Tuesday 7 June 2011

Shocking, But Somehow Not Unexpected

In an excellent article at The Free Society, Simon Hills last week put his finger firmly on the foibles of well-off UK 'progressive' elites. Drawing on the recent referendum results, he highlighted the collective mentality of Guardianistas who seem to think they are more worthy, and infinitely wiser, than the rest of us.

We just know that this class would be pro AV. In the same way that we know that it is pro-Palestine, pro-abortion rights, pro-alternative energy, pro-positive discrimination, pro-gay rights, pro-immigration. By the same token we know that the chattering classes are anti-fast food, anti-big business (with the exception of the Apple corporation), anti-car, anti-smoking, anti-television, anti-selective education. Anti working class, in other words.
Never a truer paragraph written, I'd say.

While they look to form the country - and we poor saps who have to endure their righteous pomposity - in their own image, they no doubt glance with envious eyes at the lefty paradise of San Francisco, where much of the above - if not already enshrined in law - is assumed to be accepted by everyone without question.

So much so, that the pro-Palestine (and consequentially anti-Israel) sentiment has been carried a bit too far in their zeal to ban circumcision for male children. Yes, I'm serious, they really are doing that.

With lobbying now in motion, the pro-ban contingent have - seemingly with no shame - targeted natural Jewish, religion-led, opposition with startlingly offensive campaign literature.


Now, I first thought this must be a cleverly-constructed smear, but the Foreskin Man website gives credit for the idea to the President of the organisation at the forefront of pushing the legislation through.

I don't think anyone sane believed we'd ever again see a totalitarian ideology confidently promoted with such obnoxious imagery, but there it is in technicolour.

This type of staggering arrogance - that it is unquestionable that their opinion is correct, therefore literally anything goes in pursuit of the cause - seems to be very common in all 'progressive' campaigns from public spending plans, through anti-obesity/smoking/fatty food directives to loopy and disastrously expensive 'green' initiatives. Who cares how damaging their policies, propaganda or methods are as long as they get what they want, eh?

In light of this and the other iron fist measures pursued so vigorously by the formerly peace-loving hippies who have destroyed tolerance (and the economy) in San Francisco, you have to wonder if they really do deserve the label that some ascribe to them.

We'll not need to openly invoke Godwin here, I think you get the gist.


27 comments:

mikebravo said...

Of course they are right.
Progressives are like gods and popes - infallable.

Curmudgeon said...

Hmm, Muslims believe in circumcision too. So why have they used an image that would not have been out of place in 1930s Germany?

Anonymous said...

I've not seen such hateful anti-Semitic campaign posters since looking at websites showing the types of propaganda literature and vile caricatures that Nazi Germany spewed out. And they call this "progressive"?

It's utterly hateful, disgusting. And yet they brag about it openly, as if "normal"?

The law itself is also anti-Semitic as it discriminates based on a traditional religious preference and places government dictates over parental rights.

Only in a place overrun by Nazi sentiment could such a hateful depiction and campaign against religious tolerance become everyday normal.

I would not spend one pence ever taking a tour to San Francisco, not after seeing this filth they are spewing out.

JuliaM said...

Oh, Curmudgeon, you must know why....

Christopher Snowdon said...

Complete with sinister Jewish caricature. Wow. Almost unbelievable.

Anonymous said...

My jaw dropped.
The fourth reich in California.
Yep, Nazism is definately an inherent doctrine amongst control freaks.

One more thing the site loads really slowly.
I think their web server is overloaded.
Good.

Some shark.
Some jump.

Anonymous said...

Somebody once said America would lapse into fascism.
Piece one just clicked into place.

Anonymous said...

As I understand it, many Jewish people were in the vanguard of the politically correctness movement.

Now it's their turn in the crosshairs. I can't wait until this hits New York and Bloomberg has an aneurysm.

Anonymous said...

I don't hold hostility toward Jewish people and would not wish this type of disgraceful propaganda against them or any other group. But it is true, if this happened in New York, Bloomberg would be on the spot as how to explain progressive policies, including of his own, have managed to lead us down this path of open hatred. His own health-fascist laws, like those of Hitlers, certainly played the first step in opening the door to hatred against others, in his case against smokers, drinkers and anyone whose weight he doesn't approve.

Dick Puddlecote said...

The reference to New York is well-drawn. If the natural progression of Californian progressivism from west coast to east is mirrored with this law (if passed), Bloomberg or anyone else in the job at the time can kiss their Jewish vote goodbye. I take it that Jews must have all but vacated pot-smoking, peace-loving, flower-sniffing - but religion-hating - California by now.

