Maybe Breiviki’s mother made him commit terrorism? I blame the Broken Society!

We also don’t know what part, if any, his political views actually played in this atrocity

A statement as absurdly self-serving as this is actually quite offensive, given how important it is to understand what happened in Norway in order to stop it happening again. If Phillips is prepared to warp debate on this subject just to save her own blushes then that really does tell you everything you need to know.

Typical Daily Mail really. Convinced they’re on the the moral high ground when actually, they’re in the gutter.

I’m not sure what one can really say about what might motivate a nutter like Breivik. Whatever politics were involved they must only be a small part of the story, really just a framework for his madness. It really is not right at this stage for anyone to start making political points based on what little we know.

For me the only reasonable thing to say of him, along with the Red Brigades, PIRA, Ulster loyalist thugs, jihadist thugs etc, is fuck him, the bloody shitty, murdering, inadequate specimen of low scum.

I’d like to see his name less and his picture never, as he is obviously bent on seeking publicity and hero status. We should deny him his wishes, especially on this website where I tire of seeing that awful picture of him.

In a Melanie-Phillips-moon-logic sort of way, this approach isn’t actually inconsistent with her approach to Muslims who commit acts of terrorism.

Remember the 7/7 perpetrators’ videos saying how British foreign policy was a major factor in their actions? We could ignore their political views too. They had nothing to do with it. It’s all about them being Muslims and wanting to take over the world.

It seems that if you’re convinced the Muslims are gonna get us, you can ignore any terrorist’s stated motivations if they make you feel like you might have to examine your own actions.

Mel says: “Some of the comments about me that the Guardian allowed on its website below Milne’s article were vicious.”

Does she not read comments in The Mail? The Guardian is a pussy cat in comparison!

Agree with Cherub–I for one refuse to mention that cnut by name.

Also, agree with Sunny–rather sad but hardly unexpected to see Phillips dissembling all over the place. How can she stand the cognitive dissonance? Now, in the future when she talks about “Islamic terrorism”, everyone can simply say, yes, but we don’t know if their Islamic-extremist views played any part in their terrorism.

“I’m now going to buy the Daily Mail and frame that article.”

Good man.

I was quite pleased that Anders Behring Breivik’s manifesto praised the extremist views of Mad Mel as inspiring him.

Surely, the article is asking the wrong question? Perhaps, it should have been Did Phillips’ extremist views play a part in terrorism?

“I was quite pleased that Anders Behring Breivik’s manifesto praised the extremist views of Mad Mel as inspiring him”

That seems like an odd thing to be pleased about.

As I can gather he has been estranged from his father for many years, so maybe he does hate his father?

She shouldn’t be allowed to get away with this lie either:

“I have always stressed the distinction between peaceful Muslims and Islamic extremism”

Here is an example of her stressing that distinction, by thundering on about “The moral depravity of the Arabs”.

All of them apparently.

Melanie manages to have her cake and eat it here, too…

The claim that ‘blood is on my hands’ can so easily translate into someone seeking my own blood. Heaven forbid that should happen — but if it did, there would be a direct causal link with those who have whipped up this wicked firestorm.

So, if somebody attacked Melanie, that would for def be directly linked to people criticising her on the internet. Yet, any link between this mass-killer and his self-declared politics is entirely coincidental.

Note also the hilarity of Mel accusing others of trying to “bully her into silence”… In the pages of the nation’s second best-selling daily newspaper.

Sunny

“We should never take at face-value what terrorists say or claim, even if they’ve spent years discussing those views, writing them, and planning for an attack.”

No, MP is clearly not saying that. She’s saying we should not rush to judgement, and that we should not take Breivik’s statements and claims at face-value – yet! His motivations may well be more complex than at first they appear.

“When Muslims commit terrorism… we know they are influenced by their religion.”

Yes, if they cite the Koran, which is their sacred text – and so to be obeyed absolutely. Moreover, Islam is a comprehensive (if mistaken) religio-political ideology. Melanie Phillips’s writings are not a sacred text or a source text for an ideology, and there’s no evidence that Breivik regarded her writings as such.

“When far-right terrorists kill, we should not be silent on the issues they raised. However, if Muslims kill others, then we should ask why their terrorism-inciting extremist views are unchallenged.”

