10 maart 2011

How Mr. Wilders does it: Facts are futile

I found the following article of Rob Wijnberg in my morning paper (nrc·next, March 8, 2011). Of course it was in Dutch, but I felt the urge to translate it (with some help from James). The article makes very clear why it is so difficult to argue with right wing politician Geert Wilders and his followers.

» If you have already called for the end of equality, a tax on headscarves, the deportation of non-Dutch citizens without jobs and the registration of all citizens to ethnicity, it becomes increasingly difficult to surpass yourself.

There was no great indignation when PVV leader Geert Wilders recently suggested that judges should no longer be appointed for life, but that they had to pass the PVV test every six years instead: proof that the judge punishes severe enough. If he does, he may stay, but if he chooses a community service as a punishment too often he better can work for “social services” or be a mental worker, according to Wilders. 



Some commotion was surely to be expected. What the PVV leader was proposing is the elimination of the distinction between jurisdiction and politics. The law and jurisprudence would no longer be the basis for Lady Justice then, but the political winds blowing through the Netherlands. 

If the PVV is high in the opinion polls, a judge may think twice whether he interprets the law merciful: he wants to secure his job. You could call it hypocritical (it was the same Geert Wilders who denounced his own trial as a "political trial") but it is better to call it brilliant power politics: no left-liberal party robe, but a PVV robe.

I am not writing this because of the proposal itself, but I want to detect the strategy that lies behind it. This is not incidental but structural: almost all the proposals of the PVV meet the same criteria. The first step in that strategy is the politicization of a social institution, known for its 'independence' and 'neutrality'. In the past six years, Wilders politically discredited almost every conceivable part of the public domain in the same way.

Judges are left-liberal robed, scientists are environmentalists in sheep's clothing, journalists are socialists with a bloc note, the Queen is a spokeswoman for the multicultural clan, education is the indoctrination machine of cultural relativists, the arts are a hobby of elite bosses. In other words, each institution is secretly part of the “left church” and its agenda.

After this politicization usually there is a step or two to follow: the neutralization of the institute. The PVV wants to terminate the Senate; the seats in the parliament can be brought down from 150 to 100 (so the threshold becomes higher for little parties), the European Parliament - that pursues the European integration – should be dissolved; Public Broadcasting can be minimized to one channel; scientific research on climate change should stop, the Commission Equal Rights can be dissolved, justice must be under political surveillance, the King/Queen should give up his/her position in the government, the arts sector should be transformed into a "free market", Islamic schools should be closed and the rest of the education should be centralized and nationalized. Wilders recently even demanded the dismissal of a principal of a primary school who allowed pupils to celebrate the Eid al-Adha (Festival of Sacrifice) as if he were the Rector Magnificus of the Netherlands.

Add the fact that Wilders wants to ban the public funding of political parties, while his own party goes through life as a member-less “movement” with secret accounts, and you cannot but conclude that the PVV aims for a society that in political sciences is known as a “totalitarian democracy” - a term introduced in the fifties by the Israeli historian Jacob Talmon.

Note that the term “totalitarian” has connotations that are here not applicable. It does not mean “fascism” or “dictatorship”: such comparisons won’t work. Wilders does not call for violence (and scum-villages are no concentration camps).

No, Talmon says that it is typical for a totalitarian democracy that “the scope of the policy extends to all aspects of human existence”. “It considers all human thoughts and actions as socially meaningful” - and therefore as a part of the political domain. 



That is, ironically, not only a striking summary of revolutionary, communist and radical left positions from the past (“The personal is political”) but also of Wilders ideas. He also sees in every statement or action political significance: every critical question that a journalist asks is a sign of (leftist) bias, all scientific research or any calculation of a planning office that violates the PVV program is a matter of (left ) activism, any court decision that the Freedom Party does not approve is a manifestation of hidden (left) agendas, and every word that the Queen unauthorized expresses is an element of multicultural (left) propaganda, any doctor or teacher that thinks that headscarves or Eid al-Adha are not a problem is an agent of progressive Islamization (facilitated by the left). 



This “politicization of everything” is very successful for two reasons. First, because it is fundamentally irrefutable. Values such as “objectivity”, “neutrality” and “independence” exist only as a theoretical idea. Every major enlightened thinker that advocated an objective science, free press or a neutral and independent judiciary, was therefore always given a lick with the rough side of the tongue by his later postmodern critics: nice in theory, impossible in practice. Above all these scientists, journalists and judges are humans - and humans inevitably take a culture, a vision of the world and political and personal interests with them. 



In short there is nothing to bring in against politicizing. No matter how much research you do and evidence you have that “proves” that the public broadcaster, the court or the science is not as “left” as Wilders claims, the claim that the research itself a product of that “church” (“the Universtity of Amsterdam is a Labour stronghold”, “the Volkskrant is a left parish newsletter”) is enough to disqualify it. In other words, there are no facts, there’s only politics.



The second reason why Wilders’ strategy is so mercilessly effective: it affects the current left wing, progressive (constitutional) parties in their most basic philosophical assumption: the world can be understood through “ratio” and can be explained through “facts”. That of course does not mean that only left parties restrict themselves to the facts, while the right wing is twisting the truth? No, the left assumes that facts speak for themselves and do not need to be embedded in a rhetorical environment that would give them the desired load. 


Look at the most recent video campaign of the Labour Party: that shows a list of amounts (“Child 84 euros more expensive”, “Higher rents 180 euros”, “Bonuses for bankers: 447 million”) and ends with the conclusion “This is not fair”. The assumption behind this is that each rational being cherishes the same definition of justice and numbers “prove” that this government is asocial. That’s a wrong assumption, reality and morality are not only defined by “facts”, but also by language and emotions; you can see child-care as an elitist hobby, or bonuses as a meritocratic ideal. Wilders never says how many immigrants come to the Netherlands, he says only that “the valve is wide open”. That is the art of rhetoric: giving reality a color that is favourable for you.



The PVV leader it seems has learned a lot from Karl Rove, campaign strategist of George W. Bush, who argued that political enemies should not be attacked at their weak spots, but their strong points. By politicizing everything Wilders does exactly that: it undermines the belief in “objectivity” and “neutrality” values where the established order practically has based her whole philosophy on. Arguments that begin with “figures of the Planning Bureau show that…”, “the court believes that…”, “research shows that…”, “according to the Constitution…” - and in that way arguments of his opponents start very often - can therefore be referred to the trash. 



Strategically it’s brilliant, but it also has a dark side: the PVV leader claims any disagreement with his party equals political activism. So everything is going to be a “coup” - an attempt to gag his party. The result is a kind of real-life Truman Show starring the PVV: surrounded by media, scientists and courts that are all secretly acting in a play of the left wing. This is the way the PVV leader wins the trust of ordinary people (Henk and Ingrid), who believe in this play. 



And everybody who says something about it, must be instructed by the Great Left Director. Did you know, for example, that Rob Wijnberg loves classical music, lives next to a Muslim and studied philosophy at the University of Amsterdam? Well, read his article again very carefully. End of discussion.



This is how totalitarian democracy works.



Rob Wijnberg is editor of the left wing messenger. «


Labels: , , ,