The kind of person who makes you loathe conservative sites

[fpb]

Frontpage Magazine - now don't laugh, inverarity68 - had a very interesting review of a book that detailed the curiously pro-Nazi and pro-Fascist attitude taken by the leading American colleges before the war; something of which I had vaguely heard, but which I do not think had ever been treated in depth. (The author makes the point that the universities were far out of step with the mood of the American people at large. Every new Nazi enormity provoked large displays of anger and hostility. He reports a wonderful placard from the Undertakers' Union: "We Want Hitler".)

However, one brief passage got me to comment. The reviewer mentioned one unnamed member of the Romanian Fascist party, the Iron Guard, who was hired by the University of Chicago after the war. I said:

Just one minute. I am sure this all happened and that it was as disgraceful as you say. But if by "a member of Antonescu's Iron Guard" being hired by Chicago after the war, you mean Mircea Eliade, may I make the point that Eliade was one of the greatest scholars in his field (comparative religion) that there have ever been, that any university in their senses would have snapped him up, and that under his leadership the School of Divinity of Chicago became the greatest centre for research into comparative religion outside France? And he was not the only instance. A number of musicians, scientists, and even writers and philosophers, were essentially forgiven their collaboration with Nazism on the grounds of their brilliance, from Herbert von Karajan to Wernher von Braun. And while one must take into consideration individual situations (did the individual concerned have a choice, did he or she commit crimes in person or closely support criminals in their work, etc?), I think that on the whole civilization gained more than it lost by not confining such men to jail or obscurity. Which, in the case of really brilliant people, was anyway apt not to work. One of the few people who were really effectively boycotted, film-maker Leni Riefenstahl, built herself up a whole new career as a photographer. You cannot keep such people permanently in the shadows.

Someone promptly responded with a note that opened as follows:
comparative religion? With a straight face you think of this as a creditable field?
The rest of the note clearly showed that he regarded lynching as a creditable activity.

What could I do? I posted a brief response that began:
Someone ignorant enough to post the opening sentence above probably thinks that auto shop is the height of human endeavour.

I had stayed away from that site for a while, and I had come back because a couple of articles looked interesting. I guess they won't be seeing me for a while again. There are people one is better off without.

Comments

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I'll tell you why it works for me. It works for me in two ways. First, the physical impact. While the violence of Communism is organized and bureaucratic - the midnight knock at the door, the sudden disappearance, the camps - the violence of Fascism is something that takes place mainly on the streets, with troops of fanatical young men unleashed to do the worst they can to anyone they regard as ideologically unsound. Fascism, of course, eventually develops its secret police, its bureaucracy, and its camps, but its elementary form is simply brute force from deracinated youth. Communism, by contrast, begins with bureaucracy; as soon as the Devil brings together three Marxists, they begin to organize things. In this, Islamism - the angry youths, the masses of stick-welding fanatics, the uncontrolled street brutality - is very much like Fascism. And the other is the resentment due to what Kolnai called a thwarted Titanic rebelliousness. Both Fascists and Islamists are in revolt against the present world for no better reason than they feel humiliated and abused, and they feel humiliated and abused because they feel that God or Fate or Providence or History has destined them to rule, and anyone who keeps them from ruling is in effect doing them an injustice. It is from this thwarted titanism that arises that constant sense of injustice that misleads so many people - there are as many well-meaning westerners today who are ready to swear that Muslims really are being mistreated and deprived of their rights, as there were in the thirties ready to believe that Germany and Italy had been mistreated and deprived of their rights.

[inverarity.livejournal.com]

I don't disagree with that analysis, per se. But I'm a bit of a pedant (something with which you of all people should sympathize :P), and words have meanings. You accurately describe the intersection of fascism and jihadism, but there are fundamental differences between the movements as well.

Also, the fact remains that almost everyone who uses the term "Islamofascist" is doing so solely as a convenient shorthand to demonize Muslims by equating them with Nazis. The more rational ones will issue disclaimers ("Not all Muslims are evil jihadists, yadda yadda...."), but in most cases, they strike me as disingenuous.

[mentalguy.livejournal.com]

I have to concur with inverarity68 on this point. I agree with the analysis itself, but despite the commonalities the movement in Islam is not actually a kind of fascism, and I'm really uncomfortable with the inaccurate use of a word for mere emotional impact, at least in an environment that is already very heated and where there is danger of real confusion (or actual confusion).

[mentalguy.livejournal.com]

To put it a slightly different way, do you think that Islamism and Fascism need to be addressed in precisely the same way? If not, then using a term which reinforces existing confusion is counterproductive.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I cannot imagine where dealing with them differently would be of any advantage. Viciously subversive movements arisen from a homicidal superiority complex and deploying terrorism, the scapegoating of peaceful third parties, and homicidal street violence, seem to me to demand pretty much the same approach across the board. As it is, they attract the same mistakes.