Melanie Phillips – praag.co.za

Leon Lemmer: Peter Hitchens oor die ontaarding van die Britte

Christopher Hitchens (1949-2011) was ‘n radikale, konfronterende, marxistiese joernalis wat baie polemieke met sy omtrede uitlatings ontketen het. Saam met Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett en Sam Harris was hy een van die grondleggers van die militante Nuwe Ateïsme. In sy latere lewe is Hitchens daarvan beskuldig dat hy polities (meer) regsgesind geword het, bv vanweë sy renons in Bill Clinton en sy veroordeling van NAVO se militêre inmenging in Bosnië.

Vandag skryf ek egter oor Christopher se minder bekende broer, Peter Hitchens (gebore in 1951), ook ‘n Britse joernalis, wat in sy prille jeug ‘n aanhanger van Leon Trotskie (1879-1940) se marxisme was. Hy verwys na homself as “a former Bolshevik” (bron hier onder, Kindle 4904). Peter het polities van verlinks tot regs gevorder, van sosialisme, via die Britse Arbeidersparty tot lid van die Konserwatiewe Party (1997-2003); ‘n party wat hom mettertyd ook nie meer aangestaan het nie. Deesdae beskou hy Edmund Burke (1729-1797 – Praag 2.05.2020) as sy mentor. Hitchens wil nie polities byderwets wees nie. Hy is ten gunste van die doodstraf en gekant teen homoseksualiteit asook die dekriminalisering van dwelmgebruik, bv dagga. “Legalization … lead[s] to social acceptance” (3820). Hy het geen simpatie met mense wat deur eie toedoen aan longkanker (weens die rookgewoonte) en vigs (weens homoseksuele gedrag) ly nie. Tydens Suid-Afrika se 1994-oorgang/ondergang was hy in Suid-Afrika. Hy het tot die juiste gevolgtrekking gekom, naamlik dat Nelson Mandela nie ‘n heilige is nie. Verder het hy die Wikipedia korrek as ‘n linkse naslaanbron geïdentifiseer.

Soms dryf Hitchens sy konserwatisme dalk te ver. Hy is bv gekant teen die “valsheid” van Britse Somertyd. Hy verkies Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) dwarsdeur die jaar. Hy verset hom selfs teen die metrisering van mate en gewigte. “My instincts … revolt against the shiny, efficient, ugly and stone-cold metric system” (4797). “English measures … pounds and ounces, inches and feet, chains and furlongs … were destroyed with slow subtlety and cunning, and resistance is left to a few eccentrics, such as me, fuming hopelessly against a loss nobody else can see” (4803). “[English] measurements … were based on the individual. A pound was what could be held in the hand. A pint was what a grown man might reasonably drink to quench his thirst. An inch was the top joint of a thumb, a foot was, well, a foot, and a yard was a pace. A fathom of water was deep enough to close over a man’s head. They worked outwards from the human. Metric measurements, by contrast, were based on a (mistaken) calculation of the Earth’s circumference” (4839).

Ek bespreek vandag die volgende boek van Peter Hitchens: The abolition of Britain: From Winston Churchill to Theresa May (London: Bloomsbury, 1999/2018, 368p; Amazon Kindle $21,23). Die hooftitel van die boek word in die 2018-voorwoord soos volg verduidelik: “The abolition of a great and famous nation is now virtually complete. This book, originally [1999] intended as a warning in letters of fire, might now at least serve as a headstone” (116). Die newetitel wek verkeerdelik die indruk dat hierdie boek onlangs geskryf is. Al die hoofstukke is reeds in 1999 vir die eerste keer gepubliseer. Slegs die voor- en nawoord is later bygevoeg. Nogtans toon die teks uitstekende insig in die diepgaande veranderinge wat sedert die dood van Winston Churchill (1874-1965) in die Britse omstandighede en geestesklimaat ingetree het. “The death of Churchill, an unchallengeable father figure, was a final farewell to a reassuring past” (182).

“My argument is that we chose the wrong future in the second half of the twentieth century” (101). Hy noem dit ‘n kulturele revolusie (162). “We have gravely devalued knowledge and academic qualifications, made many thoughts almost unthinkable, sundered many of the invisible bonds which once held our society together, and inflicted upon our country a permanent and irreversible change in morals, values, customs, taboos, language, humour, art and even eating habits” (167). In Suid-Afrika het dit veel erger daaraan toe gegaan. In 1994 het ons ‘n politieke revolusie beleef, waarna ‘n kulturele revolusie ingetree het waarin ‘n grootliks vreemde swart kultuur die twee tradisioneel leidende blanke kulture/lewenswyses verdring het. Hitchens noem Brittanje “a wholly foreign country” (187). Uit die oogpunt van die blankes geld dit in veel groter mate vir Suid-Afrika.

Volgens die outeur het die Britte in 1965 nog rede gehad om hulleself as die voortreflikste mense op aarde te beskou en kon hulle met reg trots op en patrioties jeens hulle land wees. Hy verwys na “a society that was profoundly civilized, gentle and humane” (707). Hy meen dat die Britse samelewing sedertdien feitlik onherkenbaar ontaard het. Dit herinner aan die ingrypende verskille wat daar tussen die ou en die nuwe Suid-Afrika bestaan, wat onder meer die entoesiasme vir en die tradisionele patriotisme van Afrikaners vir hulle geboorteland weggekalwe het. Daar kan egter kwalik van Afrikaners verwag word om die tradisionele Britte as verhewe organismes te beskou, gedagtig aan onder meer die Anglo-Boereoorlog. Tog is daar vir die plaaslike blankes min troos in die volgende reeds aangehaalde woorde: “The abolition of a great and famous nation is now virtually complete” (116). Brittanje is nog ‘n blanke Westerse land wat weens bv selfaangedoende, ingevoerde multikulturaliteit besig is om onder te gaan.

In Suid-Afrika ken baie jongmense van die huidige geslag nie die land se geskiedenis nie. Dit is veral te wyte aan die propaganda van die ANC-regime, bv in skoolgeskiedenisboeke, en die uitlatings van ANC-nalopers in die massa-inligtingsmedia. In Brittanje het iets soortgelyks gebeur. Hitchens verwys na “a generation to whom the past was not just a foreign country, but a place of mystery which was easier to mock than understand” (146). By hedendaagse Britte, soos by Amerikaners, is daar die neiging om onpatrioties te wees, om ‘n negatiewe siening van hulle land en hulle geskiedenis te hê. “The ideas of the past were invariably wrong, that putting the clock back was a sin, while progress and change were both inevitable and right” (616). Hitchens verwys na “the ‘anti-establishment’ tendencies in politics, academe, broadcasting and the press” (458). “Patriotism, monarchy and Englishness in general [became] unfashionable and – worst of all – comical” (600). “In 1965, even the radicals were loyal patriots” (474).

Daar word plek-plek na Suid-Afrika verwys:

“The old struggle between Afrikaner and British settlers in South Africa had ended in the triumph of the National Party, the building of grand apartheid and the founding of a Boer republic outside the Commonwealth” (637).
Die Britse openbare mening is “unshakeable in its certainty that personal righteousness is reserved for those who share its views about South Africa” (151), naamlik dat die swart politieke bewind reg en goed is en die blanke bewind van weleer, by name apartheid, verkeerd en sleg was.
Voorgeskrewe skooldrag word in progressiewe geledere geassosieer met “repressive and reactionary forms of government such as apartheid South Africa and Augusto Pinochet’s Chile” (1119).
“Opposition to apartheid or General Pinochet are valued more highly than personal adherance to the Ten Commandments or the Sermon on the Mount. An adulterer with the correct view on Nelson Mandela is perferable to a Mother Teresa who fails to critize the currently unfashionable regimes of the world” (4446).
Vir ‘n politieke aktivis soos Desmond Tutu gaan dit om die hiermaals en nie om die hiernamaals nie. Hy probeer om ‘n (swart) hemel op aarde te skep. Hitchens noem dit sosiale teologie “in which Christian charity to your neighbour was expressed through political action at home and abroad, rather than in your own conduct. This was especially attractive to the British because the Church’s old missionary links with the former colonies now gave it a potent voice in places such as South Africa, where it was to play an often creditable role in resisting the stupidities of Grand Apartheid” (1658).
Die hedendaagse afkeer van Standaardafrikaans kan ingevolge kulturele marxisme verduidelik word. Ordentlike, suiwer Afrikaans herinner aan ‘n glorieryke verlede wat deur ANC-kamerade weggewens word. “The glories of the language were offensive to the modernizers because they reminded them of what they owed to the past, because they reinforced the bonds of tradition, but above all because they constantly reminded them of a view of religion which was not theirs. It did not offer salvation through the Overseas Development Agency, the Anti-Apartheid Movement, Amnesty International and the Social Security budget. It offered it in an entirely non-political way, through the faith and deeds of the individual” (1871).

Hitchens kan nie (heeltemal) vrede met die nuwe elektroniese kultuur maak nie. Hy noem dit “post-literate” omdat die inligting eerder deur piktogramme, dus deur beelde/illustrasies, as deur teks oorgedra word (223). “Early television was nothing like the modern force which has now displaced all other forms of culture and entertainment. Its effect on the imagination has been the motor of the new morality and the new conformism” (234, ook 468). “The BBC [British Broadcasting Corporation] functions as a sort of priesthood of the politically permissible, awarding airtime and favour to those it likes, and silence, bad camera angles or mockery to those it dislikes” (4952). “[Television] encourage[s] only one set of ideas about what was good” (447). “It made each one of us more like the other, it narrowed the gaps between us and made us simultaneouly less alone and more conformist. We have all noticed the way in which mass culture has flattened out accents and made us dress and even walk in standardized fashions” (238).

