Tragically wrong on Norway

David Round blogs on Norway:

Norway’s recent terrible tragedy, I am sorry to say, marks a new and dreadful stage in the civil war which is slowly but surely beginning to break out in much of Europe and which threatens to finish off its enfeebled civilisation. It was a dreadful thing, and completely indefensible; but it was also inevitable, a natural consequence of the misguided, intolerant policies of a haughty elite contemptuous of the views of ordinary citizens; and it was predicted, by people rather more perceptive than those elites. But the elites, confident of their own superiority, were not listening, and I do not know how many of them are listening even now.

I reject David Round’s views entirely. There is nothing natural, or inevitable, about shooting 69 mainly teenagers to death.

This is like writing about the Nazis and saying “The Holocaust was a dreadful thing, and completely indefensible; but it was also inevitable, a natural consequence of the misguided policies which allowed Jews to become so rich and powerful in Europe”. No I am not comparing what happened in Norway to the Holocaust. I am saying that effectively blaming the victims is repugnant.

As it happens I agree that the immigration policies of Norway (and many other European countries) have been a disaster, and that the political elites are very out of touch on this issue. But that doesn’t mean that the killings done by Breivik were in anyway a natural consequence. You do not rationalise the acts of evil mad men.

I’d suggest David Round read the lunatic manifesto of Breivik, before pronouncing that his actions were a natural consequence of anything. Round continues:

‘[i]n April 2005, after virtually no public debate, the Norwegian Parliament passed a sweeping law that made it punishable by fine or imprisonment to say anything ‘discriminatory’ or ‘hateful’ about anybody else’s skin colour, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation. The burden of proof was placed on the accused: unless you could prove you hadn’t done or said something offensive, you’d be presumed guilty. Only the ‘populist’ Progressive Party had opposed this legislation.’

Now I agree such laws are a bad thing. I constantly blog against them myself. But I would never ever say what Round does:

But what would happen, you ask, if worried Norwegians were allowed to speak their minds? Surely they would say unpleasant things about immigrants and violence would result? Surely, to prevent such violence, Norway needs such a law?

That is a reasonable question, but there are reasonable replies. The first, of course, is that violence has already resulted as a consequence of this law and the general repressive regime it embodies. Breivik’s violence was a protest against the direction his country was heading in, and this law was a significant aspect of that.