimately we can only watch the life of Brian for so long before it too loses its fun value.

    You are more than welcome here if you treat others as they treat you. But if you use sock puppets again you can go elsewhere. Like any blog owner I have a responsibility to those who use the forum to keep the debate fair and not abused by the users of multiple IDs. Leaving is not an option I want you to pursue as you make a valuable contribution and represent a perspective which is probably not heard enough. And you have demonstrated that you are more than capable of making a case without resort to bile. The choice is yours: you can either waste your time trying to score points or use your time making points.

    While I have never been a fan of anonymity, feeling that people should stand over what they say, I understand fully that you will not want to use your real name. I appreciate that it would leave you open you up to a certain amount of ridicule given that you were writing on Organised Rage that there should be no engagement with me – I should be sent to Coventry – and here you are engaging with me. If anyone doubts that it was you they can read your posts on Organised Rage for themselves and compare it to your posts under the pseudonym Never Marry A Neo-Con.

    But ultimately if you want to genuinely inform and shape a discussion then none of that matters. Whatever has happened has happened and it is of no consequence one way or the other. It is not my intention to drag this thing out or engage in spiteful debates. I think I have been fairly measured in my exchanges with you. I have no reason to change that. You will be treated the same as everyone else here. How long you stay is a matter for yourself. Nobody is forcing you to go. No one is trying to out you.

    The issue is simplicity in itself. You stay as ‘Sean’. If you switch, pretending to be someone else, you will leave.

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  58. Right simple aul Belfast speak nothing fancy since I lack a formal education.
    I had originally wanted to respond to the Hail Mary article which was sound enough as it set of the reactionary dogmatic defense mechanism, a result of growing up a taig.
    Well that notion was passed by when the comments avoided the article.
    Was disappointed reading the many personalities of Stan or Sean or whoever you are today.
    I only arrive at the blog for a wee read and a different opinion, pass a half hour and then done.
    Maybe it’s just me and my simple world though the many personas of Sean are a little on the weird side by a little I mean almost schizophrenic and definitely paranoid, delusional.
    Why attack the articles with a pointless rant, and why attack very personally Carrie Twomey. Not being the brightest human on the planet I was just wondering how much time you spend playing internet cop?
    It would be decent if you would actually pick a topic and at least make an effort to defend it without the childish banter.
    If the blogger took the time to write an article and you have a comment on it by all means comment.
    Personally I find your comments odd to the point of ridiculous, maybe I lack the education but I do know the difference between debate and your obvious lack of it.
    Point, what does being pro American and writing prose have to do with “Heil Mary?”
    Being a Roman Catholic and a right winger I liked the article but unfortunately couldn’t get into it as the comments had become more of a laughing matter.
    Should I worry the blog owner might not print my comment, no!
    If he refuses I can always use the childish reply, it is because I am a right winger.
    Well I did get back to Heil Mary but the comment section is lost to me.
    The blog owner seems more diplomatic and rational and I would have to agree with him.
    Remember Sean some of us actually like to read different opinions and don’t make a song and attention dance out of them.
    Crack a window open and take a dander now and then your anger is as obvious as your poor responses.

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