So here’s the strangest response I’ve seen so far to the massacre in Norway. On Sofiastry, an antifeminist blog that seems to be broadly sympathetic to the “alt” (that is, the “intellectually” racist) right, blogger Sofia complains that feminist bloggers – she cites me and Hugo Schwyzer – are talking about the blatant anti-feminism and misogyny of mass murderer Anders Breivik. “The mendacious corollary they are trying to construct,” she writes, falling into the purple prose Alt-Righters seem drawn to like flies on bullshit, “is that all those opposed to feminist principles must be in league with all sorts of unsavory radicals.”
As I’ve already noted, this is not actually true; Sofia is being, well, mendacious. Yes, I pointed out the similarities between Breivik’s noxious misogynistic beliefs and, well, the noxious misogynistic beliefs of an embarrassingly large number of antifeminists and MRAs. But at no point did I (or, for that matter, Hugo) suggest that these people supported his despicable actions.
After purporting to be shocked – shocked! – that anyone would connect Breivik with the antifeminists of the world, Sofia offers an appreciation of sorts for Breivik’s awful manifesto. Waxing pompous yet again, she writes:
[A]lthough his actions were cruel beyond belief, and committed by a delusional, psychopath driven by his delusions of political grandeur, there is lucidity and sense in much of what he writes. He never seemed to explicitly advocated for a genocide of Muslims within Europe, but superficially claimed that he just wanted to sustain European culture.
So, let’s weigh Breivik’s pros and cons here. CON: He murdered 76 people in cold blood, motivated by a hateful ideology. PRO: He didn’t explicitly call for actual genocide?
Here’s where it gets weird. Really weird.
I feel that Breivik is being tried for more than his cruelty within the feminist community. The fact that he belongs to the privileged group of the white male makes him hate-worthy along with every other privileged white male who might sympathize with his ideology, even if they don’t happen to be psychotic. Breivik exemplifies White Men, even though Osama Bin Laden to the very same liberal ideologues did not represent Every Muslim.
It’s another symptom of our culture that feels it is OK to hold white men to higher standards of political correctness, self-flagellation and martyrdom whilst simultaneously relentlessly berating and mocking them on a cultural level.
Yep, that’s right. We hate Breivik … because he’s a white dude.
She continues on in this vein:
The subtle manifestations of an anti-white male agenda could be expounded upon for some time, even in the sexual sphere. In porn, the genre of cuckolding usually involves black men fucking white women to the dismay of her white husband. Something tells me this wouldn’t be acceptable if a black man were to stand helplessly by while a white male was sexually coercive with a black female.
Somehow we started off talking about mass murder and ended up talking about … cuckolding porn?
What. The. Fuck?
Lingua franca = a non-native language used as a means of communication between two disparate groups. Sanskrit was one. Elamatic (an Aramean language) was one. Classical Arabic was one. Latin was one. Persian was the most widespread before English supplanted it.
In India Persian was widespread. Indian translators munshis were famous for their abilities (much as the Elamatic speaking translator/messengers in the Persian Empire had been [Persian was a minority language in Persia, using a lingua franca to tie everything together]). The Moghuls spoke their own language, which was a Turkic on, as well as Arabic. Because of the use of Persian as a lingua franca in the Middle East and Asia Minor, both the Arabic and Turkic languages had strong Persian influence. Arabic, more than Turkish, also had Persian influences, but those were more limited, because they were primary languages for many people who spoke no Persian.
Your comment was in conflict because “India” has no language to learn. The most likely language for someone who moves to India to learn is the present lingua franca… i.e. English.
Ruttee: and I’d say that, absent learning Classical Hebrew, and Classical Arabic, the Bible seems less misogynistic. If one adds the New Testament, one has three books.
And the books don’t exist in a vacuum. It’s how they are interpreted which makes the misogyny actual. With no adherents, the beliefs in them are nothing more than curiosities, as with the differences in Greek religion between Sparta and Athens.
Hindu: I have a response to your questions about lingua franca, and about the conflict in your statements. It’s in moderation.
I suspect it’s for the lingua franca explanation, so I will repeat the conflict answer.
Your comment was in conflict because “India” has no language to learn. The most likely language for someone who moves to India to learn is the present lingua franca… i.e. English.
Here is the dictionary definition of lingua franca
1. any language that is widely used as a means of communication among speakers of other languages.
