Which was a response to the flak she got for this original post.
‘By banning from the country as extremists the American anti-jihadis Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, the Home Secretary Teresa May has not only made herself look ridiculous but has sent the enemies of the United Kingdom the message that they have it on the run.’
Agreed. Poorly played, Lady Britannia.
Click through for some drama as it was conservative activists who took issue with some of what Phillips wrote in response to the Home Secretary’s actions.
There’s a reasonable and skeptical conservatism out there even if you’re in an embattled minority working against public opinion, as Phillips points out. It strikes this American, with a broader tolerance for speech, as just plain stupid to not even let Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer in to discuss their ideas. More speech is often the answer.
Yet, you don’t necessarily want to embrace the English Defence League as an ally without looking long and hard at that group. Elements within it are yobbish and criminally violent, though perhaps not quite as nationalistic, fascistic, and racial-purity-Right as some groups on the Continent (and yes, the Marxist and Communist Left are fascistic as well, which form a base for much multicultural thought).
Activism can be an effective means to spread ideology (Leftists know this all too well), especially for spreading a political and philosophical ideology that a majority doesn’t favor, but those in a minority do.
We’ve seen a rise in conservative activism in America as well, sometimes copying the same methods the Left has used.
This blog is still keeping an eye on those in the British and European Left along the boundaries where a few people become something like neo-conservatives, or at least heretics and contrarians as they defend broader definitions of speech and point out the unholy marriage between Islamism and Leftism/multiculturalism and its consequences. Lars Hedegaard, Christopher Hitchens, and Melanie Philips are worth reading for this reason.
There are many other voices with important truths to tell us.
Related On This Site: Islamism, Immigration & Multiculturalism-Melanie Phillips Via Youtube
Why Lars Hedegaard Still Matters…Update And Repost- From YouTube: Leo Strauss On The Meno-More On The Fact/Value Distinction?’…Morality away from a transcendent God, but back toward Hume through the cognitive sciences?: Franz De Waal At The NY Times 10/17/10: ‘Morals Without God?’
People think I’m crazy, but NPR is the manifestation and mainstreaming of 60′s idealism. This idealism will always need money, and gravitates towards the public purse. Foundations which served other ideals naturally attract idealists. A Few Thoughts On NPR And Current Liberal Establishment Thinking Under Obama…
You know it’s getting bad when even a former NPR exec says it’s getting out of hand: Jack Shakely At The Los Angeles Review Of Books Reviews Ken Stern’s ‘With Charity For All’
From YouTube: Roger Scruton On Religious Freedom, Islam & Atheism…From The Middle East Quarterly Via A & L Daily: Europe’s Shifting Immigration Dynamic
Kenan Malik In The Spiked Review Of Books: ‘Twenty Years On: Internalizing The Fatwa’-Salman Rushdie
Theodore Dalrymple argues that France has the potential to handle Muslim immigration better because of its ideological rigidity, which can better meet the ideological rigidity of its Muslim immigrants…Theodore Dalrymple Still Attacking Multi-Culturalism In Britain
How do you reasonably deal with relativism anyways?: From Virtual Philosophy: A Brief Interview With Simon Blackburn
Repost-Eugene Volokh At The National Review: ‘Multiculturalism: For or Against?’