2083 by Andrew Berwick, aka Anders Behring Breivik

This post originally appeared on I Read Odd Books

Book: 2083: A European Declaration of Independence

Author: Andrew Berwick, real name Anders Behring Breivik

Type of Book: Paranoid manifesto, conspiracy theory

Why Do I Consider This Book Odd: Sigh…

Availability: It’s all over the Internet.

Comments: (edited to add: I mistakenly refer to the site Gates of Vienna as Gates of Brussels several times in this discussion. Mea culpa and I would change it but this article has been reproduced several places and the mistake is sort of cast in e-stone. Just know that the site is Gates of Vienna.) When I learned that the Norway mass murderer had salted his manifesto all over the Internet shortly before he went on his rampage, I knew I was going to have to read it. After all, I read odd books. And more to the point, I have an unapologetic interest in the aberrant mind. From all the commentary I read online and from news reports, Anders Behring Breivik was a fundamentalist Christian, he was a fascist, he was a racist, he was an Aryan supremacist, he hated Muslims, he was a loner, he was a part of a larger anti-Islam group, he was a lunatic, he was a mastermind – he was all kinds of inconsistent things and I wondered what was correct and what was the typical media rush to judgment.  I wondered if the people who were postulating about him and his sources had actually read the manifesto.

So I read it. Every last word. I will admit that at about page 1200 things at times got a little vague for me. Reading every word of this disjointed, strange monster of a manuscript would make even an Adderall addict bleary. I also admit that after a while, all the articles explaining the horrors of Islam and all the terrible things Muslims have done wore a bit thin. I have a feeling that were I forced to read some of them again, it would be like I was reading them for the first time. That’s okay  because all that “evidence” was not likely to be of much interest to me anyway. It’s largely unimportant because I examined this manifesto from the perspective of a person interested in strange minds and conspiracy theory. On both fronts, this manifesto was quite interesting.

Strangely, Anders Behring Breivik (to be called ABB from here on out) is not the most interesting part of this manifesto. Rather, it was the cast of characters who led him to the conclusions he reached and provided confirmation for his strange ideas. Most notable is Fjordman. So notable is Fjordman that I intend to devote two entries to discussing him. Initially, I declared Fjordman to be a complete asshole, and parts of that assessment still seem true, but as I reread and wrote my discussion, I began to find him pitiable. Not pitiful, but definitely pitiable.

Fjordman, who revealed his identity recently as Peder Jensen, a 36-year-old man who seems largely unremarkable, greatly inspired ABB’s thoughts and the terrible rampage that killed 77 people. Because Fjordman influenced many of ABB’s ideas, it seems logical to me to discuss him first. You see, though much of this manifesto consists of articles from other writers, the bulk of the articles came from Fjordman. If you have not read or browsed the manifesto, many articles from anti-Islamists are reproduced in full in the manifesto. Part two of this three-part manifesto was almost a static wiki of articles from other people. Though my eyes admittedly glazed over at times, I believe I counted 40 articles from Fjordman reproduced throughout the 1500 pages. Though there are articles from other writers (one of them a hilarious pearl-clutching treatise on the horrors of rap music), Fjordman’s words take up the most space and show a very clear path of how his words affected ABB. Though there are theories about a Brit in Malta who may have influenced ABB’s rampage, the fact is Fjordman’s paranoiac and violent rhetoric influenced ABB’s mindset and his plans more than any other writer or thinker. In fact, the subtitle of this manifesto comes from the title of one of Fjordman’s articles, and the date of 2083 seems very much influenced by estimates that Fjordman posits about the decline of Europe if Muslim immigration is not stopped soon. So logically, for me at any rate, to understand ABB, we first must talk about Fjordman’s articles and the part they played in ABB’s anti-Muslim fears.

Before you read part one of my discussion about Fjordman, there are some things I would like to share with you, gentle reader. Unpleasant things. Of course, I will never not be a little shocked when I discover a whole mess of people willing to accept conspiracy theory as irrevocable fact. I may devote my life to reading books about conspiracy theory, but it is unsettling when it hits home how deeply people can believe in it. It was shocking to realize that there are people who take the word of Bat Ye’or, the woman responsible for creating what I like to call The Protocols of the Elders of Mecca, as historical truth. It was horrifying to realize that people like Diana West (ahahahaha!), Daniel Pipes, and Robert Spencer are not laughed out of every quarter of contemporary political thought. It was disgusting to realize that there are no depths too low for the likes of Glenn Beck, Pamela Geller and Debbie Schlussel to sink as they try desperately to keep their names and ideas relevant in the minds of those who live and breathe race hate and bigotry.

