Fortunately, I think the future is bright for the Alt Left (short for “Alternative Left”), and the views of what I would call the “Realist Left.”
For the Alt Left and the Realist Left on the internet, we now have the following blogs, social media pages and other sites:
Realist Left on the Internet:Here are what I would defend as core principles of the Realist Left and Alt Left:
Realist Left on Facebook
Realist Left on Twitter @realistleft
Social Democracy for the 21st Century: A Realist Alternative to the Modern Left
Realist Left on Reddit
Realist Left Blog
Realist Left on YouTube
Lord Keynes on Facebook
Lord Keynes on Twitter @Lord_Keynes2
Alt Left on the Internet:
Alternative Left on Facebook
An Alt-Left closed Facebook discussion group can be accessed through this page as well.
Samizdat Broadcasts YouTube Channel
Samizdat: For the Freedom Loving Leftist
(1) rejection of neoliberalism, globalisation, neoclassical economics, libertarianism, anarcho-capitalism.I would add further principles that I, personally, defend as required for a sensible left, though other people on the Alt Left might disagree:
(2) support for left-heterodox Post Keynesian and/or Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) economic ideas and economic policies. Rejection of Marxism and Communism.
(3) rejection of the extreme aspects of cultural leftism, namely, French Poststructuralism, Postmodernism, truth relativism, cultural relativism, moral relativism, Social Justice Warrior (SJW) politics, Postmodernist multiculturalism, and divisive and extreme identity politics. The Realist Left / Alt Left is extremely critical of Third Wave Feminism.
(4) rejection of open borders and mass immigration, on left-wing economic, social and cultural grounds.
(1) support for full employment, Keynesian macroeconomic policies and management of our economies, a high-wage economy, industrial policy, managed trade in the national interest, a humane welfare state, and an end to offshoring of manufacturing and service jobs to the Third World.I’m on Twitter:
(2) the Realist Left rejects extreme social constructivism and the “blank slate” view of human beings.
(3) the Realist Left defends free speech and freedom of expression from cultural leftist and politically correct witch hunts and restrictions.
(4) the Realist Left is anti-imperialist and largely non-interventionist on foreign policy, but not isolationist.
(5) the Realist Left is pro-nuclear family and – at the very least – open to serious and rational discussion of the breakdown of the nuclear family in the Western world, and what harm this may have done to our societies.
(6) the Realist Left recognises that most people have a normal and natural wish to preserve their nations as homelands for their majority culture and their people. Low-level immigration and reasonable refugee quotas are fine, as long as minorities actually do remain a minority of the population, and people who wish to stay assimilate and do not bring hostile and incompatible cultures.
(7) the Realist Left opposes regressive and illiberal Islamism, and promotes the assimilation of immigrants in the West.
Lord Keynes @Lord_Keynes2
https://twitter.com/Lord_Keynes2
In short, you reject the nihilist relativism that pervades the mainstream Left. Some things are better and we should seek to advance them.
ReplyDelete(And pervades the Rothbard Right too.)
I'm visiting from the alt-right. Wanted to check out the alt-left. Didn't much like Rabbit's trans-humanist direction. However, there's really not the alt-right and your version of the alt-left couldn't cooperate on at the level of political governance. Given that we are decidedly post-libertarian, we're open to debating what economic program would work best for Western countries within a nationalist/pro-community rubric. Our main concern is that the technics of economics doesn't become the primary socio-political value. There are more things in heaven and earth than 'muh economy'.
ReplyDeletethe problem with alt right is the so called "racial realism" and antisemitism.
Deleteif thats the issues that important for the alt right i personally will always reject it.
now i am personally uniculturist i am for making immigrants to assimiliate into host culture and make them embrace the identity and values of the host culture (so no i am not multiculturist but i believe in sane policies which are racism free).
LK i think the emphasize on nuclear familiy and on familiy men and familiy women is important since that what can really convince the high tories type conservatives (big government conservatives) to join into the alt left movement
Deleteand in this case unite the sane people from both camps the (the old left and the high tories) into one strong anti-neoliberal and anti-PC culture political movement (the alt left).
PART 1
DeleteI actually am agnostic on race realism...I read the rational wiki article on racism and the refutation at the right stuff. Lacking extensive scientific acumen, I couldn't determine who was right.
