The Vlaams Blok is the largest political party in Flanders, the Flemish speaking half of Belgium… and the Belgian high court has just in effect required it to disband. Now I hold no brief for an ethnic nationalist political party (though they are the closest thing to a free market party in Belgium, which I certainly approve of), but it is hard to see how the nation which hosts the key institutions of the EU can now claim to be democratic in any meaningful way.
To ban the Vlaams Blok because it is allegedly racist, and yet not ban communists or socialists from running for office, means that only certain types of enforced collectivism will be tolerated, namely the type which is imposed equally on all, but not any form which is only imposed on immigrants. Repression is only acceptable if everyone is repressed. Keep in mind that the Vlaams Blok is not some tiny lunatic fringe of neo-fascist moonbats like the BNP in Britain but are a major political party. Yet the political establishment have just used the courts to put there opponents out of business.
I eagerly await a series of fierce denunciations of the wholesale disenfranchisement of a significant proportion of the Flemish electorate. Given the importance attached to democracy by the Guardian and Independent, I expect at least a week of outraged headlines and calls to action to defend democracy in Europe by Robert Fisk and George Monbiot.
Ok, I am waiting 
.
Very worrying. But I think the BBC article highlights two other problems. That is to do with state funding of political parties, and access to television. Why should any group be dependent upon state funds for their participation in the political process? They should have to raise funds from members subscriptions and supporters donations. Otherwise it suggests that politics only exists because it is given to us from the state; that is, the rights of representation are the gift of the state itself
The other is that the only way parties who peddle noxious aims can be stopped is by giving them a hearing. If they have no internal coherence, then let them speak; they will be laughed away. “Starving them of the oxygen of publicity” actually helps them survive, because they can then appeal to conspiracy theorists – what is it about our message that people don’t want to hear?
Disgraceful ruling.
“Keep in mind that the Vlaams Blok is not some tiny lunatic fringe of neo-fascist moonbats like the BNP in Britain but are a major political party”
What if they ARE unatic fringe neo-fascist moonbats just like the BNP – but have become very popular in that area?
Hitler’s Nazi party was also a major political party before it came to power (which is why they managed to come to power). This did not mean they were fascist dangerous moonbats.
Sorry. The last line should read “weren’t” rather than were and Vlaams Blok are extremists (and possible neo-Nazi/lunatic/BNP-like) but in that particular area, they’re not ‘fringe’.
Let’s suppose they’re “dangerous”. Will denying them the right to participate in government reduce the danger?
Is this really the way a free society deals with political dissent? What’s next, re-education camps?
Stephen Pollard had a piece on this in April. Very worrying.
From the Vlams Blok web site:
“Our party’s main objective is the secession of Flanders from Belgium. Flanders is the free-market oriented Dutch-speaking and politically minorised northern part of the country.
Vlaams Blok has always fought for: an independent and democratic Republic of Flanders; the traditional moral values of Western civilisation; and the right of the Flemings to protect their national identity and their Dutch language and culture. ”
Music to my ears.
Attacks on other genuine conservative parties in Europe, such as the Danish Peoples Party, cannot be far behind.
Another nail in the coffin of Europa.
The problem isn’t really that funding is being withheld from Vlaams Blok, but that it’s being given to everyone else. State aid to political parties is obviously a flawed idea simply because the people who run the state are those same parties and they can decide who gets the funding.
However, if Vlaams Blok are (and I admit my ignorance on this point) genuinely fascist, the rights of Belgians not to have fascist government imposed on them must be considered. The law in this case, however misguided, does appear to be trying to safeguard the rights of Belgians from a potential fascist government. Its mistake is thus: given that the various pieces of European human rights legislation make Nazi-style fascism illegal, we can safely conclude that, even if elected, Vlaams Blok would be unable to enact any serious fascist policies. This reduces their policies to a set of empty threats, which have no need to be censored.
I find delicious irony in the fact that while the Europeans whinge and moan about how Bush is a threat to democracy, it’s the Europeans themselves who try to criminalize dissent.
Vlaams Blok has always fought for…the right of the Flemings to protect their national identity and their Dutch language and culture.
Sounds like code, like “states rights” and “law and order” in the US were (and to some extent, still are) code words for state-sponsered racism.
