To no one’s surprise, Sadiq Khan will go on to a third term as the mayor of what was once the leading city in the leading nation in the world.
It’s been a long time since those days. And if it hasn’t been so many years, culturally it’s been a millennium.
Due to the good work of Tony Blair, London has ceased to be an English city. Like so many other former English cities, it’s populated by Third World Jihadists whose particular mode of waging war on the infidels is living on the dole while enjoying some sex grooming in between daily prayers. And of course voting.
Much of the population of London barely bothered to vote this time around, but between the principled lefties and the principled Pakistanis, Khan was bound to have little trouble. Much as the Muslim mayors who run many of England’s cities have had little trouble maintaining their grip on power.
The UK’s leadership is already barely recognizable and at the rate things are going, the next king will be the last English leader in the United Kingdom and he will apologize profusely for his white privilege.
It didn’t have to be this way and it still doesn’t. Decline and defeat are choices. Survival and victory are still possible.
A major European psychiatric organization has warned doctors against promoting “experimental” transgender “treatments” to gender-confused children and adolescents
The European Society of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (ESCAP) published a policy statement urging healthcare providers “not to promote experimental and unnecessarily invasive treatments with unproven psycho-social effects and, therefore, to adhere to the ‘primum-nil-nocere’ (first, do no harm) principle.”
The scientists of ESCAP highlighted the “poor reliability and instability of a gender dysphoria diagnosis in a specific child over time” and the “possible effects of the decisions to block puberty or preventing medical transitioning on a child’s psychosocial development.”
The report also stressed that “research findings are published solely on the grounds of quality criteria and not based on their findings.” In a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine (SEGM) interpreted this statement to mean that many recent studies reporting favorably about so-called “gender transition” are “deeply methodologically flawed.”
While the ESCAP report remained open to the possibility that some children might benefit from so-called “gender-affirming care,” it underscored the lack of quality research to accurately determine the risk-benefit ratio of interventions such as hormone blockers and mutilating surgeries.
The policy paper reminded its readers of core ethics principles that need to be observed in the cases of gender-confused minors:
the principle of non-maleficence: do not use outside the research environment any experimental interventions with potentially irreversible effects, or interventions with unknown long-term consequences; do not adopt new practices prematurely without sufficient evidence; do not continue with outdated practices that might not be in the best interest of the patient.
the principle of beneficence: adopt medical interventions with favorable benefits-to-harms ratio; consider benefits-to-harms ratio of not providing medical interventions; ensure adequate diagnosis and treatment of co-existing psychiatric disorders; ensure comprehensive diagnostic assessment of gender dysphoria instead of only relying on the self-assessment of children and adolescents.
the principle of autonomy: involve minors in the decision-making processes around their care in an age- and development-appropriate manner, assessing their capacity to consent; adopt an adequate informed consent process for possibly lifelong and irreversible decisions, securing that children and adolescents fully understand the potential risks, benefits, and irreversible nature of the treatments; consider the rights of their parents and guardians to consent to any major intervention or for participation of their children in research on experimental treatments; consider the rights of their parents and guardians to be fully informed about the current care for their children; offer adequate support and resources to those who decide to de-transition to their assigned sex, and respect their decision to do so.
the principle of justice: ensure access to reliable and up-to-date information, assessment, and treatment for gender dysphoria, and during transition or de-transition; adopt equal precautionary measures for all; and protect the rights of children and young people as a group in a particularly vulnerable developmental phase.
The ESCAP policy paper represents the latest example of the growing pushback from the medical establishment in Europe to so-called “gender-affirming care.”
In the U.K., the publication of the Cass Review has caused many healthcare providers to change their practices of prescribing harmful puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones to minors. Dr. Hilary Cass, the pediatrician commissioned by the UK’s National Health Service to review the transgender “services” being made available to dysphoric minors, found that “gender medicine” is “built on shaky foundations” and that while these drastic interventions should be approached with extreme caution, “quite the reverse happened in the field of gender care for children.”
Scottish gender clinics and the British National Health Service (NHS) have since halted the prescription of puberty blockers.
Other European countries like Denmark and Sweden have also moved away from the so-called “affirmative model of care” of minors who struggle with gender dysphoria in the recent past.
The long-awaited trial of a Canadian man accused of murder is facing setbacks after he filed to change his name in the indictment due to his transgender status. Gabriella Sears, born Dereck Donald Sears, has been in prison since 2021 for brutally murdering and dismembering a man in Kelowna, British Columbia.
As previously reported by Reduxx, Sears was arrested in 2021 and charged with second-degree murder and interference with human remains in the death of 49-year-old Darren Middleton, who had employed Sears to do occasional work for him.
Middleton’s body was first discovered on June 16, 2021, by his partner at the time, Brenda Adams, who went looking for him at Sears’ home after he failed to return from work that evening. Middleton was found in Sears’ bathroom partially clothed next to a bathtub with the water running.