I view race more in Spenglarian terms - that through common descent extremely deeply rooted differential modes of socio-political cultural priorities and organization emerge, and that this diversity is a good thing and worth preserving as organic wholes. The altright may call me a cuck for adopting that position, but I support the same policy prescriptions because both rationales lead to them. I want to live in a homogeneous community that talks like me, thinks like me, and largely looks like me. Even if you don't think race is a valid category, racism is still an attempt to preserve one's unique culture in a globalizing world. This quote from Chomsky is instructive:
"See, capitalism is not fundamentally racist – it can exploit racism for its purposes, but racism isn’t built into it. Capitalism basically wants people to be interchangeable cogs, and differences among them, such as on the basis of race, usually are not functional. I mean, they may be functional for a period, like if you want a super-exploited workforce or something, but those situations are kind of anomalous. Over the long term you can expect capitalism to be anti-racist – just because it is anti-human. *And race is in fact a human characteristic – there is no reason why it should be a negative characteristic, but it is a human characteristic*. So therefore identifications based on race interfere with the basic ideal that people should be available just as consumers and producers, interchangeable cogs who will purchase all that junk that is produced – that’s their ultimate function, and any other properties they might have are kind of irrelevant, and usually a nuisance.
We want to avoid a world of these people for the benifit of transnational capital:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_culture_kid
Our counter-semitism is non-negotiable. If your alt-left movement continues to grow, and if you keep signaling against globalism and multiculturalism, you will find you'll attract the attention of a (((certain minority))) in high places. Jews are a living testament alien ethnic groups won't assimilate. That said the altright largely acknowledges society won't be perfect by removing Jewish influence. We reject low brow neo-Nazism. Your alt-left competitor, rabbit, is anti-Semitic btw.
There are no *high* tories in positions of power. The 'Tories' of today are all anti-traditional, and insofar as they embrace 'big government', its to secure the interests of what Sam Francis called the managerial elite (which includes oligarchs). The Toryism of today is the (bad) whiggism of yesteryear.
Unless the alt left and alt right get over counter signalling one another, we will never take back our countries from global elites. We can disagree on the JQ (Jewish Question), and on 'race realism', but we really have to ask ourselves: Is punching against alternatives to the system, and thereby ensuring the system won't change, more important than beating the system based on commonalities (anti-war, pro people economics, pro family, anti regressive leftism, pro generic homogeneity etc)?
Here's some quotes from what you can consider altright cannon, Greg Johnson:
"The North American New Right, like the European New Right, is founded on the rejection of Fascist and National Socialist party politics, totalitarianism, terrorism, imperialism, and genocide."
PART 2
Delete"Yes, in the case of classical National Socialism, revisionists argue that many of these atrocities are exaggerated or made up out of whole cloth. But revisionism about the Second World War is really beside the point, because the terroristic, imperialistic, genocidal impulse exists in National Socialism today. For instance, latter-day National Socialist William Pierce routinely pooh-poohed the Holocaust. But he was willing to countenance real terrorism, imperialism, and genocide on a scale that would dwarf anything in the 20th century. That spirit is what we reject."
"It is instructive to look at how the New Left has handled the mind-boggling, heart-rending, stomach-churning atrocities of the Old Left. The best New Leftists do not deny them. They do not minimize them. They do not pin their hopes on “Gulag revisionism” or rehabilitating the reputation of Pol Pot. They simply disown the atrocities. They step over them and keep moving toward their goals."
http://www.counter-currents.com/2012/05/new-right-vs-old-right/
Lawrence Murray also puts the alt right's so called 'white supremacism' in context:
"The Clinton campaign, a church of no salvation which harbors the most rancid congregation of defilers and iconoclasts, charges we who follow the teachings of Esoteric Kekism and embrace the seven principles of the Alt-Right with being so-called supremacists. Much like the term racist, supremacist is used against White people who are insufficiently liberal on identity issues. In other words, if you believe Whites exist as a valid political interest group, a race, *or a culture distinct from other groups*, you are a racist and a supremacist. If you believe those same things about other groups, such as blacks or mestizos, you are a paragon of civic virtue, a social justice advocate, and a living saint in the congregation of the cucks. If not, you are a heretic of the Diverse faith."
https://atlanticcenturion.wordpress.com/2016/09/14/esoteric-kekism-is-a-religion-of-peace/
So once again, is it worth the time of the alt left counter signalling the alt right because the establishment told you we are 'Literally Hitler™'?
Lemur@September 15, 2016 at 10:48 AM
Delete(1) I imagine there really are some people on the Alt Right who understand well that there are crazed unhinged ideas and elements in it, but are there because they have nowhere else to be.
However, the crazed elements are real, e.g., the Daily Stormer types.
In fact, the Alt Right seems to be falling apart now Milo is trying to hijack it for his brand of muh! cultural libertarianism, muh! free markets, muh! capitalism.
Also, you can't help but notice the paranoia and anti-Semitism causing Alt Right people to turn on one and another.
