Autumn Fundraiser 2014, Day Two
What Cannot Be Said
The theme of this week’s fundraising effort is “Third Rails”.
The chosen topic helps explain why we have to beg money from readers to cover our operating expenses. The untouchable aspect of our core mission and its various satellite issues guarantees that income opportunities normally available to more cautious writers remain mostly closed to us. My taking a day job to support what we do here would put Dymphna at risk, due to her precarious medical situation. So we chose this route instead.
The third-rail syndrome applies not just to politicians and public figures, but to anyone who speaks out where other people can hear. Virtually every topic has been politicized, and the penalties for holding the incorrect view can be severe.
There are certain things that simply cannot be said, not without the risk of being fired or arrested or losing the custody of children.
As I mentioned yesterday, the topic of race carries the heaviest baggage. Track the most heavily publicized career-ending incidents in the news: you’ll find that most of them involve white people saying Things That Cannot Be Said about persons of color. Statements by straight people about “gender issues” are now beginning to catch up, but race still leads the field.
This politically correct virus infects the entire culture, even the “Islamophobes”. A few months ago I was at an event sponsored by a Christian activist group that helps victims of religious persecution. These are good people, and they “get it” about Islam — they understand what Islamic countries do to Christians and other religious minorities. They view Islam as a dangerous totalitarian ideology. They don’t suffer from any delusions about “moderate Muslims”.
But as I was sitting there listening to them, I realized that there were certain things that no one would dare to say out loud in front of that group. Everyone in the room was white, so as a thought experiment, I imagined myself saying in a conversational manner, “You know, I really prefer the company of white people.” Fortunately, I never act on such foolish impulses. If I had, I almost certainly would have been asked to leave.
Yet a black person who an expressed a preference for his own race would not have been sanctioned. His statement wouldn’t even draw much attention. It’s racist for a white person to prefer white people, but not for blacks to feel the same about their own race. There’s no symmetry to the rules.
When the full nature of these rules is teased out and exposed to the light of day, the irrational absurdity of the whole business is plain for all to see. It must remain a Thing That Cannot Be Said, because saying it brings the reigning cultural paradigm to full consciousness, where everyone can realize just how stupid and harmful it is.
The issue of immigration borrows its shibboleths from race, because nowadays most immigration involves poor uneducated non-whites pouring into countries that were until recently civilized and prosperous nations, and were made that way by white Europeans. Anyone who advocates the curtailment of mass immigration is therefore a “racist”, and his opinion becomes yet another Thing That Cannot Be Said.
In the United States, the mantra that invariably puts a stop to the immigration conversation is: “America is a nation of immigrants.”
Why, yes, that’s quite true. But so is Sri Lanka. So is Ireland. Your point?
The mass importation of foreigners into the United States may have been a good idea a century and a half ago when the continent was largely empty. But now it’s full, and large-scale immigration no longer makes any sense. It will obviously strain the civic resources of our country and harm the people who were born and raised here.
But you can’t say that! It’s WAYCIST!
The “racist” meme is not only guaranteed to reduce white Westerners to quivering piles of jelly, it is malleable, and can be extended to almost any other issue. Muslim Brotherhood operatives in the West are not stupid, and they understand very well how to manipulate the race issue against the kuffar.
That’s why non-Muslims are so docile in the face of aggressive Islamic demands, because the “race” tag is attached to all of them, subliminally or openly.
And that’s why we feel compelled to focus on Islamic “extremists”, and piously yearn for the “moderate Muslim”. We’re certain that such reasonable people must be in the majority. They wear beanies and put their women in black bags and hate pigs and dogs, but otherwise they’re just like us. To think anything else would be WAYCIST.
The Things That Cannot Be Said include:
- Islam is not primarily a religion, but a violent totalitarian ideology.
- There is no evidence that secular non-practicing Muslims inhibit the dangerous behavior of practicing Muslims in any meaningful way.
- There is no practical method of determining whether any seemingly peaceful harmless Muslim is actually a violent Islamic supremacist, either secretly or in potentia.
- The ideology of Islam, as written in all its books and declaimed in all its mosques, calls for the invasion of our countries and the overthrow of our civilization.
To acknowledge these facts would bring into consciousness the awful realization that more than a billion people want to destroy our way of life, and — in many cases — kill us. Once we have accepted that fact, the responses available to us are generally too horrific to contemplate.
So we don’t. We rule them off the turf instead.
They cannot be said.
