Martin Bosma, a Dutch member of parliament for the PVV (Party for Freedom), has recently been granted column space in a left-leaning newspaper. Our Flemish correspondent VH sends this note about Mr. Bosma’s first column:
Here is a translation of the first (and excellent) column by Martin Bosma in the newspaper NRC Handelsblad. Once a “gentleman” among newspapers, it has become in the past decade a common multiculturalist and left-leaning paper. Now it has invited three politicians to write a column every three weeks: Femke Halsema of the GreenLeft, Martin Bosma of the PVV, and Ton Elias of the VVD. In his first column Martin Bosma uses this left-wing platform to hold up a mirror to the readers of the NRC, who are in general not quite supporters of the PVV.
Below is his translation from printed edition of NRC Handelsblad (a pdf of the article can be downloaded here):
You are tolerant until it gets too crazy for you
by Martin Bosma
It’s not just that you don’t like me. You even begrudge me my job. If NRC-subscribers were the only ones allowed to have the right to vote (be honest: don’t you dream of that sometimes?), my party would not get beyond four seats [of the 150 in parliament — translator]. With my fifth place on the list of candidates of the Party I could have well dropped out of the boat.
Your preferences are somewhere else: You’d assign 51 seats to GreenLeft and D66. (With the 37 seats for the PvdA [Labour Party] that will take Saint Job [Job Cohen, PvdA party leader] whistling to the prime minister’s residence.) All of that perfectly matches your lifestyle: the unsprayed Toyota Prius, the little eco-house in Tuscany, the golf weekend with friends in London. Islam is not at all a problem to you. Come on, after all, you are tolerant! To prove that, to the friendly Moroccan who delivers you this newspaper you will soon hand an extra big-hearted Christmas tip. Concerning xenophobia they are with you all in all at the wrong address.
And the kids? Do you expose them to your multicultural ideals, and are you standing at the gates of a black school every morning at half-nine? Is your Emma, Anne-Fleur, or Mees [stereotypical pseudo-elitist children’s names — translator] in a cozy classroom full of Muhammads and Alis?
Ho, ho. It should not get too crazy of course. When it comes down to it, you’d rather drive an extra block with your child cargo-bike. This obviously has nothing to do with all those Muslims there. You after all are not a racist. No, it’s because of that computer room or the color of the wallpaper. Or something like that. Your Minerva friends of the Old South chapter of D66 nod understandingly. For that matter, they are doing the same.
I disagree with just about everything you agree on. Multiculturalism I find appalling. Headscarves and mosques are an abomination to me. I do not believe for an inch in the climate-hype, and I think Al Gore is a charlatan. Obama causes a shiver down my spine. Christianity I find wonderful. EU nationalism I view as the reincarnation of the Soviet Union. Reagan, Solzhenitsyn, and Jabotinsky are framed on the wall in my office.
I would rather read Hayek and Ayn Rand than Keynes and Etty [communist and columnist for the NRC]. I am firmly pro-Israel (“extreme right-wing colonist leaders” — as this newspaper calls them — are to me people I enjoy visiting). My solidarity is with the last natives in the Transvaal [in the Hague] or Tarwewijk [in Rotterdam] neighborhoods, not the elites who brought one million Muslims under our roof. I do not at all think that it is ‘the pride of the Netherlands that we do not find one culture better than the other’. The Netherlands itself does not agree to that at all. Only the leftist elites think as much.
I write in my book, The Pseudo-Elite of the Counterfeiters: that we are not only politicians, but also missionaries. Hence my book, hence Fitna, hence the frequent trips the of my party leader around the entire the world. And hence the dissident sound I may let you hear every three weeks — here, in the lion’s den.
Despite everything, I do not give up on you. You are just a victim of your upbringing, your education and your environment.
Too bad about all those subscription withdrawals because of my column. But, well, leftists like to be tolerant, unless it concerns people with different opinions. Scores left the newspaper De Volkskrant when the shutters were opened there. Joris Linssen and Kees Driehuis of the state broadcaster even openly complained of an overdose of ‘Wilders-articles’.
