But then most of our rights came after campaigns that didn't avoid that. Sometimes it has been necessary to force changes through illegal and extra-parliamentary means.
The world is simply not black and white when it comes to these types of issues.
Not the case this time, definitely not good reasons for that (as I said even the violence of the Suffragettes cannot be justified if we look retroactively, despite the fact that the rights of women were well under those enjoyed by the blacks today). The biggest problem is that this kind of discretionary, violent, tactics has been actually widely used by the progressives in the last 25 years, ultimately justified via 'justice' and anti-racism, even when knowing well that this block academic freedom, destroy careers of otherwise law-abiding citizens etc. Finally, it is actually the norm, leading often to 'witch hunt' (and worse) in the name of justice.
Take for example the case of Charles Murray, defended by Sam Harris in one of his
podcasts. Reasonable discussion in my view. And yet, almost immediately, the ‘progressive’ censors started the
usual intellectual terrorism (which incites also the violence of their supporters by the way) meant to basically destroy all their opponents with all costs, all the usual ‘arsenal’ is there, claims of pseudo-science, alleged justification for racism and so on.
And as usual they bring in their support the part of Academia which is on their side, see this is what real science say you ‘haters’; the problem is that in this case they do not have a large control over it so the truth immediately
resurfaced, it turns out that the progressive expert argues rather that we have to act as if the influence of genetics is minimal in determining the IQ, in the name of stopping possible racism, when in fact we do not know exactly how much is genetics and how much is culture (Murray and Harris do not deny this either). As side note the same is valid in the case of the often heard accusations of neurosexism, in reality the brains of males and females are sufficiently different to recognize that, with genetics playing definitely a role, albeit, again, we do not know how much (yet some progressives present facts as if culture IS the overwhelming factor in shaping how the brains work).
Things are much easier for them in the part of Academia they almost totally control (some way before the 1990s when postmodernist progressivism gained a strong traction, the islamic studies for example were already ruined by the advent of Saidism, from Edward Said, after 1978), History and the Middle Eastern studies are showcase examples here. A massive offensive has been launched in the last 25-30 years purporting to show that quite many of the old acceptations of history were in fact at best ‘eurocentrist’ (if not ‘’Orientalist’ or outright racist, something with a much more negative connotation, deserving censorship), unfortunately today the old generation of scholars opposing such views, intimidated, has significantly diminished influence, especially in America (a Toby E. Huff et altri are still there but they are also quite old now).
As expected the rhetorical arsenal is rife, truth is only subservient to politics, something easier to do given that they can cite each other’s works without much opposition, so dissent can be easily met with ‘crackpottery’ (by the way if you read in the preface that the scope of the book is to expose, or correct, ‘orientalism’ or ‘eurocentrism’ you can be sure of strong political biases, the obvious political goals are now presented in prefaces, sometimes extolling Said’s legacy, sort of paying homage to Lenin, Stalin, Mao in the old communist books)
Ricardo Duchesne has documented some of these outrageous excesses here:
https://www.unb.ca/faculty-staff/directory/_resources/pdf/arts-sj/duchesne-multiculturalparti.pdf
https://www.unb.ca/faculty-staff/directory/_resources/pdf/arts-sj/duchesne-multiculturalpartii.pdf
I can offer more examples, one hears now that the Ottoman Empire was an active participant in the European Renaissance, the Ottoman ruling class was early-modern in the European sense in the 16-18 centuries, the Ottomans also experienced an ‘Age of Exploration’, even that the West owe Enlightenment and Modernity to the Islamic world and so on; all of them staying actually on unwarranted generalizations, from a few cases to sweeping, unjustified, conclusions leading to ‘see the Ottomans were only slightly different’. One can accept that these new studies enriched the field but in no case their strong conclusions follow from evidence.
Not ultimately I have to mention the mantra that jihad was not important for the attacks against the infidels (obviously no one rational can argue that aggressive jihad was literally continuous, but it was definitely a common occurrence until the era when it became basically impossible, in the 18-19th centuries). The notion has a long history, accepted even by many of the old orientalists after WW2, before the advent of Saidism, but it was ‘progressivism’ which greatly raised it to new heights, to the extent that we cannot even talk of aggressive jihad now.
