What would happen if liberals admitted that Muslims are unassimilable?
(Those who like a certain kind of speculative discussion should keep up with this thread, which keeps on keeping on.)
Ben W. writes:
As you’ve been showing, people like Ralph Peters and Melanie Phillips show a lot of bluster, without any concrete proposals in the “war” against Islam. The single most obvious, practical solution is to curtail Muslim immigration and export them from our midst.
So why do so many of these “analysts” either miss altogether or dismiss any such steps?
Is it possible that implementing this strategy would really be an acknowledgment that secular, liberal, multicultural society is a failure? The domino effect would be that all the other liberal tenets would come tumbling down one by one. And this they fear.
George writes:
Ben W. asks if the right-liberals fear that acknowledging Muslims cannot live in the West will collapse all the other liberal dominoes.
I believe fear for the fall of liberalism is the main reason they dread a serious debate over Muslim immigration, but another reason they are afraid is because they have no idea what governing ideology will replace liberalism.
They should be worried because I myself do not know what exactly will replace liberalism after the coming Muslim immigration debate takes its toll on non-discrimination.
It is hard to predict great changes in society and what form those changes will take. For example, who in 1950 would have predicted that the American government would intentionally use non-white immigration to wipe out historical America, and yet it happened.
What we can be certain of though, is that when liberalism finally starts to fall terminally ill and a new governing ideology prepares to replace it, white racial awareness (which has been suppressed but not eliminated) in some form or fashion will take off because it is liberalism, and only liberalism, that prevents whites from acting in their own interests as an ethnic group.
We are going to enter unknown waters and that should scare anyone.
LA replies:
Well let me play the Devil’s Advocate against what has been my own position for a long time.
Why should renouncing non-discrimination in the case of Muslims necessarily lead to the discrediting of our society’s ruling non-discrimination idea with regard to other peoples?
Why couldn’t liberals say: “I agree that, because of Islam’s divine command to wage war on non-Muslims, Muslims cannot be assimilated into our society. But Islam is unique. All other groups and cultures can still be assimilated.”
And I think the answer to my question is that liberalism, as a universal, monolithic belief system, requires that its principles apply without exception to everyone. If it turns out that its principles do not apply to a major group (not just a major group but a fifth of humanity), this will break down its assurance in its own universal validity that liberalism requires to be legitimate in its own eyes. It would be like the 100-foot long rip that the iceberg made in the side of the Titanic. The ocean of non-liberal truth, which the supposedly impregnable steel hull of the mighty Titanic has been keeping at bay, would start pouring in, and the ship would sink.
George writes:
You wrote:
Why couldn’t liberals say: “I agree that Muslims because of their religion with its divine command to wage war against non-Muslims cannot be assimilated into our society. But Islam is unique. All other groups and cultures can still be assimilated.”
Actually, I fully expect them to try that line with the public if more terrorist attacks force either a ban or severe restrictions to be placed on Muslim immigration so as to keep the ship from capsizing. But that tactic cannot work. Liberals cannot make whites obey non-discrimination if they allow discriminatory immigration policies to be imposed on over one billion people. The about face would be too obviously contradictory.
The ideology of non-discrimination will collapse under this scenario.
Suppose scientists employed by the Vatican proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Jesus Christ did not rise from the dead after the Crucifixion and then the Pope acknowledges that the scientist’s findings are correct but says to his flock “Yes Jesus did not rise but everything ELSE in Catholicism is true and Jesus is still the Son of God Himself.”
It would be too little too late to save the Church.
The reversal in doctrine would be so dramatic and above all FUNDAMENTAL to the Church that the whole religion would lose credibility and lead to the serious questioning of other Church teachings.
The exact same thing would occur if liberals tried to make an exception for banning Islamic immigrants.
If liberals reversed themselves after defending Islam for so long, many people will stop listening to non-discrimination arguments and start to think about other groups are not compatible with us.
At that point, liberalism will be fatally wounded and it will only be a matter of time before the whole superstructure comes crashing down.
Mark P. writes:
George wrote:
“What we can be certain of though, is that when liberalism finally starts to fall terminally ill and a new governing ideology prepares to replace it, white racial awareness (which has been suppressed but not eliminated) in some form or fashion will take off because it is liberalism, and only liberalism, that prevents whites from acting in their own interests as an ethnic group.”