“This regimentation has also affected our thinking, and our ability to choose. In a society of stable values and unchanging tradition, this would not be specially important, and the cinema had far less impact on 1930s Britain than television was to have fifty or sixty years later. The effect of television, especially colour television, on a society whose values were all open to question and whose morals were dissolving was explosive, and continues to be” (243). “Television robs adults of one of their most important tasks, as passers-on of culture to the young” (2116). Gelykmaking, eendersverklaring en internasionalisering kan die taak van regerings vergemaklik maar het ‘n vernietigende uitwerking op bv individualiteit, kreatiwiteit en eiesoortige kultuur. NP van Wyk Louw het reeds in 1936 geskryf: “Ons tyd wil net van gelykheid en gelykmaak weet; die natuur ken net ongelykheid en streng rangordening” (Berigte te velde, Kaapstad: Nasionale Boekhandel, 1959, p 17). Plaaslik is dieselfde neiging as in Brittanje waarneembaar: “The increasingly blatant use of soap operas as cultural propaganda” (Hitchens 48). Sepies en baie ander televisieprogramme is as’t ware ‘n siekte wat nie net bedags nie maar veral saans kulturele verwoesting saai.

Amerika was die eintlike wenner in die Tweede Wêreldoorlog. Amerika het die leidende land geword. “By 1941 we were a defeated nation” (285). “When American servicemen began arriving in Britain in 1942, much of the United Kingdom fell under a bizarre and unique form of military occupation” (4140). “They spoke the same language but brought with them a completely different culture, different morals, different habits of courtship and even different tastes in food and drink, music and entertainment” (4145). “The total number of Americans in the UK at this time [1944] was more than 1.6 million, mostly active young men, at a time when Britain’s active young men were mainly away from home” (4171). Hitchens bied die volgende as ‘n kompliment aan: “A rather touching and honourable refusal by Britons to countenance the US Army’s colour bar” (4192).

Die Amerikaanse besetting van Brittanje het tot lank ná die oorlog voortgeduur. Hierdie situasie “undermined and belittled Britain’s image of herself, and the British people’s view of themselves” (270). Amerikaanse kultuur het die Britte grondig beïnvloed, nie net vanweë die baie Amerikaanse soldate wat daar gestasioneer was nie, maar ook vanweë Amerikaanse rolprente en televisie. Daar was gevolglik “the increasing use of American terms in language” (280), asook die groeiende invloed van Amerikaanse populêre musiek, bv rock (295). Hitchens verwys na moderne populêre musiek “with its strangely bisexual appeal and its carnal beat” as “part war-dance, part fertility ritual” (2121). Wat die tradisionele Britse kultuur ook ontwrig het, is “America’s supposed ‘classlessness’, actually a fiction, [which] mocked our minutely graded caste system” (290).

Hitchens maak gewag van “the huge scale of the war effort and the breath and depth of the destruction it had caused not just to the physical fabric of the country but to its social fabric. Few now recall that the immediate postwar years were a time when many were alarmed by a rapid increase in crime, an atmosphere of purposeless rebellion among the young and a great deal of family breakdown because of the number of marriages which failed to survive the long partings of war” (680). “The Americanization of our sex lives was probably more important than all these put together. American attitudes towards divorce and adultery, the collapse of American puritanism … under the blows of Kinsey and the contraceptive pill, fanned out across the country like an infectious disease” (290). “As late as 1965, the child of divorced parents was an exception at any school, illegitimate children were a shameful rarity, homosexual acts were illegal, and contraception and abortion were taboo subjects in most homes” (572). Hierby kom nog “the arrival of North American feminism” (306).

Van die veranderings in die Britse leefwyse wat Hitchens opgemerk het, is die agteruitgang van die gehalte van standaard- of tradisionele Engels [Estuary English (358)], bv weens Amerikaanse invloed. “Estuary English – the universal classless patios of southern England” (3363). Daar is deesdae baie meer misdaad (566), bv inbrake (561), as voorheen en daar lê vullis in die strate (363), onder meer weens die multikulturele gedaanteverwisseling wat veral die stede ondergaan het. Maar sulke negatiewe verskynsels word deur linksgesindes goedgepraat. Daar is “a crude moral justification for crime, seen by many modern thieves as a form of taxation levied upon the greedy by the rest” (2381). In Suid-Afrika maak die ANC-regime die nieblankes wys dat die blankes hulle grond gesteel het en dat die blankes hulle besittings bekom het deur nieblankes uit te buit, bv deur hulle te min vir hulle arbeid te vergoed. Dit kan ten minste deels verduidelik waarom misdaad, bv onwettige grondbesetting en diefstal, op so ‘n buitensporige skaal in Suid-Afrika gepleeg word.

“In 1965 … eating in the street, except for a holiday ice cream or a homebound parcel of fish and chips, was practically unknown, and drinking in the street quite unthinkable for most people” (512). Die gedrag van mense het verander; eintlik versleg (479). Daar is al beweer dat die hedendaagse Britse kultuur gekenmerk word aan “lager, football and bodily functions” (611). Hoflikheid en goeie maniere het skaarser geword (479). Goeie smaak het agteruitgegaan (368). Mense voel minder veilig as voorheen, veral snags (389). In 1965 was Brittanje baie meer verenig as tans (432), met baie inwoners in Wallis en veral Skotland wat deesdae van Engeland wil wegbreek. “Northern Ierland … was the only place on British territory where British patriotism took the form of nationalism” (4615). Daardie nasionalisme is uit nood gebore – die gevaar vir Protestantse Britte van vereniging met en oorheersing deur die Rooms-Katolieke Iere van die Ierse Republiek. By die Britte in Noord-Ierland is daar deesdae egter al hoe groter onsekerheid of hulle in die toekoms deel van die Ierse Republiek of van Engeland gaan wees. Voorheen was daar nasionale solidariteit in Brittanje maar sedert 1965 het gebeure dit weggekalwe (653).

“A nation is the sum of its memories, and when those memories are allowed to die, it is less a nation. However, when a people cease to believe their national myths, and cease to know or respect their history, it does not follow that they become blandly smiling internationalists” (756). Die ANC-regime beywer hom vir die herskrywing van Suid-Afrika se geskiedenis, sodat die swartes beter en die blankes, veral die Afrikaners, slegter voorgestel word. Plekname word verander en standbeelde vernietig of verwyder ten einde die Afrikanerdom se trotse verlede te misken. Gebeure soos die Groot Trek en die Slag van Bloedrivier word as mites afgemaak. Dit alles word gedoen om die Afrikaners as etniese nasie, as volk, te probeer vernietig. Afrikanisme en globalisme word as plaasvervangers vir Afrikanernasionalisme aan ons opgedring. Regeringsleiers soos Donald Trump en Boris Johnson verset hulle teen globalisme. Hulle ondersteun onderskeidelik Amerikaanse en Britse nasionalisme, maar word om veral hierdie rede in die massa-inligtingsmedia verguis. As eilande is Brittanje, volgens Hitchens, “uniquely suited to be a nation-state” (809); des te meer sedert sy onttrekking aan die Europese Unie.

Ons het pas die onverkwiklike ondervinding gehad dat Jeremy Vearey (Praag 26.05.2018), ‘n opgeleide ANC-terroris, oud-Robbeneilander, nie-taalkundige en nie-letterkundige, klaarblyklik weens politieke redes deur die Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns gevra is om vanjaar, vyftig jaar ná sy dood, die NP van Wyk Louw-gedenklesing te lewer. ‘n Soortgelyke vergryp is die jaarlikse Neville Alexander-lesing wat deur die Afrikaanse Taalmuseum en -monument aangebied word ter huldiging van nog ‘n oud-Robbeneilander. Hitchens vestig die aandag op ‘n soortgelyke polities byderwetse skuif: om die blanke Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), tradisioneel dié heldin in die verpleegkunde, met ‘n swart rolmodel, die Jamaikaan Mary Seacole (1805-1881), te vervang (910). Albei het gedurende die Krim-oorlog (1853-1856) gewonde soldate verpleeg. Dit herinner aan die vervanging van ons volksplanter van weleer, Jan van Riebeeck, met ‘n nuwe vader van die (swart) Suid-Afrikaanse nasie, die geweldenaar Nelson Mandela. Sedert 1994 is daar in ANC-geledere selfs meer as een moeder vir hierdie nasie ontdek.

Volgens Hitchens is die Britse neo-marxiste “drearily left-wing, and focussed upon suffering and deprivation rather than upon achievement or heroism. They are also notably more forgiving of the misdeeds of communist totalitarianism than of fascist totalitarianism” (938). Weens die gebrek aan positiewe prestasie deur ANC-kamerade word negatiewe gebeure, soos ongehoorsaamheid en geweldpleging, sedert 1994 in Suid-Afrika tydens openbare vakansiedae in herinnering geroep. Dit dui op geestelike en morele bankrotskap.

In Suid-Afrika is skoolonderrig vir die verskillende kultuur- en etniese groepe, elk met sy eie leerplanne, sedert 1994 deur gemeenskaplike leerplanne, primêr afgestem op die swart meerderheid, vervang. In Brittanje is die tradisioneel monokulturele skoolonderrig tot multikulturele opvoeding omvorm. Hitchens noem dit “yet another excuse to denigrate the nation-state, apologize for the Empire and abolish the lore of the British tribe” (998). Terselfdertyd was daar, soos in Suid-Afrika, ‘n ernstige verlaging in akademiese standaarde – “standards always are out of date” (2272) – en die vernietiging van die tradisionele geskiedenisleerplan (1003). In Suid-Afrika verkondig die ANC-regime openlik dat ons geskiedenis volgens die voorkeure van ANC-kamerade herskryf word. Daar is blanke historici wat hartlik aan hierdie projek saamwerk. “In an incredibly short time, we have been turned into a nation without heroes, without pride in our past or knowledge of either our past triumphs or our past follies and disasters” (1007).

