Fewtril #13

It may fairly be conjectured that, if we sat an infinite number of French philosophers at an infinite number of typewriters for an infinite amount of time, they would still produce nothing but gibberish.

The Mayor of Fatuity

In The Guardian today, Ken Livingstone makes a curious statement in the course of arguing for the admittance of Yusuf Al-Qaradawi to Britain: “Whatever his individual views, he is seen as a moderate and is fiercely opposed to al-Qaida”.

.....Before this statement was made, Mr Livingstone’s argument for the admittance of Qaradawi to Britain posited a moral parity between Israeli leaders and supporters of Palestinian suicide bombers, such that if we were to ban the latter from Britain, we should ban the former. But Mr Livingstone must have felt that it was also important to make some case for Qaradawi’s moderation, or, to put it another way, to persuade us that he is not an extremist. I think that Mr Livingstone is right to see this as important to the acceptance of his argument. We do not wish, after all, to admit some extremist homicidal lunatic.
.....The only expression in Mr Livingstone’s essay that suggests that Qaradawi is a moderate, however, is the one quoted above. Now, if it is meant to persuade us of his moderation, as would be useful to Mr Livingstone’s argument, it does a poor job; for it does not even address his moderation. It says only that he is seen as a moderate and that he opposes al-Qaeda. Well, I might say two things: (1) that Tracey Emin is seen as a talented artist with impeccable taste; and (2) that the Bolsheviks fiercely opposed the Mensheviks. The first testifies to the existence of cretins (or fakers); the second, that one extreme may oppose another.
.....But perhaps I have been unfair to Mr Livingstone, and his statement does address Qaradawi’s moderation. In other words, the statement is not simply meant to point out that Qaradawi is seen as a moderate, but rather that it is meant to intimate that he is a moderate. To judge his moderation, therefore, we need to assess his views. Yet with a flighty “whatever”, the mayor asks us to disregard Qaradawi’s views, the very things by which we must judge his moderation!
.....Thus, if Mr Livingstone wishes only to point out by this statement that Qaradawi is seen as moderate, then his statement reads as follows: Whether his views are extreme or not, he is seen as a moderate and is fiercely opposed to al-Qaeda. If, on the other hand, we are charitable in our interpretation, and believe that he means to intimate by this statement that Qaradawi is a moderate, then the statement is as follows: Whether his views are extreme or not, he is a moderate and is fiercely opposed to al-Qaeda. The first is fatuous and does not support the case for Qaradawi’s moderation, which would support Mr Livingstone’s case for his admittance into Britain. The second is absurd, and supports the case that Mr Livingstone has not obeyed his own exhortation for “clear thinking, not rhetoric”.
.....Mr Livingstone should hope, therefore, that we are not charitable in our interpretation; otherwise we should think him absurd.

Fewtril #12

Most people think they possess ideas, but usually it’s the other way round.

Dalrymple

"I am always astonished by the way people always suppose that, if there were any justice in the world, they would be better rather than worse off. To the contrary, many should thank their lucky stars that there is no justice in the world: for otherwise they would die in prolonged agony."

Theodore Dalrymple, "Why equality of opportunity is impossible to achieve - but intellectual elitism can offer opportunity to all" The Social Affairs Unit, 28th July 2005.

Fewtril #11

If we are to believe what we read in our newspapers, courage is possessed by anyone who suffers misfortune.

Fewtril #10

Radicalism is the outstanding achievement of the mediocre.

Splendid Mentalism

Few organisations are as comically batty as the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist). Consider the following, for example:

The Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) vehemently condemns the criminal state-organised racist attacks on individuals and their communities, which are increasing since the London bombings. Not one racist attack must be permitted! No community or section of a community must be criminalised! No incitement of community against community must be allowed! RCPB(ML) calls on the working class and people of Britain to squarely blame the government and its apologists in the media for inciting these attacks and demand that they stop their disinformation, fear-mongering and inciting of passions which target sections of the population. Right after the bombings the Prime Minister and Britain’s official circles blamed “Islamic extremists”. Within hours of the London bombings, the Prime Minister set the tone by (1) blaming “Islamic extremists” and (2) thanking various Muslim leaders for their reasonableness. Others joined in by calling on people not to engage in revenge-seeking! Why would the issue of seeking revenge on people of Muslim origin even arise except for the government disinformation and continuous media coverage blaming “Islamists”? The government, the Times and other papers should be held criminally responsible for dividing the polity on the basis of their country of origin, religion, ethnic-background and even different English cities, such as Leeds.

(“No To State-Organised Racist Attacks!” Statement of Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist), July 14, 2005)

Now that the sagacious workers in the Party have thrown sufficient doubt on the outlandish theory that “Islamic extremists” were behind the London bombings, you might wonder who really was responsible. After diligent and indefatigble enquiry, the Party has found the answers:

A consultancy agency with government and police connections was running an exercise for an unnamed company that revolved around the London Underground being bombed at the exact same times and locations as happened in real life on the morning of July 7th. . . .

. . . The fact that the exercise mirrored the exact locations and times of the bombings is light years beyond a coincidence. . . .

. . . The exercise fulfils several different goals. It acts as a cover for the small compartmentalised government terrorists to carry out their operation without the larger security services becoming aware of what they're doing, and, more importantly, if they get caught during the attack or after with any incriminating evidence they can just claim that they were just taking part in the exercise. . . .

. . . In any crime you look at history and motive, The British government has been caught in multiple examples of carrying out bombings in London which were then blamed on the IRA. . .