A case in point is this hysterical and comical piece arguing that the Daily Stormer is -- how to put this? -- in fact (((controlled opposition))):
http://alternative-right.blogspot.com/2016/09/a-surfeit-of-brackets-daily-stormerism.html
--------
Seriously, dude, this is your movement?!! lol. People are laughing their asses off.
(((i am))) guess what a jewish? i will not argue with you about the fact that jews actually assimiliate pretty quickly now and in the past and the intermarriage is really high and it was really high in germany before hitler came to power actually if hitler was never coming to power the jewish question were solved quickly by humane and peaceful way simple assimiliation of the jewish population by intermarriage.
Deletebut i want to quote you.
"I want to live in a homogeneous community that talks like me, thinks like me"
for that the person dont have to be from your race there is a lot of people from your race which will despise western culture and values (for example loonies from both extremes of the political sepctrum) but the person need to have your culture to have your ethics and values and to share the same identity with you.
if you want that to happen you dont have to look at the race of the person because there is another solution humane rational solution that is working even better.
and my prescrpition and i believe the alt left prescription is uniculturism which is the rejection of multiculturism and the adoption of skilled based immigration in modest numbers and active melting pot assimiliation policies while rejecting pc culture and the cult of diversity in the name of diversity.
so until the alt right or people like you will have the racial prescriptions you said you are supporting right now and until people like you will believe in crazy conspiracies about how jews or blakcs are evil or are trying to pollute the white race or that they control the world or any other crazy conspiracy which the alt right likes.
so when the alt right will abandon its "counter semitism" and the alt right will abandon racism and its WRW (white race warrior mentality) we will have something to talk about.
Lemur@September 15, 2016 at 10:47 AM
DeleteFinally, the bizarre and in my opinion almost mentally ill Alt Right obsession with the Jews:
(1) it's not Jewish people, but the irrational, unrealistic left-wing multiculturalism/Postmodernism / SJW *ideology" that is the major problem here.
The more left-wing multicultural/Postmodernist / SJW-ish a person is, the more unreasonable they are, and the more hostile they are not just to ethno-nationalism but even to civic nationalism.
This applies to Jewish people: the truly multicultural/Postmodernist / SJW-ish Jewish people tend to be atheists HOSTILE to Israel as a Jewish state!
This is evidence against the Alt Right conspiracy theories.
Even amongst the old socialist left, the big name Jewish intellectuals like Chomsky and Finkelstein are hostile to Israel and probably even to Jewish tribalism that the Alt Right is constantly blathering on about. Again, this is ignored in their bizarre narratives.
No, the altright is growing. Milo functions as a conduit to the real altright, and we've effectively counter signaled the entryist problem he created.
DeleteAll movements invariably develop puritans, and likewise dysfunctional types. The alt-left is only free of these problems because its so small and and unadvertised. And are you trying to tell me the broader left in general is free of people accusing other people of being controlled opposition for oligarchs? beams in eyes...
The Daily Stormer Neo Nazis et al did not form the alt right but are permitted to interact as a small element within the altright because our cardinal rule is 'no enemies on the right.'
The main websites of the altright are places like The Right Stuff, Radix, Counter Currents, VDare, The Unz Review, Vox Popoli, etc.
The blog post you linked to is from one of the lesser alt right sites, but its interesting that on its own terms its purging regressive and stupid right wing elements.
You also need to be aware the alt right uses 'constructive irony' a lot, and thus a lot of internal accusations are fatuous.
Your 'I'm Jewish' argument is just the Naxalt bro fallacy. You also don't take into account that Jews can be a race (according their own edicts), a religion, a culture, an ethnicity or whatever else is convenient at a particular time. So intermarriage is a non starter argument. Plus, Jews make the culture assimilate to them. One example: http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2014/06/the-jews-who-designed-the-american-home/372208/
Btw, guess how I became hostile to the Semitic Project? It was by noticing a distinct pattern of anti-gentile behavour by Jewish journalists and newspapers. Turns out objective research supported my suppositions: http://www.counter-currents.com/2016/09/the-alt-right-and-the-jews/
Yes, we're aware that many Europeans/whites are hostile to a traditional society, but guess what? White Democrat voting Oregon is still a nicer place to live. We call it implicit identity.
Lastly, you neglect to point out the Jewish influence on post-modernism. Ideology is instrumental as well as fundamental. And Israel has little to do with it other than laying an additional layer of hypocrisy on Jewish machinations (ethnic states for me but not for thee!).
Jews have long been a problem before (((The Frankfurt Problem))) dreamed up the current crop of cultural degeneracy. Are you really trying to tell me that being dogged by pogroms and expulsion from over 100 polities is really all explicable by 'anti-semitism' rationally conceived? (That is, anti semetism as genuine prejudice against Jews for no reason, as opposed to responses to typical behavour or policies Jews dislike).
