Just watched a video of James O’Keefe reading from Orwell’s “1984” on the subject of “doublethink,” the audacious capacity of authoritarian regimes to support two totally contradictory views while nevertheless asserting the validity of each through the sheer exercise of their power. The Identity Politics that informs our “progressive” culture is rife with such absurdities.
The underlying principle of Identity Politics is that any group, be it defined in terms of ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, etc., which has been “marginalized” by mainstream Western Culture, must be worthy of defense if not celebration, whatever the legitimacy of its moral or intellectual status. It’s Marxism pure and simple, the reduction of the human experience to mere issues of power, intelligence, achievement and morality apparently being distractions manufactured by the political Right.
Nothing better illustrates the insanity of this perspective than the dilemma of radical Feminists who, while passionately devoted to the rights of Women, are nevertheless reticent to be critical of Islam because of its hallowed status as a member of “the other,” those deemed to be unjustly demonized by we White Racist Westerners. But of course color and race have nothing to do with a rational, humane, [i.e., “conservative”] evaluation of Islam. Am I saying all Muslims are monsters? Of course not. But the fact is that in various Islamic regimes around the globe young Muslim girls are being genitally mutilated, sold into marriages with men three times their age and denied the same educational opportunities as their male contemporaries. Were any of this happening in the West, the din of sanctimonious Feminist ranting would be overwhelming. But as it is happening amongst “the other,” it is Feminism’s silence that is in fact deafening.
The amazing Ayaan Hirsi Ali managed to escape the life of servitude her Somali Muslim parents had planned for her and become a staunch advocate for Women’s rights within Islam. She is to my mind the ultimate Feminist heroine! Yet her reception here in the “progressive” West has been muted and in some cases outright hostile. You see, she’s being critical of people beyond the pale of White Western “privilege” and that fact alone, absurdly, seems to be the fundamental moral criterion of the brain dead Left!
This same sector, however, goes berserk should any White Western Male commit even the most questionable of misdemeanors. On a recent Thursday Night Football telecast, Terry Bradshaw, hardly known for his personal reticence, told Erin Andrews she looked absolutely gorgeous in her outfit. Twitter exploded with feminist outrage! How dare he! Comedian Kathleen Madigan referred to him as “Mr. Perv.” Others said his comment was clearly a form of sexual harassment!
Such is the insanity of our “progressive” culture that Men responding to their very natural urge to celebrate female beauty, however innocuously, are savagely denounced for “objectifying” Women, while those in other parts of the world treating Women as no more than pieces of meat, are spared any criticism whatsoever! It is “doublethink” pure and simple and it pervades our culture. How else would you characterize the mainstream media’s constant excoriation of the “deadly” insurrection of Jan 6, an event in which not one of the “insurrectionists” was guilty of murder, while characterizing the relentless pillaging of America’s cities over the last 18 months which have in fact led to multiple deaths, as perfectly justifiable acts of “social protest.”
Orwell, himself a socialist, cited “doublethink” as a bludgeon typically used by fascists. How ironic that it is today a pervasive aspect of the intolerant American Left whose constant warnings of the dangers posed to Democracy by “conservatives” are themselves examples of “doublethink”!