If all these people subsequently chose the NRC Handelsblad, because of me they possibly will migrate again. I hope not, but so be it. You could almost compare their fate to all those Dutch people who ever again run away when the multicultural society takes over their street or neighborhood. This way the Multicult will have us all on the move.
And Mr. Bosma is quite right — see this article from Het Parool, also translated by VH:
Cycling further for a white school
“I am not going to ask people to sacrifice their child to an experiment of general interest.” — Education Alderman of Amsterdam, Lodewijk Asscher (PvdA)
AMSTERDAM — White children cycle all the way through the city to go to a white school. For a ten percent increase white fellow students, they cycle half a kilometer further. The Service “Dienst Onderzoek en Statistiek” [Research and Statistics, O+S] of the municipality of Amsterdam, researched what makes high schools attractive to various groups of pupils. From the report, as presented today, it emerges that one out of five black students spend their entire school career in a black school. Among white students, ten percent grow up in a white primary- and high-school.
O+S researcher Lotje Cohen discovered that immigrant students of lower professional education (VMBO) especially choose a school close by in their neighborhood. Due to this, in such schools more than 40% of the students came from a weaker, black primary school. “Other students then start to avoid that school,” according to Cohen.
Native VMBO students are prepared to travel further for relatively white VMBO schools that train students for a profession in park maintenance, a bakery, or hotels and restaurants. It is furthermore the case that students travel further for a higher educational level. Cohen did not ask parents and students about the motivation for their choice, but studied on the basis of registrations what parents and children are really doing. Cohen: “That is important, because with a subject such as segregation, you won’t always get to hear the honest answers.”
Education Alderman Lodewijk Asscher does not feel challenged to stop the segregation at the school doors, for instance by forcing students to mix. “I am not going to ask people to sacrifice their child to an experiment of general interest. Before you ask parents to cooperate, you must be certain the quality is good everywhere.”
16 comments:
Saint Job, hahaha... The last prostitute of Islamsterdam is more like it, isn't it?
I do not at all think that it is ‘the pride of the Netherlands that we do not find one culture better than the other’. The Netherlands itself does not agree to that at all. Only the leftist elites think as much. -- Bosma
They dont even believe this. They are strongly intolerant of you and your culture Bosma. This...
"I disagree with just about everything you agree on. Multiculturalism I find appalling. Headscarves and mosques are an abomination to me. I do not believe for an inch in the climate-hype, and I think Al Gore is a charlatan. Obama causes a shiver down my spine. Christianity I find wonderful. EU nationalism I view as the reincarnation of the Soviet Union. Reagan, Solzhenitsyn, and Jabotinsky are framed on the wall in my office."
Martin Bosma is the find of the century for the PVV, not because I agree with what he has to say, I certainly disagree with his view of Keynes and Reagan, but because it gives the PVV an intellectual underpinning, which it is badly in need of.
I do not at all think that it is ‘the pride of the Netherlands that we do not find one culture better than the other’. The Netherlands itself does not agree to that at all. Only the leftist elites think as much.
The reader "Escape Velocity" anticipated my critique of Bosma here: In fact, the conceit of equality of all cultures promulgated or implied by Leftism and PC MC conceals (either by cleverness or, more likely, by incoherence) a decidedly unilateral anti-Western position. It is not "equality"; it is precisely inequality that Leftists and PC MCs believe in.
A separate problem with Bosma's formulation there is that he localized and delimits the problem too simplistically to an "elite". I dare say that millions of ordinary folk throughout the West have also come to believe, sincerely, if more or less, in the incoherent mush of multiculturalism.
@EV, Hesp,
Could be even more "simple" than just plain anti-Western sentiment. Progressives and especially the elites among them, display two faces: in public they sound anti-Western with all other cultures being about "equal". In private they behave conform the adagium "the West is the best".
My bet: secretly they feel superior (progressives always have a strong need for it), like the MC PC readers of NRC that Bosma mentions (be honest, wouldn't you like to have the exclusive right to vote?).
They are and consider themselves "gatherers of cultures" all equal under their benevolent guidance (they mirror the outlook of the "humanistic" Dutch colonialists of old, equally progressive and paternalistic). Thus they behave like the sympathetic overseer of their multi faceted MC utopia.