But as unpleasant as all of this is, it is important that we understand how common conspiracy theory is in some form or other for a good many people in this world. For many the natural impulse is to dismiss ABB as a crazy man, and we dismiss him as a lunatic at our own risk because if he is a lunatic, so are many, many others. It is hardwired into the human brain to believe strange things, I think, and it’s hard to look at a man like ABB and realize that he is just one of many, a man who is different solely because he took things just one step further. That is why I ultimately feel pity for Fjordman. Fjordman, a True Believer in Bat Ye’or’s Eurabia conspiracy theory was building castles in the air via his online essays, never once thinking that his words, taken at face value, could have been seen as a call to arms.

We have a vested interest in dismissing all violence as crazy, labeling people like ABB as The Other, but his views are derived from other people and are influencing other people even after anyone with common decency would dismiss him. Killing innocent teenagers for a bizarre political and social agenda should have rendered ABB’s ideas untouchable for anyone with sense and a conscience – Fjordman is appalled by what happened on Utøya – but there is a fringe element who see what ABB did as being the work of a patriot. Think I’m exaggerating? I don’t recommend visiting Pamela Geller or Debbie Schlussel’s sites because if you do, you are rewarding their dreadful antics to draw attention to themselves. Rather, check out the analysis of some of these people on sites like Loon Watch, Spencer Watch, and, interestingly enough, Little Green Footballs. (It had been years since I had visited Little Green Footballs. Last time I visited the site, it was a hive of scum and villainy. Discovering the site is no longer devoted to race hate and biogtry was perhaps the sole pleasant element to come from reading 2083.)

Before I begin my discussion of 2083, I need to make it clear, very clear, that I am not discussing any specifics of the immigration situations in other countries or the specifics of Muslim immigration in Europe. I am not qualified to discuss it and I have no interest running to ground all of the statistics, determining what information is sound and what information is not. But even though the sites I have read that discussed some elements of 2083 focus solely on the question of Islamic immigration, there is so much more than that to be found in 2083. So much, in fact, that what began as just another of my long-winded looks at strange writings turned into what I think will be a four part series: two entries about Fjordman and two entries about ABB.

But being who I am, only part of the manifesto interested me. If you want a hard political look at Muslim immigration and the social implications of it, there are plenty of political sites on both sides of the issue to accommodate you. My examination of Fjordman will look at his beliefs and an analysis of his writing. My examination of ABB will be to look at his plans and his theories, and some postulation about his brain because I cannot resist the urge to armchair psychoanalyze him. And it should be mentioned that I am not going to stray from the text. Everything I discuss about either man comes directly from 2083, and to make it clear, every word from Fjordman comes from articles that ABB found so important that he reproduced them in full in 2083. I also will end up snarking some because, given the text we are discussing, how can I not? Some ideas, even those that lead to tragedy, have an arrogant comedy in them that cannot be ignored by a woman who has a black belt in sarcasm.

So begins Part One: Fjordman.

2083, though categorized into three sections, is a mess in terms of coherence. So discussing the book chronologically is impossible for me. Instead, I am going to write in categories, first about the elements of the book that are most important in understanding the Eurabia conspiracy theory, Fjordman’s distaste for Muslims, and understanding how Fjordman’s words, however unintentionally on his part, could have inspired violence.

It’s also important to note two things before I begin. Fjordman and ABB are not native English speakers, so I will not be noting any usage errors in their writing. To include the traditional [sic] would have been time-consuming and more than a little pedantic had I been consistent. Second, if there are any errors in the way book names are presented or any other formatting differences between the original text and my quotes, assume those errors are mine. I copied from a PDF into Word then into WordPress and I can imagine some things got lost in the transfers.

So let’s begin and have a look at Fjordman, the man who influenced a mass murderer.

The Eurabia Conspiracy Theory
I want to start with the whole Eurabia theory because if we really want to assign blame for what happened in Norway, the blame begins and ends with ABB. Full stop. Non-negotiable. But at the same time, it is not hard to see how it is that conspiracy theory can lead a mind utterly astray. If Fjordman is the man who influenced ABB, then Bat Ye’or is the woman who influenced all of those who believe that there is a master plan to sell out Europe wholesale to the Muslims.

Fjordman is a true believer in Bat Ye’or’s theory of Eurabia, wherein Marxism, political correctness, cultural relativism (routinely called multiculturalism), traitor governments and the EU have collided and colluded to permit an Islamic invasion that will wipe out Western civilization. Here’s a small sample of what Bat Ye’or believes and has written about, as described by Fjordman on page 281:

In an interview with Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Bat Ye’or explained how French President Charles de Gaulle, disappointed by the loss of the French colonies in Africa and the Middle East as well as with France’s waning influence in the international arena, decided in the 1960’s to create a strategic alliance with the Arab and Muslim world to compete with the dominance of the United States and the Soviet Union.

