Front Page Magazine opens to traditionalist ideas

Front Page Magazine opens to traditionalist ideas

Two noteworthy items in the January 10th issue of Front Page Magazine. First, here is the headline for Orianna Fallaci’s article on the Muslim threat:

A Sermon for the West
By Oriana Fallaci
Our tolerance will kill us.

That startling—and radically anti-liberal—subtitle, “Our tolerance will kill us,” does not appear in the article, nor do the words “tolerance,” “tolerant,” or “toleration.” It would seem that FrontPage adapted the idea of criticizing tolerance from my January 8th article (see the headline below) and (entirely appropriately) presented it as the theme of Fallaci’s article as well. To think that David Horowitz’s magazine not only published my article with its idea that tolerance must stop being the guiding principle of our society if we are to survive, but that they then used that idea on their own as the subtitle for another article on a related theme, suggests that once-forbidden traditionalist ideas are now making their way into the mainstream. This doesn’t necessarily mean that FrontPage agrees with the notion that an excessive belief in tolerance is killing us, but that they regard the critique of tolerance as a legitimate position to be raised in public debate.

Furthermore, the subtitle of my article, while it correctly paraphrased the article’s anti-liberal argument, was not a direct quote from the article and was not my suggestion. It came from Front Page’s editors:

Liberalism: the Real Cause of Today’s Anti-Semitism
By Lawrence Auster
What happens once liberal tolerance rather than traditional morality becomes our guiding principle?

And now onto something more startling. The same issue of FrontPage features an interview with several people including Carol Swain and Jared Taylor discussing white nationalism, in which Taylor speaks of the inherent difficulty of blacks and whites living as true equals under the same government and argues that racial separation is the only answer. The other participants are basically left responding to him. Once again, this doesn’t mean that FrontPage is endorsing Taylor’s ideas; in fact the interviewer, Jamie Glazov, an editor and regular contributor at Front Page, strongly disputes them. But it does mean that Front Page is treating Taylor as a legitimate participant in the discussion.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at January 10, 2003 02:00 AM | Send

Comments

Jim Kalb and Sandy, in another recent thread, were perhaps prescient about what is starting to happen:

“There’s a lesson to us all here. If there are enough outlets and listeners to establish a presence that can’t be ignored then the established outlook can no longer present itself as a system of unquestioned truth that precedes the discussion of specific issues. That radically affects politics. — Jim Kalb” [VFR of course being one of the “outlets” Mr. Kalb refers to]

“All it takes is some common sense observation of the complex grammatical structures of the left radical chic to see the liberal mind-set at work. As we become more and more skilled in observing these tools of debate control we become harder for the left to control. — Sandy”

(from the readers’ comments on the VFR article, http://www.counterrevolution.net/vfr/archives/001122.html )

Looks like Lincoln may have been right after all — “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and you can fool all of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.”

VFR was never fooled. Looks like FrontPageMag may be catching on as well.

Posted by: Unadorned on January 10, 2003 9:42 AM

Is it also significant that some liberals in Europe (and Ms Fallaci is a most hardcore liberal: her list of Western luminaries consists of Jefferson, Franklin, Robespierre !!!, Napoleon and Garibaldi) seem to be recognising that large-scale Muslim immigration threatens the whole of Western culture, including their own tradition.

If even a portion of liberals were to take this view, it might open up a debate about culture and immigration in which conservatives could participate.

Posted by: Mark Richardson on January 10, 2003 2:18 PM

The case of Pim Fortuyn was interesting in this regard. Here was an “out” homosexual and an avowed liberal taking a strongly paleoconservative stand on immigration, mixed with what can perhaps best be described as Dutch liberal nationalism. His entire argument was based around the threat that Muslim’s pose to Holland’s liberal tradition. Interestingly, gay and lesbian people where I am currently living (New Zealand) have been virtually the only liberals to voice concern about the recent influx of Muslim asylum seekers. Ironic indeed if these people end up becoming our allies on immigration reform.

Posted by: Shawn on January 11, 2003 2:11 AM

“Interestingly, gay and lesbian people where I am currently living (New Zealand) have been virtually the only liberals to voice concern about the recent influx of Muslim asylum seekers. Ironic indeed if these people end up becoming our allies on immigration reform.” — Shawn

I wish Andrew Sullivan would wake up on the issue of immigration reform in general. It seems that nothing — no amount of alarm bells going off — can jar that man out of his slumber. I’ve simply stopped reading him — haven’t seen a thing he’s written since April and I plan on keeping it that way. I haven’t time to waste when there’s important work to be done.

Posted by: Unadorned on January 11, 2003 8:23 AM

“I wish Andrew Sullivan would wake up on the issue of immigration reform in general.” — Unadorned

I agree. Although he claims not be one, Sullivan comes across very much as a neocon, completely blind on the immigration issue. I still read him regularly however, although largely for the entertainment value rather than for intellectual stimulation. He’s very good at ecoriating the hypocrisy and intellectual dishonesty of the liberal left.

Posted by: Shawn on January 11, 2003 8:48 AM

Ironic, but unsurprising. The attempt by some to explain contemporary liberalism as a consequence of the principle of tolerance or the fetishization of equality is, as the behavior of these homosexuals attests, misguided. It is not tolerance or equality per se such people are after. It is *specific* tolerance; tolerance of specific activities and the people who perform them only.

This is why I insist that the defining mark of liberalism today is denial of the natural law, *not* devotion to tolerance, diversity, equality or anything else. “Tolerance,” “diversity,” and “equality” are merely means to the liberals’ end; the noble-sounding sophistical weapons they use in their war on Christ. The liberals’ programme is nothing but the athiest programme, and the athiest programme necessarily involves the destruction of the Christian (and Muslim, and any other orthodoxy that poses a threat) programme. No liberal is seriously devoted to protecting Christians’ or Muslims’ equal rights, nor the equal rights of anyone who threatens the liberal regime itself, though they may sometimes seem to when they are using such people in a bid to destroy some more immediate enemy. These NZ homosexuals clearly and correctly perceive that Muslims, if allowed to freely immigrate, will pose a mortal threat to their lifestyle and are simply reacting accordingly.

Posted by: Jim Newland on January 11, 2003 9:46 AM

I agree with Jim Newland that denial of the natural law comes first. First you say that “good” simply means “desired.” Then you say that since all desires are equally desires they are all equally good — equally worthy of being furthered. That’s the principle of equality. You also say that the ultimate goal of social organization is enabling people to get what they want. That’s the principle of freedom. So liberal equality and freedom aren’t really ultimate principles, they are expressions of denial that there are goods that transcend desire.

Posted by: Jim Kalb on January 12, 2003 6:16 PM