QotD: Revolutionary nihilism

The enemy abroad is by turns barbarously ignorant or a cave-dwelling comic opera evil but can under no circumstances be taken seriously for his accomplishments or his ideas. Our own fifth columnists are another matter.

When Palestinians living in the West — and their academic allies — spout the same rhetoric of grievance one is forced to concede they might mean it, that their calls for blood are not entirely coerced and that their holy men are indeed representative of popular sentiment. The will of the people truly is to throw candy to their children in celebration of the death of the children of their cosmic enemy. Their aims really are circumscribed by a seventh century psychotic fugue and have nothing whatsoever to do with the years 1948, 1967 or 1973 let alone the collective would be piety of Western onlookers.

Where is the Palestinian Thomas Jefferson or Thomas Paine? Where is the Palestinian Burke or Voltaire? If some Dark Ages Dianetics manual is the best they can manage for inspiration there can be no surprise at their barbarism and penury and no one to blame for their condition but themselves. Though, if some democratic successor government is of a litigious turn of mind, it might consider suing the likes of Avi Lewis. Such men claim to speak for an oppressed people; they do not. These men oppress Arabs, condemning them to despotism and ignorance. These men take no pleasure but in hating themselves and could care less who else pays for a masturbatory nihilism.

Nick Packwood, "Revolutionary nihilism", Ghost of a Flea, 2008-04-08