“This is a matter of a total transformation of Europe, which is the result of an intentional policy,” said Bat Ye’or. “We are now heading towards a total change in Europe, which will be more and more Islamicised and will become a political satellite of the Arab and Muslim world. The European leaders have decided on an alliance with the Arab world, through which they have committed to accept the Arab and Muslim approach toward the United States and Israel. This is not only with respect to foreign policy, but also on issues engaging European society from within, such as immigration, the integration of the immigrants and the idea that Islam is part of Europe.”

To sum up, France tried to ally themselves with the Muslims as a counter-balance to the Soviets and now, as a result, all European leaders have an alliance with the Muslim world that affects policies toward the USA and Israel and will result in the West becoming Islamic satellite nations.

From page 283, we get the following two quotes:

A wide-ranging policy was sketched out. It entailed a symbiosis of Europe with the Muslim Arab countries that would endow Europe – and especially France, the project’s prime mover – with a weight and a prestige to rival that of the United States. This policy was undertaken quite discreetly, and well outside of official treaties, using the innocent sounding name of the Euro-Arab Dialogue. The organisation functioned under the auspices of European government ministers, working in close association with their Arab counterparts, and with the representatives of the European Commission and the Arab League. The goal was the creation of a pan-Mediterranean entity, permitting the free circulation both of men and of goods.

European leaders went behind their citizens’ backs in order to sell their countries out to the Muslims.

On the cultural front there began a complete re-writing of history, which was first undertaken during the 1970s in European universities. This process was ratified by the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe in September 1991, at its meeting devoted to “The Contribution of the Islamic Civilisation to European culture.” It was reaffirmed by French President Jacques Chirac in his address of April 8, 1996 in Cairo, and reinforced by Romano Prodi, president of the powerful European Commission, the EU’s “government,” and later Italian Prime Minister, through the creation of a Foundation on the Dialogue of Cultures and Civilisations. This foundation was to control everything said, written and taught about Islam in Europe.

There is a movement to control information about Islam, including what is taught in schools, all under the auspices of European leaders working behind the scenes to give their countries over to Islam.

More from page 284:

Eurabia is a novel new entity. It possesses political, economic, religious, cultural, and media components, which are imposed on Europe by powerful governmental lobbies. While Europeans live within Eurabia’s constraints, outside of a somewhat confused awareness, few are really conscious of them on a daily basis.

This Eurabian policy, expressed in obscure wording, is conducted at the highest political levels and coordinated over the whole of the European Union. It spreads an anti-American and anti-Semitic Euro-Arab sub-culture into the fiber of every social, media and cultural sector. Dissidents are silenced or boycotted. Sometimes they are fired from their jobs, victims of a totalitarian “correctness” imposed mainly by the academic, media and political sectors.

Okay, this is important because the reason those kids were targeted on that island is because they were attending a Labor Party summer camp. ABB makes this clear in the beginning of the manifesto, but key to the Eurabia conspiracy is the idea that cultural Marxists, the people responsible for political correctness, are the ones permitting Muslim immigration into Norway. By taking out future Socialists whom he thought would continue to harm his country, ABB was trying to stem the tide of immigration that Bat Ye’or insists comes from this conspiracy of European leaders.

And it goes on and on. To save the reader from having to read more long quotes on this matter, here is the summary: Europe’s leaders have sold out Europeans to the Muslims, who are evil and seek to destroy a Western identity. All non-Muslims will be forced into a state of “dhimmitude,” a neologism coined by Ye’or to express the perpetual second-class citizenship and a state of near-slavery that she believes Muslims will inflict on non-Muslims. Fjordman believes Bat Ye’or’s conspiracy theory and therefore so does ABB.

What I later found so interesting about Fjordman’s belief in this conspiracy theory is that there are glimpses of a reasonable mind (and note I did not say rational – conspiracy theorists are some of the most rational people on the planet but they are seldom reasonable). There are moments when, as I read, I could see the wheels turning in his mind and if he had just let them turn a bit more, he might have come out on the other side of the machine. But alas, he got stuck. For instance, Fjordman is strangely aware of how dumb his particular brand of conspiracy sounds but is unaware that he is just like every other True Believer out there in how he rationalizes his ideas. From page 280:

I decided to write this essay after a comment from a journalist, not a Leftist by my country’s standards, who dismissed Eurabia as merely a conspiracy theory, one on a par with The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. I do not disagree with the fact that conspiracy theories exist, nor that they can be dangerous. After all, the Protocols and the
Dolchstosslegende, or “stab in the back myth” – the idea that Germany didn’t lose WW1 but was betrayed by Socialists, intellectuals and Jews – helped pave the way for Adolf Hitler and the Nazis before WW2.