Although Middleton reportedly died after receiving a blow to the head, the Crown prosecutors revealed he received several other disturbing injuries post-mortem, including the partial removal of his penis and testicles, a gash to his throat that “was so deep Adams could see right inside,” and other stab wounds. Additionally, Adams noted that Middleton was wearing someone else’s clothing.
After seeing the dismembered corpse of her common-law partner, Adams fled the crime scene, screaming. As she ran from the house, she saw Sears dancing in the middle of the road “with his eyes closed and his arms in the air” to no music.
While Sears, who had a full beard at the time of the arrest, did tell Adams and Middleton he was a woman two days before committing his heinous crimes, he was identified by police as a man.
The trial was underway last fall but was put on pause after Sears terminated his attorneys, Jordan Watt and Tom Forss, 18 days in. Despite successfully having his confessions excluded as evidence during the trial, Sears accused them of “gaslighting [him] and colluding with the Crown.” Watt and Forss also argued that because Sears was allegedly sexually abused by Middleton, the routine strip search and swabbing conducted by police “was traumatic and insensitive.”
Several months later, he parted ways with another lawyer, Mark Swartz, who announced he was no longer representing Sears due to a “fundamental breakdown in the solicitor-client relationship.”
“Gabriella” Sears
Although, as Castanet reports, the trial is set to recommence in July, Sears’ application to have his name changed on the indictment, citing his “equality rights” outlined in Section 16 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, may cause further delays.
In response to Sears’ request, Crown prosecutor David Grabavac expressed during an appearance this week that he is “not unsympathetic” to Sears’ reasoning for wanting to change his name but doesn’t believe the timing was right to bring forth his application.
“This is a novel legal issue which may have far-reaching consequences … I’ve never seen Section 15 of the Charter used like this in a criminal matter,” explained Grabavac. “We haven’t had a chance to research this issue … we’re going to need a couple weeks to figure out what position, if any, we have on this.”
Continuing, Grabavac expressed that given the gravity of the situation and the brutality of the murder, getting the trial completed promptly needs to be a priority.
“The priority, with the greatest respect to everyone, should be getting the trial completed as soon as possible … I don’t know how much research is going to have to go into this and if we’re spending a day or two fighting over this in a few weeks, that’s taking away from trial prep.”
In addition to Sears having several issues committing to legal representation, Justice Ross, the former judge on the case, is stepping down per a constitutional amendment that requires all judges to retire at 75 years old. As a result of this change, Sears will have the authority to decide whether to continue with the proceedings that started last fall or start the trial over.
Although it is unclear how Sears plans to proceed, his new attorney Frances Mahon, said that future deliberations remain unclear, but Sears will likely ask civilian witnesses to re-testify and will “consent to allowing forensic evidence and RCMP testimony to carry over from last fall.”
Sears is currently scheduled to make a court appearance in two weeks, which will clarify how the trial will proceed moving forward.
Not a week goes by without hearing something hair-raising from one of Berlin’s neighbourhood schools, for example in Wedding, Moabit or Neukölln. On the surface, education in these districts seems to be going down the drain. Or is it all just scaremongering?
Daniel S. (name changed) has been working as a teacher at one of these disreputable educational establishments for several years, teaching several classes in years seven to ten. Whereby ‘teaching’ seems almost a bit fancy, because he can only do this ideally – a large proportion of his pupils would have problems controlling their own emotions. Sometimes, however, the precarious domestic circumstances also play a role. If, in such a heated situation, you also touch on topics that go against the grain of the pupils, things really start getting heated.
‘What, for example?’ I ask.
Anything that contradicts the Koran according to the students’ judgement.
With guidelines like these, it’s easy to put your foot in your mouth. Needless to say, these orthodox tendencies are sometimes applied very creatively. For example, if a homework assignment is too uncomfortable for the pupils, it can just as quickly be rejected as ‘haram’, which makes the question of whether the classes are Muslim-dominated superfluous at this point. They are, and almost exclusively so. A circumstance that leads to certain problems, as Daniel S. emphasises from experience: ‘If pupils of a dominant faith, such as Islam here, stick completely to themselves and are so indoctrinated that it can only be described as fundamentalist, this affects our Western values in a very immense way.
Some female colleagues often hope in vain for the necessary respect from their male pupils. Homosexuality is also a no-go. According to Daniel S., a number of our Central European freedoms, such as the choice of religion or the free choice of identity, are not only excluded but rejected by the pupils. And of course the Middle East conflict plays a role. When he raises this topic, the class initially falls silent. But it should not stop there.
‘At the end of the lesson, they expect me to convert to Islam,’ he says with a weary smile. ‘Because they think they’ve argued so well that they’re on the right side.’