I think George under-estimates the degree of commitment liberals have to their religion. Liberals have so much invested in their beliefs that a rational thought process acknowledging liberalism’s failure is really not possible. Recent events give a hint about how liberals will behave as the Muslim immigration crisis unfolds.
I envision the government actively siding against the American people until a popular demagogue comes into power and literally abolishes liberalism by force. Look at the pattern of government behavior so far. The government’s first instinct is to refuse to call anything “terrorism” and to keep the public from drawing any connection between Islam and terrorism. The media (part of the government) actively sides with various minority “communities” (like the Bosnians in Utah) to make sure they don’t feel threatened. As terrorism accelerates, this instinct will become more pronounced, even to the point where American military personnel are stationed around mosques ready to shoot any non-Muslim that approaches.
The liberal instinct to circle the wagons around their ideology will leave a political vacuum of de facto disenfranchised citizens looking for someone to stem the tide. Opportunity will emerge for someone to step in. It will not be pretty.
Mark Jaws writes:
I think society will not only question the assimilability of liberal Moslems, but that of Hispanics as well, who will impose a cost on society that will soon be impossible—even for Scarsdale liberals—to ignore.
Alan Roebuck writes:
Fascinating discussion.
Liberal policy is not really one of nondiscrimination, because to be literally nondiscriminating is impossible for any living organism. Everyone, and every ruling philosophy, must accept some things and discriminate against (i.e., reject) others. Thus liberalism discriminates against Christianity and in favor of Islam because the religion of liberalism was designed to defeat Christianity and therefore liberalism does not recognize any other religion as a threat.
But most liberals are not consciously aware that they contradict themselves when they brag about how tolerant they are. They’re just using the conventional language of their religion. Their religion teaches that everything outside of the Western tradition is basically good, and that that’s tolerance, and they believe it.
So I agree with those who hypothesize that for our nation to admit officially that we need to discriminate against Muslims will be the beginning of the end of the reign of liberalism: A true religion is a package deal, and to doubt one significant part of it is to begin to doubt the whole thing.
Unfortunately, many liberals would rather fight that switch, so we can’t rely on people feeling the danger from Islam in their gut and then adjusting their worldview accordingly. We need to promulgate a comprehensive critique of liberalism.
LA replies:
“A true religion is a package deal, and to doubt one significant part of it is to begin to doubt the whole thing.”
Also, Mr. Roebuck has reminded us of his call for an anti-liberal apologetics, which he has written about several times at VFR.
* * *
Blogger John Savage at Brave New World Watch has a thoughtful critique of the idea that I and other commenters have stated in this thread, that if Westerners renounced the principle of non-discrimination vis a vis Muslims, the principle would be discredited across the board and the house of modern liberalism would come tumbling down. Savage makes a reasonable argument (though it could have been shorter and simpler, as my comment was a mere 155 words, and his response is 1,300 words). He says that if we are speaking of the liberalism that is based on the belief in assimilation, then the failure or refusal of Muslims to assimilate might well lead to the recognition that other groups are also not assimilating, and thus lead to a general rejection of liberal openness. But if the liberalism is the type that does not expect groups to assimilate but rather believes in multicultural tolerance of everyone regardless of whether they assimilate, the recognition that Islam uniquely among all religions and cultures in the world cannot tolerate other groups would provide a basis to exclude Islam, but would not provide a basis to exclude other groups.
To make this easier to follow, I’ll quote my comment which Savage himself quotes (the original appears higher up in this thread), then I’ll quote Savage’s response to it. As can be seen, I initially suggested that liberals could make a big exception for Muslims, then I turned around and argued against that point:
I wrote:
Why couldn’t liberals say: “I agree that, because of Islam’s divine command to wage war on non-Muslims, Muslims cannot be assimilated into our society. But Islam is unique. All other groups and cultures can still be assimilated.”
And I think the answer to my question is that liberalism, as a universal, monolithic belief system, requires that its principles apply without exception to everyone. If it turns out that its principles do not apply to a major group (not just a major group but a fifth of humanity), this will break down its assurance in its own universal validity that liberalism requires to be legitimate in its own eyes. It would be like the 100-foot long rip that the iceberg made in the side of the Titanic. The ocean of non-liberal truth, which the supposedly impregnable steel hull of the mighty Titanic has been keeping at bay, would start pouring in, and the ship would sink.