So he’s aware of conspiracy theories. He understands that they exist and that others look at the Eurabia conspiracy and dismiss it along with other conspiracies. But like all True Believers, his conspiracy is different, somehow, than all the other conspiracy theories. As much as I loathe his ideology and as much as I mock and deride his beliefs, I also know that there is a critical mind in there somewhere that has been corrupted by hate because there is no way anyone could know the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is a load of pants but not be able to see how Eurabia is the same unless one is deliberately shutting down the part of one’s mind that permits reasonable comparisons.

We continue seeing how strangely his mind works on page 280:

However, what puzzles me is that it is a widely-held belief of many (not just in the Islamic world but in Europe and even in the United States) that the terror attacks that brought down the Twin Towers in New York City on September 11th 2001 were really a controlled demolition staged by the American government and then blamed on Muslims. I have seen this thesis talked about many times in Western media. While it is frequently (though not always) dismissed and mocked, it is least mentioned.

In contrast, Eurabia – which asserts that the Islamisation of Europe didn’t happen merely by accident but with the active participation of European political leaders – is hardly ever referred to at all, despite the fact that it is easier to document. Does the notion of Eurabia hit too close to home? Perhaps it doesn’t fit with the anti-American disposition of many journalists? Curiously enough, even those left-leaning journalists who are otherwise critical of the European Union because of its free market elements never write about Eurabia.

Fjordman doesn’t seem to understand that only a small number of people believe that 9/11 was an inside job, and that when it comes up, it is being brought up and discussed by the self-same people who believe in it. Aside from Charlie Sheen and the whole “Loose Change” crowd, people feel no need to deflect blame for the terrorist destruction of the World Trade Center from the Muslim terrorists responsible for it. Therefore it is not that unusual that Eurabia seldom comes up either. The reason no one reputable mentions Eurabia as truth is because it is, as I said already, The Protocols of the Elders of Mecca. Even though there are some news outlets willing to let Glenn Beck shit up the place and therefore may have an open-door lunatic policy,  most of them are not, in fact, run by anti-Western freedom haters who want to see the entire world taken over by political correctness so that the Muslims can enslave us all. Rather, people don’t discuss it outside of Jihad Watch and The Gates of Brussels because most people are not bigoted paranoiacs. Even better, they aren’t saying it because Islam is not trying to take over the world. The reason it is “hardly ever referred to at all” is because it does not exist

Fjordman has really swallowed Bat Ye’or’s conspiracy theory hook, line, and sinker, to the point that he simply cannot see that this belief set is really a different side of the same coin used as currency in race hate and bigotry directed at Jews. From page 296:

According to Bat Ye’or, fear of awakening opposition to EU policy toward the Arab Mediterranean countries led to the repression of all discussion of the economic problems and difficulties of integration caused by massive immigration. Any criticism of Muslim immigration is basically brushed off as being “just like the Jews were talked about in Nazi Germany,” a ridiculous but effective statement.

It’s not ridiculous. It’s the same goddamned hate that has plagued mankind since we evolved into differing tribes. The arguments are the same – the Muslims want their own law system derived from their beliefs, they won’t assimilate, they commit crimes against native Europeans, etc. Just replace the world Muslim with Jew and we can reenact those same accusations of 70 years ago.

Bat Ye’or’s acolytes are no different than anyone else who bases their life around bizarre conspiracy. From page 296 we see the victim mentality that all these True Believers seem to possess:

Professional harassment, boycott and defamation punish those who dare to openly challenge the Politically Correct discourse. According to Bat Ye’or, this has led to the development of a type of “resistance press” as if Europe were under the “occupation” of its own elected governments.

What harm has befallen Bat Ye’or, or the people at Gates of Brussels, or Robert Spencer, or anyone else for speaking this nonsense other than earning the censure of their peers? If you say stupid things that have no basis in reality, people mock you. That’s life, not persecution for your beliefs. Moreover, I find it amusing that these folk consider themselves as equivalent to “resistance press.” They are tilting at windmills and are trying to give their bigoted conspiracy a patina of respectability, harking back to the real resistances that fought against actual occupying armies, like the French during WWII. This is not a resistance press that requires pseudonyms for personal safety – it’s a bunch of miserable people publishing bigotry as history, many of whom don’t want to eat the shit sandwich that being bigots would earn them. Bat Ye’or is no Lucie Aubrac. It is offensive that anyone would even try to associate this mess of hate with movements that genuinely did fight against occupying armies. But they must adopt this guise of being the voice for freedom, persecuted for their beliefs, lest they have to face the fact that their base beliefs are rejected because they are stupid and because they are wrong.

It’s all very sad, in a way, how such beliefs, so strange on their face, would influence anyone to believe. But they do believe. And a man killed 77 people because of the perpetuation of conspiracy theory as fact. Never forget this. ABB believed this conspiracy theory, but so do many others. The basis of the belief behind his rampage is shared by many other people.

