Two from the UK’s Spiked:
But Social Democracy is not simply suffering from a communication problem, which could be fixed by recruiting more volunteers or setting up more electoral huts. Instead it is time to accept what for many is a hard truth: Social Democracy as we’ve known it is no longer relevant. It has lost its political purpose and its support base. Instead of succumbing to the breast-beating of the metropolitan elites, devastated over how Sweden’s image as the world’s most tolerant country has been shattered, Swedes ought to put pressure on politicians to face up to their dearth of ideas and their inability to tap into what kind of future people aspire to.
PLUS:
Countless TV-news exposés have given the impression of vast neo-Nazi conspiracies intent on taking over the Scandinavian welfare state. That, at best, these far-right groups can organise a rally of 100 to 200 beer-drinking skinheads has never prevented journalists from painting them as an imminent threat to Swedish democracy.
Now that some of these yobs, who are a small minority in the Sweden Democrats party, have cleaned up their act, the same people who deplored their extra-parliamentary activities heap scorn on them for participating in the parliamentary process.
Never mind that their views are now exposed to public, critical debate, or that their party has publicly disassociated itself from racism. It is interesting to note that the same society that will bend over backwards to include extreme views on the other side of the cultural debate – namely militant imams – refuses to talk to the radicalised section of the indigenous population.