There was a festive atmosphere in his classes after October 7 last year. When asked by the pupils whose side he was on, Daniel S. responded with counter questions. Do the pupils mean that politically? Is it about territories or about the people who were murdered and kidnapped? This strategy provokes different, sometimes thoughtful reactions. But in the end, there is no real critical debate.
The opening act for the 2024 Olympic Games ceremony has already been in full swing for over a month: the ensemble is composed of political entrepreneurs, the media, and politicians whose shrill and polemical voices have been dominating France’s cultural stage. They have been ‘warming up’ their audience: French men and women have been riven by disagreements and are voicing their thoughts on the potential headline act.
In the spotlight for July 2024 is French-Malian singer Aya Nakamura, who has been energizing the French audience months before the international event that will saturate the already frenzied streets of Paris. Emmanuel Macron drew the ire of the public after he announced that he had asked the 28-year-old singer if she would like to perform songs by Édith Piaf for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. Two questions still loom: is Nakamura the proper candidate to represent the land of Claude Debussy, Camille Saint-Saëns, Serge Gainsbourg, and Django Reinhardt? And, if she performs this summer at the president’s behest, what does this tell us about the devolution of music and the debilitated soul of a once virtuous civilization?
The case against Nakumara
The best-selling musician sent an entire nation into a tailspin. While Nakamura’s supporters take pride in her chart history, popularity does not automatically translate to admiration: polls revealed that a handsome majority of French people (73%) neither like her songs nor want her to represent them at the Olympics, and 54% of 18- to 24-year-olds claim that she doesn’t represent the youth either. More strikingly, only 7% of French people think that the president made the right call in provisionally choosing her, and this margin includes middle-aged elites who desperately want to parade how in tune they are with the times.
The controversy was further fueled by the singer’s right-wing detractors. Marine Le Pen stated that Macron is trying to humiliate the French people, observing that “It is not a question of her nationality, but the image we want to give of our country,” alluding to the singer’s indecent dressing, vulgarity, and limited lexicon.
Marion Maréchal, a former member of the National Rally and the current head of Reconquête’s list for the 2024 European elections, echoed her aunt’s statements, arguing, “This woman doesn’t even sing in French, and she doesn’t represent the French language.” During Maréchal’s campaign meeting, the crowd fell into silence for a good five minutes as they listened to Mozart’s Piano Concerto No.23 in A Major, K 488 Adagio. The speeches resumed with Éric Zemmour’s incendiary yet meaningful discourse. He stated that scientific studies have shown that the vast majority of fetuses react more often with agreeable facial expressions when they hear classical music. Even while they are bereft of culture or prejudice, 91% of them exhibit an affinity for the compositions of Romantics like Mozart than to lecherous lyrics and undynamic beats like those of Aya Nakamura.
These statements from the French Right were catnip for left-leaning media. Journalists were quick to ask whether these politicians had racist motivations, a hackneyed script based on crass assumptions about the Right. Worse, their reductive cant extends beyond France’s borders. Many anglophone journalists, like their French counterparts, immediately chastised right-wing political actors for their “chauvinistic” attitudes and purported to protect Nakamura from what they insisted was “racist” abuse.
None of these journalists mentioned that politicians like Maréchal had argued that Joséphine Baker better represented French culture—a black, American-born, French woman. Maréchal impugned Nakamura’s lyrics because the artist does not even sing in intelligible French. Jordan Bardella, the president of the National Rally who himself grew up in a predominantly extra-European neighborhood, also argued that Nakamura should not represent France—not because of her skin color (which myopic left-wing accusers assumed), but because a staggering three-quarters of the French population also do not believe that she should represent the country. Bardella additionally pointed out Nakamura’s conviction for domestic violence, and he argued that a hostile artist cannot represent the country in a global event that necessitates unity and peace.
Nakumara is not the modern-day Duke Ellington
These simplistic accusations of racism cheapen real cases of prejudice in the history of music, and they illuminate the shortcomings of contemporary identity politics. There is no denying, for example, that many African American musicians faced prejudice during the Harlem Renaissance. From accusations that they were mutilating classical music to complaints about jazz’s dearth of sophistication, many critics heaped scorn on the genre both because it was entirely new and because the fraught racial tensions during the Jazz Age were astronomically and undeniably worse than at present. Therefore, it would be deeply incorrect to make false equivalences and assume that the stark prejudice that black musicians faced in the roaring twenties is similar to Nakamura’s case today.
Not a single one of Nakamura’s opponents has ever argued that Nakamura should not represent France because she is not française de souche. Even the palest French singer would face similar comments if she demonstrated loutish behavior at concerts, wrote lyrics bursting with ribald language, used compositions with repeatable melodic formulae, and was indicted on charges of domestic violence.