Fjordman is a religious bigot
The force behind the Eurabia conspiracy theory is hate – bigotry aimed at a religion. Saying this in no way lessens the impact of any Muslim atrocity that may have happened. Religion is, in my atheist opinion, a shield behind which many terrible people have done terrible things. Bat Ye’or suffered a shattering upheaval because of political machinations in Egypt and calling her and those who believe her conspiracy bigots should not reduce the perception of the impact bad politics had on her life. But regardless of how she came to have the ideas she does, the basis of this conspiracy theory is hate and Fjordman definitely has the hate.

Hate makes it impossible to see any blood except that which is on your enemy’s hands. Fjordman has some odd ideas about the sanctity of other religions in comparison to Islam. From page 58:

Moreover, there are hundreds of calls in the Koran for fighting against people of other faiths. “If it is correct that many Muslims view the Koran as the literal words of God, which cannot be interpreted or rephrased, then we have a problem. It is indisputable that the texts encourage terror and violence. Consequently, it must be reasonable to ask
Muslims themselves how they relate to the text, if they read it as it is,” says Magaard.

Fjordman cops to the fact that he is not a Christian, though he thinks Christian Identity could play some role in ending Muslim immigration, so perhaps he has no idea the hilarity that ensues when one engages in comparative religious examinations of the horrors religions espouse. But suffice it to say that for every line from the Koran one uses to damn the Muslims, I can find find an equally appalling line from the Bible and/or Torah to damn the Christians and/or Jews. Let us ask all the Christians and Jews how they relate to the text, if they read it as it is. That should be fun and illuminating.

More of the same, plus some bizarre rhetoric from page 337:

Muslims are stuck with their problems and their corrupt leaders and blame everybody else for their own failures because they can never admit they are caused by deep flaws in their culture. We shouldn’t make the same mistake. Europeans export wine; Arabs export whine. That’s the way it should be.

This comes from a section wherein Fjordman is postulating that the Europeans have been too weak and have the weak government they deserve. The part I am focusing on here is the statement that Muslims never admit they cause problems and that throwaway line about wine and whine. Ugh. This is ridiculous stereo-typing (based on what – I had no idea that Muslim are considered whiny – none that I know are whiny…) and really helps the case that Fjordman is just a bigoted, strange little man willing to say outrageous things because he hates. And if all Arabs exported was whine then why all the fear? What does it say about Fjordman that he has such hate for a group that is evidently so weak he uses words like “whine” to describe them?  Of course, that was a rhetorical throwaway line, but still, it is quite grating.

Then Fjordman goes on to quote a commenter from some anti-Islam sites:

Thus, from a purely economic point of view, Islam seems to be a collective of people who live by the ethos of “beg, borrow or steal.” So why do we, the capitalist countries, who do not believe in offering anyone a free lunch, subsidise the most lazy yet aggressive bunch of people on God’s planet, who are bent on subverting our democratic system? The nub is, how has it come about, that the natural progression of the most advanced civilisation on earth is towards stupidity?

Yep, from the entirety of all the Muslims on this Earth we can safely say that every single one of them is a beggar, a moocher or a thief. This is very sound reasoning and no one should ever question when anyone makes huge, sweeping, bigoted statements like this.

But Fjordman and those he quotes don’t let anything like facts get in their way of Islamic demonization. From page 414:

Former Muslim Ali Sina[51] claims that even in the USA, which has a smaller Muslim population and less social security benefits than Western Europe, Muslims are a huge drain on the economy: “Because about 2 million Muslims live in America and among them there are some who are terrorists, Americans are forced to expend hundreds of billions of
dollars on homeland security. I have no idea how much is the actual cost. Let us be conservative and say it costs only $200 billion dollars per year. In reality it could be many times more. Does anyone have any idea? With just $200 billion dollars, every Muslim, including their children cost the taxpayers $100,000 dollars per year. This is the real “contribution” of Muslims to America Mr. President. Once you add the cost of the real damage caused in terrorist attacks, such as to planes, buildings, etc. this cost will be much higher.

Just for the record, power needs no excuse to crawl up people’s asses. Seriously, if the TSA had not been the agency that more or less destroyed the Bill of Rights, some other government agency would have. I know, I know, I am totally sounding like Alex Jones. We all have our weaknesses. But back to this quote. It is a quote that assumes there are Muslim terrorists living in America and that is why the Department of Homeland Security is doing all that it does. It assumes the number of terrorists in the USA is the sum total of Muslims in the USA, because it breaks down the amount spent by the DHS per Muslim. And then the number spent by the DHS is also speculative. Fact, schmacts! Let’s yell about terror and money and stuff because who cares about real numbers and accurate statistics?