Plaaslik was daar al uitsprake van die nuwe bewindhebbers dat dinge soos meriete en standaarde Westerse uitvindings is wat maar agterweë kon gebly het. Jonathan Jansen het hom by uitstek smalend oor akademiese standaarde uitgelaat, heel moontlik omdat hy, sonder om dit te erken, besef dat akademiese standaarde in die skole en aan die universiteite in die ou Suid-Afrika veel hoër was as wat hulle in die nuwe Suid-Afrika is. Hitchens skryf: “The great universities of Oxford and Cambridge are still being attacked by ministers for trying to maintain some standards” (48). Later skryf hy van “a general lowering of Oxbridge standards” (1134). Dit is die Britse weergawe van die ANC se: “pass one, pass all.” Dit is ‘n tragedie as geestelike vervlakking twee van die oudste en akademies-wetenskaplik mees gerespekteerde universiteite in die wêreld aangetas het. Albei het in die 13de eeu ontstaan..

Hitchens noem die hedendaagse marxiste “cultural revolutionaries”: “They believe, in most cases with some passion, that education should be used to eradicate privilege and élitism, to spread the gospel of the new society in which everyone (and everything) is equal” (1015) – dus “the ‘democratic’ or levelled society” (1042). Mededinging word ontmoedig. As sommige skoliere akademies beter as ander presteer, word die (natuurlike) ongelykheid by skoliere sigbaar. As ‘n skolier druip, tas dit sy menswaardigheid aan, wat taboe in hedendaagse verligte samelewings is. Meriete is tot ‘n onding verklaar omdat dit ‘n hiërargie daarstel. “Melanie Phillips [Praag 18.08.2018] has condemned the ‘all must have prizes’ ethos of the modern system” (1108). Die gesag van onderwysers word deur ‘n verbod op (lyf)straf ondermyn. Dit skep ‘n situasie in die klaskamer waarin leer weens gebrekkige dissipline bemoeilik word. In baie gevalle leer skoliere deesdae op skool minder as voorheen. Om hierdie feit te kamoefleer, verkies die ANC-regime dat daar van leerders pleks van skoliere gepraat word. Die marxistiese obsessie met verandering (pleks van verbetering) is die rede waarom sulke disfunksionele verskynsels hulle opwagting maak (1064). Sodanige transformasie word deur sommige sielkundiges goedgepraat; “those stand-by experts who can always be counted on to decry common sense, defy public opinion and loathe hallowed tradition” (1166).

Een van die hoofoogmerke van kulturele marxisme is om die tradisionele gesin te vernietig. “The greatest fortress of human liberty, proof against all earthly powers, is the family [“huisgesin”]. In its small private space, it can defy the will of authority and the might of wealth. It is without doubt the most effective means of passing lore, culture, manners and traditions down through the generations. Its loyalties are stronger than those of the state, more powerful even than patriotism. All serious tyrannies have sought to undermine or infiltrate it, socialist tyrannies most of all” (2837). “There are many explanations for authority’s mistrust of the family. The main one must be that it cannot control what goes on there, what ideas are taught, what wealth stored up, what loyalties fostered” (2853). Weens sy magsbeheptheid sou die ANC-regime te graag iedere gesin na sy beeld wou afrikaniseer en aan die ANC gedienstig maak. Huwelike, dus histories normale gesinsvorming, word nie deur die ANC-regime bepleit nie. Die huwelik is al beskryf as “an unromantic compromise between sensuality and drudgery” (3070). Die huwelik is in baie gevalle nie hemel op aarde nie maar kultureel nogtans meesal ‘n beter, bv meer stabiele, situasie as heteroseksuele saambly of ‘n selfdegeslagverbintenis.

In Suid-Afrika kom enkelouergesinne algemeen voor, veral by die swartes. Trekarbeid, dus die blankes, is dikwels die skuld hiervoor gegee. Eintlik is ‘n gebrek aan seksuele dissipline, oftewel permissiwiteit – “moral poverty” (2635) – ‘n meer geldige rede. Die eksponensiële toename in buite-egtelike kinders kan ook toegeskryf word aan die (oor)gewilligheid van die ANC-regime om ongehude moeders met staatstoelaes te vergoed. Dit geskied sonder dat enige teenprestasie vereis word. Daar is ook nie ‘n maksimum perk vir sulke kinders nie. In die nuwe Brittanje is daar al hoe meer buite-egtelike kinders. “Roughly 44% of children in Britain are now born to mothers who are not married” (63). “The new cruelty, which leaves hundreds of thousands of children without a proper family, is imposed through many acts of generosity by the state and the taxpayers, and through the broad-minded tolerance of individuals and opinion-formers” (2428). “It is certain that crime is higher among the children of broken homes than among those from stable families” (4354). Wat nodig is, is “a sensible compromise between stern duty and individual kindness” (2433).

“Illegitimacy – the very thing marriage is supposed to prevent – has become so common as to be the norm. Shame and stigma, which once both defended respectable marriage and heaped misery on the poor bastard and his wretched mother, have disappeared. Instead, there is the slower, vaguer, more indirect misery of a society where fewer and fewer children have two parents, and where more and more women are married to the State” (2444). Maar dit is juis hierdie toenemende getal afhanklikes van staatstoelaes wat aan die ANC-regime ‘n substansiële steunbasis verseker. Terselfdertyd veroorsaak kinders uit enkelouergesinne dikwels dat misdaad floreer.

“The cultural revolutionaries have understood that a nation’s literature is one of the ways, perhaps the most important way, in which values are transmitted unchanged from generation to generation. They understand that Shakespeare’s Englishness is not an accident, and that Shakespeare and Englishness have helped to form each other” (2722). “This literature is also dominated by men” (2727). Wat ‘n marxis soos Terry Eagleton (gebore in 1943) hieromtrent doen, is “to try to rebuild Shakespeare as some sort of Marxist critic of the social order” (2738). “The desire for a national culture is seen as damagingly conservative, often ‘racist’ and almost inevitably unsympathetic to the rights of women” (2772). “Something called ‘the cult of the apron’ is constantly attacked” (2801). Die nuwe vooroordeel (2812) is dat vroue net sulke bekwame skeppers van letterkunde, asook ander literatuur, bv nie-fiksie, en ander kuns as mans is. Pas is daar ‘n bohaai in die plaaslike pers opgeskop omdat blankes oor die toekenning van literatuurpryse besluit het. Volgens die polities byderwetse narratief moet enersyds sowel mans as vroue en andersyds sowel blankes as nieblankes by enige openbare geleentheid, bv besluitneming, betrek word. Die ANC-regime verlang voorts dat swartes substansieel in die meerderheid moet wees en vroue in dieselfde mate as mans betrek moet word. Dit gaan nie om meriete, bv kennis en kundigheid, nie. Dit gaan om ras en geslag.

In hoofstuk 15, onder die opskrif, “Is Britain civilized?” word die linkse politikus, Roy Jenkins (1920-2003), uitgesonder as die hoofaanstigter van die Britse kulturele revolusie. “He should see it as his task to revolutionize all our habits” (3939). Volgens Jenkins: “It is about the need to make this country a more civilized place in which to live” (3949). Hy het bv die doodstraf en sensuur veroordeel, maar hom ten gunste van die openbare aanvaarding van aborsie, homoseksualiteit en dobbel uitgespreek. Jenkins het “a new era of loving the sinner” ingelui (4070). Die gevolg was: “The laws have grown more permissive and society more violent, selfish and chaotic” (4075). Jenkins was “the Europhile of Europhiles” (3994). Hy het geen gevaar vir die Britse kultuur weens massa-immigrasie voorsien nie. Hy het verkies om Brittanje voor te hou as deurgaans moreel voorbeeldig, naamlik as “the traditional refuge op the oppressed” (3978).

Wat ek uiters eienaardig vind, is dat Hitchens, anders as baie ander waarnemers, nie die verwording van Brittanje primêr aan die massa kultureel vreemde inkommers toeskryf nie. In sy 2018-nawoord is daar net ‘n enkele opmerking hieroor, wat eintlik geen verduideliking verskaf nie: “Immigration itself, which I deliberately did not include in my 1999 book [why not?], has beyond doubt transformed many towns and urban areas beyond recognition, far beyond what had happened in the forty years of immigration before 1997” (4753). “The UK welcomed an estimated net 1.5 million immigrants in the decade to 2008. Part by accident, part by design, the Government had created its longed-for immigration boom” (4770).

Die skuld hiervoor word by uitstek aan Tony Blair (Britse eerste minister, 1997-2007) toegeskryf. “The Blair government was not like any previous governments. It had a declared cultural purpose” (4871). “The truth, that New Labour was a sophisticated version of Eurocommunism, hugely socially radical, deeply hostile to the nation-state and monoculture and coldly dismissive of Church and Crown, can be observed in its actions by those who understand these things” (4899). Blair het erken “that he had himself been a Trotskyist” (4899). “Labour supporters … felt that mass immigration had changed their lives for the worst without their permission. It was this, above all, that turned a strong anti-EU minority into a decisive majority” (4776) in 2016.