Savage replied:
… I would think that the left-liberal, if admitting the true nature of Islam, would say something more like, “I believe that America can contain all cultures [i.e. not assimilating]. All cultures, that is, that are willing to tolerate each other and admit that all cultures have a right to exist in their country. Muslims do not believe this. Therefore, Muslims and any other groups that demand the destruction of other peoples and cultures must be excluded. But most cultures will tolerate each other; therefore most cultures can be accepted into America.” The important fact about Muslims, then, would not be that they couldn’t assimilate, but that they couldn’t live in peace alongside non-Muslims. I would think a resulting policy of Muslim exclusion would not be enough to make the liberal begin to consider restricting non-Muslim immigration. The liberal would still be able to idealize Mexican immigrants, for example, especially as long as they formed a crucial constituency for the Democratic Party.
Savage’s analysis may well be correct; I admit that I don’t have a definitive view on this question. However, Savage may also be wrong, because once we realize that a major non-Western group cannot live safely among us, whether because it can’t assimilate or because it refuses to tolerate other groups, that experience may translate into a general rejection of liberal openness.
* * *
John D. writes:
You wrote: “However, Savage may also be wrong, because once we realize that a major non-Western group cannot live safely among us, whether because it can’t assimilate or because it refuses to tolerate other groups, that experience may translate into a general rejection of liberal openness.”
At minimum, it would pose the overall question of liberal openness. I don’t think it would necessarily translate into general rejection. This would be in keeping with the ongoing application your theory of the unprincipled exception, which would allow the continuing integration of those who could live peacefully amongst us, while allowing rejection of those who can not. Your very useful theory of the “unprincipled exception” is what has allowed liberalism with its suicidal tendencies the ability to survive, in many cases against overwhelming odds, thus giving liberalism much of its continuing growth of strength, which is not really a true strength at all, as it depends upon these critical exceptions for its survival, which must be made on a regular basis to exist. Identifying these unprincipled exceptions or weak links in the chain on their regular occurring basis is our greatest hope of defeating liberalism.
LA replies:
John D.’s point is well taken. However, it runs up against the implied consensus in the earlier part of this thread, which was that designating a fifth of humanity as outside the bounds of liberal non-discrimination would be too large an exception for the liberal ideology to handle without breaking down.
George writes:
John Savage writes: “The important fact about Muslims, then, would not be that they couldn’t assimilate, but that they couldn’t live in peace alongside non-Muslims.”
If liberals had justified mass immigration by only offering the “America is a nation of values not an actual people” argument as opposed to the “we can assimilate anyone!” argument, then perhaps liberalism could survive passage of anti-Muslim immigration legislation.
However, liberals have constantly invoked Ellis Island idolatry as a propaganda tool ever since the 1965 Immigration Act. Assimilation is a never ending theme in writings on immigration for both left liberals and right liberals. Remember that it was right liberal Michael Barone’s The New Americans which popularized the idea that Mexicans, Asians and Blacks will assimilate because they are like the Italian, Jewish and Irish immigrants of the past.
When responding to questions about Islam in particular, liberals always go to great lengths to compare Islam with Christianity by saying things like “both religions are of The Book” and “God in both the Koran and the Bible is violent.” The implication is that since Islam and Christianity are similar, Muslims should not have any problem being assimilated into American life.
Because they have embraced the rhetoric of assimilation, liberals can’t concede that Muslims are impossible to assimilate and pretend that assimilation was never one of their central argument as Mr. Savage suggests.
Furthermore, many liberals are not consciously lying when they argue in favor of non-discrimination but have actually deceived themselves into believing their own rhetoric. If liberals are forced to surrender on Muslim immigration, there would create a serious ideological crisis on the left.
Many right liberals would begin to have serious doubts and start moving away from the ideology of non-discrimination, thus causing a schism on the establishment right just as some on the right have moved away from Wilsonian foreign policy. Meanwhile left liberals would confusedly lash out at the American people for imposing a discriminatory policy.
Most importantly, liberal control over white Americans would start to break down because non-discrimination will have failed a key ideological test. Liberalism does not have any sustainable political power unless whites, to some extent, believe in and/or acquiesce to liberal ideology. When whites start specifically challenging liberal teachings on Islam, the left’s hold on power will begin to disintegrate in other areas.