You are conflating “the issues they raised” with “terrorism-inciting extremist views”. Terrorists can raise important issues that need to be discussed – eg the problems of multiculturalism (Breivik) or Western foreign policy (Islamists); but these issues are not the same as, and are quite separate from, their belief in the use of terror as a political method. The issues they raise are their ends; the use of terror is the means.

Sunny, I am not sure that the “Lessons” you are drawing from the words attributed to Melanie Phillips would be drawn by a disinterested observer. There seems to be particular confusion in your mind over the difference between reading what someone says and attributing factuality to it.
As a stylistic aside, you will be more convincing if you cull the exclamation marks.
Regards.

@8 – “Jailhouselawyer” ” I was quite pleased that Anders Behring Breivik’s manifesto praised the extremist views of Mad Mel as inspiring him.

Surely, the article is asking the wrong question? Perhaps, it should have been Did Phillips’ extremist views play a part in terrorism? ”

Were you also pleased that the mass murderer also praised that great figure of the left, George Orwell, those great thinkers and defenders of liberty Locke and Mill as well as many others.

This is really quite an appalling post.

Melanie Phillips is clearly not a popular person on the left. There is a lot of what she says with which I fundamentally disagree. She overstates a threat of Islamic infilatration into this country. However she is not an extremist by any proper definition of the word. That women in the USA – Pamela Geller – now she is an extremist. Melanie Phillips is simply not in that area.

She is a conservative (with a small ‘c’) commentator and whilst her analysis of our civilisation and her drawing to attention the dubious moral relativism often practised by the left may irk many who read LibCon – she is not the only such commentator who appears widely in the printed and online media. It is also important in a democracy to have educated, considered well written views out there for all to consider.

Why then is she so much singled out (particularly it seems by Sunny)? Is it I wonder because of her uncompromising support for the Jews of Israel?

When a Muslim carries out an atrocity, it is immediately ascribed to ideology (be it religious, political or a combination of both).

When a neo-Fascist does the same, immediately we see the ‘decent’ right falling over themselves to pin his actions on mental illness, and denying that the ideology that they themselves have done a large part in pushing was either a cornerstone or at least a substantial contributory factor in what led him to commit his crime.

As for Phillips, I remember what the journalist Edward Pearce said many years ago about a similar left-to-far-right columnist, Paul Johnson:

“Paul Johnson isn’t a loose cannon; he’s a low-calibre gun on a swivel mount. When he dies, they’ll bury him with an exclamation mark through his heart.”

“Paul Johnson isn’t a loose cannon; he’s a low-calibre gun on a swivel mount. When he dies, they’ll bury him with an exclamation mark through his heart.”

Lol

How to think like Melanie Philips:

1) Drink a gallon of black coffee
2) Imagine that everyone else in the world is a gay, Marxist Muslim who longs to destroy Israel.

@ 15 Paul D

“Why then is she so much singled out (particularly it seems by Sunny)? Is it I wonder because of her uncompromising support for the Jews of Israel?”

Um, I suspect because it’s hard to think of anyone as high-profile as Phillips who spouts quite as much ludicrous and offensive drivel. Well, Littlejohn of course, but he gets singled out too. The point is that most other major conservative commentators are far less over-the-top.

Why the word “Jews” in that sentence, btw, given that you could have just as easily said “support for Israel”? Is there a point that you’re trying to make?

@ 9. vimothy “That seems like an odd thing to be pleased about”.

Not when she thinks she is the voice of reason. Had he cited Sunny instead she would be in a jubliant mood.

@ 15. Paul D I find nothing wrong with somone admiring the writings of left and right. But for her attack on Sunny I would not have mentioned her connection to a terrorist act. I don’t like her for her attacks on me and prisoners votes.

While I think that Mel is indeed somewhat ”Mad” – on the whole my sympathies lie with her in this area. Not because of anything she’s said in that article or recently – she’s not particularly good here – but I’ve not been impressed with the whole ”witch hunt” …. like where George Galloway the other night even implicated Jon Gaunt alongside Mel as being culpable. Jon Gaunt (as far as I’m aware) has never got involved with any ”Eurabia” like talk.

