Frit Folk

The other day, when I was searching for information about the Danish Constitution (the Grundlov), I ran into a site called Frit Folk, which is part of a website for a group called Balder.org.

I know a lot more Danish words than I did a few months ago. I know that “Frit Folk” means “Free People”, and on the web page I could recognize phrases like “freedom of speech”, “we have our Constitution”, and “Denmark is ours!” I even know who Balder was, i.e. the old Norse god of manly purity, slain by the trickster Loki who pierced him with an arrow made of mistletoe — just in case you’re interested.

A picture of Holger Danske was on the sidebar of the page, and I could see an obvious anti-Islamic aspect to the website, but other that that I was at sea with all the mysterious Danish phrases.

So I asked our Danish reader and commenter Phanarath for some help. I especially wanted to know whether Frit Folk was a racist neo-Nazi type of group, or whether it was a counterjihad organization like SIAD.

Phanarath wrote me back with a translation of the page, and this explanation:

I was considering that Frit Folk might be somehow connected to the Dansk Front or other National Socialist groups, but I couldn’t find any connection. Also, they make comparisons between “anti-racists” and the “brown-shirts”, and talk about how the Social Democrats also liked the Nazis back in the war.

There is nothing in all the speeches that can reasonably be viewed as Nazi. But some of the members could have been associated with other groups that can be. I didn’t find any connections, though. I thought you should know that I have been thinking along the same lines. A personal passion of mine is to get Nazism back where it belongs: on the Left.

The “anti-racist” groups call everyone Racists or Nazi including the police. It’s just something they like to shout.

The page consisted of a speech written by Bente Jørgensen for a demonstration at the Landsoldaten [a statue — the Country Soldier — erected to honor the soldiers in the wars against Germany/Prussia 1848 -1864] in Fredericia, on Sunday, December 1st, 2002. Ms. Jørgensen couldn’t be there, so the speech was read instead by Vibeke Edsberg:

What is happening in our country? We have a constitution that says that censorship can never again be introduced. We have freedom of assembly, freedom of religion and freedom of expression.

Or do we?

At the same time we have laws that prohibit us from expressing our fears about the future — if they concern the consequences of immigration and a hostile foreign religion.

A foreign religion that has come into close contact with our lives.

In the media we are confronted with violence and war, suicide bombs and oppression committed in the name of this religion.

But at the same time we are told by our politicians and spiritual leaders that we have no reason to fear.

And the immigrants tell us that their religion means peace.

But where does it do that?

- - - - - - - - - -

The USA is shown as a multicultural role model. But what is overlooked is that we seem to be playing the role of the Indians. In the USA the aboriginal inhabitants don’t have much land or resources. I cheer for the Indians in the movies, but they still lose. I wonder if the Indians would have risked being charged with racism, if they had spoken out against the white man. It did, however, take a few hundred years to eliminate the Indians. Today in Europe it is happening much faster.

Is it illegal to learn from history?

We now have about 425,000 immigrants and descendants of immigrants in this country. About 300,000 of these are from Muslim countries. This number has doubled in the last ten to eleven years. If this goes on the Danes will be a minority in about twenty-five years. But I am not allowed to express my fear about this without risking prosecution. I must be careful with my mouth. The worst thing is that it is usually other Danes who are the most active enforcers of these rules.

In my daily work I meet many people, both young and old, who are very worried and frightened. Especially the old people, who experienced World War Two.

They are all frightened of the future.

Especially the future of their children and grandchildren. And they are happy to be old, so they don’t have to live to see the future society of conflict and confrontation between cultures. They have seen what happened in Yugoslavia and are afraid of civil war in this country.

It is very painful to hear.

When the war was over, the old people say, the Germans went home. This time its different. And they mention incidents with which were unfamiliar in this country only twenty years ago.

• Gang rapes
  
• Parents mutilating their baby girls
  
• Guards on Strøjet [walking and shopping street] in Copenhagen
  
• Children in kindergarten who are not allowed to eat Leverpostej [common food made from pork]
  
• Children in Nørrebro forbidden to wear crosses
  
• Police protection for a Danish revival preacher

In the past it was not a problem to be buried next to a Dane in the cemetery.

We do not understand why the freedoms we were given in our Constitution in 1849 are now being used against us, to advance an -ism, one that is not itself tolerant towards different believers or thinkers.

• Is it wrong to preserve the society and the values we have built?
  
• Should we accept a foreign culture’s demands on us, without being allowed to speak against it?
  
• Are we not allowed to say openly why they are here? Their leaders in their home countries are not hiding it.
  
• And should we accept the fact that it falls on us to pay for the whole thing?
  