DeleteLemur@September 15, 2016 at 11:46 AM
(1) the Frankfurt School is not the major source of modern cultural leftism. That credit belongs to largely ethnic French Poststructuralist lunatics like Foucault et al., whose ideas were taken up by hordes of gentile academics who created Postmodernism.
(2) historical Western anti-Semitism has a lot to do with the irrational Christian religious bigotry towards Jews and its legacy, not to mention the medieval Christian prohibition on usury and the tradition of Jewish money lenders before laws on usury were abolished (bankers tend to be hated in pretty any society you care to name).
(3) "And Israel has little to do with it other than laying an additional layer of hypocrisy on Jewish machinations"
You have not even answered the reality I just described to you: the truly multicultural/Postmodernist / SJW-ish left-wing Jewish people tend to be secular, assimilated atheists who are hostile to Israel as a Jewish state.
There is no "hypocrisy" from anti-Israel Jewish left-wing people here. They are quite *consistent* in their opposition to any form of nationalism, certainly ethno-nationalism anywhere.
Lemur@September 15, 2016 at 11:46 AM
DeleteIt is also curious indeed that Alt Right can never talk about the incredible Jewish contribution to Western civilisation:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Jewish_scientists
"Nobel Prizes have been awarded to over 850 individuals,[2] of whom at least 20% were Jewish or people of Jewish descent, although Jews comprise less than 0.2% of the world's population[3] (or 1 in every 500 people). Overall, Jews or people of Jewish descent [Note 1] have won a total of 41% of all the Nobel Prizes in economics, 28% of medicine, 26% of physics, 19% of chemistry, 13% of literature and 9% of all peace awards."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Jewish_Nobel_laureates
------------
The Jewish contribution to Western science is extraordinary. Care to comment?
1. The Frankfurt school and post structuralists are related. The latter followed the former, and we see a recurrence of similar ideas. Secondly, abstruse French intellectuals debating about how many degenerate behavours can fit on the head of a pin is only one part of the equation. Who is most insistent on applying these ideas to culture? Who campaigned for the 1965 reform of immigration?
Delete2. It seems (((you're))) not above denigrating historical Christian, European civilization. Sad! You yourself note the people had cause to resent Jewish banksterism, and we only have to look in the Talmud to find passages about screwing over the goyem. Jews have been kicked out of non-Christian countries too. The association between Jews and international capital is well documented and deep.
3. As I said, Israel is irrelevant. Jews who support Israel will promote anti western policies in the West, and some Jews attack the west and don't believe in Israel. So what? Once again, through their disproportionate influence in the media, hollywood, and think tanks, Jews haven't 'assimilated' to traditional European culture. We have assimilated to them.
wow you created a big soup here.
Deletelets go with you point by point
1.the article about jews which shaped the architecture of american homes was about jews which ran away from nazi germany and brought with them german architecture from germany which called bauhaus.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus
so this jews brought influence of the german culture to usa so i guess you have to complain about germans which is polluting your american culture than not the jews.
actually jews have very different culture and its depends on where they coming from if they coming from euroepan countries usa or arab countries there is no coherent jewish culture or jewish architecture or etc.
even in israel there is no coherent israeli culture or architecture and this is actually the reason.
because jews were pretty assimiliated into the society they were living in.
2.now lets analyze your article in the counter current
a.neocons are not PC multiculturist worshipers yes they are not a nice movement its have a lot of problems but this movement is not against civic and cultural nationalism or assimiliation policies neoconservatives are not the PC post modernists which you are talking about.
now lets look at the 1924 immigration act.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Act_of_1924
which used the Census of 1910. The law was primarily aimed at further restricting immigration of Southern Europeans and Eastern Europeans.
(basically this law forbid for poles italians spainards and jews to immigrate to usa).
and actually if you are not conspiracy nut you can understand that if there were no act like this a lot of jews have been saved by immigrating to u.s.
so of course jews opposed it but the real problem was not 1964 act which your site claim this act limited immigration to 100 thousnds-150 thousnds people a year and mostly its been based on labour shortages and skilled based immigration which the alt left supporting.
the immigration act you are speaking about came in 1990
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Act_of_1990
which allowed 700 thousnds people immigrate each year to u.s.a and it was signed by one of the most anti israeli republican administrations the administration of the george bush the father.
now about other things yes there is a lot of jewish post modernist crazy loonies as well as americans and etc and there is a lot of jews with healthy set of mind.
most of the post moderniist regressive jews hate israel hate israelis and hate people with my way of thinking they are hostile to me no less than to you and there is nothing tribal in their behaviour as well as post modernist frenchmen and american and etc.
also i forgot.
Delete1.yes the hatered against jews because of the they cruicified christ issue and another christian antisemitism.