But we say them anyway here at Gates of Vienna. Which is why we remain at the fringes of the margins of the outcasts who have been put beyond the pale.
And that’s why we hound our readers for money four times a year.
I’ve quoted these lines by Walt Whitman many times before, but here they are again:
I do not say these things for a dollar, or to fill up the time while I wait for a boat;
It is you talking just as much as myself — I act as the tongue of you;
Tied in your mouth, in mine it begins to be loosen’d.
The generous people who donated on the first day of this fundraiser checked in from the following places:
Stateside: California, Maryland, Michigan, Texas, and West Virginia
Near Abroad: Canada
Far Abroad: Australia, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Slovakia, and the UK
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The photo at the top of this post is from the New York City Municipal Archives.
The mass importation of foreigners into the United States may have been a good idea a century and a half ago when the continent was largely empty. But now it’s full, and large-scale immigration no longer makes any sense…
Those “foreigners” who came into the US in the mid-19th century did so in an orderly and often difficult fashion – e.g., the quarantine of suspected illnesses; the separation of families when some were allowed in and some were returned as not ‘fit’ enough; the often whimsical assigning of last names to some whose surnames were considered “too difficult” to pronounce; the indignities of delousing; the endless lines and waiting and crying, hungry children…
Many could read and write, some were even scholars in the old country. All had to be fit enough for some kind of work so as not to be a “drain” to the country. Most were ambitious and anxious to ‘get ahead’.
Those who invade at our borders now are none of those things, have none of those skills, potential or otherwise. They’ll likely never be literate, or attend school long enough to even begin. Many of them are sick with contagious diseases they pass on to those of us who no longer have our distantly past immunities.
For example, I know an adult who had a persistent cough. When he finally went to the doctor recently, it was found he had whooping cough. Pertussis! He blamed it on parents who hadn’t vaccinated their children because of the latest ‘fad’ about avoiding vaccines. But when I looked into it – wondering how he’d gotten it since he was a middle class fellow who had had all his shots, I got an education. Non-compliant parents were the least of his problems. Here are a few possibilities:
1) He travels in the south for his work and is probably unknowingly using the same facilities and restaurants as some of the newest illegals;
2) The newer pertussis vaccines are not as long-lasting or effective as the old ones were, so even vaccinated children aren’t as ‘safe’ for the rest of us as they used to be;
3)It is more convenient to health providers to load these kids up with a lot of vaccines simultaneously and it may be causing a higher incidence of autism-spectrum problems for kids – thus parental reluctance to risk their children;
4) If parents have energy and time they can locate some vaccines that don’t use mercury as a preservative…
So he could have contracted pertussis from some alternative hippy kid, as he says. But he also could have gotten it from an immigrant (love that Northern Virginia diversity) or a child whose parents did due diligence but the vaccines are ineffective.
Welcome to the world of Lots-of-Bugs-Besides-Ebola.
“3)It is more convenient to health providers to load these kids up with a lot of vaccines simultaneously and it may be causing a higher incidence of autism-spectrum problems for kids – thus parental reluctance to risk their children;
4) If parents have energy and time they can locate some vaccines that don’t use mercury as a preservative…”
Sorry, but you are contributing to anti-vaccine crowd with these statements. They have absolutely no basis in scientific fact as your qualifier “may” well show.
My wife had a persistant cough and after some months went to see the doctor and she had whooping cough. Our infant grandson had been vaccinated par for the course so there were no downstream effects, thankfully (i.e. didn’t know about the reduced effectiveness). She must have caught it from her assistant, a Vietnamese woman who had been home to visit the family and developed a cough a week after getting back to work.
I’d like to add, from my perspective, why I find Gates of Vienna attractive to write for and valuable to read. My perspective is that a Wester writer who observes and writes about the Decline of the West from the outside.
The “outside” in my case is double Eastern: East-Central Europe where I was formed, and the Far East, primarily Japan, where I acquired a whole different pair of cultural spectacles. It’s not incidental that either of those localities has a single, homogenous culture, language, and is inhabited almost exclusively by one ethnic group of a single race. Talk about “Strength in non-diversity.”
Everything else stems from that: high social capital, very little violent crime, no feral minorities, no feral ideologies such as Islam, a proud, nurturing culture and sense of identity, strong families and so on. Yes, there are some curious dysfunctions, but they are the result of the particular historic challengese that either people has had to contend with, such as being a long-isolated island devoid of natural resources, or being squeezed between two great aggressive powers: Russia and Germany, and not having the natural protection against enemy invasion that the United States and Great Britain have enjoyed.
