We who try to be decent people are bombarded
by some kind of moral political pressure from
two sides: First there is the worst one, of
course, this anti-immigrant populous side
like why should we even allow refugees in;
it's their fault; third world travel and so
on, there are enough poor people here; they
come from another civilization; it means conflict
and so on and so on.
So there is all the time this pressure of
we are defending our way of life; refugees
are disturbing it.
And it's interesting how in some radical right
wing circles we really have already new conspiracy
theories, which always fascinate me in their
madness.
A couple of weeks ago the main Slovenia, I'm
a coming from Slovenia, right wing weekly
journal something like, Slovene Time Magazine,
published a comment by a guy, which was a
ferocious attack on George Soros, the humanitarian
billionaire, claiming that he's the most disgusting
despicable and dangerous person today in the
world because he's a Jew who is organizing
Muslim invasion into Europe.
The guy uses totally open brutal terms like
Negroid Islamist hoards are invading Europe.
Claiming that the Jewish plan is to destroy
Christian Europe and they're using Muslims
to do it.
Why do I like, I mean don't misunderstand
me I'm horrified at it, But why do I "like"
this fantasy?
Because it goes to the end and it brings together
two different levels of conspiracy theory.
One is Muslim invasion of Europe and the other
is anti-Semitism.
Usually we think that there is some kind of
a conflict in the Middle East between Palestinians
or Muslims and Jews.
This theory claims this is an appeared conflict
to dilute us.
In reality even the Muslim terrorists, all
of them, Isis, it's a Zionist creation to
ruin Europe.
In the good old fashion or Stalinist way you
know how fascists spoke about plutocratic
Bolshevik plot, you bring the opposites together;
they're doing this.
So, not to get lost this is one blackmail.
But then now things get much more problematic
for some liberal leftist.
Then there is the other blackmail, the humanitarian
blackmail like poor suffering immigrants coming
to Europe desperate; is Europe still Europe?
Is it using its heart?
How can we see all those people suffering
and so on and so on?
I basically, of course, agreed with this second
position.
I none the less think there is something terribly
wrong in this automatic retranslation of,
I don't want to call it a crisis but whatever
you call it what's happening with refugees
into a pure humanitarian problem, which is
out there from somewhere we don't even analyze
it closely hundreds of thousands of people
are coming and it's purely a humanitarian
question do we let them in or not?
I question this on all levels.
First, I'm absolutely ready to admit that
even crucial, that it's not simply something
horrible happening in Third World or in this
case in Middle East, as we say in Europe in
our arrogant way they screwed it up and now
we should pay the bill or what.
Of course Europe, but not only Europe, we
are deeply responsible for it.
Look at the all origins of crisis were refugees
are coming from, from northern bit not only
northern Africa, Libya and is so on.
We Europeans screwed it up with military intervention
then.
No Isis, no refugees from Syria or Iraq without
American intervention there or without this
global or geopolitical conflict between Russia
and the United States, others involved, Saudi
Arabia, Turkey, Iran and so on.
They are what is behind the Syrian civil war.
So again, we cannot say there is a humanitarian
crisis there and it's purely a question of
moral sympathy we will receive them, we are
deeply responsible for them.
First geopolitically and at a deeper level
economically.
I mean this brutal direct colonialism is more
or less over, but economic neocolonialism
this in a way stronger than ever.
We know how big Western, and not only Western
also other powers are destroying local agriculture
and so on and so on.
Like these are things we don't read a lot
about them, but are you aware of what's happening
now?
Even in some African countries where there
is starvation like Ethiopia and so on.
Western companies, and in this case happily
I'm ready to say it's not the usual culprits
Europe and the United States, it's more some
rich Arab countries like Saudi Arabia and
some Asian countries like South Korea and
so on, they're buying gigantic parts of these
countries for agricultural use growing industrial
plants and so on and so on with the millions
of people who can be employed for the time
being when production still goes on, but when
there's a crisis everything is chaotic.
And so for me the symbol of today's world,
and it's typical of how we talk of all the
crisis we read so little about that crisis,
is the Republic of Congo may be one of the
wealthiest countries in the world with regards
to natural resources and so on, but a non-existing
country; central government doesn't work,
local warlords rule all in direct connection
with foreign companies all their precious
metals to export and so on and so on.
So again, this is the situation out of which
refugees are created.
And now if anything it's getting even worse.