From page 523:

As I have demonstrated above, it is perfectly accepted, and widely practiced, by Jihadist Muslims to lie to non-Muslims about their true agenda. I have also demonstrated that the relationship between radicals and so-called moderates is a lot closer than we would like to think. At best, they share the goals of establishing sharia around the world, and differ only over the means to achieve this goal. At worst, they are allies in a good cop, bad cop game to extort concession after concession from the infidels. Moreover, even those who genuinely are moderate and secular in their approach may later change, or their children may change. This can be triggered by almost anything, either something in the news or a crisis in their personal lives, which will create a desire to become a better, more pious Muslim. The few remaining moderates can easily be silenced by violence from their more ruthless, radical counterparts.

So, even the moderate Muslims are scary because they are some sort of religious Manchurian Candidate wherein they can be triggered into extremism and violence. We have to fear them even if they are not fearsome because they may become fearsome. I don’t know how anyone could look at this and not see that this is nothing but religious bigotry.

Fjordman sees the Muslims as relentless baby-making machines, echoing language that I have read condemning Italian and Irish immigrants in the United States 100 years ago, and Hispanics today. From page 286:

The growth of the Islamic population is explosive. According to some, one out of three babies born in France is a Muslim. Hundreds of Muslim ghettos already de facto follow sharia, not French law. Some believe France will quietly become a Muslim country, while others are predicting a civil war in the near future.

I am unsure how Fjordman comes by these statistics and lack the will to find out. As far as I know, France does not collect birth information using  religion statistics. However, given that Muslims make up 9% of the French population, it is hard to see how the Muslim women included in that 9% can possibly have so many children each year that they make up 33% of the total births in any given year. Oh yes, of course, the French must be deliberately misrepresenting the number of Muslims because they are a part of the Eurabia conspiracy. Or the Muslims have babies in litters like cats. Either way, this is irrational bigotry.

Fjordman also has a hard time explaining why some religions pass inspection with him and why some don’t. From page 295:

What the European Union does, however, is to treat Islam as a traditional, European religion on par with Christianity and Judaism. This is a crucial component of Eurabian thinking and practice.

At what point does a religion’s presence obtain a traditional status. Though Muslims were expelled from Spain, there was a significant Muslim presence left behind. How long does it take to become a tradition? Christians invaded Scandinavia, replacing pagan and heathen ideals with Christian ideals in some quarters and Scandinavia has only been “Christian” for 800-1200 years. If Christianity is considered a traditional religion for all of Europe, then why not Islam? Well, because Bat Ye’or’s conspiracy theory has led Fjordman to conclude that Muslims are evil.  (And while I am aware of some of Fjordman’s story that he told when he revealed his real name, I am doing my best to stick to the manifesto. However, I will say that while Fjordman has lived in Egypt and studied there, and was appalled by some Muslim reaction to the 9/11 attacks, such ideas are worthless in determining a unified outlook in the world. Taking the specific and making it the general for all people within an entire faith is a bad way of forming ideas.)

I’ll end this section on Fjordman’s religious bigotry with this quote from page 335:

There is, however, a big difference: The Islamic world always has been our enemy and always will be. China and Russia do not have to be our enemies, although our relations will be complicated because of their size and their own Great Power ambitions. We can, at best, persuade them that directly opposing us isn’t going to pay off.

So, we can reason with the Chinese and the Russians so they will not stand in the West’s way as they contain the Muslim Menace, but we can’t reason with the Muslims. Interesting… But even more interesting is the notion that the Islamic world was, is and always will be our enemy. See, this is why this is nothing but hate. This mindset is no different than those who insist that the beliefs of the Jews mean they will always be the enemy of civilization. But when you are in the depths of such beliefs you can’t see how they are the same hatred perpetuating itself over and over and over.

I don’t even have the time or desire to discuss all the various Muslim fears that Fjordman has, but he thinks the Muslim Brotherhood has a multi-point plan to take over Europe. Investments in Europe evidently mean they are setting the stage to have a strong financial foothold once they kill off or enslave whitey. At any rate, this is perilously close to New World Order bullshit because at this point, international trade and foreign investments are a part of the world economy. Get over it. There were many times I wanted to tell Fjordman to pull up his socks and get over it – the world has changed, and as much as he demeans the tribalism of Islamic adherents, he sure cloaks himself in his own tribal identity. But seeing conflicts in thinking are not the strong point of any conspiracy theorist. I will touch more on some of Fjordman’s inconsistencies in the second part of my look at his words.

