Summary: Continuing my series describing how both Left and Right in America have become unmoored from their roots and adopted strange new beliefs. This post looks at the New Left. These evolutions have made the Right stronger and the Left weaker.
“Using the hijab as a symbol of women’s liberation & empowerment is like using the hammer & sickle as a symbol for free markets & expression.”
— By “IllimitableMan” on Twitter.
The latest wave of feminism
Lots of articles like this during the past few years: “The hijab has liberated me from society’s expectations of women” by Nadiya Takolia, an op-ed at The Guardian — “Wearing the hijab doesn’t have to be about religious dedication. For me, it is political, feminist and empowering.” She is a researcher at Engage. Another is “The Freedom of the Hijab” by Ayesha Nusrat, op-ed at the NY Times. She is a 23-year-old Muslim Indian from New Delhi.
Hanna Yusuf in The Guardian, 24 July 2015. She is a freelance writer.
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For every dozen articles advocating the hijab as a sign of feminist empowerment, there is one pointing out the sensible and obvious: “Is hijab really a symbol of liberation when millions are oppressed into wearing it?” by Arshia Malik at The Nation — “One has to see objectively what the hijab, niqab, and burqa have come to signify. There are symbols of oppression of the unwilling, and the atrocities faced by Muslim women who don’t keep their ‘proper’.” She is a Srinagar-based teacher and writer about issues and conflict in Kashmir.
“The fundamentally Swedish is merely barbarism…”
— Fredrik Reinfeldt, Former Prime Minister of Sweden.
Having fun while the Left’s leaders do the real work.
Other oddities of the modern Left
Their embrace of Wall Street banks.
Hillary Clinton’s early and core supporters were Wall Street bankers. This oddity goes back to the Bill Clinton days, but remains as strange today as then. For a detailed analysis of this strange symbiosis, see economist Michael Hudson’s “Trump Is Obama’s Legacy. Will This Break Up the Democratic Party?“ in the Real-world Economics Review, 21 March 2017.
Their embrace of perpetual war.
The Left and Right have allied to advocate perpetual war for America. The Left markets it as our Responsibility to Protect (see Wikipedia and the International Coalition for the Responsibility to Protect). Unfortunately they do not get consent of the people they “protect”, like those in Libya (still burning). Equally oddly, they do not enlist in the military or (appear to) urge their children to enlist.
They advocacy for open borders in Europe and America.
The Left and Right have another alliance: to allow in massive flows of people. Oddly for the Left, many are from cultures far rightward of the West’s Left. As their numbers grow, they will push the West to more conservative attitudes about gender and other social values. They accept this, plus the resulting increasing social conflict. It is as if they deliberately seek to erode away western culture.
“There will be conflicts. The more openly we talk about the fact that people are worried, that there’s fear in the country and that there may be conflicts will, I think, help us deal with this realistically and confront reality.”
— Sigmar Gabriel, Chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Germany, quoted in “EU should ‘undermine national homogeneity’“.
For more about this slow-mo disaster, now accelerating, see these posts.
- Europe’s elites use immigration to reshape it.
- Sociologist Wolfgang Streeck explains the politics of the migrant crisis reshaping Europe.
- The numbers about immigration that fuel Trump’s campaign.
- A Harvard Professor explains the populist revolt against immigration & globalization — By George Borjas, Professor of economics at Harvard.
- An anthropologist explains the disruptive politics of immigration — By Maximilian C. Forte, Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Concordia University.
- Stratfor: Is the West Being Overrun by Migrants? — By the famous sociologist and historian Ian Morris.
- An anthropologist explains how immigration serves the needs of capitalism.
For More Information
If you liked this post, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. See all posts about ways to reform America, about the Left, about Trump and the new populism, about immigration & globalization, about women’s issues, and especially these…
- Populism arises amidst American workers abandoned by both Left & Right.
- An anthropologist looks at the empty identity politics of America’s Left.
- 2016 revealed the true nature of America’s left & right. It’s bad news.
- Why the Left will divorce Hillary and the new Democratic Party.
- Clinton lost because fear failed, and voters disliked her Social Justice Warriors.
- The Left sees President Trump and goes mad.
- The Left becomes a cult rather than gather support to oppose Trump.
- How the Left lost but can win again.
Books to help understood what’s happening on the Left.
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