Anyway, this is my thinking. Although I might be missing something, I think that Mr. Savage’s critique has a serious hole in it.
Bart V. writes from the Netherlands:
First of all, I would like to thank you, at long last, for your invariably hard-hitting commentary on “the passing scene.” While I occasionally find myself in disagreement with some of your views (and some of your contacts’ opinions, put bluntly, make my hair stand on end), I believe that we agree on the core issues—the essentials—and, for this reason, your articles never fail to strike a chord with me, at least on some level. However, I must dissent from the view that the acknowledgment of the fact that (1) Islam poses a grave threat to the West, that (2) Muslims, collectively, will not be able/will not show any willingness to integrate and that (3) Muslim immigration is, as a result, highly undesirable and should be either greatly restricted or ended altogether will inevitably lead to the dismantlement of the modern-day liberal order as a whole. In other words, I am responding primarily to this statement (assuming I understood its gist correctly):
“Is it possible that implementing this strategy would really be an acknowledgment that secular, liberal, multicultural society is a failure? The domino effect would be that all the other liberal tenets would come tumbling down one by one. And this they fear.”
To begin with, consider the example of the Netherlands, which happens to be an insanely liberal country on most counts and yet has already adopted certain “radical” (in the context of modern-day liberalism) measures to keep the bulk of Muslims out of the country. If you are not familiar with the said steps, you probably should look through this article.
(At the outset, I, of course, admit that they, for the most part, are quite meek and insufficiently bold to resolve the issue once and for all; however, they definitely have the potential to ameliorate the existing situation.)
The purpose of these measures? Protection of the liberal order.
“They will also have to take an exam testing their compatibility with Dutch liberal values. The exam includes a movie featuring homosexuals kissing and a scene at a nude beach. The movie emphasizes the point that this is all part of normal life in the Netherlands.
“Britain recently announced it will rate potential immigrants according to a point system that will favor well-educated or highly skilled workers, and two German states recently proposed new citizenship tests that would question applicants’ views on forced marriage, homosexuality, women’s rights, and terrorism.”
Sure, even from reading the aforementioned scantily educating article it becomes abundantly clear that certain far-left elements have already flown off the handle and are vigorously accusing the government of being racist and discriminatory against the Other, but the profoundly liberal Dutch population, amazingly, does not display too much eagerness to follow them off the cliff. Concurrently, the Dutch are largely protective of their liberal ideals—as a matter of fact, I would submit that Muslims, with their utter rejection of those, have forced many Dutch to appreciate their “treasure” more keenly.
Most of my co-workers (I am Dutch) are on record as saying in no certain terms that absolutely all immigration from Muslim countries—no caveats and no apologies included—should be banned immediately. Why? The answer they tentatively give is that—I am paraphrasing here—they love their liberal enclave of a country and do not want to be disturbed by foreigners. They harbor no burning desire to “spread the word” all over the globe—they want to be left alone to revel in the experience of living in what is probably the most socially liberal country on the face of the earth.
Here is another: When I once remarked that I am not exactly enthusiastic about gay marriage (it is legal here), it was coldly suggested that probably I should pack my belongings and head for the Muslim world, where I and my backward world view belong.
I would theorize that many liberals believe that our world is about to witness an all-out war between the forces of good—liberalism—and the force of evil—conservatism. Judging from the dynamics of my social circle, more and more people are starting to arrive at the conclusion that the Muslim world is actually part of the conservative army and, consequently, makes a rather ineffective ally against Western conservatives. Paradoxically, Larry, you and the like-minded folks may wind up being placed on the same side as Muslims—according to the collective liberal psyche. The masses of liberals, should push come to shove, may make the decision to take up arms to protect the core tenets of their Weltanschauung.
Some of my liberal friends have already expressed the view that the Western world—the liberal realm—should be “purged” of conservatives, Christians and Muslims alike. Why? Because they threaten the tenets of modern-day liberalism. Liberals, at a subconscious level, anticipate the upcoming battle with Islam and its hungry soldiers and welcome it with opens arms, as they consider it to be an opportunity to affirm the fundamentals of liberalism and chase away “the forces of evil” for an indefinite period of time.