2:The Italian-Provençal jargon (with elements of Spanish, French, Greek, Arabic, and Turkish) formerly widely used in eastern Mediterranean ports.
Origin: 1670–80; Italian: literally, Frankish tongue
Rutee: I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to misspell your name.
“Your comment was in conflict because “India” has no language to learn. The most likely language for someone who moves to India to learn is the present lingua franca… i.e. English.”
WRONG. Anyone who moves to India permanantly will be expected to learn the local language of whatever region they settle in, otherwise they will have a very difficult time living in India. English is by no means known by the majority of Indian citizens.
I reject the idea that Persian was ever widely spread amongst Indians. That forgeign invaders used it in their imperialist courts means nothing to the local people who were speaking their own indigenous languages WHICH the imperialist Mughal leaders SHOULD have taken the time to learn.
Sanskrit was also and still is an elite language. The languages of India that are thriving now have been thriving for thousands of years. Those are our regional languages and there are dozens of them.
Imperialists and colonizers be damned.
I think this particular conflict about language in India is about terminology, correct me if I’m wrong HINDU, but when you said early something about people learning the language of the *country* they were in, you were perhaps not referring to India but to other countries (we have, after all, been discussing Europe and the US in this post), and perhaps a more appropriate way of putting it would be that immigrants should learn the language appropriate to where they settle?
To be clear, I don’t think it should be necessary for immigrants to learn the language of the country they move to – I for one SUCK at learning languages and don’t feel I would be able to learn a language if I had to move, at least not for a long time, and I would resent feeling like I HAD to learn it or I wasn’t welcome. Particularly given that many immigrants are coming from war-torn countries etc. and don’t necessarily get much of a choice about moving about or where they end up.
“To be clear, I don’t think it should be necessary for immigrants to learn the language of the country they move to”
How will they get jobs if they don’t?
I’m not saying the issue isn’t complicated, but I’m saying that much of the ‘make them learn our language if they’re going to come here!’ conversations seem to completely ignore how difficult that is, and that refugees rarely have choices about moving from their homeland or where they go. Therefore, saying that they HAVE TO learn the language seems harsh. Yes, it will be difficult to get anything other than menial jobs without learning the language, but jobs are available. Plus, refugees can form communities and set up businesses to cater to other refugees etc. – this is totally what happened with Italian immigration in Australia and the US. Usually subsequent generations learn both languages, but first generationers (particularly older ones) can find it difficult and occasionally impossible to become fluent speakers of a new language.
How will they get jobs if they don’t?
They will learn the words and phrases they need to get by. They will spend time in the enclaves, and neighborhoods where they live, or into which they are forced to live.
If they are not marginalised they will assimilate.
And I don’t think you understand the function of a lingua franca.
Hindu, my uncle lived in japan for about 20 years and never learned the language. He had a job (teaching English). I don’t quite know how one teaches a language to people if you don’t know their language, or get by on a country like Japan if you can’t speak Japanese, but he did. He’s kind of a stubborn dude.
As I said before, there are plenty of immigrants in Chicago from all over the place that don’t speak English (or speak it well).. Many of them get jobs in communities in which lots of other people speak their language.
A friend of mine moved into a neighborhood full of Mexican immigrants, many of whom don’t speak English. So instead of saying “hi” to them when she walks down the street, she says “hola,” like they do to her. (Somehow I suspect they would understand her if she just said “hi” too; she’s just being polite.) When she went to a hardware store run by Spanish-speaking immigrants, she had to point and gesture to explain what she wanted. But she got what she needed.
It’s not the end of the world if not everyone assimilates.
“They will learn the words and phrases they need to get by.”
Just like you will do if you ever go to India 😉
“They will spend time in the enclaves, and neighborhoods where they live, or into which they are forced to live.”
What does that have to do with learning the local language and getting a job?
“If they are not marginalised they will assimilate.”
Those who do not assimilate marginalise themselves.
Regarding Persian lingua franca (or lingam franca, as it applies to India LOL), it just goes to show you that the Islamic invaders, imperialists, and colonizers were cultural bigots who had no intention whatsoever of assimilating into the local cultures of India and learning our languages.
Well, yeah, invaders who conquer an area don’t usually learn the language. Immigrants who settle in an area do usually learn the language.