”Londonistan” was a very dodgy book, but going after the authors personally is not the thing to do in my opinion. Some of the hate blogs deserve it. Gates of Vienna and Fjordeman I think deserve to be lambasted, but this general sweep of all right wingers is too much.
Seumas Milne was poor, and the Independent fingered Thilo Sarrazin for his book ”Germany Abolishes Itself”.
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/10948/

And there’s Jai over on Pickled Politics working up a head of steam over links between the EDL and Norway, and taking no criticism (deleting unwanted comments).
http://www.pickledpolitics.com/archives/13387

I think one has to be careful not to go too overboard with the ”Anti-Fascist” conspiracy theories.

@ Damon

I agree that people are getting a bit opportunistic here (e.g. the links with the EDL; Breivik might have had EDL supporters as Facebook friends but that doesn’t mean they endorsed his later actions). But Phillips is being attacked for comments she has made publically. Is it wrong to argue back?

@21 Damon

“”Londonistan” was a very dodgy book, but going after the authors personally is not the thing to do in my opinion.”

I’m struggling here. I’m quite happy to admit when someone I normally respect writes a stinker. Think of Salman Rushdie’s sham adoption of Islam, or the Hari affair. If I’m not to criticise the auther, then who?

Chaise Guevara and Cherub, there were lots of examples in my post. There’s several links in that Spiked article alone.
One of them titled ”The ideological roots of the Oslo atrocity” starts off like this:

Since the attacks carried out in Oslo last Friday, there has been a concerted campaign by the bourgeois establishment in Europe to deny that the murderous rampage conducted by Anders Behring Breivik was motivated by anti-Islamist prejudices with deep roots in mainstream politics.

Admittidly, that’s some rather obscure communists, but that mood has been everywhere hasn’t it? Pointing the fingure for Norway at anyone who has ever spent ”too much” time focussing on anything to do with muslims or immigration.

It is fair to go after Phillips and authors for their output, but I don’t agree with the excitable connections everyone has been making over Norway, and particularly when those links are tenuous at best.
People from UAF could be accused the same way if some random person went out and killed a BNP member. But they would not be to blame, the killer would be.

Who’s going after Phillips “personally”? That would be to abuse her looks, dress sense, family life – anything that is personal. What people are castigating are her wacky opinions, style of crazed hysteria and lack of proportion. The end of civlisation is always about five minutes away, according to her.

FR @ 12:

“So, if somebody attacked Melanie, that would for def be directly linked to people criticising her on the internet. Yet, any link between this mass-killer and his self-declared politics is entirely coincidental. ”

No, she is not trying to have it both ways, because the two scenarios you mention here are not symmetrical.

If (which is unlikely) some leftist or Islamist thug attacked Melanie having read claims on leftist websites that she has “blood on her hands”, there would be a direct causal link between the malicious propaganda and the attack. And if there is a direct causal link, then there is at least some culpability.

However, there is no direct causal link between Breivik’s killing spree and anything written by Melanie Phillips or any other major UK columnist. No direct causal link means no culpability. That said, we may yet find that there is a direct causal link between Breivik’s murderous actions and some malicious propaganda he had read on some fringe and extreme anti-Islamic website.

You’re right in most of this article except where you say Melanie Phillips is wrong to label him a psychopath. Umm… I think there is a very good chance he is. Nobody with a shred of normal human empathy would have the stomach to spend two hours gunning down scores of teenagers.

Sunny,

Lesson 1: “What goes around comes around”.

Your evident glee at trying to connect the views of Melanie Phillips with the killings in Oslo do you no credit whatsoever. Your repeat articles about her show you are hunting with the pack instead of thinking with your brain.

You’ve raised raised your head above the parapet to kick both Melanie Phillips and Rod Liddle when they were vulnerable. So don’t come crying to LibCon if they highlight to a mass audience any embarrassing comments or articles on this site which leave you prone to wide spread ridicule. They and the old tale of the ‘blogger who lives witty his mum’ could become what defines you rather than your prodigeous output.

PS: We’re still waiting for your articles linking Gandhi, Frank Field and George Orwell with the killings in Oslo.

Stop picking on old ferret face Sunny, leave the poor confused old bint alone.