What makes Gates of Vienna unique for me is that it’s a counter-jihad platform not pretending that Islam is our one great bane: repulse it and then kick back and count your blessings. No, Islam is an explosives-laden train riding on rails via propulsion from a compound Third Rail: a rail powering at least ten other awful trains traversing the large territory I call Whiteyland and stretching from Berlin to Brussels to Birmingham to Boston to Berkeley to Brisbane.
A few other Websites cover the Muslim train’s features and itinerary adequately, sometimes covering the evil third rail too — e.g. political correctness in American or British government activities — but I am yet to see elsewhere an attempt to address seriously the whole rail map and trip schedule of the full train service coursing this vast land.
There are publishing platforms, Web +DTO, devoted to those other trains: for instance VDare.com excellently covers the disaster of American Immigration, American Renaissance gets similarly high marks for its coverage or the dysfunction rained on America by its non-white minorities, The New Criterion has few peers in its coverage of our cultural debasement and Zero Hedge in its coverage of the economic one. But those, in turn, ignore Islam and related issues as if they did not exist, though that is the most combustible train.
Sadly, the immigration and race-trouble related websites maintain this large gap because they have important supporters and contributors who are virulent anti-“Zionists” or indulge in other kinds of Jew-hatred. The enemy of their perceived enemy is a friend.
Ultimately, that cannot stand, for like Progressive Liberalism it’s a masssive distortion of reality out of neurotic or psychotic reasons. So I repair to Gates of Vienna, where the room for expounding on some subjects is more limited, due to the C-J focus — but at least the environment is lucid, sober, morally acceptable to me, and packaged with all the beauty of the English language and judiciously selected graphics.
It’s worth preserving, this oasis.
Takuan, I find myself agreeing with much of what you say here, but I fear you over-simplify. For example, northern and western Europe, ie the primarily Protestant area, has, at least since the Enlightenment, been more welcoming to those of different cultures than the Catholic and Orthodox parts, eg towards Jews. Yes, I know this is a generalisation, but like many such, it contains some truth. This can result in such oddities as antisemitism in Hungary, most of whose people, being of Magyar descent, actually arrived after the Jewish population.
Immigration is a complex subject; multiculturalism may indeed be a chimera, but we are financially enriched by those who come to work and better themselves, and don’t practise self-imposed apartheid.
Mark, as a veteran of skirmishes with ideological opponents on the left and the right who don’t know what they are talking about, I always relish the opportunity to read your different opinion, for it usually stems not from ignorance or pigheaded obstinacy bu from a genuinely different cast of the mind.
Who do you think is more the authority on immigration: me, whose parents were forced to migrate (by the Soviets) from the Polish part of Ukraine to the Polish part of Germany and who himself has been an immigrant four times over in his life, including living now as a “legal” expat in faraway Japan? Or you?
Indeed, immigration is a complex issue, and the only way to discuss it is truthfully, which is not being done anywhere. Yes, the Protestant West has been open to immigration for a long time — but not to immigration of Muslims, Africans, and other barbarians — save for excepotional cases. Unprincipled exceptions that are always cited by Progressives only bolster my point, not theirs.
Thus if you are ready to wheel out the cases of some Nigerian tobbaconist in Victorian Manchester, or a captive Zulu who became a footman to the King, or half-Negroes Pushkin in Russia or Dumas in France, you might be expounding on 0.00001% of the population at that time, not on 3.5% as the case is now in Great Britain. Same with Muslims, except the situation is even worse: it’s 4.5% of the population now, at least.
It’s the PROPORTION that matters. Third World immigration is like hot pepper sauce: a few drops in your mashed tatties will indeed enliven them, make them more- yes- “vibrant.” But 5% of Tabasco in your mashed dinner staple will give you stomach cramps and a severe indigestion. Over 30%, which is increasingly the case in many British and continental towns, will send you to a hospital and probably render you an invalid for life. And 50% and over — we are beginning to see that too in several European cities and in Dearborn Michigan relative to Muslims, in the plurality of America’s large cities relative to Blacks, and in California, Texas and the Southwest relative to imported Mestizos– that will kill you.
That’s one. And two, you are daydreaming in asserting that we are “financially enriched” by Thirdworlders. That is total bunk. Yes, England is greately enriched by the Gulf rich and Russian mafiosi who come to spend money in London, but regular immigration of Third World populations is an unsustainable burden on the public purse. The evidence for this is so overwhelming, and across so many countries, that I am not prepared to argue the point with you. Just do your homework; prepare before you opine.