Hitchens se betoog is soms wydlopig. Hy is geneig om in sypaaie af te dwaal. Die volgende kan as ‘n samevatting van sy konserwatiewe stellinginname beskou word: “The pattern in all these events is the same: Behaviour which was once deviant is made to seem mainstream, or al least acceptable, and those who are unhappy about it are portrayed as narrow-minded, old-fashioned, prejudiced and wrong. The effect of this implicit propaganda upon public opinion has been enormous, causing many people to be ashamed of views they had held since their childhood and had thought until recently were normal” (3439). Veertig jaar gelede was daar onder blanke Suid-Afrikaners ‘n oorweldigende mate van eenstemmigheid dat een mens, een stem rampspoedige gevolge sou hê, ‘n swart meerderheidsregering die land in sy swernoot sou stuur, gedwonge rasse-integrasie absoluut verwerplik is, ens. Deesdae word diegene wat steeds sulke menings huldig as verkramp en rassisties uitgekryt. Die ergste is blankes, insluitende oud-Broederbonders, wat deesdae valslik voorgee dat hulle eintlik reeds hulle hele lewe lank nalopers van die ANC is.

“How do you tell that a country has died? I would say that the moment comes when its people no longer even know that they have lost their culture and their history” (4730). Die Afrikanerdom is darem nog nie daar nie, maar is fluks op pad daarheen. Binne enkele geslagte kan sowel ons voortreflike Afrikanerkultuur as ons roemryke geskiedenis in die vergetelheid verborge wees. NP van Wyk Louw het in 1936 oor “ware volkskuns” geskryf: “Die beste daarvan sal alleen vergeet word wanneer die geaardheid en omstandighede van ‘n groep so verander dat hy homself nie meer daarin herken nie” (17)

Leon Lemmer: Melanie Phillips: Van progessief tot behoudend

Melanie Phillips (gebore in 1951) is ‘n Britse joernalis wat uit ‘n ouerhuis kom waarin dit vanselfsprekend was dat die Arbeidersparty ondersteun word. Sy het Engelse letterkunde aan St Anne’s College, Oxford University, bestudeer en daarna joernalistiek in Cardiff. As joernalis was sy agtereenvolgend verbonde aan leidende Britse koerante: The Guardian, The Observer, The Sunday Times en Daily Mail. Hierdie lys weerspieël hoe haar mening geleidelik van progressief na behoudend verander het; ‘n aanvanklik linkse “that has been mugged by reality.” Dieselfde kan gesê word van haar tydskrifartikels wat voorheen in New Society, New Statesman en later in die meer konserwatiewe The Spectator gepubliseer is. Tans lewer sy weekliks ‘n artikel in The Times.

Die van Phillips klink Brits maar is in werklikheid ‘n verengelsing van haar oupa se Poolse van. “My father’s father – who, according to family mythology, was given the name Phillips because the immigration officer couldn’t pronounce his Polish name” (2018-boek hier onder, Kindle 189). Dit herinner aan Joseph Conrad (1857-1924), maar anders as Conrad, vir wie Engels sy derde taal was, is Phillips in Londen gebore en is haar beheersing van Engels idiomaties en uitmuntend. Sy het verskeie boeke gepubliseer, bv All must have prizes (1996), waarin die polities byderwetse gelykverklaring van mense, die relativering van waardes en die ondermyning van gesag aan bod kom.

Die boektitel is ontleen aan ‘n frase in Lewis Carroll se Alice in Wonderland: “everybody has won, and all must have prizes” – soos wat graag oor die nuwe Suid-Afrika beweer word (‘n wen-wen-situasie) terwyl dit veel eerder die geval is dat almal verloor (‘n verloor-verloor-situasie). “In this book, I wrote that education standards had not only plummeted but education itself had been redefined. It was no longer the transmission of knowledge and culture, but a process of self-discovery by ‘autonomous meaning-makers’ – once known as pupils” (2018-boek, 1389). In die nuwe Suid-Afrika, waar minder as ooit op skool geleer word, het skoliere (“verouderd” – HAT) oornag leerders geword.

Phillips se teks is op die Britse skoolstelsel toegespits, maar dit herinner aan die Afrika-benadering waarvolgens alle swartes in dieselfde mate bevoordeel moet word, bv die jaarlikse toekenning van bonusse aan alle werkers en nie slegs aan diegene wat uitsonderlik produktief was nie. Dink ook aan swart skoliere en studente wat mbt eksamens eis: “Pass one, pass all.” “I could see for myself that teaching had been hijacked by left-wing ideology. Instead of being taught to read and write, children were being left to play in various states of anarchy on the grounds that any exercise of adult authority was oppressive and would destroy the innate creativity of the child” (2018-boek, 838).

In The world turned upside down: The global battle over God, truth and power (2010), spreek Phillips haar kommer uit oor die irrasionaliteit wat die hedendaagse wêreld oorspoel. Sy lewer ‘n pleidooi vir die terugkeer na rasionaliteit en religieuse tradisies. Phillips se eerste roman is onlangs gepubliseer: The legacy (2018). Phillips het veral bekendheid verwerf met die boek, Londonistan: How Britain has created a terror state within (2006), waarin sy aantoon in watter groot mate veral die Britse hoofstad, maar ook talle ander gebiede in veral Engeland, vermoslem het. Tien jaar later, in 2016, het Londen sy eerste Moslem burgemeester gekry. Kindle-weergawes van die laasgenoemde drie boeke is beskikbaar.

Ek het Londonistan in ‘n vorige rubriek bespreek (Praag 15.05.2016). Bv: “Londonistan verwys nie slegs na die Britse hoofstad nie, maar ook na vermoslemde areas in Britse nywerheidstede, wat die tradisionele aard van die Britse samelewing nie net verander het nie maar op die lange duur selfs kan vernietig … Weens kultuurverskille, dus nie-wittes se vreemde leefwyse, kon hulle nie so maklik soos blankes in die Britse samelewing geassimileer word nie. Die nie-blanke immigrante was geneig om eie monokulturele gebiede in Brittanje te vestig, wat veral in stede aangetref word en dikwels die aanskyn van krotbuurte aangeneem het … ‘the deadly fusion of an aggressive ideology [Islamism] and a society that thas lost its way [Britain] has led to the emergence of Londonistan.'”

Ek het pas Phillips se outobiografie gelees: Guardian angel: My journey from leftism to sanity (New York: Bombardier Books, 2018, 256p; Amazon Kindle $9,19). Daarin word sy beskryf as “Britian’s most controversial champion of national and cultural identity” (Kindle 2080). Die boektitel sinspeel op die bekendheid wat sy as joernalis by The Guardian verwerf het. Wat ek eienaardig vind, is haar lojaliteit aan die Verenigde Koninkryk in sy geheel, dermate dat sy ‘n eie Ierse en Skotse nasionalisme en kulturele identiteit ontken of ten minste as onaanvaarbaar beskou. Ek gaan nie oor haar familiegeskiedenis geskryf nie maar eerder oor ‘n aantal sake wat sy opper.

Op 23 Junie 2016 het 51,9% van die Britse kiesers in ‘n referendum die wens uitgespreek dat die Verenigde Koninkryk uit die Europese Unie (EU) moet tree. Daar was en is hewige meningsverskille tussen die Brexiteers en die Remainers. Die laasgenoemdes beweer massa-immigrasie het die uitslag deurslaggewend bepaal. Dit was ‘n groot terugslag vir “liberal, tolerant, outward-looking Remain” (66). “This view was rooted in the belief that the Western nation was the source of global oppression, bigotry and war. It therefore needed to be constrained by transnational institutions such as the EU and the United Nations, and by ‘universal’ laws such as human rights. Because transnationalism embodied the brotherhood of man, these institutions would necessarily supercede national parliaments and their laws” (79).

Die Brexiteers meen egter dat die hoofoorweging nie ontevredenheid met massa-immigrasie was nie maar “the desire for Britain to control its own policies and laws” (66). “On June 23, 2016, the British people found the courage to assert once again the rightfulness and desirablity of an independent Western democratic nation giving expression to its own historic culture, beliefs and laws” (86). Die referendumuitslag “represented the defeat of a progressive worldview that had been actively reshaping British and Western culture for more than half a century” (73).

Die verkiesing op 8 November 2016 van Donald Trump as Amerikaanse president word in dieselfde konteks as Brexit beskou. “He was brought to power by a revolt against a political and intellectual establishment which had long sought to erode America’s values at home and emasculate its power abroad” (92). “Both in voting for Brexit and for Donald Trump, the people were demanding the upholding of their core culture, the defense of their nation and the restoration of the democratic compact of citizenship with their country’s government” (98). Hier is daar duidelike verset teen die linkse siening “that the nation state was an oppressive western construct that was innately racist and inescapably created nationalism, conflict and war” (1504).

The Guardian was in Suid-Afrika berug vir wat hy oor apartheid gepubliseer het. Phillips was van 1977 tot 1998 aan hierdie koerant verbonde. Nadat sy bedank het, het hierdie koerant stemming teen Phillips gemaak deur haar as ‘n “human cactus” te beskryf (2013). Terugskouend skryf Phillips: “The defining feature of Guardian journalists [is] a narcissistic self-regard based upon a fixed belief in their own superiority and righteousness, nurtured by indulgence and privilege” (464). “We also admired what we told ourselves was the paper’s historically noble and principled stand in defence of liberty and justice and against oppression. We were proud of its nonconformist origins as the Manchester Guardian and proud of its legendary former editor CP Scott who coined the dictum, ‘comment is free but facts are sacred.’ It was only later that I realized there was more than a shred of truth in the old joke that Guardian news stories freely spun the facts while its editorial comment columns treated opinion as sacred. No one ever mentioned the paper’s unfortunate support in the 1930s for Stalinism, when it sacked its Moscow correspondent Malcolm Muggeridge [1903-1990] after he had tried to report the effects of the bureaucrat-induced famine in the Ukraine and Caucasus in which some six million people starved to death” (478).

