Sunday, November 03, 2013

http://logooftheday.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/left-right.png

Any term in political science is useful if it is denoting, or describing, something in reality. That doesn’t mean it is, or has to be, perfect. All descriptive terms (particularly in a field as potentially complex as political science) have flaws; the question is whether the flaws outweigh the usefulness.

On the one subject of the problem of Islam, the terms Left and Right in my estimation do denote real political and cultural phenomena, where we do see a trend whereby more individuals who can be approximately categorized as on the Left tend to whitewash Islam and to denigrate condemners and warners of Islam, while comparatively fewer on the Right do so.

However, there has come to my notice over the past decade an important wrinkle to this seemingly simple formula: the unusually, and discomfittingly high number of individuals one could approximately categorize as on the Right who nevertheless tend to do with regard to the problem of Islam pretty much just what Leftists do—perhaps not with quite the self-righteous zest by which Leftists tend to add insult to injury; but still, the damage continues to be done.

We cannot call these people on the Right who behave this way “Leftists”.

Hence my development of the term “PC MC” to denote precisely non-Leftists who nevertheless tend to defend Muslims from “bigotry”, and in the process, either implicitly or explicitly tend to chill, or even vilifythose who warn of the dangers of Islam.  The Republicans who betrayed Michelle Bachmann not too long ago when she reasonably broached the topic of the possibility of Muslim Brotherhood infiltration into American politics is a good, and alas not uncommon, example. My intermittent and still incomplete series on Voegelinians is another case in point: These "Voegelinians" are mostly academics dedicated to continuing scholarship inspired by their mentor, 20th century philosopher Eric Voegelin, who on most issues could not be remotely categorized as “Leftist” (and indeed was branded sometimes as a right wing demagogue for his firm anti-Communism); but who, nevertheless, when it comes to the one issue of the problem of Islam, suddenly begin conforming to the PC MC paradigm. Obviously, such otherwise classic conservatives cannot be said to be doing this for “Leftist” reasons. 

Thus “PC MC” denotes a broader, and deeper civilizational process that must have been occurring under our feet all along—a massive paradigm shift that has grown throughout the 20th century, a sea change in the sociopolitical and cultural public conscious that brings with it a whole constellation of axioms, shibboleths, mantras and memes—including the only one I really care about: the reflexive need to defend Muslims from “bigotry” and its obverse side of the coin, the reflexive need to vilify those who condemn Islam and who logically condemn all Muslims who enable Islam (and what Muslims don’t...?).

Conclusion:

So, the above has been my long-winded way of saying that we should adopt “PC MC” as the key term, and it would be defined somewhat circularly:

Anyone is PC MC to the extent that they defend Islam and Muslims.

And yes, unlike pregnancy, one can be “a little PC MC”. The crucial question in that regard is whether one is sufficiently compromised by PC MC as to be part of the Problem, rather than part of the Solution.

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