In public their slogans sound conspicuously self effacing precisely because they can afford to be, "knowing" full well that they, "the anointed" (Sowell) are in fact superior beyond borders. Of course the West is really bad in their view, where it concerns mass entertaiment for the plebs, lower classes hanging on to ancient traditions and "populism".
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
I -all'y'all was a "liberal" regarding the
"other" i.e. Non-Whites - then became a "Progressive" by 1981 I became a "Progressive" which I explained to a reporter, who thankfully did NOT quote me, as being a "Liberal who wants to WIN elections.
Since then I have "Grown" - Up and Out of the Soft BIGOTRY of LOW EXPECTATIONS.
I EXPECT the same LEVEL of CIVILITY and CORRECT/STANDARD ENGLISH for all born and raised here in the US. "HIP_HOP" doesn't cut it for me. Makes you another "Rastus" character in somebody's Minstrel Show. Should you CARE to be that for the rest of your life, GOOD LUCK, you will need it!
Muslims are another Matter, Their internals do NOT drive them to "appear stupid" to gain approval. That is to their advantage. Otherwise, they are the religion/cult of the DISINHERITED SON, Ishmael. As a disinherited son l, I can understand the feeling, AND, have gotten over it. ISLAM has NOT for the last 14-1500 years. WTF, enough is enough. CLEAN UP YOUR SANDBOX and join the WORLD - OR - disappear or be disappeared in a HUGE WAR all'y'all are destined to start through hubris.
Dr.Shalit
He likes Reagan? Then I like him :).
I get that Seguno,
However, while they may just see themselves as superior to all other cultures and peoples, they are indelibly hostile and intolerant of the European Clasically Liberal Christian Right. As can be seen in their words and deeds.
Yes @EV,
That's correct, and perfectly in line with their own sense of superiority. They view traditional christianity as a relict from the past, not really belonging to "modern day" Europe, or EU to be more precise.
It is this group of people that Martin Bosma is adressing. A côterie of multiculti elites that can afford to escape the consequences of the real and existing MC in our cities these days. So is Bosma saying that the ideology of PC MC is limited to the elites? (@Hesperado). Of course not.
He knows full well that - albeit ever smaller - parts of the general public are still brainwashed by the MSM, parrotting the slogans, but in my opinion the support is comparable to the support for orgs. like Greenpeace. People still believe that such orgs are about "the environment" while they've long since the end of the eighties been taken over by progressives.
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
Yes, one wonders just why these people are 'tolerant' towards alien cultures. Do they in fact want to have all the trappings of Islam (let's say) in their own lives? If so, why don't their own wives go around in a burka?
Or do they only want to appear 'tolerant' so that they can claim some moral high ground of their own devising?
<< I dare say that millions of ordinary folk throughout the West have also come to believe, sincerely, if more or less, in the incoherent mush of multiculturalism. >>
Hesperado, I was going to disagree with you, especially after I just read Fjordman's thought on where European populations stand:
"Roth addresses the disturbingly undemocratic nature of the regime of mass immigration imposed by authorities on the citizens of all Western nations in defiance of their expressed wishes, and shows that the chasm between elite views and public opinion is so deep that current policies can only be maintained by an increasingly totalitarian suppression of dissent." -- Link.
I think tight controls on speech are strong evidence of popular unhappiness and of elite desperation. While I note this fact, I still cannot ignore the fact that, on secret ballot after secret ballot, Europeans return their betrayers to power time and again. Nationalist fight much harder than they should for a presence in national legislatures and they are mostly only grudgingly rewarded by the voters.
This is persuasive evidence for your point. To reconcile your and Fjordman's point it may be that I have to view speech laws as preemptive measures presciently put in place to take care of the vanguard thinkers and leaders.
Fjordman sees more widespread discontent but I see only passivity at best and enabling at worst.
Col. B. Bunny,
I agree. The problem with "Elitisticians" (those who indulge in "Elitistics") is that they assume that all (or nearly all) of The People are on their side, and the only problem is a dastardly cabal of Elites on the other side. This sets up a needless -- and grossly inaccurate -- battlefield of Civil War where, apparently, one side will be composed of some 4 billion Non-Elites and the other side will be composed of a handful of a million or two (tops) of Elites with all their wealth, power and control of technology and institutions.
