It’s always wise advice, that when a horrific tragedy occurs one should refrain from commenting. Not least because in the midst of an emotive situation we don’t know the full circumstances and more importantly to make room for grief, mourning and respect. But we live in a 24 hour news cycle society – we live in a world where it seems as though every politician, journalist and cleric has to tweet their sympathy/outrage/solution to the world.
Thus it was with the Christchurch shootings. The blood was hardly dry on the Mosque floors, before the cyber ink flowed. It was not just the killer who used Facebook to livestream his sickening and perverse deeds – the internet and this incident was seized upon by many for their own ends. Personally I find the horror of these kinds of massacres such that I have no desire to read about or watch it, let alone comment. 50 humans beings have just been killed by another human being – I’m not sure that in the moment I need to know anything more. There is a time for weeping. And silence. Understandably and rightly there is a great deal of outrage at the voyeurism of the video being livestreamed on Facebook and then downloaded millions of times. But is the endless commentary not in its own way a different kind of voyeurism?
The numerous commentaries, the good, the bad and the ugly, tell us a great deal about our society – and most of it is not good. Indeed the killers aim of stirring up ferment, violence and division seems to have been achieved already.
The Sympathisers –
I’m not talking here about the small but dangerous group of people whose minds have been so warped by hatred, ideology, drugs, violence and personal circumstances, that they actually rejoice in this evil and treat the killer as some kind of hero. Their condemnation is deserved. No- I’m talking about those who, whilst they condemn the killings, nonetheless have some degree of sympathy with those who kill Muslims. Most are wise enough not to be vocal just now but there is a private sympathy and understanding. They will engage in ‘whatabouterry’. ‘Yes it was horrible but what about the thousands of people killed by Muslims?’ – as though the one evil somehow justifies the other.
Some are not so quiet. The most infamous perhaps being this statement from Senator Fraser Anning of Queensland: I am astounded at the crassness and ignorance of this letter. The real cause of the bloodshed is the immigration programme that allowed Muslim fanatics to move to New Zealand?! The Senator has no idea of the state of Islamic fanaticism in New Zealand but to suggest that the Muslims who were slaughtered are responsible for their own deaths is as perverse as it is illogical.
How dare he use the words of Jesus to justify this evil! Jesus was not teaching revenge or political policy. He was telling Peter to put away his sword because violently resisting his unjust arrest was not going to help anyway and would just beget more violence. If you claim to be a follower of Jesus, when someone throws an egg on your head, you don’t respond by punching them!
Senator Anning is extreme but I think all of us, including myself, need to pay more attention to how we use words and how they can so easily be misinterpreted. This does not mean that we should be cowed into silence – but rather than our words should be considered and seasoned with salt. The truth should always be spoken in love.
The Sanctimonious
I would like to say this following tweet is an aberration – but it is only one of several I have read. It is as crass, crude and ignorant as Senator Annings.
The Philosopher and anti-Brexit obsessive, AC Grayling saw his opportunity as well.
Apparently Brexit, and those who voted for it, are complicit in the Christchurch massacre. Even the BBC Sunday programme linked Brexit and the New Zealand shootings – without blinking an eyelid. This is as perverse and irrational as the killers own confused reasoning in his manifesto. Note that Brexit is perceived as “an evil disease that needs to be eradicated”.
Of course our One Party Ideology in Scotland was quick to get in on the act – politicising the event for their own purposes – gleefully using the massacre to reinforce their own anti-Islamaphobia credentials – as well as using it to show what that this is what happens when you don’t automatically buy into their ‘progressive’ values. My concern here is the hypocrisy – attacking this extreme manifestation of identity politics whilst at the same time espousing a milder form. This week Mike Russell referred to Tory MPs as traitors and when given the opportunity do so, the FM refused to take that opportunity. Meanwhile Humza Yousaf, Justice Secretary did not miss his opportunity to jump on the bandwagon to signal his own virtue/policies and condemn that of those who disagree with him.
Jonathan Freedland in The Guardian uses the old trick of guilt by association (in much the same way that Richard Dawkins cites Westboro Baptist as being caused by mainstream Christianity) to blame Trump, Orban and basically anyone who does not accept the ‘liberal’ progressivism’ of the New Left. Possibly the worst example of this was an article from Dani Garavelli in the Scotsman which is one of the most disgusting self righteous, hypocritical, intellectually vacuous pieces of ‘journalism’ I have read in a long time. To use the massacre of 50 Muslims in NZ to further your own narrow politics and tar all who disagree with you as responsible is shameful.
This is what Brendan O’Neill calls the barbarism of identity politics . It is the very thing that the killer was looking to stoke up – and so many of our journalists, politicians and commentators give him what he wants – because they are playing the same game.