– Josh
llamas was born in Eindhoven, so perhaps knows a little more about the ins-and-outs of this particular brouhaha.
Vlaams Blok is a reaction to the ways in which the Dutch-speaking Flemish majority has found itself increasingly marginalized by the pressures of the French-speaking Walloon minority. In the past, natural forces kept the two in balance, but of late, the centralization of EU power in Brussels and the influence of the French has allowed the Walloons and those of like political persuasion to gradually gain the ascendant. As we now see.
Calling Vlaams Blok ‘racist’ is nothing more than the use of a code-word which allows its suppression to be easily sold in the rest of the EU, to people who don’t know and don’t care what Vlaams Blok is about. A more mature person would consider Vlaams Blok to be, not racist, but rather, more far-sighted than most. They see the ways in which uncontrolled and unassimilated immigration of large numbers of Muslims is tearing great wholes in the fabric of society both to the north and to the south of them, and they naturally desire to avoid that. Think about it – in modern-day Europe, it would be impossible to become the majority party anywhere if your basic policy was racist – comparisons with the Nazis of 75 years ago notwithstanding. Even the most expressed and devout racists of Europe – people like the BNP, or Jean-Marie le Pen, are either tiny minorities or transitory flashes-in-the-pan.
I predict that large numbers of Vlaams Blok supporters and sympathizers will move north, across the border into the Netherlends, where the culture and langugage are more to their liking. It’s not that hard to live in the Netherlands and work in Belgium as it is. The end result will be a gradual stagnation of the Flemish part of Belgium – the economically-vibrant part of the nation – as the population deserts and leaves the Francophone and Francophile minority to their fate. Between falling GDP and the development of the sorts of immigration-related issues now seen in Paris and Amsterdam, I predict that, in less than 10 years, the US State Department will issue travel advisories to US citizens to avoid Belgium.
llater,
llamas
Belgium is not, nor ever has been, a real country. It does not correspond to any rational division of population based on ethnicity. But that makes it all the more fitting a site for the capital of the wondrous new Europe of the Regions, in which the only national allegiance will be to Europa. Therefore at all costs “divisive” tendencies must be slapped down in Belgium. It would never do for the showplace of supranationalism to become just another couple of nasty little nation states.
That said, if a party has genuine backing it cannot be suppressed by a bench of judges. As Beachcomber defined ‘clean-up’ in A Dictionary for Today: ‘A system employed by the police to get rid of undesirable night-clubs. The clubs are closed, and may only be opened again under new names.’
You point to the BNP being marginal (and you’re right) but it may well be that in that area this BNP-like party (or perhaps more extreme, worse) is rather more popular than the BNP is in Britain.
After all, Jean-Marie le Pen represents more than a “tiny minority”.
It’s a tough call because while such parties are inherently non-tolerant. We, on the other, do wish to be tolerant. In the end, it really comes down to whether this party is akin to the BNP (or worse).
Official statements by parties, things like “we’re not fascist” – while not proving that they Are fascists, also don’t prove the reverse…
On the subject of Racism, they called Pim Fortyn a fascist and a racist.
The reality was that he was a liberal in every sense of the word, economic and social. His concern was that individual freedom was being snuffed out. His real crime was to threaten the consensus.
This was reported by the usual suspects in the media as being the rise of a Dutch Le Pen, a man to whom he bore no resemblence.
After all is said and done, the 68 generationers who are ruining the cultures of Europe have no moral authority to tell us what we can and can’t think or say and who is acceptable for us to vote for. These are people who spent their youths plotting violent revolution and have spent their adulthood squeezing dissent out of the people at every chance
Hmmm
Its no tough call at all. However racist/fascist a political party may be, it should have the right to be heard like all others. If they are beyond the pale simple debate will expose them. Once you accept the principle that a point of view may be proscribed its only a matter of time until the principle is turned on you.
Its my view that this is beside this particular point. It appears to me that the dominant left/EU block in Belgium is flexing its muscles and silencing opposition. Here comes the train.
While it was not all unexpected, I was rather perturbed to see that there was no mention at all of this on Newsnight. Instead they focused on bashing efforts of the coalition in felujah. I wonder if there would be the same silence if say a party of the left was banned in the European country. Couple this with their neutral take on the death of Van Goth; the BBC is really out-doing itself in prejudiced reporting (or lack thereof) this week. Guess its yet another thing that bloggers have to make an attempt to let people know about.