Die destydse siening van die linkses/progressiewes het intussen nie verander nie: “Whereas the right seemed to believe the worst of people, we believed the best. They embodied darkness; we embodied light. They were about the past; we were always looking to the future” (492). “Whatever we said was, by definition, morally correct” (498). Dink aan “die donker tyd van apartheid” waaraan ons feitlik daagliks herinner word en die “moreel hoë grond” wat die ANC beklee, so hoog dat geen kwaad in die beoogde owerheidsdiefstal van blankes se eiendom gesien word nie.

“I always thought of myself as a liberal, in the classical English meaning of the word, which to me was another way of saying I believed in progress and the capacity of human beings to create a better world” (498). “Only much later did I realize that the left is fundamentally illiberal … everything not on the left was politically extreme” (505). In die Naspers/Media24-koerante word enige iemand wat regs van die sentrum is, verregs genoem. Wat vermoë tot wêreldverbetering betref, kan ons gerus erken dat alle mense nie eenders is nie. Ons kan daagliks waarneem dat net sommige mense/groepe die vermoë het om ‘n beter wêreld te skep. ‘n Ander gevolgtrekking waartoe Phillips gekom het, is: “The left didn’t like ordinary people and in particular the lower middle class, the striving class who believed in things like self-discipline and personal responsibility” (999). Regte eerder as verpligtinge word beklemtoon.

In die jare sestig het die swart burgerregtebeweging die Amerikaanse samelewing onherroeplik opgedonder; nie dat gelyke regte noodwendig verkeerd is nie, hoewel ‘n mens sou verkies dat sulke regte (in bv Amerika en Suid-Afrika) verdien en nie gewelddadig opgeëis word nie. Waarteen ek dit het, is dat swartes suiwer rassisties en dikwels sonder teenprestasie deesdae in buitensporige mate bo blankes bevoordeel word. In die jare sestig was daar in Brittanje ook ‘n kulturele revolusie, die “swinging sixties,” wat deur die beskikbaarstelling van die geboortebeperkingspil en die seksuele revolusie wat daarop gevolg het, moontlik gemaak is. ‘n Militante soort feminisme het sy kop uitgesteek.

“It was during the seventies and eighties when those ideas actually became embedded in British society, when the students and young agitators of the sixties became lawyers, teachers, university lecturers, civil servants, campaigners, thinktankers, and politicians – and thus captured the citadels of British culture, where they proceeded to undermine core values of education, family, law, and other cultural building blocks of society … There was virtually no questioning of the iron assumption that the poor and socially disadvantaged were inevitably the victims of circumstances rather than accountable for their own behavior” (538). Hoeveel groter en meer tragies is die Suid-Afrikaanse revolusie van 1990/94 nie? Apartheid, dus blankes, word die skuld vir iedere swart agterstand gegee.

Die uitgangspunt is dat almal gelyk/wesenlik eenders, bv (potensieel) ewe bekwaam, is. “‘Mindless egalitarianism’ … was leaving children ignorant and untaught” (1195). As in die praktyk blyk dat mense nie eenders is nie, word die swartes as die benadeelde slagoffers beskou en die blankes as die skuldiges wat moet opdok. “The left … had replaced truth with ideology and [their] weapon of choice against all dissent was vilification and demonization” (565). Byvoorbeeld, enigeen wat ‘n geluid maak wat polities nie korrek genoeg is nie, word sonder meer ‘n rassis genoem. Dit is nie vryheid nie; veel eerder ideologiese verslawing.

“Respect for authority both in and outside the classroom had collapsed. Knowledge had given away to creativity and spontaneity. Literacy had been redefined as un-reading. The essay had been supplanted by the imaginative story, replacing teaching children to think by allowing them to imagine. Teaching the rules of grammar or maths was frowned upon for stifling a child’s innate creativity. Right and wrong answers were no longer distinguished from each other; relativism reigned instead, and children were told to make it up as they went along” (1397). “Correcting children’s mistakes was an illegitimate exercise of power” (1403).

Kinders wat akademies beter as ander presteer, mag nie geloof word nie omdat dit die selfbeeld van minder talentvolle kinders ondermyn. Dit kan egter eerder ‘n geval wees van mindere toewyding as mindere talente. Die aandag van agtergeblewenes mag nie daarop gevestig word dat hulle agter raak en bly nie. ‘n Blanke mag nie spreekwoordelik van ‘n lid van ‘n ander ras/etnisiteit sê hy ‘n aap of bobbejaan nie. Die objek mag hierdie karakterisering hoogs nodig hê, maar volgens die HAT is albei neerhalende terme. “The outcome was a Lewis Carroll world in which failure of a child to learn to read was glorified as evidence of success. The result was mass functional illiteracy among school leavers, and associated behavioral problems by pupils excluded from classroom life through their inability to read. Even universities were forced to provide remedial courses for undergraduates to compensate for the gross inadequacies of the education system” (1403). Dit is ook waar van Suid-Afrika waar nie net funksionele tekstuele ongeletterdheid kenmerkend van sommige/baie skoolverlaters is nie maar ook/veral funksionele numerêre ongeletterdheid.

“My writing during the 1980s and 1990s reflected the fact that Britain was undergoing a cultural revolution … Fundamental assumptions and values were being challenged, attacked and undermined. The homogeneity of British society was being eroded by mass immigration, which was changing the face of the country. As socialism withered and the free market dominated, identity politics replaced economics” (1006). “This was not merely to transform family life, but also turn the understanding of what was normal and what transgressive* inside out” (1012). “The left was rejecting all external authority and embrasing instead moral and cultural relativism, the idea that ‘what is right’ is ‘what is right for me,’ and declaring any hierarchy of values illegitimate. But to me, this was a recipe for an amoral free-for-all in which freedom would die” (1012). Op ‘n soortgelyke manier word hiërargie by individue en groepe mense ontken; almal is bv ewe bekwaam en moreel goed. In werklikheid is daar mense wat werksgewys nie die mas opkom nie en moreel sodanig is dat hulle nie in die samelewing geduld behoort te word nie. [* “Transgressive {oortredend/oorskrydend}: involving a violation of moral or social boundaries.”]

As ondersoekende joernalis het Phillips “benadeelde” armes in hulle huise besoek. Te midde van die vullis was daar luukse goedere soos video-opnemers, vrieskaste en duur fietse. “What I saw was a spiritual poverty that could not be explained away by material deprivation” (585). ‘n Feitlik onontbeerlike item in ‘n arm huishouding is ‘n televisiestel. Die SABC het onlangs genoem dat hy nie sokkeruitsendings op radio kon bekostig nie omdat hy nie geld vir duur sportuitsendings het nie. Die SABC het hierdie versoek simpatiek oorweeg omdat dit hoofsaaklik swartes is wat sokkeruitsendings begeer. Wat polities korrek nie genoem is nie, is dat indien die oorgrote meerderheid swartes vir televisie-uitsendings betaal, sou die SABC oorgenoeg geld hê vir die uitsending van sokkerwedstryde op radio én televisie. Voorspelbaar het die SABC sedertdien geld gevind om sokkerwedstryde op radio uit te saai.

Dit is hierdie nie-betaalkultuur wat veroorsaak dat diegene wat wel televisielisensies het, eersdaags vir dekodeerders sal moet opdok terwyl die nie-betalers op groot skaal van gratis dekodeerders voorsien gaan word. Die huidige bevoordeeldes gaan dus verder bevoordeel word. Die huidige benadeeldes gaan verder benadeel word. Normaalweg kyk ek nie televisie nie. Dit was ‘n riem onder die hart om te lees: “I knew that having the TV on in the middle of the day was a sign of moral weakness” (293). Die bekendste lewende, konserwatiewe Britse filosoof, Roger Scruton, het nie ‘n televisiestel nie, maar hy het sy twee kinders soms toegelaat om by die bure te gaan kyk. Omdat so baie mense in hulle vryetyd as afleiding eerder televisie kyk as om hulleself geestelik te verryk deur bv te lees, het die “sportsterre” multimiljoenêrs geword. Baie van hulle het skynbaar nie tyd om te skeer nie maar hulle vind tyd om op die veld te spoeg, hulle hare te kleur en hulle op ander maniere te mismaak, bv om hulle (oormatig) te laat tatoeëer.

Diskriminasie teen blankes word nie rassediskriminasie genoem nie, maar regstelling. Owerheidsdiefstal van blankes se eiendom word nie nasionalisering genoem nie maar teruggawe, asof die huidige swartes, anders as die huidige blankes, ooit wettige aanspraak op bv daardie plase gehad het. Die staatsdepartement wat met die owerheidsdiefstal van veral blankes se eiendom gemoeid is, word Landelike Ontwikkeling genoem. Swart bevoordeeldes word benadeeldes genoem. “This is the core of what we now know today as ‘political correctness’ through which concepts are turned into their polar opposite in order to give miscreants a free pass if they belong to certain groups designated by the left as ‘victims.’ They are thus deemed to be incapable of doing anything wrong, while groups designated as ‘oppressors’ can do no right” (696). “This twisted thinking is what now passes for ‘progressive’ thinking in Britain and America” (703).

Iets anders wat Phillips as ondersoekende joernalis vasgestel en oor geskryf het, is “the refusal to teach Standard English on the grounds that this was ‘elitist'” (889). “Teachers wrote to me in despair at the pressure not to impose Standard English on children on the grounds that this was discriminatory. They knew that, on the contrary, this was to abandon those children to permanent servitude and ignorance” (895). “The problem was the number of bad teachers who were turning good teachers into a beleaguered minority” (902). “Dissent was being silenced, and those who ran against the orthodoxy were being forced to operate in secret; worse still, the very meaning of concepts such as education, teaching and knowledge was being unilaterally altered, and thousands of children, particularly those at the bottom of the social heap, were being abandoned to ignorance and institutionalized disadvantage” (915).