Magnetic said...

Antismoking is not new. It has a long, sordid history, where much of it pre-dates even the pretense of a scientific basis or the concocted idea of secondhand smoke “danger”.

There were concurrent anti-tobacco and anti-alcohol “crusades” in early-1900s USA. These crusades led to a temporary ban on the sale of tobacco in some states and smoking restrictions in most states, and eventually Prohibition immediately following WWI.
http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1981/2/1981_2_94_print.shtml

Pushed by the Eugenics and Temperance Movements, antismoking (and anti-alcohol) was viewed as in the interests of a “healthier” society. Rather, this fake “purity” promoted irrational fear, hatred, and social division: It brought out the worst in the human disposition. Baseless, inflammatory claims were made as a matter of course by so-called “authorities” and “experts”.

What is not noted in Dillow (1981) is that eugenics was rife at the turn of the last century. Eugenics views humans as no more than a “herd” that can be “engineered” along the biological dimension for “maximal health.” Health is reduced to an entirely biological phenomenon (physicalism, materialism). In addition to its racial/heredity/breeding dimension, eugenics also has a behavioral dimension. Along this dimension, eugenics is anti-tobacco and anti-alcohol (negative eugenics) and aggressively pushes approved diet and physical exercise (positive eugenics). In this context, tobacco and alcohol are viewed as body toxins that should be avoided/eradicated. They are considered to detrimentally affect human [body] performance and reproduction.

nisakiman said...

I can't say this surprises me. The Haight-Ashbury set are now so far up their liberal arses that the light of reason has no chance of shining on them.

I personally see circumcision as unnecessary and rather barbaric, but each to their own.

Magnetic said...

California was the leader in the American eugenics insanity. It performed more sterilizations – by far - than any other state. It performed over 20,000 sterilizations. The next highest state was North Carolina with 7,600. There was also an intimate connection between American – particularly Californian – and German eugenicists. The latter (and Hitler) were students of American eugenics that later went on to lead the Nazi assault.

Although there were eugenics societies in a variety of countries, post-WWII, the greatest concentration of eugenicists was in the USA, and within USA, in California. The eugenics mentality was never resolved in the USA. Eugenicists didn’t just disappear or change their mentality. They believed that Hitler had gone “too far” but that the fundamentals of eugenics were sound. They were more than happy for the public to believe that eugenics was a Nazi phenomenon that disappeared with the defeat of Nazism and that anti-tobacco/alcohol in the USA had been solely produced by the Temperance Movement. Given the horrors associated with the term “eugenics” following Nazism, they simply stopped using the “E”[ugenics] word. Further, given their thoroughly flawed “heredity trees”, they abandoned the heredity/racial/breeding dimension and focused entirely on the behavioral dimension. [Genetics/genetic engineering took over study from “heredity trees”. This study, in its infancy immediately post-WWII, has produced the Human Genome Project which is housed in the very same building complex in Cold Spring Harbor, NY, as the original Eugenics Record Office]

The contemporary antismoking “crusade” has been produced by the same eugenics personnel – physicians, biologists, zoologists, pharmacologists, statisticians, behaviorists – continuing the eugenics obsession with anti-tobacco. Health reduced to only biology is the eugenics framework and the aggressive peddling of the definition with a view to societal change (social engineering) is very much the fascism of the eugenics mentality. It is the eugenics mentality that dominates health bureaucracies that has made antismoking a societal ideal. And California has been the global leader in antismoking.

Curmudgeon said...

I think a reading of "Liberal Fascism" by Jonah Goldberg is in order here.

Anonymous said...

Speaking as someone with a Jewish background it is shocking to see the blatant nature of the campaign literature, but the stated objective of the group should not be confused with the thoroughly disgusting way in which the message is being put forward. As Curmudgeon points out male circumcision is common among muslims as well as jews. My position is that it is time to stop people from cutting bits of helpless infants. If a man or woman wishes, as an adult, to make their flesh sacrifice to their god then as a consenting adult no one can have the right to stop them. I think you would find however that if jewish and muslim men had to undergo circumcision as adults in order to demonstrate the depth of their faith a good, sound religious reason to stop the practice completely would soon be found hiding in the scriptures.

Anonymous said...

Anon said: "The fourth reich in California."

Well they did have an Austrian in charge..."

wcoaphorse2010 said...