Granted that Nakamura’s supporters are steeped in the belief that the singer embodies multicultural France, in reality, none of her pieces bolsters this criterion. Unlike her jazz counterparts of yesteryear, her lyrics do not capture an acute understanding of any political, cultural, or even profound personal struggle. Her works are just as expendable as those of the many other non-black artists who also relentlessly sing about sex and drugs.
Unlike the great jazz musicians of the past, Nakamura’s hardship stems from perceived racism. Although her antagonists criticize her work, those with a parochial outlook are quick to deem any scintilla of negativity as racist. An increasingly rancorous and pugnacious Nakamura responded by writing a song within a few weeks entitled “Doggy,” yet she inadvertently proved her critics right: only 40% of the song’s lyrics are in the French dictionary, and the scant English vocabulary the multicultural Nakamura employs are mere expletives. She attempts to evince resistance in her lyrics, singing “It looks like you can ‘dead’ (not die, but dead). I don’t have enemies. It’s them that don’t like me,” before ungracefully chanting “doggy” countless times.
By contrast, although the pioneer of big-band jazz Duke Ellington used jazz as a form of activism to combat racism in the 1940s, he did not want to be pigeonholed as a black musician. His rich and poignant compositions, such as “Black, Brown, and Beige” wielded enough power to convey the harrowing black experience in early 20th century America, from the palladian arches of Carnegie Hall to late night speakeasies in Harlem. It is also worth mentioning that Ellington’s largely instrumental masterpiece offered an aural image of the trials, tribulations, and triumphs of African Americans. Whether it is when a sax or trumpet solo intervenes, what the tolling of a bell encapsulates, or why certain non-metrical rhythms were juxtaposed with a coherent melody, Ellington’s meticulous and judicious musical choices showcase his innate genius.
Thedeath of music or a new zeitgeist?
Despite all these criticisms, there is no denying that Nakamura’s songs catapulted her into the limelight. Her supporters claim that she is one of the most listened-to francophone singers in the world, and therefore she deserves to represent the Republic. Her streaming records and overflowing concerts are indeed a testament to her success. She has also soared in popularity online, with over 20 million followers on social media, and her latest song—if we can call it that—had over a million views in just one week. But is the commercial popularity of an artistic product truly a measure of its quality—or its ability to represent one of the bastions of high culture in Europe?
Frankfurt School theorists Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Walter Benjamin were perhaps right to lambast pop culture. They augured the devolution of art under late capitalism, arguing that the culture industry continually strives to make every consumer into essentially the same person as it entices them to purchase the replicable cultural commodities it manufactures. They further claimed that the extent to which a work of art conforms to social norms should never be the determining factor in its success. Instead, genuine art should not be replicable and easy to consume. It also ought to stimulate new ideas and thorough discussions.
Granting that the controversy that Nakamura’s racy repertoire instigates inevitably engenders thought-provoking discussions—such as the debauched, soulless, and lecherous social legacy of the long sixties—it in and of itself does not compel listeners to discuss the implications and underlying meaning of each song, beat, and lyric.
Another Frankfurt school theorist, Herbert Marcuse, discussed how contemporary art has also become prosaic and bereft of transformative power. The philosopher coined the term ‘repressive desublimation’ to refer to the way consumer capitalism has eroded the transcendental elements of high culture and has led to the flattening of art. Art under late capitalism has become unidimensional, as it no longer distinguishes itself from reality– or ‘that which is.’ Furthermore, his definition is rooted in the destruction of Eros and a rampant intensified sexual existence, which further serves as an affirmation of the current debauched order. Nakamura’s lyrics run parallel to this observation: they are mere facsimiles of countless degenerate songs that hegemonize the morally void Western cultural landscape in the aftermath of the deleterious sexual revolution.
Furthermore, Nakamura’s ability to produce a song entitled “Doggy” less than a month after her critics chafed at Macron’s proposition is a testament to the dearth of genius and assiduity in contemporary pop music. While Mozart wrote “The Marriage of Figaro” in less than six weeks, he composed a quasi-cinematic score of around three hours that included at least 16 different instruments. His cavatina in the second act, although composed of only four lines, has the sheer power to transport audience members to a transcendental realm that Nakamura’s vapid iteration of the word “doggy” categorically cannot. Both ordinary listeners and august musical scholars listen to Mozart with rapt attention and are prodded into undertaking an aural, lyrical, and perhaps even philosophical analysis of his opera buffa the moment they leave the theater, whilst Nakamura’s vacuous songs can be played as an accompanying background noise to our pedestrian lives—or worse, encourage listeners to gyrate to her music and promote libidinous behavior.