Yeah I am waiting for Frank Field to be linked to, though I cant possible think what can make that man more right wing. Hehehe, I love the righties constantly banging on about old Field being used as if he is a left wing firebrand…as for Orwell, he has found a home amongst the tinfoil hat wearing right wing (poor sod!)from which this man who commited these vile acts surely belonged too.

I feel the Breivik links have become too Phillips-centric (with no mention of Jezza Clarkson for days now) – can we not widen the net slightly so that other people can be accused of being indirectly culpable for the blood bath?

As a matter of interest does anybody know if Sir Alex Ferguson is in the manifesto?
http://www.funnyblogger.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/funny-pics-of-alex-ferguson.jpeg

cultural marxism eh, bloody hell.

…but I want to insult Mel some more before this story ceases to be of any interest. WAHWAHWAH

DAMMIT! It is getting too mel-centric, people might think us lefties are obessed with her, well screw that!…BRING ME THE HEAD OF CLARKSON!

In defence of Anders Behring Breivik
http://jailhouselawyersblog.blogspot.com/2011/08/in-defence-of-anders-behring-breivik.html

I’m coming to the conclusion that the loopier end of the anti-Muslim right are incapable of sincere reasoned argument. I can’t for the life in me understand why I never realised this before. It’s not that they are suffering from misconceptions about how the world works. The truth is, they invent ludicrous arguments to support a series of preconceived ideas, e.g. “Islam is a threat.” Adopt a position, and defend it with whatever hatemongering specious verbiage you can muster.

*shakes head sadly*

No, she is not trying to have it both ways, because the two scenarios you mention here are not symmetrical.

Uh, okay pilgrim, nobody worth taking seriously is saying that Mel livestreamed her hate-beams into the killer’s mind and implanted a lust for murder. What they’re saying is that a) She and others like her are significant contributors to an atmosphere of relentless, paranoid alarm and demonisation that feeds hate groups and extremists and that b) When challenged, all of them are massively downplaying and misrepresenting their own previous statements and playing the victim card in an incredibly slimy way.

So, the situations are not symmetrical. On the other hand, if that’s the extent of the argument here, I’m not buying it.

Of course, saying “This particular individual has blood on her hands” is far more specific than Mel et al’s frequent cries “The entire western political/media elite are engaged in a vast conspiracy with the enemies of Christendom to enslave us under a totalitarian alien empire, and something should be done about it”.

Let’s not pretend that the two represent some wholly distinct species of argument though, shall we? After all, Mel herself names enormous numbers of people as part of her vast, impurifying conspiracy of Mohammedan domination. Is she inviting violence against named politicians, journalists and celebrities?

If she’s not, then she should really be pointed and laughed at. If It’s fine for me to pin responsibility for murder on the words of others, but it’s unacceptable, irresponsible, hatemongering incitement when others do the same to me is really the totality of her argument here, then it is – for real, yo – attempting to have your cake and eat it. In about the most childish, stroppy way imaginable.

Confused re comment 29 :

You forgot Gandhi. Do you hace any smartypants comments about his supposed links to the killings in Oslo? Sunny doesn’t. Why is that?

There’s a fabulous comment under the Mad Mel piece, which begins, “To all those oh so self-righteous hippocrites of the left, those “engaged” woolly “liberals”, just remember who sowed the seeds of “activism”, and who sowed the seeds of this tragedy by censoring debate on anything and everything that they didn’t think was PC enough for their liking.” Oh yes, it’s the old, “no one is allowed to talk about” (immigrants, Muslims, etc), even though its a obvious even to a dolt that everyone is. Remember these? Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam And The American Left (2004) by David Horowitz, The Enemy At Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11 (2007) by Dinesh D’Souza, The Grand Jihad: How Islam and the Left Sabotage America (2010) by Andrew C. McCarthy. Huge best sellers, and their ideas touted by right-wing bloggers around the world. But Breivik did it coz the PC lefties stopped people talking about evil Muslims etc! Amazing.

Kojak @35:

“You forgot Gandhi. Do you hace any smartypants comments about his supposed links to the killings in Oslo?”

What links are these? The bits where Brevik says his approach won’t work against Muslims because they’re barbarians. Top links, those.

Whups. Should have been a question mark on the second-last sentence there.