The crux of my view is that liberalism will not necessarily come crushing down in case of a confrontation with Islam and Muslims. On the contrary, the threat from Islam may unite liberals—most Westerners outside of a handful of American states, to be precise—and galvanize them into action.
LA replies:
Well, this is most interesting. Bart V. is saying that in expelling Muslims—and, he adds, conservatives as well—liberalism will re-affirm and purify its non-discriminatory ideology, which will now be redefined as: non-discriminatory tolerance toward those who believe in non-discriminatory tolerance. All people who reject non-discriminatory tolerance, namely Muslims and white conservatives, must be removed from society.
Thus, instead of the rejection of Muslims leading to the breakdown of the liberal ideology of non-discrimination and the restoration of conservatism, the rejection of Muslims would lead to the super-empowerment of the liberal ideology of non-discrimination, and the total elimination of conservatism—and of conservatives.
Bart V. replies:
I appreciate your response, Mr Auster.You have hit the nail on the head here—and thanks for articulating my ideas so clearly. (As an aside, I yet again have to marvel at how masterfully you are able to encapsulate the central points of any piece of writing that comes your way).
To elucidate my point, I would like to present another example of the reasoning of many liberals who have abjured their naive belief that Islam is “a Muslim Christianity” or thereabouts.
A couple of years ago, I was an active participant on a prominent forum devoted primarily to anatomizing Islam in a scholarly manner and informing the larger world of the religion’s ultimate goals.
Without delving into the finer points of one fateful discussion, I made the point that the West should reject the liberal order—not just left-wing parties—but the liberal order in principle, in its entirety. I essentially expressed some of the core beliefs of traditionalists, which run contrary not only to the agenda of the Left, but to the cherished ideals of the Right as well. I stated that I was both saddened and angered by the advance of the homosexualist agenda and questioned some—not all!—tenets of feminism.
The response was damning. One female member of the forum unwittingly captured the spirit of the line-up of responses I was pelted with by writing, “Whatever for should we fight Islam if your ideas are the alternative? To me, there is no difference between the two in practice, and maybe in theory too.” Others, obviously in the spirit of liberal acceptance, suggested that I am an identical twin of your average member of the Taliban.
The majority of those liberals felt compelled to stand up against Islam because it threatened liberalism. Most of them believed in immigration, but clarified that the right to immigrate should be granted only to those who subscribe to liberalism.
Might it be that to many liberals the fault line lies between liberals and conservatives—the latter being comprised of Western conservatives and Muslims? Framed in such a way, liberals may harmlessly let go of their desire to bring hordes of Muslims into the West. After all, the liberal principle of non-discrimination, in my experience, rarely applies to conservatives.
Mark P. writes:
1) Bart V. wrote:
“They will also have to take an exam testing their compatibility with Dutch liberal values. The exam includes a movie featuring homosexuals kissing and a scene at a nude beach. The movie emphasizes the point that this is all part of normal life in the Netherlands.”
Right. Because a terror-supporting jihadi is going to let it be known how much he is disgusted by these practices. What, are they going to measure psychological reactions?
2) Bart V. wrote:
“Britain recently announced it will rate potential immigrants according to a point system that will favor well-educated or highly skilled workers, and two German states recently proposed new citizenship tests that would question applicants’ views on forced marriage, homosexuality, women’s rights, and terrorism.”
Surely Muslim doctors and engineers would never commit acts of terrorism. And, again, we have more easily gamed tests.
3) Bart V. wrote:
“Most of my co-workers (I am Dutch) are on record as saying in no certain terms that absolutely all immigration from Muslim countries—no caveats and no apologies included—should be banned immediately. Why? The answer they tentatively give is that—I am paraphrasing here—they love their liberal enclave of a country and do not want to be disturbed by foreigners. They harbor no burning desire to “spread the word” all over the globe—they want to be left alone to revel in the experience of living in what is probably the most socially liberal country on the face of the earth.”
And has this attitude made any dent in government policy? Has the Muslim population been substantially reduced? [LA adds: Please see my recent post about the Dutch integration minister saying that the Islamization of the Netherlands should be encouraged.]
It doesn’t matter if an unorganized and deracinated population has a dim view of Muslims. What matters is what the government does.