These two divergent experiences run parallel to Roger Scruton’s distinction between listening and hearing: devoid of an education of aesthetic appreciation, Nakamura’s fans hear her but they do not listen to the ways in which her tones and rhythm hang together structurally—perhaps because they do not. And although both Mozart and Nakamura produced works in such a scant amount of time, there is an immensely wide gulf between Mozart’s unrivaled artistry and prodigious talent and Nakamura’s vapid and incomprehensible whining. To argue otherwise would ring hollow.
Finally, and perhaps more importantly, philosophers like Plato, Nietzsche, and Schopenhauer saw music as one of the noblest art forms. Plato thought that good music had the power to lead its listeners to virtue and an ordered soul, whereas bad music made them fall prey to evil. Similarly, Nietzsche stated that music could elevate our fragile being and lead our mundane thoughts to higher things. Schopenhauer maintained that music manifested the Will itself and the innermost soul of phenomena. It was not a replica of the Will, which made it inherently more powerful than other aesthetic pleasures. While these philosophers allude to instrumental music (and although they were not exposed to an array of contemporary musical expressions), there is a kernel of truth in the metaphysical significance of their theories that is urgently relevant today.
Although I wouldn’t consider Nakamura’s songs to be ‘music,’ if Schopenhauer thought that music was unparalleled as it was universal, based in the metaphysical, and the direct expression of the Will itself, then he would be crestfallen to learn how the marriage of Nakamura’s flat compositions and insipid lyrics echoes the inane and vacuous zeitgeist today. He certainly would not categorize her works as true music either, as they are antithetical to the Will, merely replicate phenomena, and further lead to more imitative music.
Although it is devastating to witness the French president cast a spotlight on a depraved singer, there is perhaps a silver lining. The onslaught of negative reaction vis-à-vis her lewd songs and salacious behavior can perhaps signal that good taste and virtue are not completely lost. While her popularity is an indictment of the weakening of the soul of her listeners and even of Western civilization, a resistant chorus emerging from both the left and right wings of the stage is rising to a crescendo. This symphony of virtuous and cultured voices, orchestrated with the help of brazen political conductors, is slowly muting the noise that at once misrepresents the bleu-blanc-rouge and unduly exploits the true virtuosic and uncommodified Black, Brown, and Beige.
I spent one of the happiest years of my life in Leeds, Yorkshire, England. Now, I’m afraid I’d be run out of town for being Jewish. Cementing that feeling is a video that’s circulating on X showing one of the newest members of the Leeds City Council celebrating his victory with a cry of “Allahu Akbar.”
In 1981, I got accepted to the University of Leeds for my junior year abroad in England. I was absolutely devastated. I’d had dreams of strolling through the medieval streets and quads of Oxford or Cambridge. Instead, I was being banished to the desolate north to a late Victorian institution.
I was so wrong to be disappointed. I adored my time in Leeds. No, it wasn’t all beautiful and medieval, but I had fun from beginning to end. Additionally—especially for a person coming from San Francisco—fall and spring dazzled me. To this day, I’ve never seen a more lovely spring than I did in Leeds when my daily walk between my flat and my classes took me through a park that had acres of snowdrops, crocuses, daffodils, roses, horse chestnuts, and other feasts for the eye.
What I also discovered about Leeds was the sheer Englishness of it all. As a committed Anglophile since my childhood, I basked in the fact that Leeds felt like England. The same was not the case in Southern England. London was a cosmopolitan, multicultural city; Oxford and Cambridge had international student populations; and the more popular tourist destinations had visitors from around the world who drowned out the locals. But Leeds, specifically, and Northern England, more generally, were English.
In 2004, I met a non-Jewish woman from Leeds who told me something very interesting. Yorkshire, she said, was increasingly Pakistani and Bangladeshi in both the big cities and the small, oh-so-English towns I remembered.
She also told me that the incoming Muslims targeted the north because it was Jewish. This wasn’t because they believed that Jewish communities were safer or had better schools and housing. It was to drive out the Jewish population, which they did through low-level, chronic intimidation. A decade later, I heard the same from a young Jewish man raised in Manchester, which is second only to London when it comes to its Jewish population.
Speaking of Muslims, Leeds, the English city I once knew, has one of England’s larger Muslim populations. It was 5.4% in 2011 but is now 7.8%, a 44.44% increase in just 13 years. No wonder Leeds currently boasts one of the most notable mosques in England.
That mosque didn’t exist when I lived in Leeds. Back then, that mosque was a church. While Leeds isn’t in the top 20 Muslim cities in the UK, Yorkshire is generally following the trajectory that the woman told me about in 2004—it’s getting Islamisized.
This gets me to last week’s election for the 2024 Leeds City Council. This was an election that encompassed several regions that used to be individual towns but are now part of greater Leeds. The Labour Party maintained its hold on the city (unsurprising, for Leeds has always leaned left).