Fjordman’s bleak, urgent and violent rhetoric is alarming
I have to state pretty clearly that Fjordman was pulled into this against his will. Evidently he never exchanged ideas directly with ABB and declined to meet him. In a way he didn’t ask for this. But in a way, he did. Information placed on the Internet reaches all kinds of readers and in writing in such a vehement, angry manner, using terminology for war, battle, and siege, as well as stating the urgency of the dire situation in Europe, it is not unreasonable to look at his words, note their inclusion in the manifesto, and understand the role his rhetoric played in ABB’s rampage. I don’t agree with some bloggers that Fjordman bears a criminal culpability, and he may not even bear a moral culpability. But there is no way to look objectively at his words and not come to the conclusion that they could have been read by a fellow True Believer as a call to arms.

I have seen some pundits say that if Fjordman is to bear any responsibility then the Beatles must be held responsible for the actions of the Manson family or that Salinger must be responsible for the murder of John Lennon since Mark David Chapman was carrying a copy of The Catcher in the Rye when he shot him. That is all nonsense. Paul McCartney did indeed write a song about the fall of a civilization but at no point did he say that there was to be a race war and that someone needed to start it off by killing a pregnant starlet. And god only knows what Chapman extrapolated from a book about a kid who hated phonies but at no point did Salinger indicate that perhaps the way to rid the world of phonies was to shoot a politically active rock star. However, Fjordman does, in fact, indicate that there needs to be some drastic action to stop Muslim immigration, which he sees as a part of a larger scheme to create a Eurabia wherein white Europeans are enslaved by Muslims, and he uses violent language as he shares his ideas. More importantly, he made a very convincing case that there is no hope for change via the political process or even peaceful demonstrations, which would lead some True Believers to think that the only method by which change could be achieved is the individual acting against the state.

At some point, the blogging world is going to have to understand that our words mean something, that they have overt meaning plus subtext, and that when information is so easily disseminated, words laden with subtext may reach an audience that may not know you were writing hypothetically. I can understand why Fjordman went into hiding. The horror of this situation alone has to be killing him.

But none of that changes the fact that the proof for his exhortations for urgent action, possibly violent, are clear as day in his words. Though he did not state outright that one should kill members of the Labor Party in Norway (cultural Marxists) in order to stem the tide of Islamification, he engages in fear-mongering, uses violent language that gives lie to the idea that he did not tacitly encourage violence, and proves his case that things are beyond hope. Did he mean to set off ABB? Of course not. This is less an insinuation about Fjordman’s role inspiring the Norway murders than it is an attempt to show those who still have not made up their mind about the text that there is a strong sense of urgency and a call to violence that cannot be denied simply with good intentions.

I want to begin with some quotes, offered with no commentary. In this entire section, for all quotes that have words in bold, the emphasis is mine. We start on page 322:

I know many Americans, and Europeans, too, have more or less written off Western Europe as lost to Islam already. I would be lying if I said that I didn’t think this too sometimes, but I do see encouraging signs of a real shift of public opinion beneath the surface. Judging from information such as the extremely high number of Germans hostile to Islam, I still believe, or at least hope, that Europe can be saved.

But this hope hinges on the complete and utter destruction of the European Union The EU must die, or Europe will die. It’s that simple.

From page 331:

It is conceivable that Islam in some generations will cease to be a global force of any significance, but in the meantime it will be a constant source of danger to its neighbours, from Europe through India to Southeast Asia. The good news is that Islam may not be able to achieve the world dominance it desires. The bad news is that it may be able to achieve a world war. We can only cage it as much as possible and try to prevent this from happening.

More dire language from page 378:

I’ve suggested before that native Europeans face three enemies simultaneously when fighting against the Islamisation of their lands: Enemy 1 is the anti-Western bias of our media and academia, which is a common theme throughout the Western world. Enemy 2 are Eurabians and EU-federalists, who deliberately break down established nation states in favor of a pan-European superstate. Enemy 3 are Muslims. The Netherlands from 2001 to 2007 is a clear case in point where enemies 1, 2 and 3 have successfully cooperated on breaking down the spirit of the native population through intimidation and censorship and by squashing any opposition to continued mass immigration.

From page 613:

Scandinavia is a Utopia lost. Previously quiet Scandinavian nations now suffer Islamic terror threats and death threats[28] against people criticising Islam. Norway celebrates 100 years as an independent state[29] this year. Judging from this new discrimination act and the runaway Muslim immigration, perhaps the anniversary should be called “From independence to colonisation”. At the same time as their women are no longer safe in the streets because of immigrant gangs, the authorities respond by making Norwegians defacto second-rate citizens in their own country. They use their own people as stepping stones for their personal careers in the UN bureaucracy.

From page 520:

Centre Democrat Ben Haddou[27], a member of Copenhagen’s City Council, has stated: “It’s impossible to condemn sharia. And any secular Muslim who claims he can is lying. Sharia also encompasses lifestyle, inheritance law, fasting and bathing. Demanding that Muslims swear off sharia is a form of warfare against them.”