4) Bart V. wrote:
“Some of my liberal friends have already expressed the view that the Western world—the liberal realm—should be “purged” of conservatives, Christians and Muslims alike. Why? Because they threaten the tenets of modern-day liberalism. Liberals, at a subconscious level, anticipate the upcoming battle with Islam and its hungry soldiers and welcome it with opens arms, as they consider it to be an opportunity to affirm the fundamentals of liberalism and chase away “the forces of evil” for an indefinite period of time.”
And when the EU army is composed mostly of Turks, from where will come the “liberal soldiers” who will force this purge? The American military, for examle, is composed largely of white, male, evangelical Christians. The secular left is composed of lawyers. Do the secularists expect their “words” to deflect bullets?
Sorry…all of this sounds very fanciful.
LA replies:
I think Mark’s point is that current Dutch policy continues to welcome Muslims, therefore there is no liberal purge of Muslims in sight, therefore Bart’s notion of a liberal purge of conservatives along with Muslims is not in sight.
Ok, let’s say for the sake of argument that what Bart has perceived is a tendency in the (Dutch) liberal mind, rather than an actual program. Nevertheless, this tendency does exist. I’ve often noted how secular liberals frame the Islam problem as part of a larger threat coming from “theocracy” or “religion,” i.e., from Christianity. The question is, to what extent will liberals, in order to feel comfortable in opposing or even expelling Islam and in order make their expulsion of Islam really “pay off” for them, define Islam as a type of “conservatism,” which also must be expelled? And the next question is, to what extent would this idea gain political support?
To keep this discussion on planet earth, we’re not talking about America here, but Europe, where, given the already existing quasi-totalitarian left-liberal regime, the denial of citizenship rights to conservatives is not a complete fantasy.
Sage McLaughlin writes:
Regarding the question of whether the failure of Muslim assimilation will cause liberals to question their premises, I haven’t been following the debate very closely, I admit, since it appears there’s an argument going on about things that haven’t happened yet and seem unlikely to happen any time soon. My view, at any rate, is that there is little chance of liberals ever admitting the basic incompatibility of large Muslim populations with Western society, for a host of reasons. Also, if that admission ever did happen, it wouldn’t cause the crisis of liberal faith you’re describing (though I’d sincerely love to be proved wrong on that).
The most important problem, of course, is what you call Auster’s First Law of Majority-Minority Relations in Liberal Society. I have very serious doubts that any committed liberal will respond to bad behavior by Muslims by questioning whether they belong in the West (or, I should say, they will never question whether they belong among lower- and middle-class Westerners). That instinctive liberal Cringe; that unerring tendency to blame any and all minority crime and depredation on the awfulness of the majority; the increase in that tendency in near-perfect coincidence with the severity of the affront to civilized norms—all of this is symptomatic of some truly basic liberal assumptions. Liberals do not, in fact, have a history of abandoning liberalism in the face of obvious failure. As we see in Europe, the reaction to such failures, be they economic, demographic, or otherwise, is to insist that the results of liberal policies are actually the results of insufficiently liberal policies.
What I think some of us are saying, in the end, is that liberals should, logically, begin to question their assumptions at some point, especially as the self-imposed catastrophe of Western liberalism reaches genuinely apocalyptic proportions. But really, they should have abandoned those assumptions a long time ago.
Now, assuming they ever did let go of the idea that Muslims can be nicely integrated en masse into Western civilization, I see no reason to think they’d see this as a failure of liberalism. On the contrary, they would probably conclude that the West remains too damnably Western, and redouble their efforts to annihilate its distinctive character from within. The would conclude, one may say, that the problem with the West is that there are simply too many Westerners in it. If Muslims cannot be integrated into liberal society, it is only because white men from the American south are ALSO incompatible with Western society, which they define as being synonymous with hyper-liberal society. At least, this has been the kind of reaction we have gotten in the past. We’re already seeing traces of it—how often now do you hear that the problem is not so much Islam, or even radical Islam, as it is religion as such?
Your First Law of Majority-Minority Relations is actually just one species of a larger pathology of advanced liberalism: in the face of undeniable evidence that non-discrimination is lethally insufficient as a ruling social principle, the liberal response is not moderation, but increased radicalism. Which is to say, the more society suffers from the application of liberal ideology, the more the society is found wanting—thus justifying an ever-more-invasive application of liberal medicine. Just because your young people are being raped and knifed in the streets by Muslim gangs, as is the case in many unfortunate Western environs nowadays, is hardly any reason to question the wisdom of resettling hostile foreigners in your country, so far as a liberal is concerned. It is considered by most liberals morbidly racist even to complain about such things.
