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Opinion: The nationalist wave in the U.S. and Europe that liberals still dont get
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-nationalist-wave-in-the-us-and-europe-that-liberals-still-dont-get-2017-03-20
Far-right’s positions are being adopted by centrist parties
Geert Wilders, the nationalist candidate for prime minister of the Netherlands, lost that country’s election last week. This has brought comfort to those who opposed him and his views on immigration and immigrants. It is odd that they should be comforted.
A decade ago, it would have been difficult to imagine that someone of Wilders’s views would have won any seats in parliament. The fact that his party is now the second-largest in the Netherlands, rather than an irrelevancy, should be a mark of how greatly both the Netherlands and Euro-American civilization have changed — and an indication that this change is not temporary.
Indeed, the second-place showing of the nationalists in the Netherlands is accompanied by an interesting phenomenon. The center-right has shifted a number of its positions toward the nationalists. As we approach the French and German elections, a similar process is under way. While the right may lose elections, its positions are being adopted, at least in part, by centrist parties.
Wilders’ views are coarser than most, to be sure. He called Moroccans “pigs” and advocated closing mosques in the Netherlands. But more alarming is the inability of his enemies to grasp why Wilders has risen, and their tendency to dismiss his followers as simply racists. This comforts his critics. They feel morally superior. But paradoxically they are strengthening both Wilders and his allies in Europe and the United States.
...
For the well-to-do, this is a drama acted out of sight. The affluent do not live with poor immigrants, and if they know them at all, it is as servants. The well-off can afford a generous immigration system because they do not pay the price. The poor, who live in neighborhoods where immigrants live, experience economic, linguistic, and political dislocation associated with immigration, because it is the national values they were brought up with that are being battled over. It is not simply jobs at stakes. It is also their own identities as Dutchmen, Americans, or Poles that are at stake. They are who they are, and they battle to resist loss or weakening of this identity.
...
In other words, the nationalism issue has become a football in a growing class struggle between those who praise tolerance but do not face the pain of being tolerant, and those who see tolerance as the abandonment of all they learned as a child. I began by talking about Hitler, whom no reasonable and decent person wants to emulate. Yet, what made Hitler strong was that the elite held his followers in contempt. They had nowhere else to go, and nothing to lose. Having lost much in World War I and the Depression, they had nothing left but pride in being German. And the scorn in which they were held turned nationalism into a monstrosity.
Far-right’s positions are being adopted by centrist parties
Geert Wilders, the nationalist candidate for prime minister of the Netherlands, lost that country’s election last week. This has brought comfort to those who opposed him and his views on immigration and immigrants. It is odd that they should be comforted.
A decade ago, it would have been difficult to imagine that someone of Wilders’s views would have won any seats in parliament. The fact that his party is now the second-largest in the Netherlands, rather than an irrelevancy, should be a mark of how greatly both the Netherlands and Euro-American civilization have changed — and an indication that this change is not temporary.
Indeed, the second-place showing of the nationalists in the Netherlands is accompanied by an interesting phenomenon. The center-right has shifted a number of its positions toward the nationalists. As we approach the French and German elections, a similar process is under way. While the right may lose elections, its positions are being adopted, at least in part, by centrist parties.
Wilders’ views are coarser than most, to be sure. He called Moroccans “pigs” and advocated closing mosques in the Netherlands. But more alarming is the inability of his enemies to grasp why Wilders has risen, and their tendency to dismiss his followers as simply racists. This comforts his critics. They feel morally superior. But paradoxically they are strengthening both Wilders and his allies in Europe and the United States.
...
For the well-to-do, this is a drama acted out of sight. The affluent do not live with poor immigrants, and if they know them at all, it is as servants. The well-off can afford a generous immigration system because they do not pay the price. The poor, who live in neighborhoods where immigrants live, experience economic, linguistic, and political dislocation associated with immigration, because it is the national values they were brought up with that are being battled over. It is not simply jobs at stakes. It is also their own identities as Dutchmen, Americans, or Poles that are at stake. They are who they are, and they battle to resist loss or weakening of this identity.
...
In other words, the nationalism issue has become a football in a growing class struggle between those who praise tolerance but do not face the pain of being tolerant, and those who see tolerance as the abandonment of all they learned as a child. I began by talking about Hitler, whom no reasonable and decent person wants to emulate. Yet, what made Hitler strong was that the elite held his followers in contempt. They had nowhere else to go, and nothing to lose. Having lost much in World War I and the Depression, they had nothing left but pride in being German. And the scorn in which they were held turned nationalism into a monstrosity.
It's worth reading the whole thing. This author brings up a lot of interesting points about the class/economic issues. The wealthy do tend to be more global in business/vacations and the types of people they know in their network. Many normal people don't have those opportunities.
I faced irrational daily racial discrimination when I worked in IT in technical roles. The nontechnical business/strategy/administrative jobs are much more diverse and less openly racist.
There does seem to be an unsettling rise in nationalism with surprise upsets like Brexit and Trump and even a far right landslide win in India on a nationalist platform.