The Wikipedia entry describes them as “far-right antisemitic nationalist”, the article makes them seem like continental kin of the BNP. Those who argue otherwise might like to make corrections to it.
What I wonder, is how can a political party can be so dependant upon government funds? Especially bieng a bastion for the free-market, you’d think they’d at least have some private support.
Dal
Stephen Pollard’s article which I linked to above states:
Hayek was right: socialism brings totalitarianism.
Amazing that a court would ban the largest political party in the nation. Absolutely amazing.
In Wallonia the Parti Socialiste dominates everything. All the Walloons together comprise 40% in Belgian parliament. In Flanders there are two competing left parties: the Socialistische Partij Anders (20% in Flanders) and the far-left Green! party (6% in Flanders), who are disputing the votes of the Muslims and thus crawling for them. Voting is compulsory, thus the Muslims don’t stay at home. Do you now understand how the conservatives in Flanders, although in Flanders with a majority of 75%, are squeezed? And the others simply have no respect for high principles and vote all kind of laws that those 75% Flemish simply don’t want.
I read above something that is completely false: you may write what you want about Vlaams Blok, but Vlaams Blok and the Jews are SUPER GOOD FRIENDS. By the way, an academic study has proven that most of the descendants of collaborators with the Germans are member of the other little nationalist party N-VA, although they cannot be held responsible for this. And Vlaams Blok leader Filip Dewinter is from a good Flemish resistance family. But of course their opponents try to depict another image…and this apparently even was recorded in Wikipedia. For the case you don’t believe me, I’m willing to send you an article out of the Jewish magazine Mishpasha.
In Belgium parties are state funded. Other gifts are very limited. There was too much bribery in the past.
Flanders in Belgium
I find it a difficult issue. I question the claim that parties like the BNP have a “right to vote” since it does not seem, on the face of it, that they do. People only have a right to participate in legitimate activities, and the BNP’s “right to vote” is a right to participate in a whole variety of illegitimate activities that it would be downright unjust for anybody to participate in.
In reference to Perry’s point about the Belgians not banning the communist party as well, I seem to remember someone commenting on this blog that although the moral discreditation of race-based nationalism has been generally accepted by the majority of the British public, the moral discreditation of socialism and communism has not.
From talking to someone last night I think I’ll concoct a little sociology study over the next few weeks: I’ll ask people what comes to mind when they think of Hitler’s discredited political views, and note down how many people mention racism/nationalism and how many mention socialism – and how many mention both. For those who don’t mention socialism, I might even ask them whether they consider it morally discredited or not.
Since I live in red Edinburgh, I expect the people who mention racist nationalism will form a majority, those who mention both racist nationalism and socialism will form a minority and those mention just socialism will form an even smaller (and worrying) minority if they even exist at all.
Let’s all hope my prediction is wrong.
Richard Garner:
I agree that in an ideal world nobody would have a right to vote because there would be no government to vote for.
However, as long as there are governments, surely you would agree that laws favouring certain parties and banning others are undesirable? To put it another way, statism is bad but totaliitarian statism is even worse than democratic statism.
Otherwise you end up with the situation over in the U.S. where numerous legal hurdles are placed in the way of third party candidates like the libertarians – (Link)
I don’t, thank heaven, know, nor need to, much about Belgium or its politics. But from what I’ve read about this ruling, it confirms my deep distrust of the EUConstitution, with that document’s demands for consensus. This ruling did not merely ban the party; it criminalized it, and anyone who supported it. It took the quango complainant months of forum shopping to find a sympathetic court. It took a constitutional amendment to take the case outside the jury system. If I understand the evidence of ‘racism’, it consists of 16 extracts from publications and statements over years, most of which were data (crime rates, education levels, welfare, etc.), and one pamphlet by a belgo-turkish woman about treatment of women in immigrant communities.
What is astonishing is that none of these writings were found to be racist in themselves. No, the recital of data was found to have the intent of promoting hate, or incitement, or some such thing.
If collective guilt and punishment of alleged implied, but unexpressed intent is not deeply troubling to you, ….
