from The Brussels Journal and Europe News:
In his sixth and final in a series of six essays, Peter Carl offers some practical insights and suggestions as to how the Counter-Jihad Movement and its leaders and supporters can best learn from Winston Churchill’s experiences and successes from World War II. The author concludes that, in light of Islamism’s own well-coordinated international implementation and its deeply local successes across both the West and the remainder of the world, failure on the part of the Counter-Jihad Movement to realize similar levels of effectiveness as those achieved by Islamists will not and can not bode well at all for a vulnerable Movement and the future of the West. Hope, however, may be found, argues Peter Carl, in implementing and pursuing jointly coordinated policies and efforts domestically and internationally within the Counter-Jihad Movement, based upon today’s practicalities and Churchill’s most successful insights and strategies.
Looking back over the past five essays, the difference between our own times and those of Winston Churchill become rather apparent. Today, among the Counter-Jihad Movement, in contrast to Churchill’s unity movement, there is at present much more disarray and far more polarization and strident points of view among those who wish to defend Western freedoms. As one member of the English Defence League (EDL) recently characterized these essays in the EDL forums, he described them as "[a] very hard hitting [series] that many [within the Movement] are not going to like but [which] needs to be said because it sums up the publics [sic] opinion of us.” More specifically and perhaps least easy to palate in these essays, as the EDL commenter alludes to, I have provided a detailed summary of the rather uncomfortable yet actual reasons for these views so uniformly held by the general public across the West.
The difference between Winston Churchill and some today who are entrusted with decisions in matters of politics and political messages is that for Churchill, as we saw so plainly in the previous essay (Part V), on the issue of defeating totalitarianism, it was never a question of ideological power moves, the "spin” of public relations management, or, perhaps, the marketing of a next book: Churchill understood the larger civilizational goal and the nuances of partisan politics all within the context of both Western history and, most importantly, the human psychological and emotional dimension. It was what he referred to as understanding things "in their true proportion.” Churchill also did not have to deal with the thorny issue (that causes confusion for individuals both outside and inside of the Movement) of an attempted defense of freedom and human rights ever being misunderstood among the general public as "religious bigotry” or an "attack on religion.” Defending against Nazi attacks on our Common Freedoms is obvious to us all, from each of us as individuals to the strident, vocal, and usually violent members of Antifa; however, as to Islamism, an attempt to defend against its inhumane treatment and supremacist denigration of the rights of women, girls, homosexuals, atheists, non-believers, apostates, Jews, Christians, Hindus, religious minorities, cartoonists, bloggers, criminals, human rights activists, and so many others that Islamism designates as societal "inferiors”, to be targeted and punished in the basest ways, is all too easily confused with being an attack on a religion or a religious minority. Churchill never had to face this very serious conundrum. We do. (...)
Surviving Islamism ... And Right/Left Politics: Churchill's Principle - Part VI: Back from the Brink
The Brussels Journal 20 January 2012
By Peter Carl
By Peter Carl
Looking back over the past five essays, the difference between our own times and those of Winston Churchill become rather apparent. Today, among the Counter-Jihad Movement, in contrast to Churchill’s unity movement, there is at present much more disarray and far more polarization and strident points of view among those who wish to defend Western freedoms. As one member of the English Defence League (EDL) recently characterized these essays in the EDL forums, he described them as "[a] very hard hitting [series] that many [within the Movement] are not going to like but [which] needs to be said because it sums up the publics [sic] opinion of us.” More specifically and perhaps least easy to palate in these essays, as the EDL commenter alludes to, I have provided a detailed summary of the rather uncomfortable yet actual reasons for these views so uniformly held by the general public across the West.
The difference between Winston Churchill and some today who are entrusted with decisions in matters of politics and political messages is that for Churchill, as we saw so plainly in the previous essay (Part V), on the issue of defeating totalitarianism, it was never a question of ideological power moves, the "spin” of public relations management, or, perhaps, the marketing of a next book: Churchill understood the larger civilizational goal and the nuances of partisan politics all within the context of both Western history and, most importantly, the human psychological and emotional dimension. It was what he referred to as understanding things "in their true proportion.” Churchill also did not have to deal with the thorny issue (that causes confusion for individuals both outside and inside of the Movement) of an attempted defense of freedom and human rights ever being misunderstood among the general public as "religious bigotry” or an "attack on religion.” Defending against Nazi attacks on our Common Freedoms is obvious to us all, from each of us as individuals to the strident, vocal, and usually violent members of Antifa; however, as to Islamism, an attempt to defend against its inhumane treatment and supremacist denigration of the rights of women, girls, homosexuals, atheists, non-believers, apostates, Jews, Christians, Hindus, religious minorities, cartoonists, bloggers, criminals, human rights activists, and so many others that Islamism designates as societal "inferiors”, to be targeted and punished in the basest ways, is all too easily confused with being an attack on a religion or a religious minority. Churchill never had to face this very serious conundrum. We do. (...)
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