And so in order to deal with the demonisation of Muslims you just demonise those who don’t agree with your particular ideology. Thus Melanie Phillips, Rod Liddle, Doug Murray – even Dan Walker are cited as causes. And the left who are not ideologically pure enough are also fair game. Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and even Chelsea Clinton were blamed because they are not sufficiently pro Islam. When Iain Macwhirter, impeccably liberal and left wing journalist’ stated that Boris Johnston was not responsible for Christchurch, he was immediately turned upon by the Mob.
The trouble with this is that it is far too simplistic. The killer is, from his own manifesto, a self-identified fascist and is a racist, deeply into white identity politics. But he is also an extreme environmentalist, believing that the planet is over populated. He called himself an ‘eco-fascist’. Does this mean we should blame the Greens for the massacre? Or warn those children on the ‘climate change’ strikes that they are being manipulated by ecofascists?! Does the fact that he was into body building and video games mean that we should blame the gym and computer games. “Spryo the Dragon3 taught me ethno- nationalism and Fortnite trained me to be a killer and floss on the bodies of my enemies” https://www.spectator.com.au/2019/03/the-christchurch-killer-behind-the-headlines/
Another difficulty is that this is a form of the Bushite philosophy where the world is divided into the good Empire and the bad Empire. If you are not for us then you are not one of us. If you don’t accept the prevailing ideological consensus re Islam then you are not ‘one of us’. You must be ‘one of them’. It is a myth of the prevailing ideology that Islam is both inherently peaceful (just like every other religion except of course American evangelicalism) and that it is a race, not a religion. On the simplistic narrative of the Freedlands, Garvellis and Owen Jones’s of this world, anyone who thinks that Islam is a political system (as well as a religious one) and as such is fundamentally incompatible with the values of the West, is automatically castigated as a racist whose views lead to slaughtering Muslims. In this simplistic fundamentalist world of the New Progressives it is sadly necessary to point out that being opposed to the ideology of Islam does not mean that we do not not welcome Muslims (especially refugees) nor that we do not permit them to practice their faith within our countries. Freedom of religion is after all a fundamental value of the Christian West. But in order to protect that freedom we cannot ignore the fact that Islam is a political system and that where it prevails there is either a greatly reduced or no freedom of religion. Can our commentators name one country where Islam prevails where there is real freedom of religion? Islam on Lewis: Why the church should support Muslims’ right to build mosques
My view is that I welcome Muslims but I oppose Islam. Does that make me a fascist?!
There is also a worrying double standard with some of our commentators. I was in a church composed mostly of Nigerians yesterday. 10,000 Nigerian Christians have been killed in the past four years. – 120 of them in the past three weeks. Can anyone explain why this massacre is not headline news? Is it an implicit racism which considers that the lifes of people in Africa are not as valuable as the lifes of people in New Zealand? Or is that it just doesn’t fit the narrative of the political classes? I’m wondering why Nicola Sturgeon did not immediately visit one of the 80 Nigerian churches in Scotland when 120 Nigerians were killed? I don’t object to her visiting a Mosque nor do I question her motivation in so doing – but I do question why there are not visits to churches every time there is a massacre in Pakistan, or Nigeria or the Middle East. Or why Christophobia isn’t as big a concern for the Scottish Government as Islamaphobia?
Again Brendan O’Neill hits the nail on the head – https://www.spiked-online.com/2019/03/18/new-zealands-ghoulish-opportunist
The Suffering
There have however been commentaries that show both balance and compassion. Claire Lehnmann in Quillette is superb. My colleague Steve Macalpine had this warning for those who want to blame Islam. From the Muslim and Australian perspective I thought this was both moving and balanced.
Our primary concern in this should not be to promote our own ideology/philosophy/prejudices, but rather to seek to prevent such future suffering. Ironically by engaging in the very identity politics that fuelled the hatred of the killer, our sanctimonious politicians and commentators are playing into his hands and ensuring that similar attacks will happen in the future. I actually believe that real fascism is a genuine danger to our culture. But when you demonise everyone who does not agree with you as a fascist, rather than discouraging fascism, you run the danger of enabling it. Whether of Left or Right, political extremism will only be encouraged by the political classes ignoring the suffering, and using the poor only as objects of their pity or electoral fodder.
Returning to Senator Anning’s misappropriation of the Bible. Rather than twist the words of Christ, we should listen and be doers as well as hearers of the Word. Jesus tells us that we are not to use the weapons of this world; that our fight is not against flesh and blood but against the spiritual forces of evil; that we are to love our enemies; that we are to proclaim the good news of Christ to all; and that we seek to persuade men and women to be reconciled to God and to one another. We weep with those who weep and we point to the only One who is Good.
Marantha! How long O Lord? How long?….
This song – about a massacre and sung just after a terrible terrorist atrocity – expresses my feelings well
Big challenges ahead when so many are turning to extremism. We’ve been finding that people are so aggressive now, the slightest thing and there’s raised voices at least. Just among the believers, the matters which are dividing us, and to such a depth of hatred, I’ve never seen before in over 40 years. Everything is going to get so much worse from now on. Pastors don’t seem to be informing and training the believers as the Chinese I knew many years ago did.