For example professor Eamon Gearon assure us in the TGC course ‘Turning Points in Middle Eastern History’, episode ‘Second siege of Vienna 1683’, a mainstream view by the way, that
‘As for the muslim Ottomans march on Vienna there was certainly a lot of talk about the battle between Christendom and Islam, although not generally on the Ottoman side. The promise of plunder appears as being incentive enough for the Turkish side, without the need to sell it as a religious war. In Central and Western Europe by contrast most talk did revolve of the incoming war as a religious clash’.
What? The Turks could do it [and did it] without holy war, at that time? This is only if one totally ignores the nature of Islam itself and the data from that time. In reality the Islamic religious motif is at least on equal foot with the desire to acquire wealth & power and so on (not to mention that Muhammad preached that the war against the infidels is justified only if it is waged for the sake of religion alone).
In point of fact Islam is the only major religion which has very detailed instructions on how to divide the spoils of war in its holy book (establishing the rewards for the participants to jihad), sadly Islam and acquisition of wealth (from infidels) are actually intrinsically linked. Additionally we must never forget that in the Middle Ages people were extremely religious, heavily indoctrinated from childhood, improbable that jihad was that secondary as it is implied here. It is true, some soldiers thought strongly at booty, something heavily criticized at the time, but the religious motif was always there close, intrinsically linked with the desire to acquire wealth and greatly increasing aggressivity even in naturally peaceful persons.
Much closer to the truth is Pal Fodor (historian from Hungary, largely rejecting the progressive narrative):
It is wrong to pit this position [my note: holy war had primacy] against the stance of some (often criticised at the time) that regarded the holy war as an opportunity for looting [desire for booty was primary, holy war a dstant second, the position of the professor]. The two complemented, rather than opposed, one another. Indeed, pillaging was a concomitant and legitimate act of jihad, provided that the rules of distribution were observed. When, therefore, the rulers encouraged the population to take part in the wars called gaza [my note: the name of offensive Jihad in the Ottoman Empire, a communal duty of the Islamic state, although not all those capable to carry arms were required to fight] and jihad [the name for defensive Jihad in the Ottoman Empire, binding for all those capable to fight] by promising prospective spoils, they acted in a perfectly legitimate manner, in consideration of the interests of religion, state and individual alike
.
Secondly, we have hard data which shows quite clearly that the sultans considered themselves as champions of Jihad (see for example Suleiman the Magnificent and so on) so we can safely conclude that Jihad was one of the main factors for expansion throughout the period when Jihad was possible. In the specific case of the attack on Vienna in 1683 however one can easily show that the professor’s stance is completely wrong, no matter the situation at other times. Indeed at that time the Kadizadeli 'return to the basics' (very intolerant) interpretation of Islam, via the preacher Vani Mehmed Efendi, still had a huge influence over the sultan Mehmed IV; contemporary chronicles, like that of Hajj Ali Efendi for example about the 1672 campaign in Podolia, say that Mehmed IV saw himself primarily as a ghazi warrior striving in the path of Allah, enthusiastically seeking new conquests for religion, Vani Mehmed Efendi preached large parts of the troops extolling the virtues of jihad etc, in fact the purely military reasons and acquisition of wealth were at most on the same level with the religious motif.
Honestly I'm appalled by the ease with which these professors talk about the Mongol belief that they had mandate from Heaven to conquer all Earth (driving them to action) or about the 'wicked' Christian version of holy war (leading to the Crusades) whilst sweeping jihad under the rug (for which there is actually much more support in the Islamic traditions, before the 19th century jihad was almost a 6th pillar of Islam).
I could continue much longer, for example I think one can make a good case, at least as a legitimate direction of research, against the stance that ‘dhimma went well’, along the lines (although not in entirety) presented by Bat Ye’or in her academic books on dhimmis (‘The Dhimmis…’ and ‘The Decline of Eastern Christianity…’ only, nothing about what she wrote about the present, don’t mention please again the progressive nonsense that I defend someone who is discredited because of her books ‘Eurabia…’ and so on).
I will stop here, I think it is enough to show that the current version of ‘progressivism’ is nothing like the best hope of Humanity, on the contrary it is a huge failure, resembling the Stalinist purges. But as I said I think that progressivism can do much better than that. Let’s only hope that Reason will prevail. Optimistically soon.
