A very good and fair-minded review. It reminds me of the warning to never meet your heroes. I love reading Orwell, both for writing style and content, and admire him for, as you say, his political decency. But he does often seem to have a 'my way or the highway' attitude and deep down, part of me isn't sure that I would have liked him as a person.
Soon after he would be deriding those who took the anti-war position - a position he had taken himself for much of the preceding decade - as ‘objectively pro-Fascist’.
* * *
I mean, this is just obviously correct, and has only grown more obviously correct with time. Even during the more lionized "anti-war" periods, like with Vietnam, the practical result of retreating from the war was the betrayal of our allies and the murder and enslavement of millions of Asians. Depraved as the Corbynistas support of gangrapist, baby-baking necrophiliacs is, they're not doing anything meaningfully different to what they've done before. Thry're just being more openly racist.
Besides, many are clearly not even genuine peace activists. They're only working to stop one side of the conflict from fighting, and they dismiss any violence from their prefered side as somehow legitimate. If one of the sides wants to continue fighting for the sake of establishing their totalitarian deathstate versus a free people who merely want the right to life and liberty (and there is nothing resembling a free society in the West Bank; let alone Gaza), then opposition to the free people's fight for theirselves and their country isn't "pro-peace", it's pro-violence.
The anti-warrists have always been pro-violence. It's why Comrade Jeremy has so many friends who are literal terrorists.
Excellent review, thank you. I read the previous edition and maybe will have to get around to this one at some point.
Thank you.
A very good and fair-minded review. It reminds me of the warning to never meet your heroes. I love reading Orwell, both for writing style and content, and admire him for, as you say, his political decency. But he does often seem to have a 'my way or the highway' attitude and deep down, part of me isn't sure that I would have liked him as a person.
Wonderful piece. I will look forward to reading Taylor's work.
Thanks Sam
Soon after he would be deriding those who took the anti-war position - a position he had taken himself for much of the preceding decade - as ‘objectively pro-Fascist’.
* * *
I mean, this is just obviously correct, and has only grown more obviously correct with time. Even during the more lionized "anti-war" periods, like with Vietnam, the practical result of retreating from the war was the betrayal of our allies and the murder and enslavement of millions of Asians. Depraved as the Corbynistas support of gangrapist, baby-baking necrophiliacs is, they're not doing anything meaningfully different to what they've done before. Thry're just being more openly racist.
Besides, many are clearly not even genuine peace activists. They're only working to stop one side of the conflict from fighting, and they dismiss any violence from their prefered side as somehow legitimate. If one of the sides wants to continue fighting for the sake of establishing their totalitarian deathstate versus a free people who merely want the right to life and liberty (and there is nothing resembling a free society in the West Bank; let alone Gaza), then opposition to the free people's fight for theirselves and their country isn't "pro-peace", it's pro-violence.
The anti-warrists have always been pro-violence. It's why Comrade Jeremy has so many friends who are literal terrorists.