The rise in exclusionary rhetoric

By this I mean a marked increase in statements like “X is not who we are” or “there is no place in this city/state/country/organization for people who believe/practice X”. Such statements are not necessarily bad. For some values of X, such exclusion is appropriate. However, for values of X that impugn a large fraction of the population, or beliefs or practices that until recently were uncontroversial, it is remarkably aggressive.

About the time I was leaving New York, the governor (I think it was) made some statement to the effect that those who disapprove of homosexual sodomy have no place in his state and should leave. As it turns out, I was going anyway, but it was disturbing nonetheless, because there was no acknowledgement of any place in particular where people of my religious and philosophical persuasion do belong.

Compare to an immigration restrictionist who yells at immigrants to “go back where you came from.” Don’t do this, it’s rude, but even this is less menacing than what non-Leftists are hearing. The restrictionist might think that Mexicans don’t belong in the U.S., but he presumably acknowledges that they do belong in Mexico. At least, he doesn’t particularly object to them being there.

Compare, if I were to make a statement like “In an ideal Catholic state, there would be no place for atheists.” Would it not be natural for people to ask me what I proposed to do with atheists? Indeed, the question is much more appropriate for our exclusionary Leftists. My “ideal Catholic state” is the hypothetical musing of a powerless man; an actual Catholic state might differ from the ideal in numerous ways, and how they are to be accommodated will depend on the details of the case. (One might wish to treat atheists who have lived in the area for generations and are not making trouble differently from foreign atheist missionaries, for instance.)

By contrast, exclusion by the Leftist power is happening right now, and the questions are pressing. People who profess Christian sexual ethics and whites who feel toward their own race in the way other races feel toward themselves are not to be allowed to work in this and that profession. What exactly are they going to be allowed to do for a living? If they’re not “who we are”, i.e. not Americans, what are they, and where do they belong?

Sometimes we will hear things like “racism has no place anywhere”, but do those who say it appreciate the genocidal logic of the statement? Apparently, whites who do not hate their own people shall not be allowed to exist.