Among the winners were:
Shaf Ali (Labour)
Ashgar Khan (Labour)
Mohammed Rafique (Labour)
Mothin Ali (Green)
Mohammed Iqbal (Labour)
Javaid Akhtar (Labour)
Only Mothin Ali and Mohammed Iqbal had close races, with fellow Muslims nipping at their heels. The rest were runaway victories.
Mothin Ali was pretty excited about his victory. This is his celebration:
This Islamist won elections in Leeds and is now a new city councillor. The situation in UK is dramatic. May God help them. pic.twitter.com/wkaNlyDrh6
Note that he’s not talking at all about his ostensible country, the one in which he lives and in which he’ll now share governance. Instead, he’s celebrating a faraway people and Islam. By the way, when Ali isn’t calling for jihad (“Allahu Akbar” is the jihad cry) or celebrating Hamas, Ali is just a humble Bangladeshi-style gardener.
Mothin and Leeds were not the only ones. Bradford, a nearby Yorkshire town that used to be England squared, is now Muslim, too:
When I look at England, I keep thinking of the 1980 Star Wars movie The Empire Strikes Back—not the plot itself, but just the name. Once, England controlled a quarter of the globe—her Empire—bringing both Anglo-Saxon and Biblical values and stable governance wherever she went. England and the English were often deeply flawed, but those core values were and are good. But now, the former British Empire is striking back and taking England and the rest of the West with it.
Lors des élections locales en Grande-Bretagne, des candidats ouvertement islamistes (se présentant sans étiquette) dament le pion à la gauche historique. Ici par, exemple, à Bradford. pic.twitter.com/KfgvSTvHpQ
— Fdesouche.com est une revue de presse (@F_Desouche) May 4, 2024
Translation: In the local elections in the UK, openly Islamist candidates (running without a party ticket) are making life difficult for the established left. Here, for example, in Bradford.
Grande-Bretagne : vainqueur des élections locales dans une circonscription de Leeds, le candidat écologiste Mothin Ali fête sa victoire au cri "d'Allah Akbar" pic.twitter.com/JKqAviCkqR
— Fdesouche.com est une revue de presse (@F_Desouche) May 4, 2024
Great Britain: winner of the local elections in a Leeds constituency, the ecologist candidate Mothin Ali celebrates his victory by shouting ‘Allah Akbar’.
Burnley (GB) : les habitants célèbrent la victoire du candidat islamiste dans les rues de la ville pic.twitter.com/ABeBWggvO0
— Fdesouche.com est une revue de presse (@F_Desouche) May 4, 2024
Burnley (GB): residents celebrate the victory of the Islamist candidate in the streets of the town
Three Indian nationals have been apprehended by Canadian law enforcement in connection with the killing of Khalistan separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.
These individuals, residing in Canada as non-permanent residents, allegedly fulfilled various roles during the incident at the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara in Surrey, British Columbia, where Nijjar was fatally shot.
Mandeep Mooker, an RCMP superintendent, disclosed that the individuals in question, Karan Brar, Karanpreet Singh, and Kamalpreet Singh, all in their twenties, were apprehended in Edmonton.
Mooker further asserted that investigations are underway to determine any potential links between the suspects and the Indian government.
Earlier last year, Canada blamed India for authorising the assassination of Khalistani terror Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia, setting off a diplomatic row between New Delhi and Ontario that saw the return of at least 40 Canadian diplomats working in India.
India had vehemently denied allegations of ‘Indian agencies behind Nijjar killing’ and called them “absurd” and “motivated”.
While Canada continues to blame ‘Indian agents’ for commissioning a hit squad to take down Nijjar, it has failed to provide credible evidence that linked the assassination of the Sikh separatist leader with the Indian government.
Moreover, one of the three arrested in connection with the murder had harboured anti-Modi, pro-Khalistani tendencies, as per media reports and his Facebook page. According to a report published in Jagran, Karan Brar, one of the three arrested suspects arrested by Canada Police, hails from Kotkapura city in the Faridkot district of Punjab. This suspect had travelled to Canada on a study visa approximately four and a half years ago.
Interestingly, a Facebook account named Karan Brar matches the description and details mentioned in the Jagran report. Below attached is the screenshot of Karan Brar’s Facebook profile. In the About section, Karan mentions that he lives in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, and is from Kotkapura in Punjab, which matches the details in the Jagran report.
Karan Brar’s Facebook profile
Karan is the only son of his parents. His father, Mandeep Singh Brar, passed away due to a heart attack just on April 18th this year. Meanwhile, his mother, Ramandeep Brar, had also shifted to Singapore about two and a half years ago. Brar had recently shared a post mourning the death of his father, Mandeep Singh Brar.
Karan Brar mourned his father’s death on FB earlier last month
Karan Brar’s anti-Modi, pro-Khalistani posts
However, what is interesting is the fact that Brar has posted anti-Modi and pro-Khalistani content on his Facebook profile page. In one of the posts he uploaded in 2020, Brar had called for boycotting PM Modi.
