Professor Troll

In Hbl of Fre 5.02., p.17, Paul Lillrank had an I DAG column titled ”Rasism är ett brännmärke” which began with the claim ”Något alldeles oerhört har hänt i den politiska debatten. Feminister slätar över våldtäkter, förstår gärningsmännen och ignorerar offren i rädslan för att bli kallad rasist”.

Examples, or names of persons who did so he did, though, not give. In answer to this, there appeared already on the next day a full-page article in Hbl (of Lö 6.02., p.12) titled ”En brännmärkt halmgubbe”, in which a number of Swedish-Finnish better-known persons were expressing their dissatisfaction with Lillrank’s text, also stressing that they, at least, were unaware of any such development in the public debate. What they did NOT, though, was to express any criticism of the further course of Lillrank’s ”reasoning”, which goes, about, like this: that the accusation of being racist (= ”brännmärkning”) were a weapon which allows the Red-Green ones to cut off any undesirable political discussion, which were also a necessity for them, because ”[o]m brännmärken lades åt sidan skulle det bli uppenbart att kommunismen och facismen är två likartade varianter av totalitarism. Detta skulle vara förödande för den rödgröne storyn. Antirasismen håller vänsterns livslögn vid liv. Därför måste drabbade kvinnor och saklig debatt offras.”

In order to be able to categorize Communism and Fascism as equal, Lillrank introduces his very own political right-left scale: ”Höger-vänster-skalan inom politiken markerar förhållandet till staten”, in about that sense that the Extreme Right does not want any state at all (possibly represented by, say, members of the US National Rifle Association with truly unlimited ideas of personal freedom) while the Extreme Left (according to Lillrank) simply considers society and state apparatus as identical (in perhaps that sense that there should simply be no other life than life of the type ordained by the state apparatus). This results then in Lillrank’s claim that ”[f)acism är vänster …”. And the type of society which he seems to see as optimal is, on his scale, localized by ”[p]å högerkanten ligger liberal parlamentarisk demokrati, marknadsekonomi, och upplysningens tradition av förnuft och universella mänskliga rättigheter.”

Of course it is possible to point to similarities between the forms of Realsocialism and Fascism which we have seen in history: the necessity to motivate, organize and put into action large numbers of individuals who are not professional politicians will, human psychology being what it is, easily result in similar-looking phenomena. But there are of course also differences, even if Lillrank is seemingly choosing not to see them: where Fascism is encouraging imperialist expansion and, quite in general, mistreatment of members of other nations, ”inferior” ”races” and/or ”inferior” members of one’s own society (so-to-say ”kicking downwards”), the ideas of the Left are usually encouraging solidarity, also international solidarity, and general ”kicking upwards”. And, more specifically about Lillrank’s piece: the fact that the Left does not like the idea that the female half of mankind should have to live in fear of våldtäkt and general violence (a Feminist position) does NOT mean that the Left should suddenly begin to like that foreigners of any type (including other ”races”) should have to live in fear because of widespread suspicions that they were inclined to committing våldtäkt and similar acts of crime and violence (an anti-racist position). About the question how to prevent misdevelopment of well-meant (also Leftist) political ideas I have years ago formulated the principles of Freudarxism (which can be repeated on request). As to the political ideas favoured by Lillrank (see above), they have, up to now, resulted in a world where at present 62 individuals own as much as the poorer half of mankind together and where even the larger systems of the environment (such as climate, atmosphere and oceans) are deteriorating at a rapid rate – i.e. Lillrank’s ideas might be in need of some correction.

Finally, one could call it rather remarkable that a ”professor vid Aalto-universitetet”, i.e. somebody who should be used to expressing himself in text in generally acceptable ways was here making wild claims, also inventing new political classifications for, seemingly, the main purpose of black-painting the red-green part of the political spectrum. This in terms which occasionally reach up (or rather down?) to what we would usually expect from less academically-educated internet trolls.