2.jews had to work as lenders or tax collectors or another work like that since it was forbiden to sell lands to the jews or give them to become peasents and as you know until the industrial revolution the major sector of any economy was agriculture and jews worked as tax collectors lenders or middlemen because they simply had no other choice.
LemurSeptember 15, 2016 at 12:19 PM
Delete(1) they are related, but still French Poststructualism invented lots of new ideas different from the Frankfurt School, and was led by ethnic Frenchmen. I doubt you're even properly familiar with French Poststructualists.
(2) most capitalists are Gentiles. Get over it. You're dealing with class issues here, if we want to talk about the destructive aspects of free market economics.
(3) "some Jews attack the west and don't believe in Israel. So what? "
lol.. that collapses a major element of your anti-Semitic conspiracy theory. Strange you can't even see it.
Daniel MarmurSeptember 15, 2016 at 12:25 PM
Delete"until the industrial revolution the major sector of any economy was agriculture and jews worked as tax collectors lenders or middlemen because they simply had no other choice."
Yes, along with Christian anti-Semitism, this is another big explanation of historical European anti-Semitism.
An example for the Alt Right:
Delete"Jonas Edward Salk (/sɔːlk/; October 28, 1914 – June 23, 1995) was an American medical researcher and virologist. He discovered and developed one of the first successful polio vaccines. ...
Jonas Edward Salk was born in New York City on October 28, 1914. His parents, Daniel and Dora (née Press) Salk, were Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants from Poland who had not received extensive formal education"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonas_Salk
------------
And we could list the inventions of brilliant Jewish scientists all day long.
I'd say the Jewish contribution to Western civilisation is huge.
Are you suggesting if Jews didn't exist these inventions wouldn't have made by someone else? I mean the Cold War shows quarantined scientific domains eventually produced the same products. Had America not developed the first atomic bomb are you saying that means the Soviet Union would not have developed one?
DeleteNo, I am saying the reality of history as we see it shows massive contributions to Western civilisation, which you, I bet, with your paranoid hatred will be incapable of even acknowledging.
DeleteThe so called "non semitism" looks pretty much like the new clothes of antisemitism. I would prefer almost ANY political view to this one.
Delete(And Lemur think of it twice : what you need to live a good, meaningful life is not people looking just like you, it is reasonnable, decent, properly educated fellow citizen willing to engage into fair cooperation. And guess what ? you can obtain that from many different cultural "racial" backgrounds, if only there is good public education and not too much scarcity stress over jobs and ressources.
In what way does it harm you that the neighboor eat stuff, or wears stuff you are not familiar with ?
Who is harming you more your black or jewish or whatever buddy at work or the director of some hedge fund who decides that your factory is not profitable enough and leaves you unemployed ?
Seriously ?
germi lad
Deletein somethings i agree with you but in other things i am not.
for example i agree with you that society should be colourblind.
but i dont agree with you that society should be cultureblind or valueblind.
for example if the differences between 2 people ending in the preference of food or how they worship god or other prefered deity its fine.
but when there is serious difference in culture and values and there is no wish to accept the culture values and identity of the host population it can create serious problems.
especially if the people are coming to developed enlighted country from a country with intolerant and politicallyincorrect culture and values while they have no feel of solidarity with the host population and no wish of integration.
now i remember your comment about your optimism about the process of assimiliation of muslims in france and even though i am not a frenchman by myself sadly i cannot share your optimism.
why because i can explain your arguements in support of the notion that muslims assimiliate in france from a different perspective maybe its correct maybe its not but its different explanations for the same events.
1.even though the young population know french better than the generations before that and there is some people in this community which somehow integrate does it mean they are assimilating? i think its not the most important criteria.
about intermarriage i dont found any new data.
but the arguement about the fact that muslims voting left socialit parties i dont think honestly its proving anything.
like why should they vote for the right which is for french and catholic identity? (they reject both of this values) of course they would vote for PC culture left parties which will in order to get their votes will increase their welfare benefits and which will support open borders in order to allow them to bring their relatives from arab countries more easily.
the arguement that they dont vote for islamic parties is again flawed in my opinion because the reason for that maybe that the chance for islamic party will able to gain enough sits in order to gain enough influence is too low so they prefer to influence through being the electorate of the big left parties.
now why i am not sharing your optimism about assimiliation.
because i always see a lot of articles like this:
http://qz.com/562128/isil-is-a-revolt-by-young-disaffected-muslims-against-their-parents-generation/
which are saying that the younger generation is more radicalized than their parents generation.
and articles like this.