As a remark: party funding in Belgium is quite different as in other countries. Each party that got elected in the federal government gets a dotation and is made dependant of the number of seats. Private funding is almost prohibited (no donations may begiven above a rediculously low maximum, a few hundred euro’s or something), and not by corporations etc. . The reason why this came to be is because of several financial scandals (mainly socialist perpetrators) and because Vlaams Blok was one of the most succesful parties in getting such funds (back then they were relatively small so imagine the funds they could raise now). As an aside note, one of the socialists that got accused of corruption (Frank Vandenbroucke), was a federal minister until a few months ago to become a minister in the Flemish government.
Julius, you know not what you’re talking about. The libertarians are on ballots all over the place in America. They just don’t get much support. We have a two party system here in the U.S., and that’s the way it is. Thanks to fringe parties not getting much support, we don’t have to contend with weak coalition governments.
Chuck technically you are wrong too. In states like Maine the Republicans and Dems have colluded to keep the Libs off the ballot by raising the requirements to be a “recognised” party to a ludicrous level. Technically speaking libertarians who run in Maine are in fact independents. The ability of third parties to be recognised seriously varies from state to state.
Alene is right. So is Pete. The leftists are now in train to banning all opposition that fails to toe the party line. And this is being made possible by the huge, ropey coils of the opaque, barely sane EU “constitution”. Basically, anything can be declared illegal. Just like that.
Also, could people who have never read anything about Jean-Marie LePen refrain from giving us their considered opinions? LePen is not a racist. Yes, you read that right. LePen is against all foreigners, and that includes the 450,000 British who own homes in France – and all the others – and yes, indeed, he includes N Africans. He would like us all to vacate the premises. He thinks we are diluting the Frenchness of France. (Yes, you are free to call him by the left’s second favourite word: xenophobe.)
His hero is Jean d’Arc and he can quote all her speeches from memory. In any event, this is all moot now as he is no longer the leader of his party. He stepped down last year and his daughter Marine took up the post. She is in the process of softening the rhetoric and frankly, I think she is someone to watch.
If Le Pen came to power all my liberal friends who switched from Streatham to Languedoc would have to come home !!
Vlaams Blok took 37% of the vote in Antwerp at the last election. Clearly 37% of the population is NOT racist, so there must be some other factors that have caused it to become the largest party in Flanders.
the answer is fairly simple: Antwerp is the penultimate station on the railway line that connects Amsterdam with Brussels via The Hague and Rotterdam…
Now, what has this to do with anything you may ask?
Well, all cities have been subject to a huge influx of Muslims immigrants largely from Morocco (a country with NO historical connection with either Belgium or Holland) over the last 20 years.
The governing political classes in both countries have met this mass immigration with multicultural policies that have allowed Muslim communities to develop parralel and unconnected to mainstream Flemmish or Dutch society.
The ‘appearance’ to the outside world has been that of social hamony in progressive liberal democracies.
However, the reality has been very different. Multiculturalism has only managed to take root because of the consensus that has developed between the activist leaders of certain minority groups and the governing elites have imposed de facto taboos against ordinary citizens who have tried to openly question the wisdom of mass immigration of those who follow a religion with codes of conduct that can, let us say, be at odds with the values of liberal democracies.
So, those who have expressed concern about the fact that Muslim children are becoming a majority in those cities on that railway line – Mohammed is the most popular name for new born boys in Brussels for the 5th year running and in 2003, 56% of babies born in Brussels were Muslims – have been dismissed as ‘Islamophobic’ and ‘racist’.
Those who have expressed concerns about rising anti-Semitism and homophobia – promoted openly by imaams preaching in mosques about ‘dirty pig’ Jews and homosexuals – and who have raised concerns about the book ‘The Way of the Muslim’ – being promoted by a mosque near you in Holland and Belgium right now – which provides useful chapters on how to beat up a Muslim wife without leaving obvious marks and how to ensure a homosexual is killed by being smashed head-first into the ground have been told that their fears are mis-placed – Islam is, after all, a religion of peace and only a small percentage of Muslims believe in Jijad against the West.
Into this Alice-in-Wonderland world of multi-culti values have stumbled two main forces that have been ‘mugged by reality’ in a big way. One was in Holland: the party founded by the late Pim Fortuyn which raised the alarm about how misplaced and complacent multiculturalism was destroying authentic liberal values of Dutch tolerance largely because of the import of an alien religious tradition that – unlike Christianity – had never been subject to the reformation.