“10,000 Nigerian Christians have been killed in the past four years. – 120 of them in the past three weeks. Can anyone explain why this massacre is not headline news? Is it an implicit racism which considers that the lives of people in Africa are not as valuable as the lives of people in New Zealand? Or is that it just doesn’t fit the narrative of the political classes? ”
It’s not racism surely? Our western political systems have been taken over by anti-Christian progressives who, unashamedly are intent on stamping out Christianity throughout the world. This is classic end-times prophetic fulfilment as the Anti-Christ’s appearing gets ever closer. This is deliberate with secularists using Islam as a battering ram to kill Christianity. Why have negligible numbers of Christians fleeing Syria been welcomed into the West, whilst hordes of Muslims, steeped in Mohammed’s evil Mafia have been given warm welcome’s even whilst committing terrorist acts everywhere that they settle. Why have we not thrown our national arms out to Asia Bibi, whose life sentence is ongoing because of our cowardice and political correctness?
Have you not read the Quranic instructions to all the Islamic faithful, of which the so-called extremists are the most faithful of all, to kill Jews and Christians ‘wherever you find them’, to make no treaties with the infidel ( or actually to make them with the intention of breaking them), in the interests of lying for Allah; to subject non-Muslims to slavery, to treat women as cattle and justify raping any woman as they so wish (as this ‘most excellent of men’ himself did) , forcing them to have FGM, wear burkas and other wicked garments, divorcing on a whim etc, etc, etc, etc……..
This sober assessment should be read by all of us:
https://civilusdefendus.wordpress.com/2010/01/10/4-stages-of-islamic-conquest/
Islam is not a religion but the exact opposite of Christianity and one of Satan’s prime weapons to destroy the Gospel. The prophecy in Genesis names it and shames it (God’s words, not mans):
“The angel of the LORD said to (Hagar) further, “Behold, you are with child, And you will bear a son; And you shall call his name Ishmael, Because the LORD has given heed to your affliction
“He will be a wild donkey of a man, His hand will be against everyone, And everyone’s hand will be against him; And he will live to the east of all his brothers.”
We cannot say were not warned and history has proved it and is still proving it. We have cast our pearls before swine and wring our hands in the pretence that we do not know that our pearls are being trampled on by Satan’s ground-troops.
Of course, there are refugees that are fleeing the bonds of this evil and mean no harm. But the fear that is at its roots silences many and those who do speak out against the evil are in mortal danger of being slaughtered, and indeed are, even by their own families.
It’s no longer PC and anyone who quotes Winston Churchill’s warning of a hundred years ago is now in danger of vilification:
“Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyzes the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.”
Why do we ignore his unapologetic warning, informed by direct personal experience of war and peace in the lands of the East? Many, including myself, have good relations with individual Muslims, some committed and some nominal just as in the Christian community. But we should not let that blind us to the Trojan Horse that is well ensconced in our lands. It is like the story of the King’s New Clothes, when we are told we are the ones who are blind. Treat us like those little boys, pat us on the head often enough and you think we will now be quiet. If we don’t speak up, as Jesus says, the very stones will shout out!
Churchill may not be a recognised prophet but he was a discerning observer of humanity and history when he said this:
“Well before the birth of modern Israel, its terror tactics and drive for world domination were felt. “Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step, and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it (Islam) has vainly struggled, THE CIVILISATION OF MODERN EUROPE MIGHT FALL, AS FELL THE CIVILIZATION OF ANCIENT ROME.” (My caps)
Science is clearly not holding back this tide any longer, not that any force except the return of Jesus will sort out the satanic mess the world is in and the false religion of scientism works hand in glove with all those who hate our Saviour.
We eventually recognised Nazism as the enemy of civilisation, and, thanks to God raising up Churchill, we survived that threat but fail to recognise the enemy that is now within – orthodox, devout followers of Mohammed and his false god, Allah.
Why are we so surprised and indignant that one hate spawns another as with Nazism and Communism last century and now the growth of anger from those who feel disenfranchised by the liberal elite? Even eighteen weeks of ‘Gilet Jaune’ rioting against Macron and his anti-France policies has so far failed to get western governments to change their death wish (log on to Gatestone Institute or Douglas Murray on ‘The Stange Death of Europe’ to see how morbid our societies have become).
The OT prophet Jeremiah pronounced this chilling prophecy which will one day, sooner rather than later, come to pass:
This is what the Lord says:
“I will stir up a destroyer against Babylon
and the people of Babylonia.
Foreigners will come and winnow her,
blowing her away as chaff.
They will come from every side
to rise against her in her day of trouble.
Jer 51:1 & 2.
All our protestations and opinions are in vain – Sola Scriptura . Maranatha