http://www.thelocal.fr/20150121/the-ten-real-no-go-zones-in-paris
about no go zones
and articles about how the assimiliation in france is failed
http://www.ibtimes.com/why-do-american-muslims-fare-better-their-french-counterparts-2189449
also i have to say that i am living in israel and many jews from france are basically runing away as "refugee" to israel from france because they are saying that their life became intolerable in france because of islamic antisemtism against them and trust me its not one or two persons its way more than that.
now you may say that its because of discrimination or because there was no much efforts to integrate muslims economically and educationally.
but here is the question for you in this case.
jews came from the same exact countries like muslims algeria morroco with the same economical background and educational level as the muslims frm the same arab culture as the muslims and etc its not european western ashkenaji jews.
and i believe they got the same exact conditions from france which the muslims got no better no worse.
and yet jews assimiliated pretty quickly in france they became famous scientists philosophers their economic conditions became equal to native frenchmen pretty quickly as well as their education level and their feel of shared identity with frenchmen.
so my question is how so? how jews assimiliated pretty quickly while muslims still are not assimiliated into french culture?
Hello again Daniel,
DeleteI will try to address your many points.
1. My point about the alledged "muslim vote" was more limited than this. I only noticed that even if islamic authorities (just like most religious authorities) are rather conservative when it comes to sex, french muslim citizen do not vote accordingly which strongly suggests that those issues (same sex marriage etc.) are not a priority to them.
2. Identity is a rather fuzzy notion. So a definition of assimilation referring to identity is not practical.
3. the articles you pointed to me do not show an assimilation problem
The one that comes closest to that is the paper with quotation from Olivier Roy who is trying explain the terror attacks. He speaks of a generation gap between primary schooled fathers and secondary educated children. I find it rather convincing (actually it is in line with Todd's demonstration of a destruction of the traditionnal arab family). But it does not amount to show that most maghrebian ascent young french are misfits within french society in the same way the perpetrators were.
The "no go zones" article is more joking that anything with the zones mentionned being rather dirty and / or overcrowed areas like "la place de l'étoile". I can promise you there are absolutely no no go zones in Paris ;-)
The third paper then seems to advocate a rather multiculturalist / anti assimilationist point of view. It suggests that french muslims have a hard time assimilating because of french secularism and assimilationnism.
Even if we were to admit that usa muslims assimilate more or faster (which only hard facts like intermarriage could ascertain), it is not unlikely that we are speaking of very different "types" of people. I mean algerians coming to France in the 60's were mostly peasants and they went to do unskilled labour. As to US immigration I do not know, may be it is the same, may be it is more a "brain drain" immigration type.
4. The proposed comparison is a little more complicated since the algerian jews were full french citizen since 1870 whereas most algerian arabs remained "indigenes" until the independance.
But there are also deep cultural differences between sefarads and arabs. First and foremost the traditionnal jewish family is the stem-family with one heir, a strong authority from the father and a stress on transmission. This family structure happens to be very effective for education.
The traditionnal arab family is the community endogamous family (with high rates of marriage between cousins). As everybody knows (but wrongly blames islam for) the status of women is rather low which is quite unfortunate for education.
Just to be clear about that, the arab family structure is not reproduced by migrants children. The opportunity to marry a cousin is not at hand and it is illegal.
The intermarriage rates in both case do not seem to be strikingly different. Again I only rely on Todd Le Destin des immigrés, that has not been translated into English.
5. Last but not least. Antisemitism. I do not doubt the experience you mentionned. It is of course a serious issue. As Bebel once famously said "antisemitism is the socialism of the imbeciles". It is no less true today. So common sense old left agenda is in order here. But it must not be overestimated either we have some demagogues here who tried to build an electoral coalition based on antisemitism and who notably targeted people in impoverished suburbs. They failed so miserably on the 2009 european elections that as to now they did not try it again.
(I do not want to name them but you can find them easily.)
The figures of both antijewish and antimuslim acts are worrying (they rose in 2015 after the attacks.
But on a more personnal level, I happen live in small town very close to Paris where both numerous muslims and jews live. (It is not imagination there are many casher and hallal shops in the very road I live on.)
Anyway my main concern is that overemphasis on real or alledged "trouble with islam" is kind of polluting the political debate here.
Delete1.or maybe it is a priority to them just they can enforce it on community level while they cant enforce easy immigration rules for their relatives or welfare benefits.
Delete2.well if they identify themselves as algerians and muslims before they identify themselves as frenchmen should mean something.
3.i just said that i read many articles like that and i dont want to try to find all of them and spam it to you.
and even if they have particular prescribtions it doesnt mean that its true the real point here is that they are saying that there is a problem.
