Antiracist progressives today often encounter the conservative backlash that twists the democratic doctrine of free speech into an absolutist or ‘purist’ form – weaponizing it as a warped defence of white supremacy in a way that seeks to make #racism legally acceptable.
Today the New/Alt-Right is asserting a putative political need for an ostensibly democratic society to maintain an absolute tolerance of abusive & even assaultive speech – as protected forms of dissent.
The free speech fallacy: opposition to hate speech imperils free speech.
Herbert Marcuse believed that this doctrine of absolute tolerance of 'free speech' was being systematically utilised to abuse guarantees against bigotry & discrimination, & to derail or destroy the possibility of democratic egalitarianism.
Many protect neofascist speech, but classical liberalism intended speech protections primarily for powerless minority voices expressing dissent against the ideology of dominant interests, not to protect establishment voices that are already hegemonic as well as often distasteful.
‘This pure tolerance of sense & nonsense’ practiced under the conditions prevailing in the United States today ‘…cannot fulfil the civilizing function attributed to it by the liberal protagonists of democracy, namely protection of dissent.’ (Herbert Marcuse, 1965).
The assertion, often heard nowadays, that racist and sexist views contribute necessary components of cultural diversity and belong within an inclusive pluralism is an utterly perverse example of vicious cultural and political double-speak.
After 6 January 2021, Tech-platforms banned Donald Trump in an effective action against a #neofascist threat of force & violence against liberal political leaders & ordinary citizens. Freedom of speech in not absolute & must be viewed in the context of its political consequences.
Crimes by the Right are tolerated by the US state eg racist police brutality, rejecting comprehensive health care, treating asylum seekers as criminals, implementing the death penalty in a racially biased manner, supplying training to Govts that commit human rights abuses etc.
We need a strategy to oppose racism, bigoted nationalism, & warlike patriotism - to go on the offensive for the changes that can support & extend race & other equality, labour freedoms, economic abundance, peace, & communal well-being: a ‘Great Refusal’.
🧵In January, Farage said Musk was justified in calling Starmer complicit in failures to prosecute grooming gangs: “In 2008 Keir Starmer had just been appointed as DPP & there was a case brought before them of alleged mass rape of young girls that did not lead to a prosecution.”
The allegation that Starmer was complicit in failures to prosecute grooming gangs is often repeated. But how true is it?
Two Facebook posts, originally appearing in April/May 2020, claimed Starmer told police when he was working for the CPS not to pursue cases against Muslim men accused of rape due to fears it would stir up anti-Islamic sentiment.
In 2022 the posts and allegations saw a resurgence online with hundreds of new shares. They said: “From 2004 onwards the director of public prosecutions told the police not to prosecute Muslim rape gangs to prevent ‘Islamophobia’.
Decades of research shows that parroting or appeasing the far-right simply legitimises their framing, and further normalises illiberal exclusionary discourse and politics.
Starmer's speech is more evidence that the far-right has been mainstreamed.
Cas Mudde, a Dutch political scientist who focuses on political extremism and populism in Europe and the US, is, imho, one of the most important voices on the Left today.
Allow me to briefly summarise some of his work.
In a 2023 lecture, Mudde emphasizes the importance of precise terminology in discussing the far-right, distinguishing between extreme right (anti-democracy) and radical right (accepts elections but rejects liberal democratic principles like minority rights and rule of law).
He argues we're in a "fourth wave" of postwar far-right politics, characterized by the mainstreaming & normalization of the far-right - what Linguist Prof Ruth Wodak in a related concept refers to as the 'shameless normalization of far-right discourse'.
After eight years as US President, on Janury 17, 1961, Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower, former supreme commander of the Allied forces in western Europe during WWII, warned us about the the growing "military-industrial complex" (and Trump2.0) in his prescient farewell address.
Before looking at that speech, some context for those unfamiliar with Eisenhower, the 34th US president, serving from 1953 to 1961.
During WWII, he was Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe and achieved the five-star rank as General of the Army.
Eisenhower planned & supervised two consequential WWII military campaigns: Operation Torch in the North Africa campaign in 1942–43 & the 1944 Normandy invasion.
The right-wing of the Republican Party clashed with him more often than the Democrats did during his first term.
In England, 18% of adults aged 16-65 - 6.6 million people - can be described as having "very poor literacy skills" AKA 'functionally illiterate'.
This leaves people vulnerable to manipulation and exploitation, and poses significant challenges for society and democracy.
Being 'functionally illiterate' means that a person can understand short straightforward texts on familiar topics accurately & independently, & obtain information from everyday sources, but reading information from unfamiliar sources or on unfamiliar topics can cause problems.
Adult functional illiteracy—lacking the reading, writing, and comprehension skills needed for everyday tasks—poses significant challenges for a country, society, and democracy.
The first asks "Is it OK to smoke while I'm praying?"
The Pope replies "No! You should be focused on God!"
The second Priest asks "Is it OK to pray while I'm smoking?"
The Pope replies "Of course, there's never a bad time to pray"
Nigel Farage’s rhetorical technique of framing controversial or inflammatory statements as questions, often defended as “just asking questions,” is a well-documented strategy - sometimes called “JAQing off” in online discourse - that has drawn significant criticism.
This approach involves posing questions to imply a controversial viewpoint without explicitly endorsing it, thereby maintaining plausible deniability. Farage often uses this strategy to raise issues around immigration, national identity, and 'wokeness' or 'political correctness'.