In Amerika is daar ‘n soortgelyke verskynsel. Pleks van onderrig in Standard American English aan swartes te verskaf, word druk uitgeoefen dat swartes in Black English onderig moet word omdat dit hulle moedertaal is. Soms, veral in die Suide, word dit Ebonics genoem, wat glo die taal was waarin die swart slawe probeer het om met hulle (wrede) wit eienaars te kommunikeer; soortgelyk aan die manier waarop Afrikaans na bewering ontstaan het. Dat daar baie fiksie/mites in die ontstaan van Ebonics is, blyk uit die feit dat daar min woorde van Afrika-oorsprong in die Engels van swart Amerikaners is. Daar is heelwat meer wat oor hierdie onderwerp gesê kan word: “Die ebonisering van Kaaps” (Praag 16.02.2014). Insgelyks is daar min woorde in Afrikaans wat aan bv die Khoi-San en die Maleis van die destydse slawe toegeskryf kan word. Maar die handvol Afrikaanse woorde van nie-wit oorsprong word deesdae tot vervelens toe gelys terwyl die olifant in die taalkamer, die Afrikaanse woorde wat uit bv Nederlands en Duits oorgeneem is, verswyg word; om nie te praat van die groot aantal Afrikaanse woorde wat vindingryke Afrikaners geskep het en steeds skep nie.

Phillips keer telkens terug na maatskaplike kwessies. “By far my biggest break with the left … was over the breakdown of the family. In the late 1980s, I noticed that the institution of the family was suffering a ‘chronic crisis of identity and self-confidence.’ There were more and more divorces and single parents; at the same time parents were becoming less confident in managing their children” (1045). “Fatherless families [were] at least partly responsible for a national breakdown in authority and rising levels of crime” (1052). Let op hierdie skewe (feministiese) siening: Distansiëring vind plaas “from the bad old days when simply everyone was miserable because marriage chained women to men who, as everone with the correct view knew for a fact, were basically feckless wife-beaters and child abusers as well as being irrationally prejudiced against the opposite sex” (1085).

Dit is bekend dat die meeste swart kinders in Suid-Afrika vaderloos grootgeword het en dat die buitensporig hoë voorkoms van misdaad (veral) hieraan toegeskryf word. Die tragedie is dat hierdie slegte voorbeeld van vaderlose gesinne al hoe meer in die Weste nagevolg word. “During the 1990s, the ultra-feminist agenda behind the willed breakdown of the traditional family became even boulder in attacking its real target: men. It seemed to me to be driven by women who were declaring, offensively and stupidly, that men were a waste of space and that no sensible woman ‘would take one home'” (1455). Dink aan wat mense soos Amanda Gouws en Christi van der Westhuizen aangemoedig/toegelaat word om in die hoofstroomkoerante kwyt te raak; mans as suurstofdiewe. Sulke uitlatings kan as “emotional incontinence” (emosionele swakblasigheid) beskou word (1559).

“The left had become the sum of various interest groups all out for their own particular causes such as single parenthood, homosexuality, or animal rights” (1202). Phillips se gevolgtrekking is: “The destruction of the traditional family had as its real target the destruction of Biblical morality” (1118). “What I saw so clearly in the areas of education or family … was in essence the displacement of truth by ideology” (1138). Dít het sy vroeër soos volg geformuleer: “Truth was being sacrificed to expediency. Evidence would be denied if the consequences were too inconvenient” (1079). Hierin lê, in ‘n neutedop, ‘n verduideliking van die onverkwiklike situasie waarin die Weste, insluitende blank Suid-Afrika, hom bevind. Die ideologie wat besig is om Westerse beskawing te vernietig, is kulturele marxisme, dikwels politieke korrektheid genoem (1277). Een van die kernmaniere waarop gepoog word om die Weste kultureel te verslaan, is om die gesin af te breek. Sogenaamde selfdegeslaghuwelike is een van die maniere waarop dit gedoen word. Namate al hoe meer gesinne disfunksioneel word, word dit al hoe moeiliker om ‘n funksionele, vreedsame, voorspoedige, gelukkige samelewing in stand te hou.

“Truth was being sacrificed to expediency” kan as ‘n “cultural nervous breakdown” beskou word (1559). Ek volstaan met twee plaaslike voorbeelde. Eerstens, in die Universiteit Stellenbosch (US) se Eeufeesjaar (2018) kies Wim de Villiers openlik en sonder dat hy daadwerklike teenstand ondervind om eerder Nelson Mandela as Jan Marais te huldig. Mandela sou De Villiers se verengelsing van die US geloof het terwyl dit teen die grein van Marais se stigtingsvoorwaarde ingaan. In die nuwe Suid-Afrika kan De Villiers mos nie verkeerd wees as hy hom eerder by ‘n swarte as ‘n blanke skaar nie.

Tweedens, sedert 1994 is die agteruitgang van die gehalte van Afrikaans onrusbarend opvallend. Hierdie kreeftegang verkry al hoe meer momentum. Dit is die enkele kenmerk van die Afrikaans van ná 1994 wat nie misgekyk kan word nie. Desnieteenstaande voer Afrikaansinstansies en Afrikaansdosente nie ‘n veldtog om suiwerder Afrikaans te bevorder nie. Die rede hiervoor is dat die sprekers van Kaaps, dus van geradbraakte Afrikaans, polities korrek nie aanstoot gegee mag word nie. Dit is ‘n sprekende voorbeeld van misplaaste voorkeur: dat onderdanigheid aan politieke korrektheid belangriker as die heil van Afrikaans geag word. Diegene wat so lou/halfhartig oor Afrikaans is, laat my dink aan: “Maar nou, omdat hulle lou is, nie warm en ook nie koud nie, gaan Ek julle uit my mond uitspoeg” (Openbaring 3:16).

Leon Lemmer: Melanie Phillips oor Londonistan

Londen, die Britse hoofstad, het vandeesmaand ‘n Moslem-burgemeester van Pakistanse oorsprong gekry (Praag 6 deser). Geen sektor van die immigrantebevolking in die Weste (veral Amerika, Brittanje en Europa) veroorsaak meer probleme en word meer gevrees as die Moslems nie. Die klassieke boek oor die Moslembevolking in veral Engeland is Melanie Phillips (gebore in 1951) se Londonistan: How Britain has created a terror state within (London: Gibson Square, 2012, 288p; Amazon Kindle $7,40). Sy was aanvanklik ‘n linkse joernalis maar “has been mugged by reality.” Londonistan verwys nie slegs na die Britse hoofstad nie, maar ook na vermoslemde areas in Britse nywerheidstede, wat die tradisionele aard van die Britse samelewing nie net verander het nie maar op die lange duur selfs kan vernietig. Die agtervoegsel -stan, soos in Pakistan, beteken in Persies en Oerdoe ‘n plek of land. Londonistan is die naam wat die Franse geheimediens aan Brittanje gegee het omdat daar aanvanklik geen amptelike besorgdheid was oor die potensiële gevaar wat Moslem-immigrasie inhou nie, al is Brittanje telkens deur Frankryk daaroor gewaarsku (Kindle 4920). Frankryk het eerstehandse ondervinding van Moslem-immigrante, veral sedert die grootskaalse invloei van Algerynse Moslems na afloop van die Algerynse oorlog (1954-1962).

Sommige mense en dalk veral politici sien nie graag feite onder die oë waarvan hulle nie hou nie. Afgesien van hulle ydele ego’s is politici se openbare beeld vir hulle baie belangrik. Byvoorbeeld, toe Pallo Jordan nie meer as doktor aangespreek kon word nie, het hy dadelik uit die politiek getree. Van die kernkenmerke van politiek is professionele manteldraaiery. Daarom is daar talle voorbeelde van politici wat van een politieke party na die ander migreer het, bv Japie Basson en Koos van der Merwe. Soms kan so ‘n skuif eerbaar wees, bv as die politieke party (radikaal) van beleid verander, soos die Nasionale Party. Ander kere is so ‘n skuif minder eerbaar, bv wanneer dit suiwer in eie hoogsbetalende, posbehoudende belang is.

Die Nasionale Party het amptelik maande of eerder jare lank voorgegee dat sy onderhandelinge met die ANC-terreurgroep klopdisselboom gaan; dat talle deurbrake gemaak en lofwaardige kompromieë aangegaan is; dat formidabele wigte en teenwigte gevestig is; dat daar ‘n skitterende nie-gewelddadige, nie-kommunistiese land in die vooruitsig is; en dat nie net die boere se kaart en transport veilig is nie, maar dat daar ook ‘n veilige, voorspoedige toekoms vir al die blankes en hulle nageslagte, insluitende die taal en kultuur van Afrikaners, voorlê. Hierdie beeld is op ‘n uiters sluwe manier geskep om die oneervolle, onnodige, ongelooflik dwase, algehele politieke oorgawe aan swart mag te verdoesel.

Groter politieke dwaasheid as wat in 1990/1994 in Suid-Afrika gepleeg is, is moeilik voorstelbaar. Maar Britse politici het op ‘n soortgelyke manier aanvanklik die werklikheid van die immigrante in hulle midde en die probleme wat hulle veroorsaak, probeer miskyk en dit later probeer regverdig of verantwoordelikheid vir hulle aandeel ontken. Die nie-wit immigrante het ‘n ander kultuur as die inheemse Britte. Voor 1950 was die Britse bevolking monokultureel blank. Blanke immigrante uit Europa en Statebondslande, asook Jode, is met gemak in die bevolking opgeneem. Met nie-blanke immigrante was dit nie moontlik nie en dit het van Brittanje ‘n multikulturele land gemaak.

