TUESDAY, 28 AUGUST 2018
A thought has been rolling around in my head for a few days: Activist journalist. It’s understandable that you want your life to mean something, that you want to make a difference to the world. Perhaps I even agree with your political views and appreciate the time you take to lay your points of view out in ways that help people understand the issue from a certain perspective.
But let’s be clear about one thing: If you are an activist journalist, or an activist reporter or an activist anchor person, you cannot be trusted to report the news accurately. You cannot be trusted to tell me what’s going on, because I will always assume you’re distorting what is happening to suit your agenda.
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The same goes for activist academics. An academic is a scientist. A scientist must be able to drop a favourite hypothesis like a plate of hot cakes if experiments suggest something different than what they had envisioned. An activist academic finds a way to fit the results of an experiment into what they had hoped for. That is dishonest. It’s not science – it’s propaganda. Such an academic is a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
TUESDAY, 23 OCTOBER 2018
People migrate across the desert from countries in North Africa, and from war-torn areas in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. In many (or most?) cases, they do not speak the languages of the countries where they’re heading. In most cases, there are aspects of their culture that are directly opposed to the dominant culture of their ideal destinations.
What does this lead to? Conflict, and disorder.
Do the migrants/refugees want conflict and disorder? Certainly not, seeing that conflict and chaos are exactly what they are fleeing from in many cases.
In fact, migrants/refugees do not only end up in “Italy” or “France” or “Sweden”, but in the Italian town, Ferrara, or in the quiet French village, Forges-les-Bains, or in the Swedish city of Malmö. Is there work for them? Is there enough housing? Is there enough space in the local schools for their children? Are there enough beds in the local hospitals for when they get sick?
What percentage of the new inhabitants are willing to make changes to their culture to fit into Ferrara, or Forges-les-Bains, or Malmö? If this percentage is not sufficient, it will lead to conflict and disorder.
When hundreds or thousands of people arrive in Ferrara, or Forges-les-Bains, or in Malmö, how many of them say: This is it. This is my and my family’s new home. Here we will grow new roots and do everything in our power to fit in and contribute to the well-being of the community. How many of them express something of this nature? Seventy percent? Fifty percent? Ten percent? And if not enough of the new residents are willing to declare that a place is their new home and that they will do what they need to do to prove themselves to their new community, where does it end? In disorder and conflict.
I of all people understand why people go from one country to another in search of better opportunities, or a better life. But, I also understand why people in Europe become increasingly cynical when their governments fail to use their common sense.
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