Hopefully the Labor and Torie parties will take notice and start paying more attention to some of the issues for which the BNP has valid concerns (mass immigration, "Euro-ization") and prevent their more whackjob ideas (worshipping Hitler, resettling black and Asian British citizens in their ancestors' homelands) from gaining steam. Alex
Frankly, I'm not bothered about the BNP. This is because there isn't a snowball's chance in hell of many Scottish people voting for a "British" National Party, And it's not as if the BNP is reaching the level of le Pen, Fortuyn, Haider and so on. Five council seats hardly compares with 20% of the vote in a Presidential election. Also, the LPF collapsed this week from 26 seats to 8 seats in the Dutch Parliament elections this week. So it would be a misrepresentation to suggest there is some sort of rising tide of fascism in Europe. There may be some truth to say that many are getting bored with the centrist parties, but not more than this.
The BNP "has valid concerns"? No Alex, the BNP hijacks the extremes of a mainstream political issue, adds alarmist invective (by, for instance, falsely attaching the word "mass" to any discussion of Britain's immigration levels ) and then exploits the reaction that garners amongst the white working class. Neither extreme of the political spectrum "has" valid concerns. By definition, they concern themselves with the extremes of an issue, which, equally by definition, obviously lack validity.
I said the BNP has valid concerns, I didn't say they have valid solutions for these concerns (I really don't know one way or the other, but given what I do know about them I would kind of doubt it). The immigration levels in Europe, as well as Britain ceding its sovereignty to the EU (which it has restrained itself remarkably well from doing so far) are valid concerns. And Fortuyn wasn't a neo-Nazi (neither are Le Pen and Haider, but Fortuyn wasn't even close). Alex
I know what you said. And I said that the BNP (or any other party like it, at either end of the political spectrum) does not "have valid concerns" because they choose to appropriate aspects of a valid political issue that suit their extreme take on that issue, then intentionally add irrational, emotive invective and seek to excite popular resentment amongst what they see as their core audience by hawking these inflated, alarmist "concepts" to them. By definition, I said, such representations are not valid. They lack the basis in fact and/or sense to retain the validity that the original issue possessed. But you are right on your second point - Haider and Le Pen are just plain old fascists and racists.
First off the LPF isn't fascist and secondly their collapse had far more to do with voters tiring of their internal bickering than their policies.
Which supports my point further, ie fascist parties are not taking over, as some in the media would like to believe. If their policies were that great, internal bickering wouldn't matter so much.
I'm not sure how a non-fascist party losing support helps your case that fascism is on the decline. It seems rather irrelevant. Debatable, their internal bickering without the leadership of Fortuyn was so great that it caused the government to collapse. You can have ideas that the voters like but if you can't put them into action what's the point?
But I wasn't saying that the far-right was losing support (it would be pretty hard for them to lose support!). I was saying that they are not gaining significant amounts of support, as has been reported in the media. Furthermore, there is more chance of a swing to the left in some of the nations. The SSP (Scottish socialists) is by far the fastest-growing party in Scotland, for example.
Well Haider became PM of Austria and he made no attempt to massacre any ethnic minorities, so I don't think he's a neo-Nazi. Racist and fascist, maybe, but not a neo-Nazi--there's a difference between not liking a particular ethnic group, and wanting to kill everyone who belongs to it. Alex
I don't like Le Pen, but come on. If he had been elected PM/Premier/President/whatever the Froggies call it, do you honestly think he would have attempted to commit genocide? Alex
He advocates (less so now but he certainly condones by his followers) violence against French of Northern African descent. I lived in France for an extended period and let's just assume I know a lot more about this. You say tomayto, I say tomahto. I don't want to get into an argument about whether he's a neo-Fascist or a neo-Nazi, because I frankly can't stomach either one. Jorg Haider's on the list too, by the way.
Fair enough. I can't remember ever reading anything about him that said this, but if you lived in Froggieland I'll take your word for it. Alex
Haider isn't PM of Austria. The sucess of the right is more a result of voter apathy. The fact that LePen couldn't do anything in the Presidental runoff show the limitations the far-right has in Europe. Hard to call the Dutch LPF a far right party whenit's platform was the preservation of liberal Dutch values. It counted the countries minorities as amongst it's biggest supporters.