The posts were made in the wake of the ‘farmer protest’ in India following the passage of three farm laws. The ‘farmer protest’ witnessed large-scale violence as the rabble-rousers, a significant section of those supporting Khalistan, hijacked the protests and ran riot across different parts of the country. Several notable personalities, including PM Modi and actor Kangana Ranaut, had come under the attack of the farm protest sympathisers, with many of them such as Karan Brar, calling for their ostracisation with boycott calls.
Last year I reviewedParents with Inconvenient Truths About Trans: Tales from the Home Front in the Fight to Save Our Kids for First Things. It is a truly horrifying book, especially for a parent. The book was filled with story after story of heartbroken, desperate mothers and fathers discovering that their child identified as transgender – and then, that school staff, clinicians, medical staff, and even other parents were all arrayed against them in their attempts to save their children from the irreversible damage of cross-sex hormones, puberty blockers, and sex change surgeries.
Most of the parents writing their stories chose to remain anonymous in order to maintain their relationships with their children, and to avoid being targeted by trans activists. Some parental nightmares, however, show up in the papers. A recent example was just published in the Telegraph. A top private school in Edinburgh, Scotland – George Watson’s College – called social services in December of 2020 after the parents objected to the transitioning of their daughter and instead asked that the school practice the “watchful waiting” approach. The parents had come to this conclusion after consulting a psychologist.
“’Watchful waiting’ is an approach in which a child’s view of their gender is closely observed but without social or medical intervention,” the Telegraph noted. “Evidence suggests that many children with gender issues will revert to identifying as a member of their biological sex as they become older.” That is true for over 80 percent of children who struggle with their sex, which is why “watchful waiting” is the approach advocated by the recent Cass Review. Teachers at the school disagreed and stated, instead, that it was important to “affirm” the girl’s supposed transgender identity in order to respect “his [sic] wishes to use masculine pronouns” and to put the girl’s “best interest and wellbeing at heart.”
George Watson’s College, like many other private schools, had been infiltrated by LGBT groups – in this case, the radical trans “charity” LGBT Youth Scotland (LGBTYS), which “requires schools to rewrite policies and send teachers on its training courses in April 2019,” after which each school is given a gold, silver, or bronze ranking “denoting their LGBTQ+ friendliness as part of the charter scheme that is backed by the SNP government.” According to the girl’s mother – who remained unnamed – the school preferred to listen to the activist LGBTYS rather than clinical advice from a psychologist.
The girl decided to identify as transgender after joining an LGBT club, which is also part of the LGBTYS mission in schools. “We were repeatedly lied to by the school,” the mother told the Telegraph.
I feel that our child was just seen as a little guinea pig by the school and LGBT Youth Scotland. The school policies, which LGBT Youth Scotland helped write, are set up to ensure parents are deliberately misled. We had two expert opinions, including from a specialist in gender, not to challenge our child but that adults should basically turn a blind eye, and not affirm her. But these experts were repeatedly dismissed by the teachers. They literally said to us on one occasion that LGBT Youth Scotland were the experts in this.
“Rather than engaging meaningfully with us, we were referred to social services by the school and investigated,” she continued. “Fortunately, they were sensible and it went no further, but the fact that this was deemed appropriate in the first place is outrageous.” Records obtained by the mother through a Subject Access Request indicate that the school had, against her wishes, without her knowledge, and against the advice of clinicians, changed her daughter’s name and switched her pronouns to “he/him,” noting that “mum and dad absolutely do not agree with the ‘positive affirmation approach’ that the school is endorsing.”
According to the Telegraph: “Correspondence with social services states the child was ‘anxious now that social work have been contacted’ and asked for her to be ‘reassured’ that social workers were ‘part of a support network.’” In response to the story, a spokesperson for George Watson’s College insisted that they “have always worked collaboratively with parents and apologise to those involved in this case for any distress caused by what are difficult and challenging circumstances. Every school in Scotland has to weigh up parental engagement with the rights of children, with transitioning being a fluid and ongoing challenge for all.”
Despite this harrowing ordeal – it must have been a terrifying experience to discover that you have been reported to social services for trying to protect your child – these parents and their daughter were lucky. In plenty of other cases, the children have been removed from the parental home.
In France, the first opposition party, the National Rally, has included in its programme the organisation of a referendum on immigration. Marine Le Pen wants to enshrine in the Constitution a “national priority” for access to social housing, employment, and welfare benefits. These are proposals that have been on the table for years and are regularly the subject of fierce criticism from legal experts and politicians who are more or less openly hostile to this party.