Takuan, your ‘mashed tatties and Tabasco’ analogy of third world invasion into the West is a wonderful description of what truly ails us all.
I will have to remember it when the next time comes up for me to argue against the nation destroying concept of Multiculturalism to the truly deluded.
I so love this site and you all are just damn special in me little quiet life. A safe haven for those who dare speak and I will until me last breath is drawn and I am called home. Sending a bit here to you all. I do not comment as I used to and it is a time thing but I read here and almost every day. If I was close by I would offer me assistance to you as I best could with whatever you two needed. I know what it is to struggle with medical issues and now do it on me own hook. Thanks and wish I could do more
I strongly suspect that Pigpen ISN’T REALLY BLACK!
No, Pigpen is indeed white. But that little fellow in the ‘toon posted above isn’t Pigpen. I forget his name, but there was a black character in Peanuts. That’s who that is.
Pigpen isn’t. Perhaps that’s supposed to be Franklin.
Thanks, Flossie & ews; it is a long time since I read “peanuts”!
America needs to total’y pull out of the wretched United Nations its nothing but a bunch of War Mongers and Terrorists Supporters
It is long past time that the US got out of the UN and the UN was unceremoniously thrown out of the US. It is a nest of spies, despots, and anti-Semites, all supported by our taxes and contemptuous of our laws and customs.
The “R” word – the biggest taboo of modern times?
As for the “consistency” in the R-word being applied, the cartoon reminds me of a classic article, in no less than the BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11434399
A brief extract:
“Bene is a young, bright and beautiful black woman in Manhattan. But she thinks that finding a decent black man who could be marriage material may not be so easy…”
One could play a quick game: change all occurrences of the word “black” to “white”, and vice-versa – how does the article sound now? And could one post this changed article on Facebook, or a blog – let alone the BBC – without being instantaneously attacked with the “R”-word?
A good article Baron! I too have at times been moved to speak out on things that should be publicly argued when out and about. And because I have a tendency to do that, speak up that is, I find I am occasionally kicked under the table, elbowed in the ribs or through other less aggressive means reminded by my loving wife, who generally displays more tact then I at times find I can muster, especially when it comes to defending those core issues as you have exposed and should be defended thoroughly, to remain mute.
But even her ‘reminders’ generally speaking, do not silence me.
There is a story in the Daily Mail (Australia) today, Wed, Oct 08, in which a banner had been draped from an overpass on the Logan Freeway just out of Brisbane, Qld, for all approaching drivers to notice. It reads: Multiculturalism is White Genocide. A simple message, but a message with a most powerful meaning, especially to those drivers who can see and hear what is really going on around them instead of relying on a collective media and their educational indoctrination on which to get by in life.
I like to point out to those who can’t think for themselves that it was not foolishness that got the West into the problems that we all face today, but a socialist agenda that was designed through the United Nations via first the 1951 Refugee Convention and then the Multicultural delusion which brought with it the doctrine of political correctness. Both the latter policies largely undermine our Constitutional authority as sovereign nations while the former forced, what was then homogenous Western nations, into accepting the ‘other’ into our midst who to a large extent, assimilated. The ‘other’ then being over time, expanded to include ‘the third world’ and cultures that should never have been invited into what was once largely White Christian nations.
And from that a ‘thinker’ may conclude that one or two White Christian Nations accepting the delusional Multicultural doctrine as being stupid, but when the entire West embarked on such stupidity it then becomes a political agenda put in place to destroy the White Christian Nation states.
And it is doing just that!
In addition to multiculturalism, another force behind the immigration follies is do-gooderism or a squishy notion of “fairness.” I hear it from my brother (who is definitely not the kind of guy you would assume to be left-leaning).
One of his beliefs is that it isn’t “fair” that we were lucky enough to be born in the blessed USA while others got stuck with Mexico or Guatemala, so therefore we don’t have any moral right to keep them out if they want to live in a better place.
I can list various other ways that life is unfair, and explain that it was the citizens of the USA who made this a better place to live, while the citizens of Mexico and Guatemala have done otherwise — and it doesn’t matter; he still argues that his view is nicer and fairer. Aaaaargh.
I was once told by a “Hispanic” that it wasn’t fair the US grabbbed all the parts of Mexico that had good highways, and left the undeveloped parts to the Mexicans.