California uber alles?

Anonymous said...

In reality its a pretty massive step from circumcision bans to green initiatives, but then I suppose this whole article is about making sweeping statements and leaps in logic. I find it hard to believe,for example, that California's economic woes were caused by extreme liberals when there was a Republican at the helm from 2003 to 2010. That said, your basic point that state involvement in religious practice is quite a few steps down a slippery road is spot on PLUS it means I get a chance to reference the Dead Kennedys- Looks like its California Über Alles all over again.

James Higham said...

I don't think anyone sane believed we'd ever again see a totalitarian ideology confidently promoted with such obnoxious imagery, but there it is in technicolour.

The German Health Ministry pamphlet in Cologne, promoting incest was just such a brightly coloured propaganda campaign for the totalitarians.

Mr A said...

No surprises here. Anyone who knows anything about the motivations of the anti-smoking lobby ("What's wrong with denormalising people?" - Arnott, ASH, 2011; "Then they'll just have to die!", DeVille Almond, Senior Nurse, 2009) and their eugenic agenda KNOW that they are Nazis. Not "like" Nazis.... they ARE Nazis, pure and simple. You only have to look at the social division and promotion of hatred that has occurred since the smoking ban (and your own "Anti-Smoker Psychosis" section) to see this is true. (And the well-established links of the anti-smoking movement to Nazi Germany, of course).

Still, I am somewhat surprised to see something like this. Not because they don't think like that, of course. That is apparent to anyone (except the dumb MPs who somehow still seem to think that ASH and their ilk are working for "public health"). No, I just thought they were more PR savvy and media aware than to be so blatant as to produce something that could come straight out of Berlin circa 1939. Still, when everything goes their way and they are never questioned and are convinced of their righteous superiority, then this is what you get.

A warning to us all - our dozy MPs in particular.

Mr A said...

That said, isn't it funny how we can all look at the "Foreskin Man" comic and be shocked at how obviously anti-semitic it is. Yet is there really any difference between that and this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_CPTcZn9fg

I remember seeing this as a kid and thinking nothing of it. Yet there do seem to be striking parallels between the two. The antis have been at it for decades.

All we need to remember is that "Tolerance is tolerance," not just tolerance for the select few.

Dick Puddlecote said...

How uncanny, Mr A. I had the very same thought about that old ad just this morning.

Dr Evil said...

But circumcision is very common amongst male muslims too!

That imagery is actually worse than a lot of the Nazi stuff from the 1930s. Incredible! I expect their constitution allowing free speech is their stay out of jail clause.

Just grotesque.

Sam Duncan said...

They've backed down.

In Santa Monica.

“Unlike in Santa Monica, Troutman confirmed that a measure banning male circumcision of minors will still appear on the ballot in San Francisco. If passed, the measure would make it a misdemeanor crime punishable by a $1,000 fine or a year in jail.”

Anonymous said...

"In reality its a pretty massive step from circumcision bans to green initiatives, but then I suppose this whole article is about making sweeping statements and leaps in logic. I find it hard to believe,for example, that California's economic woes were caused by extreme liberals when there was a Republican at the helm from 2003 to 2010."
--
No, it's a massive step, in the opposite direction. California extremism in green laws and smoking bans has already become the norm and it is the circumcision ban the one step further.
--
Schwartzenegger was a RINO and the "fall-guy", the "one to blame" while the liberal majority controlled the Assembly and most layers of the bureaucracy in the state, county and local levels and certainly in San Francisco, which is uber-liberal-progressive, to the point of Nazi/Socialism.

They have their career politician and extreme liberal-progressive idealogue Gerry Brown in the governor's seat, the same one who created the financial burden during his first turn as governor allowing collective bargaining and ultimately burdening the state with unmeetable salary and pension plan funding that is a major problem there.

Schwartzenegger was more like the curtain that hid the liberal-progressive majority power-base that has been calling the shots in California for decades now. He's the "fall guy" - "Republican bad" - "Liberal-Progressive-Democrat good". It's what they want you to believe. It's better for hiding the truth.

Dick Puddlecote said...

Sam Duncan: Although she seems quite decent, what's this all about?

"Troutman, a lactation consultant"

WTF?

Anonymous said...

"Lactation Consultant"?

She must be obsessed over women's dangly parts up above and men's dangly parts down below.

I say she should get herself a life and quit worrying about private personal things none of her damned business.

Just another typical liberal-progressive know-it-all expert bent on telling everyone else how to live.