On April 22, Laurent Fabius, the president of the French Constitutional Council, declared that the referendum on immigration promised by Marine Le Pen would run into a problem of conformity with the Constitution. According to him, most legal experts agree on this issue. Fabius addressed the fact that this referendum would be held within the framework of Article 11 of the Constitution (i.e., organised by the president of the Republic on a proposal from the government on “reforms relating to the nation’s economic, social, or environmental policy”). In his view, and that of the legal experts behind him, immigration is not an economic issue. Nevertheless, he pointed out that the Constitution could be amended beforehand under Article 89, with the agreement of both chambers, the Senate and the National Assembly—which is unlikely to succeed in the case of a possible Marine Le Pen presidency.
But Fabius also confirmed that General De Gaulle chose to amend the Constitution by using Article 11 for a purpose not provided for in the text. At the time, De Gaulle wanted to amend the Constitution to make the election of the president by direct universal suffrage. Fabius argues, however, that the president of the Constitutional Council at that time, Léon Noël, had informed General De Gaulle that he could not use Article 11 to modify the Constitution.
This is factually incorrect, and Laurent Fabius probably knows it. In his memoirs, Léon Noël wrote that he had chosen not to censure De Gaulle, not because he did not have the courage to do so, but because the Constitution did not give the Constitutional Council the power to cancel a referendum proposal. In its decision of 6 November 1962 (decision no. 62-20 DC), the Constitutional Council explained that it refused to review the constitutionality of a referendum because it constituted “the direct expression of national sovereignty.” De Gaulle’s choice therefore led to a broadening of the scope of Article 11, in order to establish something absolutely central, if not the most decisive, to the French political game: the election of the president by direct universal suffrage.
As the lawyer Pierre Gentillet observes, it is true that in its so-called Hauchemaille decision of 14 March 2001, the Constitutional Council, interpreting the Constitution and its organic law very broadly as always, decided that it was its responsibility to review a decree triggering the referendum. However, this review has never taken place. At no time does Article 11 of the Constitution allow the Constitutional Council to carry out such a review. In fact, this control is only provided for in the case of a referendum triggered by Parliament, and not in the case of a call to the electorate by the executive. Moreover, the control under the Hauchemaille case seems to be limited to the proper conduct and regularity of the operations.
More generally, Fabius’ comments are rather comical when you consider that supporters of immigration never miss a chance to explain that immigration is necessary precisely for economic reasons. If we follow this logic, then it really is an economic issue. Supporters of immigration shy away from the term ‘identity,’ almost seeing it as a sign of crypto-fascism. They systematically take the debate into economic and social territory. In fact, for them, all the problems are primarily due to economic and social factors.
Laurent Fabius’ objection is obviously political, and has very little to do with legal issues. Fabius is part of a major trend in the Fifth Republic, which originally placed popular approval at the forefront, and then gradually abandoned the referendum tool. Its last use was in 2005, when the French voted against the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, before it was passed by the National Assembly in 2007 in the form of the Lisbon Treaty. This was a betrayal and an abrogation of direct democracy that Ghislain Benhessa analyses perfectly in his book Le Référendum impossible.
The controversy ignited by the president of the French Constitutional Council is symptomatic of an institutional evolution and of its relationship with democracy. It is now the judges who set the pace. Their exaltation counts for more than the will of the people. They are experts in everything but elected by no-one. Law takes precedence over politics. It evolves with the times, never ceasing to find new values and minorities to protect, to the detriment of the popular majority. It is pseudo-expertocracy versus democracy.
The essayist Max-Erwann Gastineau has rightly pointed out that the problem of the power of judges has been well known for a long time. He quotes Pierre-Henri Tavoillot, who argues that, although our democracies made it their motto to combat the abuse of power by means of checks and balances, there is now an abuse of checks and balances themselves. Gastineau also draws on the thesis of Israeli political scientist Ran Hirschl, who in 2004 spoke of a ‘juristocracy’ when referring to the process of transferring power from representative institutions to judicial systems.
According to Hirschl, in Western countries, this trend is the result of “a strategic interaction between hegemonic yet threatened political elites, influential economic actors and judicial leaders” forming a “coalition of self-interested legal innovators.” This, in turn, is part of a wider process in which “political and economic elites, while claiming to support democracy … attempt to insulate political decision-makers from the vicissitudes of democratic politics.”
In the case of France, these observations are still more pertinent when you consider the composition of the French Constitutional Council, whose members are appointed by the president of the Republic and the presidents of the National Assembly and the Senate. Its current chairman, Laurent Fabius, is well known to the French, having been a socialist for over half a century and having held such prestigious positions as prime minister, finance minister, and foreign minister. He was one of the most important stars of François Mitterrand’s two seven-year terms (1981-1995). Mitterrand himself is credited with saying something timeless: “Beware of judges. They killed the monarchy. They will kill the Republic.” That may have been a strong statement, but there is no doubt today that judges are in many opposed to democracy.