Actually, the most unfair distiribution of all is that of beauty, charisma and talent. The inmates-in-charge have already taken care of talent, through “Affirmative Action” in all areas that favor superior intellect. They have taken care of charisma by promoting a black kind of charisma to the point where our people no longer recognize their own. But beauty is hard to manage “equitably.”
I therefore propose that all those with looks that can be graded as 8+ on a ten-scale, receive government summons for obligatory sprinkling with hydrochloroc acid.
Takuan, I was considering my reply to your post (7th, 3.47pm) when I scrolled down to the above from the 8th, the last paragraph in particular.
This goes beyond irony, IMHO, and descends into visceral hatred of the “other”. I acknowledge your intellect and learning, but without recognition of our common humanity it is worthless.
But Mark, don’t you get it? Common humanity is ALL we have in common with the ‘other’!
Mark,
I am not sure I understand how your comment relates to what I wrote. But I exceed you in the recognition of “our common humanity” too, being the only remnant from two large families that were wiped out, but for my parents, during World War 2. And not only by the Germans and Austrians but also by Russians, Ukrainians and Lithuanians.
In any event, fences make for good neighbors. Recognition of common humanity is much easier when Muslims and Africans live in their own countries and I live in mine. I actually advocate — though I am a Party of 1 at this point — that Socialists, Lib-Progressives, Multiculti hounds and Compulsive Altruists carry a passport different from mine, even it it means separating the country in which we live.
You have no idea how much friction and bitterness such a separation would eliminate. Finally, our common humanity could be recognized, maybe even reinforced in mutual tourism, joint film or food festivals, sports competitions and so on.
Takuan, I owe you an apology. I read your second para about “black charisma”, etc and carried the impression over to your third about sprinkling with acid; no wonder you were confused, and I’m sorry.
How do you reconcile your ideas about fences with your presence in the near-monoculture of Japan? And what do they make of you?
@Mark,
Re: Japan and I
Consider this:
1. I had studied the (old) Japanese culture, some of it intensely and painfully, for twenty years before I first set foot in Japan, and that was in 1984. Parts of that culture I know better than native Japanese do.
2. I came to Japan first, second and now too, at the invitation of the Japanese. They don’t just invite anybody able to jump over a fence. If you want to reside there, some Japanese enterprise or government bureau has to prove how it’ll benefit Japan rather than crowing in atruistic ecstasy how that will benefit you.
3. I am in Japan what the Negro or Muslim was in Georgian or Victorian London: a rarity. They do have an interest in my people’s culture and continue adopting from its best features, and even improving upon them — e.g. some of the best Italian and French restaurants and German bakeries in the world are in Tokyo. But I have no standing at all with respect to demanding that they change or adulterate their culture for my sake, and have no recourse to an army of “civil rights” lawyer-leeches to sue for every perceived “discrimination” on account of my foreigness.
This state of affairs has existed for some 160 years now. Few people know that Mitsubishi started as a 19th century partnership between a Scottish sea captain and a Japanese samurai, or that Dutch doctors were teaching Western medicine there already in the 1800s.
Every time I walk on the street among a sea of Japanese faces I receive a confirmation of how right they are, and how wrong we are.
If you look at world population charts, India and China account for almost 37% of human beings on Planet Earth. The United States comes in third; a country of immigrants. Brazil and Mexico also rank in the top 13. http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/population-by-country/
Liberals believe that “birthplace is not destiny”. Third world immigrants are heading to Europe, Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand because of human rights and equality for all. If these principles were practiced in the 58 countries of the OIC, Africa, and South America, and other places, people would most likely remain in their birthplace origins. Mass immigration has less to do with geographical location and everything to do with opportunity and basic human rights. Formerly Christian, white majority countries have the best track records for job opportunity and equality. However, our human rights are quickly eroding with too many people wanting free handouts and free benefits provided by indigenous, taxpaying citizens.
Meanwhile, the United Nations want to dictate immigration quotas and engage in social justice and wealth redistribution schemes. “White guilt” is fueling their Marxist, totalitarian ideologies. Chinese and Eastern Indians comprise approximately 37% of the world’s population. If China and India would cut their numbers in half, less mouths would need to be fed, clothed, educated, employed, and sheltered. Eastern Indians are currently taking their IT skills and post graduate degrees to Europe and America; further reducing the amount of high paying, white collar jobs available to the indigenous populations. Many American companies have off-shored jobs to India as well. It’s a competitive, global world where the spoils now go to the brightest and most educated amongst us.
Mo, I would also suggest, and to the cheapest labor on offer.