And even if a particular group of immigrants doesn’t learn the local language, it’s still not the end of the world. The Pennsylvania Dutch settled in Pennsylvania nearly 300 years ago, and set up their own German-speaking enclave. Their descendants speak English now, but the process was a gradual one that took centuries, and no harm came to the USA as a result.
Johnny, not all immigrants are the same or equally benign.
This has probably been brought up earlier, but she thinks cuckolding porn is racist against WHITE people?
It’s not the end of the world if not everyone assimilates.(David)
I imagine this is totally dependant on what they are NOT assimilating to. There does need to be a certain cultural definition(the rule of law maybe) that we all adhere to or else you are in for a world of hurt. As we are seeing in multiple western countries one of those is the requirement to show your face in governmental areas or to identify yourself to police. If we leave that up to religions then obviously the niqab could become quite troublesome as is evidenced right here.
This has probably been brought up earlier, but she thinks cuckolding porn is racist against WHITE people?
Well, whites are the most oppressed people in America. I heard Rush Limbaugh say it, so it must be true.
The German and and Romans invaded Spain before the Arabs. The Arabs got in because the Germans were fighting among themselves. The Arabs did not only invaded the Suth of Spain , they invaded 95% of it. They were great at medicine, arquitecture, agriculture and they left a unique and wonderful legacy behind, just like the Safardy Jews.
About the inmigrants having to learn the language, I have to say , that how many English people living abroad have you met anywhere that speak the language of that country? Zero. In Spain , no one of them , including the criminals in the prison and the ones living in the Costa del Sol , speak Spanish. The other inmigrants , even the ones from Rumania, do speak the language in less than a year. What shall we do about that?
The best way to counter people like Anders Breivik is to say that at the end immigrants assimilate, glorifying the non-assimilation of immigrants just encourage racists like him.
About Sharia Law/arbitration service in European countries. The most vehement opponent to them are not racists but Muslim feminists. In Canada, in Ontario, it’s Muslim feminists that were the main opponent to Sharia Law/religious tribunals.
The best way to counter people like Anders Breivik is to say that at the end immigrants assimilate(no more mr nice guy)
Unfortunately when someone is this nuts, as in insane, the best way to counter them is to put them out of their misery as quickly as possible. Individuals such as Breivik are not anti-Islamist nor are they anti feminist, they are anti everything. In other words his distorted brain would eventually have found any excuse to kill. Sad but true.
Hyu needz tzu be schowing hyour verk. Beekus hyu zay Hy haf been secksist, raceest und bigoteed hyu must hav schom proov, eh?
Ver az Hy haf, een hyour houwn post,
und
Hyu need tzu schtoop uzink vords hyu don’t underschand.
I meant to counter the ideas of Anders Breivik. There is a lot people that think like him, I’ve seen anti-djihadist sites were they were praising Slobodan Milosevic and hoping the same thing for Europe.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/07/anders-behring-breivik-and-the-anti-jihadist-blogosphere/242533/
Ami, hyu ever read Red China Blues
Hy vas eenterested een de post-Mao china und read eet. De autor realee opeened my eyez un vat eets like to bee furegn een two countrees.
Those invaders are still there, they were just deposed by the British. Did you look at the timeline… 600 years. Did you wonder why, in 600 years there was still the neede for a lingua franca?
The same reason there is one now. Because India doesn’t have a “national” language. People who want to do things with people outside their linguistic group need a common tongue.
For 600 years, in India… a bit more in the wider world) that was Persian.
People who are marginalised often don’t assimilate because they are marginalised. They don’t get jobs, aren’t given access to housing and so they clump together. Then the majority culture abuses them for not wanting to fit in.
It’s a feedback loop.
titfortat: Thats a convenient defense…it’s the “no true scotsman” writ as “he’s crazy”. He is antisocial, but I don’t think he was unaware of what he was doing, nor that the reasons he had for doing it were deranged.
Wrong yes, but that’s not the same.
Saying he wasn’t really anti-feminist, or anti-muslim, or anti anything, because he was,”crazy” denies what he said, and did.
He didn’t choose to go gunning for MRAs. He went gunning for those whom he saw as promoting the policies he saw as favoring equality for women and muslims.
Seems a rational action to me; attack the source, not the symptoms. If I were starting a war, it’s where I’d start.