• Can we hope to be able to see once again a society built on harmony and safety?

When we protest, we are told that we are racists. But what is racism?

Today is it simply ascribing negative qualities to persons having a different skin color?

No, racism covers both culture and religion, but only addresses violations committed against a minority, which in return gets a free pass.

In South Jutland, where I am from, and in South Schleswig we have a German and a Danish minority as a consequence of where the border was drawn. The new minorities come from immigration.

We need to look at this differently.

Is it racism to speak against a foreign culture or religion when its foundation — seen from a Danish perspective — is violence, and to discuss things that its followers openly acknowledge?

When is someone a minority? Can 5 million Danes be seen as a minority compared to 1.3 billion Muslims or 70 million Turks?

Or should we wait until the number of Muslims in Denmark is bigger then the number of Danes, and believe that when that happens, the racism laws and the Constitution will still apply?

Are we not allowed to fight for our original culture and people?

When did Denmark and the rest of Western Europe commit ourselves to be so self-destructive?

Can the right to practice a religion outweigh the right to decide in our own country?

Our asylum rules were instituted during the post-war period. After World War Two, everyone wanted to return home. They don’t want that today. In ten years we have had about 2,000 returning home annually. With 425,000 immigrants and their descendants, it will take at least 200 years until they are gone — and, all the while, still more are flowing in the opposite direction.

If one wants documentation for the overall goal of this immigration from the Middle East and Central Asia, one should study the Koran and statements from the Muslim leaders — before it is too late.

Also, here one could ask for better information about immigration and the impact of alien religious law on society. The educational materials in the schools mostly focus on the positive aspects of Islam. It is dangerous to be critical of this religion; it can quickly bring on an accusation of racism.

Here I would also like to call out to our priests and bishops to stand up and help us in our need.

Where are our priests? They should be the ones who know about these things; they should be reacting. What are they afraid of? They are amazingly silent — except for a small handful, to whom we should be deeply grateful.

What will it take for the Danish people to wake up? During World War Two, three years had to pass before serious resistance against the occupying power began. But back then we knew that when the war was over, the Germans would go home.

Neither Germans nor Danes back then expected to gain citizenship automatically after a short number of years.

Only a person who through all his actions — and even through his attitude towards life — has shown himself to be willing and able to work for the benefit of Denmark should, by my understanding of the spirit of the Constitution, be allowed to become a citizen. Danish citizenship should only be given in rare cases, as a recognition of long and faithful work for Denmark and not to people who, with their attitude and way of life, work against Danish society.

Why don’t Danish politicians actively resist this misuse of citizenship and of the asylum system that is going on to day? The media show us daily obvious examples of fraud, and still the majority of the parliament votes for new mass handouts of citizenship. How can the politicians give citizenship to persons who by their religion are forced to work against the Danish legal system? Or maybe one is no longer allowed to ask that question??

The concept of integration is also new. And be careful with misuse of the word. Leading personalities among immigrants have expressed their view that Muslims should only accept the parts of Danish culture that are compatible with Islam. Whenever Danish tradition is in conflict with Islamic tradition, the Danish version must be rejected. The state finances the dissemination of this information to the immigrants, as a part of this so-called integration process. This has to be stopped.

We must make it clear that it is not the religious laws of immigrant minorities that should control Danish society. We have in Denmark persons from 172 different countries, but only one group is making special demands.

We must say no, for it is our right to say no.

We must reject intolerant demands.

We must reject having our society rearranged by self-proclaimed minorities.

We will not accept being silenced.

We must preserve the Constitution and the freedoms that it contains.

We must fight for the people’s right to decide.

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Phanarath wrote me this afterword, with more about Frit Folk:

I could find very little mention of the group Frit Folk. They seem to appear for the first time at this demonstration with three speakers: Åse C. Bjergs, Vibeke Edbjerg and Bente Jørgensen. There was a very aggressive counter-demonstration by “anti-racist groups”, and they had to stop the demonstration prematurely when the police thought it was getting out of control.

There were the three speeches, and a press release by Frit Folk after the demonstration, and an article in a local magazine about the whole thing.

Last time they were heard from was in 2005, when they called for an open meeting in a community-house Brønshøj; the meeting was later canceled.

They are described as a group which tried to unite far-right elements who were too radical for Dansk Folkeparti. They were mainly anti-Islamic.

They don’t exist any more and I haven’t been able to find any clues to where the members went, or if they started new groups. One of the speakers, Åse C. Bjerg, was also the leader of the group and her picture is here. She also gave a speech that day.

Her speech is more aggressive and rhetorically better, in my opinion.

Phanarath is working on a translation of Ms. Bjerg’s speech, which will be posted here later in the week.