FR @ 34:

“She and others like her are significant contributors to an atmosphere of relentless, paranoid alarm and demonisation that feeds hate groups and extremists…”

Vague and weasel words – “significant contributors to an atmosphere…” coupled with exaggeration – “relentless paranoid alarm and demonisation” – and an unproven empirical claim – “that feeds hate groups and extremists…” when said undefined hate groups/extremists are perfectly capable of feeding themselves.

“Let’s not pretend that the two represent some wholly distinct species of argument though, shall we?”

But they aren’t identical, are they? ‘Something should be done about x’ and
‘M has blood on her hands because she said something should be done about x repeatedly and then B…’ are different sorts of claim. One is a warning or analysis, the other is an attribution of causality and culpability – and an attribuition which is at odds with English law and with discussions of responsibility going back to the ancient Greeks…

Melanie Phillips is no more responsible for Breivik’s killing spree than left-wing journalists were responsible for the actions of the Angry Brigade, Baader-Meinhof or the Red Brigades. Right or left, there’s just no causal connexion, so there’s no culpability..

However, if anyone had claimed that those left-wing journalists had blood on their hands because they shared some concerns with the terrorists, that they were significant contributors to an “atmosphere of relentless paranoid alarm” about the oppressiveness of capitalism that had fed the extremist groups…Well, that could look like incitement…

Melanie Phillips is no more responsible for Breivik’s killing spree than left-wing journalists were responsible for the actions of the Angry Brigade, Baader-Meinhof or the Red Brigades.

Yes, and I’ve said so here and elsewhere repeatedly, to the point where I’m starting to automatically assume that anyone still loudly defending Mel from non-existent accusations of totally brainwashing killers with her magical hate powers just isn’t being honest.

Still, let’s imagine these hypothetical lefty journalists, if they were Mel today. They’d still be free to babble enthusiastically and portentously about the Man and his evil ways, or about the Fascist Insect That Preys Upon The Life Of The People*, or all those other lunatic enthusiasms. Nobody would infringe upon their right to free speech, even if it involved violent rhetoric relating to extremist conspiracy theories.

On the other hand, you can bet your last fiver that somebody would ask them about it if they appeared on Question Time. If they were employed by the country’s second best-selling daily newspaper, advertisers might say things like “I’m not sure we want to associate our product with a columnist who believes the government is evil and must be destroyed”. Their appearances on Radio 4 might include pointed questions about the number of people who believe that who also do things like shoot coppers or blow up post offices; if they responded with even wackier conspiracy theories about their own oppression, they’d be regarded as nutters.

In short, if a lefty 60′s journalist repeatedly claimed in print that LBJ was a genocidal Gorgon heading a fascist empire of death, for instance, they would be treated as extremists, and the subject of their extremism would be on-topic in every interview. If they did it in the 21st Century, they’d probably get lots of criticism on internet blogs. And so, here we are.

Vague and weasel words – “significant contributors to an atmosphere…” coupled with exaggeration – “relentless paranoid alarm and demonisation”

If you’re not familiar with Mel’s output, feel free to Google. I was under the impression that anyone contributing to a thread on her work would be familiar with her habit of accusing great swathes of politicians, hacks and celebs of conspiring in all manner of baleful anti-western schemes.

And an unproven empirical claim – “that feeds hate groups and extremists…” when said undefined hate groups/extremists are perfectly capable of feeding themselves.

Fuck a duck man, people can create their own drugs and pornography but as a society, we don’t generally accord much respect to drug dealers or pornographers. Creating and disseminating conspiracist propaganda about liberal-jihadist plots against the populace isn’t an admirable behaviour for a pamphleteer or a blogger, let alone a mainstream journalist… And remember, the Mail and the Spectator are the mainstream right-wing press outlets, and they’re carrying material that wouldn’t look out of place in a Nick Griffin speech. You don’t have to be the UAF to think this is bad news.

*Genuine quote from that wacky era – Symbionese Liberation Army, kidnappers of Patty Hearst.

Interesting piece in Foreign Policy by someone else who was cited by Breivik.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/08/01/a_murderers_manifesto_and_me

The other lesson I take from Breivik is also a theme of much of my writing on global demographics. Societies that are, or that perceive themselves to be, in demographic decline are potentially dangerous, as fear of being outbred and overrun by “others” awakens reactionary sentiment. In the United States during the early decades of the last century, fears of “race suicide,” voiced by figures ranging from Theodore Roosevelt to Margaret Sanger, led to the horrors of the eugenics movement, to the revival of the Ku Klux Klan, and to the closing of America’s immigration gate until the 1960s.

