The
right-wing nationalists appear to be gaining the hearts and minds of
many around the world, winning a number of crucial elections. Despite
their extremism they have acquired a large degree of mainstream
legitimacy. The far right have developed an ideology that is uniting
racist neo-nazis, conservatives and populist politicians going well
beyond their previous fringe existence. Over and over again in
different languages they are telling us it is “Us” (whites,
Christians) or “Them” ( black and brown, Muslims), that
immigrants are storming the battlements of “Fortress Europe”,
breaking through the southern border walls of America and invading
the island nation of Australia, in other words what they call the
“civilized world”. It is what’s called the “great
replacement” to oust the native-born inhabitants. Its tactics are
infiltrating institutions from the inside, spreading their
“insidious” culture, and producing a lots of babies to
out-populate the local people.
Between
2012 and 2019, for instance, 1.5
million tweets in
English, French, and German referenced this warped theory of the
“great replacement”. Its origins was from a gay radical poet,
Renaud Camus, who had been a student
demonstrator in
Paris in 1968 and who in 1981 voted for Francois Mitterrand for
president of France. In 2010, he published a book entitled Le
Grand Remplacement depicting
a France and a Europe transformed by immigration. His work became the
foundational text for a growing movement called Generation
Identity,
a version of white nationalism. The “identitarians” embraced
Renaud Camus' ideas and spread conspiracy theories. It was not just
only explicit racists and Islamophobes who are pushing these views
but also mainstream conservatives such as Republicans fearing
demographic change such as increased Hispanic voters will undermine
their political power.
Our
entire civilization is now at risk, they keep saying. European
christian culture and civilization is being undermined and must be
preserved. The American way of life is endangered.
Putin
said, “This liberal idea presupposes
that nothing needs to be done. That migrants can kill, plunder and
rape with impunity because their rights as migrants have to be
protected.”
“Africa
wants to kick down our door and Brussels is not defending us,”
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in
2018. “Europe is under invasion already and they are watching with
their hands in the air.”
In
the context of great insecurity among the “middle class” and the
working poor, believing themselves abandoned by the elite and their
political parties multiculturalism and immigrants became easy targets
for the mounting anger of the nationalists and white supremacists.
Subject themselves to austerity policies, the funds being spent on
caring for migrants and refugees has led to a growing resentment
against them
among workers. Those on the right have taken full advantage of this
latent xenophobia. No more is the talk about keeping immigrants out
but ethnic cleansing (or as they euphemistically call it
“remigration”) is being voiced. The platform of the German
far-right party, Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), for
instance, reads:
“Germany and Europe must put in place remigration programs on the
largest possible scale.” In America, they now demand the
deportation of the “undocumented”. No more is the discussion
about absorption and assimiliation. The EU slogan “unity in
diversity” and the Statue
of Liberty's “Give
me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe
free…” are
being challenged by those who do not accept humane immigration and
refugee policies or believe in an inclusive vision of society. It is
“Us” versus “Them”. They work hard to use the social media to
dehumanize the “Other”, the “Undesirables.”
The
real tragedy is that a “Great Replacement” is imminent and
looming on the horizon. Millions of desperate families will be
fleeing the environmental destruction of climate change. Some argue
that civilization will disappear and humanity itself will be
replaced.
Adapted from here
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-far-right-is-winning-the-global-battle-for-hearts-and-minds/
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