4.most of the jews from algeria came to france not in 1870 but in 1960.
also i know well the history of the sephardic jews and their main familiy was endogamous as well with big or small clans being the most important
also intermarriage between relatives been pretty common practice as well for the sephardic jewish community.
not to mention that the hair is really important in both types of families.
btw today there is no intermarriage between relatives not only in france but in the middle east as well but the clanship is important no less than before even if we are speaking about christian viliages.
even though a stranger will not always notice this.
so i cant really say that the 235 thousnds jews which came in 1960-s had different culture and values or economic conditions from the muslims who came in this years.
my guess is that the jews just had sincere wish to become french and assimiliate in the french culture while muslims came there because of economic reasons and to improve their life by immigrating to first world country.
thats the difference between jews which have their cultural differences but this cultural differences end in the plate and on the religion they belong to.
while i am not sure that its the case with the muslim immigrants.
5.well if france will return to policy of restricted immigration and will reject open border politics and will do all the efforts to proportionaly distribute muslims between the population including outlawing low income ghettos,in which the french government will be commited to give them housing in another place.
then i think there will be much less emphasize on islam.
and this policies i guess closer to old left and realistic left more than to multiculturist SJW.
1. Hollande immigration policies are not very different from those of Sarkosy. Both know mass immigration is not popular and both refuse to get out of the schengen agreements (Sarko promised he would eventually do that if... but you can doubt it since he had been in office for years with plenty opportunities to do it.) Furthermore restricting low cost foreign workforce would entail a real struggle with those who profit from it like building companies.
Delete2. So it is a matter of feelings. It is rather hard to measure. Moreover the very existence of a kind of anti-muslim consensus among journalist and political leaders (from Valls to Lepen) does not help.
4. My point about 1870 was that sephardic jews were already french citizen (except under the vichy regime alas) when they did join whereas algerian born people had been second class citizen for generations. And then the war. And the economic failure of the FLN regime.
You know sephardic jews history far better than I do. I only wanted to stress the relatively higher status of jewish wife and mother and the importance of transmission as being key factors of educationnal success (displayed everywhere by immigrant jewish people - btw it explains away all the conspiracy BS). I am not sure but I would not be surprised if litteracy rate had been quite different also.
Another point I come to think of is that permanent setting in France was probably not a life project of its own for many algerian born workers. As for many poles and italians, the first generation was always thinking of going back to the homeland but then most children could not share this project : they were already french in so many ways (language, way of life, schoolfriends...).
All immigration waves I know of first tend to build a community of some sort. It was even true for internal migrations (for example the bretons) and it was also true for the first generation of jewish immigrants (nowadays there are still jewish neighborhoods in paris for example in the XIX arrondissement). I think it is only natural that a) assimilation happens only through small steps b) some assimilated people do want to keep in touch with some cultural "roots".
5. I think there are two points we can definitely agree on : open borders are ill conceived policies and impoverished neighborhoods are a problem. BTW as "the tide lifts all boat" a general recovery (through trade tariffs and keynesian policies) would deeply alleviate this last problem.
I am not sure about relocating population according to their cultural background or religious belief. It looks dodgy to me and might well backfire in several ways : targeted families resisting relocation, other politicians blaming you for spending public money for a specific community etc. If it were to be done, I think it would have to be discrete, throug guidelines to council houses organisation may be ?
There is one point where I was not able to convince you : there is a disproportion between the real problems that arise here and there and the attention mainstream media and neoliberal politicians give to them.
Ok i got it tjat it hard to rellocate existing communities but can you agree that its easier and healthier try to settle new immigrants in less ghetto like places at least?
DeleteYes of course ;-)
DeleteAs allways the hard question is how. First things first we should make every local government abide by the law. As you may know we have laws about the numbers of council houses per inhabitants. But many (rather right wing) elected officials from quite wealthy neighborhood do prefer to pay the fine that abide by the law ! For example Sarkosy was just doing that as maire of Neuilly (a very wealthy suburb). But then the so called "socialist" government did nothing to just have that law abided.
So here too a proper "old labour" left is in order and I would add one that is not led by members of the oligarchy...
A realist leftist might say something like "there are costs and benefits to immigration that is why 1) totally open borders is out question 2) all the costs should NOT be on the blue collars while most of the benefits are for the upper class."
Living in impoverished neighborhoods with cultural tensions as a result is one of those costs.
So I totally agree with you on this even if I do not share your concern about my muslim fellow citizen.
Personally I reject the 'nuclear family' idea, because I support exploring societal experimentation, in the area of things such as e.g. polyamory (something which is very easily misunderstood, it's worth reading about).
ReplyDeleteI'm not convinced on the opposition of parts of feminism either - a huge amount of it is utter garbage, egged on as clickbait by news media - but it's such a tricky/opaque subject, with so many contrasting views among feminists, that I don't think there is an appropriate way to identify all of the troublesome feminists under one label - I very very heavily distrust all the MRA-sourced opposition to feminism.