What a lot of people don’t get is that when a liberal asks (explicitly or implicitly), “Why do they hate us?” the question is actually rhetorical. The liberal already thinks he knows exactly why they hate us. They’ve been supplying us (and them, actually) with the answer for decades. Open any academic text pertinent to the subject, and you will find page after wearisome page of explications on the sheer horror that is the West, that is whiteness, that is our religion and our heritage and our history. The hate us because we deserve it, and there are tenured professors in every last nook and cranny of Western academia ready to read you the rap sheet at a moment’s notice (for a proper fee). This goes for our poets and our politicians, too.
No, Larry, when liberals see the incompatibility of that wonderfully colorful Other with white Western society, they don’t feel shocked out of their assumptions. They feel vindicated.
LA replies:
What a flow of eloquent reasoning from Mr. McLaughlin.
Basically, Sage rejects the very premise of this entire discussion, which is that at least some liberals (and by liberals I mean all modern Western people who believe that non-discrimination is the ruling principle of society) are moving toward the recognition that Islam itself is the problem. But clearly some of them are. And that fact renders the question of the effect this will have on their thinking more than merely speculative. Also, in order for this discussion to be meaningful, it does not have to be the case that all liberals give up on the hope of Muslim assimilation. Whether many liberals change their thinking about Muslims or only a few, the question in this discussion is, what will be the consequences for their overall liberalism?
Further, since the liberals who are under our microscope include many “conservatives” or right-liberals, and since conservatives do NOT blame all minority problems on the majority (the First Law of Majority-Minority Relations applies to left-liberals, not right-liberals), that makes it likely that their change of view on Muslims will lead to a larger change in their thinking about non-discrimination generally.
Perhaps the distinction between left-liberals and right-liberals should have been made from the start, but that would have made this already very complicated discussion even more complicated.
Sage McLaughlin replies:
Your response certainly firms up the contours of the discussion. Maybe the most important point you make is that right-liberalism is starting to show some actual signs of wear. Perhaps it’s the strain of the Comprehensive Black Death bill (a terrific phrase, by the way). It’s true that we’ve been witness to some real angst over first principles from the mainstream right (which is unsurprising, since modern conservatism tends to entail explicit attention to first principles). The key question, if we agree that at least some liberals are reconsidering their commitment to non-discrimination, is whether we’ll see enough defections for it to matter politically. The recent immigration fracas gives me some hope that all is not lost.
Thanks for the clarification.
M. Mason writes:
I certainly agree with Mr. McLaughlin’s excellent analysis up to a point, but the situation re the Liberal West with respect to Islam seems to me to have its own quite different and ominous political dynamic (although liberals as a whole do not yet realize this). Unlike, say, the black populations in Western countries and many other exotic minority groups who do not pose a political threat to liberalism—and are, in fact, extremely useful to liberals as stage props—the conflict between the followers of Mohammed and European left-liberal utopians will come to be seen as a clash between two utterly different opposing totalitarian ideologies. Since ultimately one must subsume oneself to the dogmas of the liberal collective—which is precisely what Muslims absolutely and defiantly refuse to do— how can there not be some sort of momentous crisis for European socialists coming in the future over this?
Once Europe’s socialist architects come to realize that there is little or no “social justice” mileage to be squeezed anymore from the increasingly difficult, recalcitrant and politically dangerous Islamic communities in their midst, I suspect that a “tipping point” will be reached and some of them (though not all) will eventually begin to project a different attitude. One sees this same thing here in America, for example, when blacks become conservatives or Christians—immediately they lose their usefulness to liberals who, in fact, then turn on them. In Europe, I expect this to take the form of moving against all forms of “fundamentalism” (which will, of course, also include many Christians as well), thus solidifying the power of the state to an even greater degree. That certainly doesn’t mean all Muslims will be deported or that there won’t be continued serious problems, but rather that increasing restraints on their influence will be seen and some curbs on immigration will be instituted in certain countries. It will be some time, however, before this happens in a decisive way.