We all sympathize hopes of 20 years ago with
the tragedy of Sarajevo in ex-Yugoslavia,
a big city of hundreds of thousands people
under siege like in medieval times.
Okay, but what's happening now in Aleppo is
even worse in a way.
It's a really big city of almost two million
people and at least out of egotism we should
worry more.
Are we aware what kind of explosive new refugee
crisis is being prepared there?
So again, I buy all of this.
On the other hand, now comes the problematic
part, I don't believe that first that we are
the only culprits.
Because is not simply us Western Europeans,
Americans and Arabs, there is a mega class
division rich countries, poor countries, corruption
among Arabs themselves.
And as some people pointed out you cannot
just simply say many left liberals enjoy this,
they have a kind of a perverse pleasure whenever
there is a crisis in a Third World country
they always will someway prove oh it's our
possibility.
There is something so patronizing in this
as if they are even too stupid all those Arabs
or black Africans to be really evil.
If they do something catastrophic only we
are big enough even in the direction of the
evil to do it.
So let's take this case, let's ask a simple
question, which some people don't like to
ask, aren't they immediately below the big
crisis region, Syria, Iraq, aren't there a
couple of Arab Muslim countries who are among
the richest in the world, take Qatar where
they control their own Al Jazeera who all
the time emphasizes the plight of immigrants
and so on.
Qatar usually, at least among the first three
per capital with greatest per capital income
richest countries in the world, competition
is somewhere, Lichtenstein, Europe, Qatar
and Singapore.
You know how many refugees they took?
None.
All of them, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar,
Emirates, none, only the poor countries are
invaded by them.
So I don't think these questions should be
taboo like what's the international geopolitical
game that is being played here?
That's the first point.
The second point, so called Moslem fundamentalism.
You know, we should not simply say - okay
of course I'm not condemning it in a racist
way, but it's also not enough to say okay
this is just a reaction to Western imperialism
so automatically again we are guilty.
Of course it's a reaction, but listen, let
me draw a parallel.
Hitler was also just a reaction to brutal
Western imperialism, treatment of Germany
after World War I.
It's absolutely clear in this sense Western
Europe, England, France were responsible for
Hitler, but this doesn't mean that they were
wrong to fight it afterwards.
And it's the same way here.
Arab's have been exploited all that, all of
that, but nonetheless Moslem fundamentalism
is not to simply just a pure passive reaction
to a difficult predicament, it's nonetheless
a conscious choice, it's certain active politics,
it's a way in a very strong sense to react
to what?
To modern crisis.
So for me instead of accepting this official
coordinates, on the one hand we Western permissive
society, on the other hand bad fundamentalists.
A more radical question is what is fundamentalism
today?
In what sense is it generated by inner antagonisms
of global capitalism.
Even in the United States you probably know
it's simple, it's not Guy Fieri, but great
book Thomas Frank what happened in Kansas.
This is the enigma Kansas, which was for over
a century the quintessentially progressive
American state from anti-slavery campaigns
and so on.
In the last 30/40 years it became the very
backdrop of new Christian fundamentalism.
So if you look at numbers of fundamentalists
in the United States they are pretty much
the same in percentage, some three/four percent
as the number of radical fundamentalist among
Arab countries and so on.
First we should approach the problem in this
more fundamental way, not simply blaming Islam
and so on, Islam is a problematical religion
but every religion is problematic.
I think we are living today in an era of,
I'm not too afraid to speak as a leftist moral
conservative, an era of ethical decay, disintegration
of ethical substance where things which were
simply unimaginable decades ago can be said
or done today.
Let's take the example of a state, which boast
itself as the only island of reason in that
area of the Middle East.
Do you know that the highest religious authority
in the army of a country there said two or
three months ago, I checked it with my friends,
it's not a hoax it's true, that when the army
of their country occupies another land of
people, soldiers have the right to rape local
women there.
Now we will say who was this Isis?
No, the big Rabi of idea of Israeli defense
forces.
The truth are with all my disagreement with
the politics of their government now they
are the ultimate people of civilization, but
you see even they are part of this decay.
So that I don't lose the track, the first
thing to do with refugees is to locate them
in this global economic ideological political
situation.
The second thing is nonetheless not to make
a taboo of the fact that they are not just
passive victims, day by day I mean here not
refugees as such but those among them who
clearly are fundamentalists, and we should
debate these issues openly.