Weens kultuurverskille, dus nie-wittes se vreemde leefwyse, kon hulle nie so maklik soos blankes in die Britse samelewing geassimileer word nie. Die nie-blanke immigrante was geneig om eie monokulturele gebiede in Brittanje te vestig, wat veral in stede aangetref word en dikwels die aanskyn van krotbuurte aangeneem het. Daar is nie-wittes wat makliker as ander met die Britte integreer, bv Hindoes uit Indië (2102), maar daar is ook nie-wittes wat glad nie kon of wou integreer nie. Moslems uit bv Pakistan en Bangladesj, veral die fundamentalistiese variëteit, wil Brittanje kultureel verander en selfs polities-religieus oorneem pleks van self ‘n poging aan te wend om by hulle nuwe vaderland aan te pas. Dit is die onderwerp van Phillips se boek. Hierdie teks is so ryk aan inligting en gesonde insig dat dit onmoontlik is om in ‘n enkele rubriek reg aan alles te laat geskied.

“This book is an attempt to piece together this complex cultural jigsaw, and to show how the deadly fusion of an aggressive ideology [Islamism] and a society that has lost its way [Britain] has led to the emergence of Londonistan” (435). “The attempt to establish [a] separate Muslim identity is growing more and more intense, with persistent pressure for official recognition of Islamic family law, the rise of a de facto parallel Islamic legal system not recognised by the state, demands for highly politicised Islamic dress codes, prayer meetings or halal food to be provided by schools and other institutions, and so on. No other minority attempts to impose its values on the host society like this. Behind it lies the premise that Islamic values trump British ones, and that Muslims in Britain are necessarily hostile to the values of the society of which they are citizens” (451).

Die meer sigbare gevaar vir Brittanje is dat terroriste saam met die Moslem-immigrante ingevoer is; soms as nasate. “The attempts to take over our culture is even more deadly to this society than terrorism” (74). Islamisering is ‘n “attempt to colonise British society for Islam” (162). ‘n Soortgelyke situasie bestaan in Suid-Afrika. Toe die terroriste die bewind oorgeneem en hulle geweld amptelik gestaak het, is die publiek wysgemaak dat alles nou wonderlik gaan wees. Maar toe het die swartes hulle kulturele oorlogvoering in alle erns vanuit hulle politieke magsposisie begin ten einde die blankes en hulle kultuur onder die dekmantel van bv transformasie en nasiebou te verswelg en te poog om bv Afrikaner-identiteit en Afrikaans te vernietig.

Op amptelike Britse regeringsvlak en by die elite is daar ‘n gebrekkige besef van die gevare wat dreig: “They are simply blind to the ruthless way in which the Islamists are exploiting our chronic muddle of well-meaning tolerance and political correctness (backed up by the threat of more violence) to put Islam on a special – indeed, unique – footing within Britain. As a result, the steady Islamisation of British public space is either being ignored or even tacitly encouraged by a political, security and judicial establishment that is failing to identify the stealthy and mind-bending game that is being played” (74). “Islamism will only be repulsed if Britian once again regains the confidence of its own culture, heritage and traditions” (196). In Brittanje behoort konserwatisme, tradisionalisme en identiteitsbevestiging en -bevordering die wagwoorde te wees. Dit geld ook vir die blankes, veral die Afrikaners, in Suid-Afrika. In sowel die ou as die nuwe Suid-Afrika is die regering met geweld afgedreig. Dit toon dat die gewelddadigheid (en die onbeskaafdheid wat daarmee gepaard gaan) nie deur gesprekvoering, paaiery en halfhartige optrede uitgewis kan word nie maar net deur ferm optrede en swaar strawwe. Een van die baie dinge wat FW de Klerk en sy kornuite nie verstaan het nie, is “the first law of terrorism, which is that it preys on weakness” (4027). Swakheid veroorsaak dat terrorisme ‘n lonende bedryf word.

Die huidige Britse regeringstrategie is gebaseer op “isolating the extremists and encouraging the moderates. The problem, however, is that it doesn’t understand what Muslim extremism is. Believing that Islamic terrorism is motivated by an ideology which has ‘hijacked’ and distorted Islam, it will not acknowledge the extremism within mainstream Islam itself” (80). Islamiste “are all engaged in the same project – to Islamise the free world” (97). “The premise upon which this book is based is … that jihadi Islamism … has become today the dominant strain within the Islamic world” (441; ook 4079).

Phillips gee voorbeelde van hoe sogenaamde gematigde Moslems by pogings betrek word om die bedreigings te neutraliseer wat hierdie immigrante vir die Britte inhou. Telkens is die resultate teleurstellend omdat die sogenaamde gematigdes nie bereid is om terreurdade te veroordeel nie. Dit herinner aan Desmond Tutu wat beweer het dat hy teen geweld gekant is maar terselfdertyd alles in sy vermoë gedoen het om onrus te stook en dan geweier het om die daaruit voortvloeiende geweld te veroordeel. Dit herinner ook aan Michael le Cordeur wat as vermeende pro-Afrikaanse deur die Afrikaanse Taalraad, die Afrikaanse Taalmuseun en -monument en selfs Het Jan Marais Nationale Fonds by aktiwiteite betrek word maar wat dan as valse profeet van Afrikaans Wim de Villiers se verengelsingsbeleid aan die Universiteit Stellenbosch ondersteun.

In Suid-Afrika is daar nie ‘n enkele universiteit wat daarop aanspraak kan maak dat hy nie ANC-gedienstig is nie. In Brittanje is daar ‘n soortgelyke neiging: “The universities are steadily being Islamised, with academic objectivity in the teaching of Islam and Middle East studies being set aside in favour of indoctrination and propaganda” (108). Daar is selfs “the increasing Islamisation of the police” (114). Soos in Suid-Afrika word voorkeur aan nie-wit kandidate gegee, wat met ondergekwalifiseerdheid wegkom, met die gevolg dat die publiek vertroue in polisiëring verloor. “The courts still appear to be bending over backwards* to appease Muslim radicalism” (168). “Sharia law is steadily encroaching into British institutions … Britain is already developing parallel sharia jurisdiction** … with blind eyes turned to such practices as forced marriage, cousin marriage, female genital mutilation and polygamy; indeed, welfare benefits are now given to the multiple wives of Muslim men” (156). “Most of the leadership of the Islamic movement is on [state] benefit” (843). Plaaslik word die onnodige ekstra koste wat Jacob Zuma se talle vroue vir belastingbetalers meebring nooit opgehaal nie. [* Byvoorbeeld, “a series of judgments under human rights law – such as the ruling that halting welfare payments to asylum-seekers denied them a right to family life” (953). “Almost a quarter of all terrorist suspects arrested in Britain since 9/11 had been asylum-seekers” (964). Dit is eintlik “dutiless rights” (1093). “The highest judges in the land had been engulfed by the moral bankruptcy of victim culture” (1200). ** Dit word die “sharia creep” genoem (4967).]

Die Britte het nie die gevaar van Islamisme onmiddellik na die 9/11-voorval in Amerika besef nie. “The very concept of Islamic terrorism or other wrongdoing is automatically denied” (446). Die Britse publiek (eerder as die politici) het hierdie boodskap eers op 7 Julie 2005 gekry toe bomme in drie ondergrondse Londense treine en in ‘n bus ontplof het. Die gevolg was 52 dooies en meer as 700 beseerdes. “The appaling phenomenon of suicide bombing had arrived on British soil. Two weeks later, an almost identical attempt was made to blow up commuters on the Tube [London underground railway system] and buses. This time – incredibly – all four bombs failed to detonate … From the moment the [7/7] bombs went off, however, Britain sought to deny their full implications. For it quickly became clear that the bombers were all British … There was now no getting away from the fact that British Muslims had turned themselves into human bombs to murder as many of their fellow citizens as possible … The attacks had been carried out by home-grown Muslim terrorists” (217). “These British boys, the product of British schools and universities and the British welfare state, behaved in a way that repudiated not just British values but the elementary codes of humanity” (239). “It [7/7] dwarfs altogether any previous terrorism directed against the British state, including the campaign waged by the IRA” (Irish Republican Army) (4325).

“Every year some two thousand British Muslims were attending clandestine terrorist training camps around Britain to learn about holy war … The camps were being held most weekends in Birmingham and London” (1269). “The Islamists were being left undisturbed to conduct their activities on the assumption that they would not then attack Britain” (1408). Daar was soortgelyke verbaasde ongeloof in Suid-Afrika toe dit blyk dat verskeie moskees en kerke* vir terreurdoeleindes misbruik is. Die onbeholpe Nasionale Party-regering het hulle nie as onheilige ruimtes getakseer nie, maar verkeerdelik as heilige plekke. Die werklikheid van Suid-Afrikaanse “home-grown terrorists” gedurende 1990-1994, waarop ek voorheen die aandag gevestig het, is aan die plaaslike publiek feitlik onbekend. [* Onder die voorwendsel van religieuse vryheid: “In both the US and the UK, there was and still is a great reluctance to investigate any religious activity unless there is clear evidence that a crime has been committed” (1461). Die Britse polisie se beleid is “never to raid the mosques” (4476).]