It's a ludicrous scenario, and crumbles around the edges (if not into its caked center) the closer it is scrutinized -- unless one is comfortable characterizing the modern West as a crypto-Totalitarianism in a nightmare world of Gnostic Mad-Max proportions.
Sagunto,
Yes, another wrinkle to this whole thing I failed to mention (perhaps because it would have aroused complications I didn't want to get into at the time) is that Leftism and PC MC retain -- incoherently, ironically and hypocritically -- the paternalistic condescension toward the non-Western Other that derives from Western Colonialism.
Leftism and PC MC are not really anti-Colonialist: they have simply transmuted some of the terms of Colonialism into Wilsonian Idealism, based upon a belief that all non-Western peoples can be saved by becoming Western -- or, rather, by realizing (with our generous help) their innate humanity defined according to Western liberal ideals.
For more on this, see my essay:
Four phases of Western universalism, and the humanity of Muslims
@Hesperado,
Very well put. I especially like the part about the Wilsonian mindset. Your second remark eloquently illustrates what a Dutch scholar of history, Prof. H.W. van den Doel, had to say about the origin of the foreign aid workers' mentality [my transl. from Dutch]:
"..the loss of the Dutch East-Indies seemed dramatic for all of those who aspired to follow in the footsteps of Multatuli, that is, for those civil servants and technicians who wanted to develop the land and people of Indonesia. The loss of what had for decades been the territory of ethical politics also appeared to signal the end of 'tropical science' in the Netherlands. But again it proved to be no devastating goodbye. The Dutch discovered the "Third World" and with it a field of work that was way vaster for the foreign aid business than the Indonesian archipelago had ever been for ethical politics."
So there was a great measure of continuity between colonial ethical [i.e. progressive] politics and postcolonial foreign aid. Of course that direct link has always been vehemently denied by progressive foreign aid workers.
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
About your essay: read it, liked it. You're good.
Afterthought: in a way it is with today's MC as if "ethical colonialism" is coming home. Same progressive mentality, same hubris.
Thanks Sagunto. I'm convinced there is definitely continuity between Western Colonialism and post-Colonial idealism, which for example one can see massively and intricately displayed through the activism and philosophy of the United Nations from its inception to today. Indeed, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which we in the anti-Islam movement otherwise rightly use as a measure to expose Muslim nations, nevertheless makes assumptions about a general "Humanity" that ignore the cultural recalcitrance in non-Western societies. Such Western idealism then sets up a mechanism for a self-perpetuating industry of idealist compassion (read: neo-Colonialism) for the Third World. The specific and localized process Prof. van den Doel describes in your quote with regard to Dutch activities in Indonesia may be seen reduplicated nearly everywhere by all the Colonialist Western nations with all their Third World holdings as they made the transition into the 20th century. And more broadly and philosophically (or ideologically) speaking, it has come to inform the West's worldview and attitude about itself and the Third World, and its consequent obligations to the Third World, including massive immigration into the West so we can help save them from themselves.
Add the crucial factor of Muslims, who look ethnic and arouse associations of a vaguely Third World culture whenever we regard them -- and who uniquely among all Third World peoples use threats and actions of violence to get their way -- and we have the formula for the irrational, and increasingly suicidal, disposition of a neo-Wilsonianism whenever we engage with Muslims. Needless to say, a society in its right mind does not engage in idealistic humanitarian terms with a deadly enemy, and does not try to "save" them. It first and foremost tries to ascertain their weaknesses in order to fight them, in order to neutralize the danger they pose.
The problem, of course, is that the Muslim qua Enemy is ensconced within a globally massive milieu of ordinary Muslim "moms and pops like the rest of us" who don't seem to be doing jihadist things (at least not at the moment). And so, the squeamishly PC MC among us fret anxiously that any talk of Muslim "enemies" will perforce be extended to all Muslims -- and then the slippery slope of the H word begins (both "Holocaust" and "Hitler"), and we the evil white West, always seeking ways to oppress, harrass, lynch and "hate" Brown People, will begin to do to Muslims what Hitler did to the Jews -- unless we stop ourselves in time, and vilify those "far right" "Islamophobes" among us.
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