. . .The London Underground exercises were used as the fallback cover to carry out the attack. This is the biggest smoking gun yet pointing directly to the most secretive levels of the British establishment itself being behind the attack.

(“London Underground Bombing ‘Exercises’ Took Place at Same Time as Real Attack”, by Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones/Prison Planet. July 11 2005.)

There are many more delights on the website of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Mentalist-Lentilist), delights which my hide-bound bourgeois scribbling cannot describe adequately. I suggest, therefore, that you pay it a visit.

Fewtril #9

Our intellectuals hold truth in contempt because it too often makes them look like fools.

Monsters in Waiting

It has been a matter of great importance to madmen that it be seen that there is nothing between madness and sanity but social prejudice. That which goes in favour of this view, however, is little but the wish of the madman to propagate his madness; for to him the madness, as expressed in an idea, is a great and sacred truth, which ought to find acceptance; and it is in that it does not find wide acceptance that he views the norms of behaviour and society as a prejudicial affront, and common decency and sense as an unjust hinderance.

.....A war is declared against the status quo, radical change is proposed, and all that has been hitherto accepted by society at large is pronounced a great sham, an evil imposition and a bar to self-fulfillment. Yet by this “self-fulfillment” he means nothing but the acceptance of his madness.

.....This broadcasting on behalf of madness and social pathology, this desire to subvert and destroy society, is candidly described by China Miéville in Socialist Worker Online (“China Miéville: A Marxist Guide to Monsters”):

I think that on our side there has always been a sneaking sympathy for the monster. The notion of the monster as mere social pathology is put about by people whose ideal is the social status quo.

.....But there are those of us who, because of our class positions, realise that the status quo is all about violence. So it’s not surprising that we wouldn’t completely buy into the idea that ‘pathologies’ are a bad thing.

.....I very much want to preserve this critical view of monsters. If we go down the route that they are just ‘about’ social pathology, then it follows that we should just get rid of them. But if there are no monsters after the revolution, I don’t want to play!

Mr Miéville need not fret unduly, however; for if we are to judge by other socialist revolutions, there would no doubt be no shortage of monsters in the one to which he looks forward.

Fewtril #8

I'm beginning to suspect that a moderate Muslim is a man who wouldn't dream of condoning terrorism before breakfast.

The Gramsci Plague

Most on the Left have abandoned Marx’s idea that a transformation of the economic base would change the “ideological” and cultural superstructure, which is, according to his theory, merely a reflection of that base. Instead, they have embraced Gramsci’s idea that a transformation of the superstructure – the apparatus of the ruling class’s ideology – is necessary before the revolution can take place.

.....Following Gramsci, the scoundrels now wish to “capture the culture” which might be achieved after the “long march through the institutions”. That march is well under way, and might be likened to the advance of a locust-plague through an agricultural district.
.....The resistance of a cultural institution to politicisation is seen as proof of its political nature, an entrenchment of the ruling class’s political dogma, and thus the socialist radical feels justified in politicising it in his own form.
.....Neither content with nor contrite for the economic and human destruction that the politics of the Left have wreaked in the twentieth-century, the Left now has its sights on the destruction of culture – and who yet knows the extent of the human casualties this will bring?

Fewtril #7

The trouble with cynics is not so much that they assume that behind every avowed ideal lies a material and selfish concern, but that they fail to discern that behind many an avowed material and selfish concern lurks an ideal.

Fewtril #6

Future-orientated persons – those who consider posterity – are less likely to fall in line with the orthodox falsehoods of the age; for if they understand these errors as such, they are loath to sacrifice their reputations in posterity even for the reward of present power or popularity. Present-orientated persons, on the other hand, whose concern lies in immediate reward, would rather serve these falsehoods, even if they understand them as such, than suffer present privations for reputations in posterity that they may never enjoy.

Su Tung-p'o -- On Crowning a Tranquil Life

Families, when a child is born
Want it to be intelligent.
I, through intelligence,
Having wrecked my whole life,
Only hope the baby will prove
Ignorant and stupid.
Then he will crown a tranquil life
By becoming a Cabinet Minister.

Su Tung-p'o (1036-1101 AD)

(“On the Birth of his Son”, tr. by Arthur Waley, 170 Chinese Poems, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1919)

Fewtril #5

These days it is not enough that a man observe the laws; he must also express outrage at the truth.

Two Nations Joined in an Orthographic Squabble

I have come under criticism recently for the spelling of the word "behove". It seems that a chap has been stung into looking the word up in his American Heritage Dictionary, wherein he found, no doubt to his critical delight, that it was spelt "behoove", a finding that has precipitated in him a somewhat dim view of me. This ready disgust at my apparent solecism might explain why he failed to consider a rather important word associated with that doubtlessly august lexicon. That word is "American".

.....I feel it is opportune, therefore, to point out that, contrary to the claim of Jean-Marie Colombani of Le Monde, we are not all Americans, nor, I might fairly add, shall we be in the near future, at least in so far as an Englishman might be permitted to retain his spelling-traditions; for it seems that we Englishmen, if we are to judge not only from our native tradition but also from the pages of the Oxford English Dictionary, have the luxury of two spelling variants: "behove" and "behoove" (from OE behofian). My own preference (call it a peccadillo, if you will) is for the first.

.....I should like to remind further that we in England insist on using a "u" in such words as "favour" and "honour", despite the pain this might cause to the sensibilties of Americans and classicists alike. But there it is: that's what we do......