I take Mr. Auster’s earlier point that “designating a fifth of humanity as outside the bounds of liberal non-discrimination would be too large an exception for the liberal ideology to handle without breaking down.” Yes indeed, one would think so, but let me suggest that I believe he may be approaching this the wrong way—which is to say that he is thinking in a rational, principled and logical way about it. As I see this, it’s not just the inherent contradictions at the root of modern liberal politics that are at issue here. The left-liberal postmodern is also often enslaved to a psychologically dysfunctional cognitive strategy that is able to shift, without a blink from one subjective conviction to its exact opposite without a shred of self-awareness or mental disturbance. I have seen this happen numerous times in my conversations with these self-styled “intellectuals”; many are simply incapable of processing the sheer irrationality of their beliefs. This virtually guarantees, in my opinion, that at some point in the future we will see something like a 180 degree shift among a number of the European decision-making elites and power players about their growing “Islamic problem.” To the extent that this might come as something of a momentary rude psychological shock for many of them, they’ll get over it. The fatuous socialist utopian fever-dream of universal “tolerance” and “non-discrimination” always was an absurd ideological fantasy anyway. Once that pretension is stripped from them, they will simply resort to yet another unprincipled exception—this time on a massive scale—to justify the new dogma, and all that will really be left for them to believe in is the unfettered authority of the godless leftist state, Nietzsche’s will to power writ large.
LA replies:
If I understand M. Mason correctly, he says there is an irrepressible conflict brewing between the European left and Muslims leading to a leftist rejection of Islam. But this leftist rejection of Islam will result, not in a leftist rejection of leftism (which would result from leftism realizing the unworkability of its principle of non-discrimination) but in a (as I put it in my discussion of Bart V.’s comment) super-empowerment of the left against all non-leftist ideologies. So I’m not sure what Mr. Mason is saying that Bart V. hasn’t already said.
M. Mason writes:
Yes, that’s what I’m saying, and also adding the essentially irrational nature of post-modernism into the mix. Now, obviously there are different degrees of liberalism, different kinds of individual personalities and even different national “temperments” that factor into this too, and it would be a mistake to over-generalize. So, I have no doubt that many of the more naive, idealistic, rank-and-file types would find their “religious calling” (and expiate in their own souls their feelings of white, Western guilt) by becoming dhimmi retainers or functionaries in a Muslim-dominated society.
But in my experience, at least, that by no means includes all of them, and since a poster has already related a personal experience about this subject, let me tell you about one of mine. I saw the sort of bizarre, erratic post-modern behavior I’ve described above play out some time ago during a lengthy online discussion I had with a life-long, self-styled, hardcore “progressive” over a period of several weeks. He was an intelligent guy who initially presented himself as just a middle-aged, “moderate liberal”—the standard answer given by many actual leftists attempting to be evasive about their political beliefs. After making the usual reflexive multicultural noises whitewashing Islam as essentially a “religion of peace,” he did allow that they seemed to “still have some problems keeping their religion from mixing with their politics” (!?!) This silly, ignorant leftist song-and-dance routine continued for some time.
But then an interesting thing happened. When the worldwide Muslim rioting over the Dutch publication of the Mohammed cartoons occurred, a glimmer of light about the true reality of Islam actually began to penetrate into the dark recesses of his mind. The result was that he made an abrupt, unexpected 180 degree shift from his previous tolerant, inclusive position and said in no uncertain terms that he now wanted these people (the Muslims) to “get off my [expletive deleted] planet.” At that point, I merely asked him the obvious question: since 1.4 billion adherents of Islam weren’t going to be magically transported to somewhere else in the solar system, the logic of his politics seemed to dictate that the only way for him to get rid of them permanently was to kill them all, or at the very least tens of millions of them. Is that what it would finally come down to now for the realization of a world-wide, progressive utopia—some sort of mass extermination of Muslims?
In a word, yes it did—at least for one committed leftist idealogue (though he was cagey and wouldn’t publicly admit it). When it finally began to dawn on him that Islam was not going to be amenable to being infiltrated and “managed” by liberalism in the same way that large swathes of Western Christendom have been so undermined, in a moment he then “dropped the mask” and showed his real attitude and intentions toward it. I expect a similar political/psychological dynamic to slowly but eventually play itself out across various parts of Europe with some prominent leftist politicians in relation to their ever-growing “Muslim problem” in the years to come.
Posted by Lawrence Auster at July 20, 2007 11:20 AM | Send