THe other was in Flanders: Vlaams Blok which until 5 years ago was regarded as the voice of the disaffected Flemmish voter who wanted seccession from French-speaking Belgium. However, Vlaams Blok has had a meteoric rise in its electoral fortunes in the past 5 years – just, strange this, as there has been a huge increase in street crime in Antwerp, a huge rise in street attacks on Jews, a huge rise in ‘queer-bashing’ (something until recently virtually unknown in liberal Holland and Belgium).
The complacent mainstream Belgian parties are privately horrified about the Frankenstein’s monster that has arisen from their mis-guided PC policies…whereas Vlaams Blok is offering an immediate stop to immigration, increased law and order, greater induction of all immigrants in Belgium to Belgian values of democracy etc etc.
Which do readers think are more appealing to worried voters?
Vlaams Blok will now just change its name but will be bigger than ever at the next elections because it now has underdog and martyr appeal. Which is a shame because some of its ideas are racist. However, this really is a problem that has been created by the mainstream politicial parties’ negligence and denial.
Even Jews and homosexuals have recently been voting for Vlaams Blok – those who, along with many other citizens of Antwerp are not anxiously looking towards events in the Netherlands and wondering whether the same will soon happen in Belgium…there are reports in both NL and Belgium that these groups and the middle-classes are now abandoning these cities before….well…who knows what might happen?…
Democracy needs a party like Vlaams Blok. In a country where there is no place for such a party, there is no democracy.
Orthodox Jews in Antwerp have been backing the sinister neo-Nazi VB because it fights Islamic fundamentalism, which any good Zionist will tell you was pro-Hitler (Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and all that).
Oh dear, isn’t life complicated when you stop burbling about left and right, racism and fascism, and consider the facts on the ground?
Compulsory voting, egads! I thought that was a feature of banana republic faux democracies, where the winning candidate gets 99% of the vote and the voters for the other guy wind up unemployed, homeless, or dead. Freedom includes the freedom *not* to vote.
I don’t understand Europe’s love of Muslim immigrants. My parents were born in England, the Queen was on my passport (I was Canadian), and I could not immigrate or get a work permit to move to England. I had a good education and skills to offer. Yet any lorry stowaway North African Muslim could get in and get set up on a generous welfare scheme and be permitted to stay. WTF?
And if Europeans are so concerned about the Muslim menace, why aren’t they having more children? The Crusades II will be won by the Muslims demographically, and through democratic elections (compulsory voting or no), will democratically elect the Taliban.
Ah, but Paris will design very fashionable burqas!
Elizabeth – Australia, a democracy on a very high level by the most exacting standards, has compulsory voting. They see it as a duty owed for citizenship. People are free to spoil their ballots, write rude things on them, draw obscene pictures. But they must turn out to vote.
Back to Vlaams Blok, tangentially speaking, I see the Norwegian government has banned Jews from taking part in any commemorations of Kristallnacht. This from one of the oldest democracies in the world?
Verity-
Don’t overstate the Norway/Kristaallnacht problem. ‘Jews” were not banned. Jewish symbols were banned. Too provacative, you know, that star of David.
The reality is ugly enough.
Compulsory voting makes about as much sense as the death penalty for suicide.
DB’s long piece makes for very interesting and rather sobering reading.
What amazes me is that I have heard Tories & Republicans and Labour & Democrats express a view that they wished all politics was more centrist in nature. Their view, and I know this is the view on the continent, is that even allowing parties outside the mainstream, of any ilk, encourages non-standard thinking that is not part of the “concensus”. They think me mad when I suggest that parties outside the mainstream help fuel political discourse.
Alene – According to the NY Sun: “On the TV2 evening news, a group of Jews and their friends who wanted to take part in the commemoration were shown being firmly told by a policeman to ‘please leave the area,'” according to a dispatch from an American journalist living in Norway, Bruce Bawer, on AndrewSullivan.com.”
Postscript:
It appears from press reports this weekend that the banning of Vlaams Blok will backfire spectacularly. Speaking behalf of Vlaams Blok, Frank Vanhecke said that the party would be re-launching next week. He said that ‘Belgium has tried to bury our party. We will return to bury Belgium’. This is an ominous reference to VB’s commitment towards seceeding Flanders (Flemish region – northern Belgium – capital Antwerp – ‘economic engine’ of Belgium which subsidizes the rest of economically-weaker Belgium) from Wallonia (Belgium’s French-speaking and economically depressed southern region).