Today, I see a similar dynamic unfolding in the United States and to a much greater extent in Europe and Russia, as low birth rates combine with high rates of immigration to produce a stew of racial fear and resentment that brings with it a resurgence of nationalism, fundamentalism, and a deep backlash against multicultural and progressive values.

5cc regarding comment 37:

Gandhi was mentioned in Breivik’s statement. So why no article trying to link him to the motivation of the killer? It’s a ‘Mel-fest’ over here.

Does no one else find it funny how Sunny has run 3 or 4 stories linking Melanie Phillips with the dreadful killings in Oslo, yet when she mentions this on her blog Sunny starts off this article with: “The Daily Mail columnist Melanie Phillips has written an article attacking me today……….” Ah, didums.

Sunny, for a blogger you have a very thin skin – Melanie Phillips is the one who is being polite in responding to your frequent jibes. She isn’t “attacking you” – though perhaps that is what you secretly would like her to do.

Give it up, Hadel. You’re toast.

Don’t mess with Melanie, she’s Premier League. You’re not even Irn-Bru Third.

The writer of the above seems to be obsessed with Philips – it’s bordering on stalking at the moment.

@24 damon

Do you really think that citing “Spiked” will be taken seriously? Do you know anything about them?

Kojak @42:

“Gandhi was mentioned in Breivik’s statement. So why no article trying to link him to the motivation of the killer? It’s a ‘Mel-fest’ over here.”

Heh. Do you not see the difference between a mention that talks about how Ghandi’s approach wouldn’t work with Muslims because they’re barbarians and reproducing an article by Phillips used to support the idea of a secret government plot to import immigrants?

45. Cherub. Yes I know plenty about them. But I only linked to one article about an interview with Thilo Sarrazin, who was besmirched in an editorial in the Independent, which said this:

Across Europe, the far right has been growing in strength in recent years, propelled by a strong current of Islamophobia. This poisonous mindset is sometimes stoked by ostensibly respectable political groups like Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party in Holland, or mainstream voices like the former Bundesbank member, Thilo Sarrazin, who has written a best-seller called Germany Does Away With Itself.

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/leading-articles/leading-article-a-massacre-born-from-a-poisonous-mindset-2319939.html

I linked to an interview he did in answer to these critics. That’s all.

idiotic piece, why waste space with this rubbish, breivik is an adult, he’s responsible otherwise your all guilty of hatred and incitement to someone.

It is always good to see the odious Melanie Phillips squirm. She made a deliberately provocative, racist point about “The moral depravity of the Arabs” and now is trying desperately to rewrite history.

Charles 49

The Arabs, in general, ARE a pretty depraved bunch, didn’t you know?

Their racism echoes that of the Nazis and it’s all underpinned with the teachings of the Koran and the comments and commands in the hadiths.

You really should check your facts before rushing into print and making a fool of yourself.

Yeah, what 5cc said…and btw my smartypants are my best pants, better then my skidmark ones.

What a pity that Sinny and “Liberal” Conspiracy censor ant serious attempt to dispute with them. Clearly they have, politically, far more in common with Breivik than Melanie has.

@52 Theres a load of deleted comments we don’t know about? Or are you so thick you can’t tell the difference between censorship and criticism?

I dunno -Fascists used to be inspired by philosophers like Nietzsche & Plato, nowadays they’re reduced to quoting hacks like Mad Mel & Mark Steyn.

We just aren’t producing the same quality of fascist these days

Fascism quite obviously doesn’t work so the intelligent are unlikely to join. However there are still plenty of idiots and the “left” has been happy to welcome ecofascists and more traditional ones like Sunny, into their fold.

You are a tw** Sunny but then you seem to be a liberal rather than a logical intellectual. Says it all

You got owned!!!! you are Melanie’s Bitch now…..

Melanie Phillips has her own agenda as evdenced in her now defunct Spectator blog which took every opportunity to paint the worst image of the arabs and praise unreservedly the actions of extreme right wing Israeli groups. Fortunately the Spectator realised that her message promoted racism.