In die Britse bevolking van sowat 60 miljoen is daar ongeveer 2 miljoen Moslems. “According to British officials, up to sixteen thousand British Muslims either are actively engaged in or support terrorist activity, while up to three thousand are estimated to have passed through al Qaeda training camps, with several hundred thought to be primed to attack the United Kingdom”* (234). “What if Britain, rather than being the front line of defence against the threat of radical Islam, has become a quisling** state that actually threatens to undermine that defence? What if, instead of holding the line for Western culture against the Islamic jihad***, Britain is sleepwalking into the arms of the enemy?”(256). [* “In 2001, a BBC poll had found that 15 percent of British Muslims supported the 9/11 attacks on America” (2083). In 2005 “one in ten [British Muslims] supported the attacks on July 7, and 5 percent said that more attacks in the UK would be justified” (2090). “An opinion poll carried out … July 2006 revealed that seven per cent of Muslims polled, equivalent to 112 000 British Muslims, thought suicide bombing in the UK was justified in some circumstances” (4296). ** Quisling: “A generic term for a traitor who aids an occupying force.” *** Jihad: “Holy war undertaken by Muslims against nonbelievers.” (Albei laasgenoemde aanhaling uit Collins World Encyclopedia, 2003.)]

“Britain has become Europe’s Islamist terror factory” (4166). “Britain had become the global hub of Islamic terrorism outside the Muslim world” (4920). “London has become the most important centre for Islamic thought outside the Middle East” (594). Een van die gevolge is “the astonishing procession of terrorists fanning out from London across the globe” (624). “London had been the epicentre of Islamic militancy in Europe. Under the noses of successive British governments, Britain’s capital had turned into ‘Londonistan’ – a mocking play on the names of such state sponsors of terrorism as Afghanistan – and become the major European centre for the promotion, recruitment and financing of Islamic terror and extremism” (272). Dit is natuurlik nie die eerste keer dat Londen, eens voorgehou as die hoofstad van (Westerse/Europese) beskawing, funksioneer as gasheer en vroedvrou* van terrorisme nie. Die “ANC in ballingskap” het jare lank die gasvryheid en misplaaste verdraagsaamheid in die Britse hoofstad misbruik om fondse en wapens te bekom en om sy terrorisme te beplan en ten uitvoer te bring. Nou toon die Islamiste aan die naïewe Britte hoe destruktief die koestering van terroriste is. Maar geen Britse regering aanvaar verantwoordelikheid vir die verwoesting wat terrorisme in Suider-Afrika aangerig het en vir die wandade wat deur sodanige regerings gepleeg word nie. [* “The British acted as midwife to the monster of global jihad” (1455).]

Phillips vestig die aandag op die volgende waarheid oor Britse Islamisme: “Always presenting themselves not as aggressors but as defenders of a victimised culture, the Islamists seize on any defense the west may mount to protect itself, citing such action as further proof of its perfidy in order to incite hatred and recruit yet more to the cause. This is the trap that terrorism always sets for its victims – that there is no escape from it. A response by terrorism’s victims creates more terrorists; but not to respond is to surrender to terror. Thus, to follow the anti-war argument to its logical conclusion, the west must do nothing to defend itself against murderous aggression or the clear threat of such aggression, because this in turn will be used to recruit still more to the cause of terrorism. This is, of course, a recipe for cultural suicide and the defeat of the west” (403). Pleks van Islamiste te paai, moet daar eerder die volgende ondubbelsinnige immigrantbeleid wees: “Fit in or get out” (4226). Margaret Thatcher het darem die moed van haar oortuiging gehad om Nelson Mandela ‘n terroris te noem. Plaaslik het ons egter elemente soos Max du Preez en Pierre de Vos wat predik dat blankes stil moet bly en eerder moet luister na wat swartes sê en ‘n mens soos Anton van Niekerk wat Afrikaners daarvan beskuldig dat hulle vyande kweek as hulle beswaar teen die miskenning van Afrikaans opper.

“After the London bombings, the main concern of the media and intelligentsia was to avoid ‘Islamophobia’, the thought-crime that seeks to suppress legitimate criticism of Islam and demonise those who would tell the truth about Islamist aggression. Consequently, Muslim denial of any religious responsibility for the bombings was echoed and reinforced by government ministers and commentators, who sought to explain the Islamist terror in their midst by blaming, on the one hand, a few ‘unrepresentative’ extremist preachers and, on the other, Muslim poverty and discrimination … Londonistan is – among other things – a state of mind that has spead well beyond the capital … It is not a transient phenomenon … and has been created by the confluence of two lethal developments. The first was die arrival in Britain of large numbers of Muslims, first from Asia and then from Arab countries, where Islam had been systematically radicalised by a political agenda promoting the conquest and Islamization of the West. The second development, which was critical, was that British society presented a moral and philosophical vacuum that was ripe for colonisation by predatory Islamism. Britain has become a decadent society, weakened by alarming tendencies towards social and cultural suicide” (419).

Daar is “a fundamental loss of national self-belief throughout the institutions of British society. Driven by postcolonial guilt and, with the loss of empire, the collapse of a world role, Britain’s elites have come to believe that the country’s identity and values are by definition racist, nationalist and discriminatory. Far from transmitting or celebrating the country’s fundamental values, therefore, they have tried to transform a national culture into a multicultural society, both in terms of the composition of the country and the values it embodies … all minorities are deemed to have equal status with the majority and any attempt to impose majoritarian values is held to be discriminatory. Schools have ceased to transmit to successive generations either the values or the story of the nation, delivering instead the message that truth is an illusion and that the nation and its values are whatever anyone wants them to be. In the multicultural classroom, every culture appears to be taught except Britain’s indigenous one” (457).

In Suid-Afrika probeer die marxiste polities korrek om die plaaslike “bevrydingstryd” aan die gewelddadigheid van blankes toe te skryf en om die fundamentele immoraliteit van die terroriste te ontken. Boonop word enige poging om die Afrikanervolk te laat herleef, verdag gemaak en ondermyn. Ons geskiedenis word herskryf om blankes af en swartes op te gradeer. Wanneer Die Burger (6 April 2016) oor belangrike datums in die geskiedenis berig, bly die aankoms van Jan van Riebeeck in Tafelbaai (doelbewus) onvermeld.

“Virtually the entire British establisment has succumbed to multiculturalism and victim culture, and the attack on British values that these encapsulate. In America, the churches have been in the forefront of the defence of Western values. In Britain, by contrast, the Church of England has been in the forefront of the retreat from the Judeo-Christian heritage. At every stage it has sought to appease the forces of secularism, accommodating itself to family breakdown, seeking to be nonjudgmental and embracing multiculturalism” (506; ook 3175). “Britain … has effectively allowed itself to be taken hostage by militant gays, feminists or ‘antiracists’ who used weapons such as public vilification, moral blackmail and threats to people’s livelihoods to force the majority to give in to their demands” (517).

In Suid-Afrika word die swart meerderheidsmening op hierdie manier afgedwing, bv deur die toepassing van polities korrekte sensuur. Baie dinge mag nie meer by die naam genoem word nie. “As religion has retreated and morality becomes privatised, individual conscience has become universalised” (529). Dink aan die wêreldburgers wat Wim de Villiers aan die Universiteit Stellenbosch wil kweek. Phillips noem sodanige strategie ‘n “potentially deadly cultural meltdown” (557). “Instead of being taught how to think, children were now told what to think” (1745).

My teks hier bo is hoofsaaklik op die voorwerk van Phillips se boek gebaseer. Dit is duidelik dat ek die res van hierdie belangrike boek nie hier in besonderhede bekend kan stel sonder om ‘n redelike lengte vir hierdie rubriek op ‘n buitensporige manier te oorskry nie. Maar my bostaande teks behoort aan Praag-lesers ‘n aanduiding te gee van waaroor hierdie boek handel en ook dat sommige aspekte plaaslik ter sake is. “Muslim enclaves” word ironies “areas of separate development” genoem (589) en vir immigrantgebiede word selfs die kosmologiese term “black holes” gebruik (1705). Ek sluit hierdie rubriek af met twee paragrawe wat ‘n aantal aanhalings uit die res van die boek bevat.

“The emergence of a culture of hyperindividualism gave rise to a radical egalitarianism of lifestyles and values. Morality was privatised, and all constraints of religion, tradition or cultural taboos came to be seen as an attack on personal autonomy. Where previously ties of obligation had bound individuals to each other and to the state, the new culture of entitlement imposed instead an obligation on the state to deliver individual demands that were presented as rights. Since radical egalitarianism meant that all lifestyles were of equal value, the very notion of a majority [ie white] culture or normative rules of behaviour became suspect as innately exclusive, prejudiced or oppressive” (1015). “Moral equivalence rapidly mutates into moral inversion, in which those doing wrong are excused if they belong to a ‘victim’ group while those at the receiving end of their behaviour are blamed simply because they belong to the ‘oppressive’ [white] majority” (1898).

Ingevolge die multikulturele standpunt “Britain is now made up of many cultures that are all equal and therefore have to be treated in an identical fashion, and … any attempt to impose the majority [ie white] culture over those minorities is by definition racist” (1631). Multiculturalism and antiracism were now the weapons with which minorities were equipped to beat the majority. Not all minorities, mind you – Jews were not considered to be a minority … since Jews were seen to be powerful, they were part of the majority and so could never be victims” (1669). “Democracy became effectively redefined from majority [ie white] rule among equal citizens to power-sharing among ethnic and other interest groups” (1026). In Suid-Afrika het FW de Klerk se sogenaamde magsdeling tot algehele magsoorgawe aan die swart meerderheid gelei. Die wit meerderheid in Brittanje word deur etniese minderheidsgroepe suksesvol tot magsdeling geïntimideer, maar in Suid-Afrika is daar (nog) feitlik geen sprake dat die swart meerderheid hom aan die blanke of ander etniese minderhede hoef te steur nie.