The third thing, and that may be the crux
of the misunderstanding why people attacked
me.
The third point is look, we tend to forget
that we all are not just abstract free individual
citizens of the world, we do live as part
of concrete communities with certain ways
of life which are focused precisely on ways
of enjoyment of how sexual relations are regulated
all that that's very core of a community and
we are different to here so we should not
avoid all these questions of, for example,
Muslims, Muslim Arabs entering Europe they
come with their customs.
And okay the politically correct way is to
say we should leave them their customs, we
have our customs, we should elevate ourselves
above these differences and take care of fundamental
equality human rights and so on.
This I claim doesn't work because human rights
are universal values are never abstractly
elevated above concrete ways of life.
Like examples that you get in Germany, I write
about them in my book.
Over 2000 girls per years of immigrants to
Germany who go to ordinary German high schools
escape from home because they were more seduced
by the western way of life, visit night clubs,
have German boyfriends and so on.
And then their families put pressure on them
like we know in what sense and they escape,
seek refugee with the police.
Do you know that they already have over 20
safe houses in Germany where these girls are
provided with fake ID and so on and so on.
And of course, massive community cries or
you are ruining our way of life.
Let's be frank, in a way they are right.
I mean you cannot impose on a Muslim community
our Western notions of freedom if we need
to choose the sex partners and claim we respect
your way of life.
The way that family deals with a woman is
the very basic components of their way of
life.
I'm not saying there is an easy way out here,
but I'm just saying that you see my point
that the problem is real here, the problem
is real and I think we - and also I know the
Muslim intolerance is often exaggerated, there
is a big story of intolerance of Western people
towards Muslims, but there is also the other
side of the story.
For example, I learned this from leftists
in Berlin, in Sweden, in Denmark and in Netherlands,
Muslim communities they're attacking gay parades
or when they see public display of homosexuality
and so on and so on.
So you see what I mean.
What I'm simply advocating it's not, of course
not, oppressing refugees on behalf of our
Western standards, but I hope you admit you
have to set a certain limit and it's a difficult
limit it has to be renegotiated like I don't
know, when a girl who doesn't want to be veiled
is forced by her family to wear a veil and
she comes to German police and complains.
You have to decide, you say no that's their
problem or do you say no we respect a certain
notion of feminine freedom their rights, we
will not tolerate that.
Whatever you do it will be very painful.
I'm claiming this, if we don't approach these
topic's openly in a public debate we are just
feeding the anti-immigrant populist racists
and we will get in 10/20 years a terrible
Europe where the predominant force will be
anti-immigrant populists.
So again, my point is not we are incompatible
with immigrants let's not have them in Europe,
no we can have even more immigrants.
But we should absolutely talk about these
problems in an open away not ignore these
problems.
Ignoring these problems means you leave the
space open for anti-immigrant populous and
then you have this after catastrophe of literally
divided nations were simply the liberal left
attitude is as if if you just mentioned these
problems they claim no this is anti-immigrant
Islamophobic racism, these excel the problems.
No, ordinary people experience see these problems
and we have to also address those concerns.
I'm not talking here as a right wing populist,
on the opposite if I make a quick jump to
American politics that's why, although I know
we shouldn't expect too much from Bernie Sanders
but my admiration for Bernie Sanders was that
he mobilized for a progressive project precisely
those ordinary small half impoverished farmers
workers who ideally vote for the new populist
Republican right.
Bernie Sanders opened up the scope of the
terrain for progressive cost for the left
outside all this academic LGBT whatever and
included into it also ordinary impoverished
people who are the ideal pray of right wing
populace.
For me everything politically depends on this.
We have two struggles today, one which unfortunately
are combined enough.
One struggle is all the struggle against sexism
and so on, gay rights.
And the others struggle is the struggle for
poor people, economic struggle, Third World
and so on.
And the most tragic thing I write about this
in my book is I hope you noticed this, it's
when Third World countries advocate controlling
women, homophobia and so on as part of their
anti-colonialism.
No this is like - the ridiculous example of
this is Mugaba who openly stands for it.
But you have in the Kenya in all those countries
where openly the very notion of women's rights,
gay rights is dismissed as neocolonialists
strategy of ruining the local communities,
of destroying local ways of life and so on
and so on.
But if this problem will not be resolved,
if we will be caught in our politically correct
struggle against discrimination and so on
and keeping this at the distance from basic
economic social struggles then we are doomed.