On open borders, I mostly agree except that at times of full employment/prosperity, I don't see why they shouldn't be open - but certainly, restricted borders when below this level of prosperity.
The rest of this sounds interesting though, and is something I could get behind - but the message needs improvement (don't know if I can stomach many more memes ;)).
john b
Deleteyeah like 99% percent of people want to live in polymary (cynicsm).
yes if people want to live in polymary we are going to respect their choice but what it have to do with helping families?
also even if you have full employment you have to bring skilled immigrants in order not to decrease the producitvity of the country so its never should be open borders anyway.
"Personally I reject the 'nuclear family' idea, because I support exploring societal experimentation,"
Delete= recipe for social catastrophe.
We have already "experimented" since the 1960s with policies that tend to break up the nuclear family and the results are awful.
Can you elaborate on the changes since the 60's, which have impacted the nuclear family with bad results? (just a topic I'm unfamiliar with)
DeleteI don't oppose the notion of a family unit, I just don't see why it should match the traditional configuration of two partners and their kids.
I think that polyamorous families can often be more stable than the traditional nuclear family, as kids can have more adults supporting/raising them - it depends on the people involved of course.
yes nobody is going to punish polmary but i believe people still think that familiy is the most important thing in their life and i believe that people want the government to support the familiy and make it stronger economically by policies which will help economically to raise children which will help to buy affordable housing which will help families to have a freedom of choice if they want 2 parents to work full time or maybe they want one of the parents to stay in the house with the kids.
Deleteits legitimate wishes and i believe that the government should sattisfy this wishes.
JohnB@September 15, 2016 at 11:12 AM
DeleteAny kind of polygamy or polyandry is a disaster, because it means the best and most attractive men/ women get to monopolise the opposite sex.
E.g., polygamy just means:
(1) the most wealthy or most powerful or most attractive men get to monopolise women.
(2) this leaves many men without the chance to have wives and children.
---------------
This is something the cultural leftist lunatics do not understand:
monogamy IS the best, fairest form of gender equality, because in a society of roughly 50% men and 50% women most people get a good chance at having a partner and children.
Polyamory does not equal polygamy/polyandry:
Deletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyamory
My view of polyamory, would emphasize both men and women being able to have multiple partners - there are a large variety of possible configurations for polyamorous relationships though.
I don't see how this would lead to any form of monopolization? If anything, it would widen peoples opportunities to develop close connections with others, because people in polyamorous relationships may still be available.
if people want to have polyamory lifestyle they can do it today so what from that john b?
DeleteYep, the Realist Left isn't going to take much questions about the "Jewish Conspiracy", without acknowledging that yes, they are relatively better off, have better test scores, are disproportionately in sciences and academia, receive a lot of Nobels, and are also concentrated in one of the biggest Financial and Media capitals of the world (New York).
ReplyDeleteThere's room for common ground with some Alt Righters, particularly those that share left-wing views on economics, as well as the pro-free speech and anti-globalization attitudes. But all of this stuff about Jews and about Race emphasis is all rather silly to me. We simply don't want to encourage further Balkanization of society, as the Regressive Left and now some elements of the Alt Right are doing. in General, we're opposed to "Identity politics" of all kind, which unfortunately the Alt Right seems to mirror in the other direction from the Regressive/ New Left types.
I think that the Realist Left should also appeal to many of those, as Daniel called it, "High Tories". We might be in general disagreement about drug laws, or the precise amount of foreign interventionism, or different degrees of attitudes towards tradition. But I would imagine that Peter Hitchens would fit in MUCH better in a "Realist Left" than he would in any of the major movements today, including the Alt Right.
Yeah, I mean, really, the Alt Right and SJWs basically have the same mad conspiracy theory, just different people blamed: evil white heterosexual men for the SJWs and the Jewish people for the Alt Right.
DeleteKain
ReplyDeleteabsolutely agree with you
LK
so i am screwed either way haha
Family matters. Even more than you probably think :
ReplyDeletehttp://www.craigwilly.info/2013/07/07/emmanuel-todds-linvention-de-leurope-a-critical-summary/
But I am not sure that there are very effective political means to make marriages long lasting and happy.
Or very indirect ones : more jobs, better jobs, shorter working time, better housing, etc.
Undermining the 'Jewish conspiracy'?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.counterpunch.org/2016/09/12/the-israel-lobby-the-syrian-war-and-the-meaning-of-empire/
FYI PK conference keynotes streaming here:
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/umkcecon
i don't get why the word "left" is so important to you that you're dead set on arrogating it even if it means fundamentally redefining it
ReplyDeletewhy not just call yourself what you are: "alt-center"