He added that, instead of pushing for the expulsion of non-European immigrants, in the future the new party will demand the departure of minorities “who reject, deny or fight against culture and European values like the separation of church and state, freedom of expression and equality between men and women”.
Expect stormy political times ahead for Belgium…
DB that should be interesting to watch…
The true story of Roeland Raes
I picked up an interesting story on another blog that perhaps gives an answer to much of the questions above about Wikipedia, Vlaams Belang and would-be Anti-semitism. Perhaps it’s also an answer to Mr. De Haan’s concerns?
See at: http://majorityrights.com/index.php/weblog/comments/54/
Full text:
Nationalism in European countries is not necessarely anti-Semitic. I fully agree with Fred Scrooby. But I was intrigued by something mentioned in Wikipedia. There I read about Vlaams Blok (Belang now): “ In 2002 party ideologue and vice-president Roeland Raes gave an interview on Dutch TV where he cast doubt over the number of Jews murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust.”
This seems very serious to me, because negationism is very bad. So I did a little bit of research and found that this is completely false in different views. But of course, if somebody can proof the opposite, I invite him to do so.
First a remark. As a Vlaams Blok (Belang now) watcher, I remember having read on their web-site that Roeland Raes was a negationist (this seems a confession to me) and that therefore they dropped him. So my first problem is: if Vlaams Belang openly disavowes him, why then continue to mention him on Wikipedia in that respect?
Secondly I found that the Thought Police charged him in March 2001. Thus the year mentioned by Wikipedia is certainly not correct, although this is not the only error (see below). And three and a half years later there isn’t a conviction in court either. But does this mean that he is innocent? At any event, I digged a little bit deeper, so that you can judge by yourself.
Thus there was a programm on the Dutch television (in Holland) about negationism and of course to make it thrilling, someone of the Vlaams Blok was invited about which all Walloons and the Flemish left allege that they are facists. During this interview, Albert Raes said that he had no doubts about the systematic persecution and deportation of the Jews by the Germans (!), but (and that’s the thought that became fatal for him), he said: “whether it was planned ahead that they should all die during the war is another question”(in Dutch: “Of het gepland is dat ze allemaal zouden sterven tijdens de oorlog, is een andere kwestie”) And it was for these specific words that he was charged.
My conclusion: Raes was an idiot to grant such an interview in which he made his deadly slide by provocation. And Vlaams Blok (Belang)? Altough there is in fact no serious ground for a conviction, Vlaams Belang, being a political party, wanted to stop the discussion by pleading guild and dropping him. But Wikipedia perpetuated the event…
Not to forget, this sort of action was one of the first efforts of the National Socialist Workers Party in 1930s Germany to control “nonconformers”
Nothing new, Europe is still the true ‘dark continent’ where the right to speak or vote, or wear what you want (aka France’s so called secular law against religious garment) according to one’s conscience is a right ‘given’ by the government. The problem is that that rights that are ostensibly ‘given’ by politicians are bound to be taken away some day. At least in America people are born with their rights, they are not some ‘gift’ from a government.
So recently an Italian EU Commissioner is forced step down because he thinks that homsexuality is a sin. A preacher this year in Sweden is given 1 month in jail because he says ‘homosexuality is a cancer in society’. Mr Le Pen of France was labelled a racist in true EU-sponsored demagoguery , Jorg Haider’s government in Austria was sanctioned (in 1998) because they won an election that EU hoped they would have lost. And Vlaams Blok Party is now banned because it and its supporters at the polls do not see things the EU way. What’s new? Welcome to the EU my friends.
The Guardian trying to be “objective”.
See at: http://majorityrights.com/index.php/weblog/comments/157/
The Vlaams Blok is the only thing in Flanders that is willing to stand up to the tidal wave of Muslim scum invading our nation. I don’t want Flanders to become an Islamic state a la Iran!
[Name removed by Admin due to questionable authenticity]
The separation is only an interim step. The two halves are too immaterial to matter. In time the international community will integrate flanders into the Netherlands and the South into France. Sensible riddance of silly egos.