Read that statement again, and read it carefully. Muslims in the West consider it “a form of warfare against them” if they have to live by our secular laws, not their religious laws. Will they then also react in violent ways to this “warfare” if they don’t get their will? Moreover, since sharia laws ultimately require the subjugation of non-Muslims, doesn’t “freedom of religion” for Muslims essentially entail the freedom to make non-Muslims second-rate citizens in their own countries?

It goes on and on and on. From page 342:

This war by Islam against Europe, the West and indeed mankind has been going on for more than 1300 years. This is the third major Jihad, the third Islamic attempt to subdue the heartland of the West. Although I cannot prove this, I have a very strong feeling that this will also be the last attempt. There will be no fourth Jihad. Either Muslims will win this time, or Islam itself will be handed a defeat and a blow so powerful that it may never recover from it. This is perhaps the longest, continuous war in human history. And it’s about to be decided within the coming decades. I’m not sure how all of this will play out. What I do know is that it could all be decided on my watch, and I don’t want to be the weak link in something my ancestors kept intact for 1300 years.

Fjordman is making his case about the Eurabia theory – Islam is coming to get Europe. In this one passage he spells out that the time to fight is at hand, giving urgency to the situation. He calls it a war, one of the longest in human history. He says that if Islam is not crushed this time there will be no second chance. He says he does not want to be part of the reason the West succumbs to Islam. There is no way for anyone but a Fjordman apologist not to see the implications in his ideas and his loaded word choice.

Just some more examples of the descriptive language Fjordman uses as he discusses his conspiracy theory. From page 603:

Since its inception, Islam has been waging an aggressive war against the rest of mankind, with the stated purpose of bringing every single human being on earth under Islamic rule. Infidels have been presented with only three options: Convert to Islam, die, or submit under Islamic rule as a dhimmi, a second-rate citizen in your own country subject to serious financial pressure, constant verbal humiliations and frequent physical abuse. Islam hasn’t changed in the last 1400 years.

This entire quote is incendiary in the mind of anyone who believes in Eurabia conspiracy, and ABB was definitely a True Believer.

How about this from page 636:

According to Politikerbloggen[9], AFA have produced a manual about how to use violence in order to paralyze and hurt their opponents, and they encourage their members to study it closely. Meanwhile, senior members of law enforcement are too busy waving plastic penises to care. It’s all for tolerance, and then there is this small group at the back, behind the police, the media and the cultural and political establishment, ready to assault, beat up and hospitalise anybody deemed to be insufficiently tolerant.

The people who want tolerance will beat people to a pulp to get it. With incendiary words like this one wonders if ABB decided to fight Fjordman’s fire with fire.

The urgency that Fjordman brings to making the case for Eurabia is also strong and persuasive to a True Believer. From page 677:

Several recent incidents have demonstrated that Muslims are now trying to apply these dhimmi rules to the entire Western world. The most important one was the burning of churches and embassies triggered by the Danish cartoons depicting Muhammad. This was, down to the last comma, exactly the way Muslims would treat the persecuted non-Muslims in their own countries. The cartoon Jihad indicated that Muslims now felt strong enough to apply sharia rules to Denmark, and by extension NATO. Hardly anybody in the mainstream Western media made any attempts to explain this to the public.

We are hurtling toward slave status now, this very minute. The Denmark cartoon incident proves it, in Fjordman’s eyes.

More about the cartoon situation in Denmark. From page 593:

The status given to non-Muslims who accept being second-rate citizens, dhimmis, under Islamic rule is technically referred to as “protected.” During the Cartoon Jihad, the leftwing coalition government demonstrated in public that Norwegian authorities did not control the security of their citizens, and thus had to accept Muslim intervention to secure their safety. This amounted to the acceptance of Islamic rule according to sharia law, a view which was subsequently strengthened by payments to Muslims at home and abroad. Undoubtedly these payments offered by Mr. Giske on behalf of the government were viewed by Muslims as jizya, the “protection money” non-Muslims are required to pay in willing submission (Koran, 9:29) as a sign of their inferior status vis-a-vis Islam, as a compensation for not being slain.

When the government in Norway failed to protect its citizens from Islamic backlash, they effectively sold out Norwegians into a state of protected, Islamic slavery and tacitly accepted Sharia law. This is clearly making the case that urgent action is needed, right here and right now, because the government has already made Norwegian citizens Islamic slaves.  Christ, as I reread this, I sort of think that Fjordman should kiss the ground that this did not turn out worse than it did.

Here’s some more urgency from page 600:

My bet is still on Britain, or possibly Denmark, as the first Western country to face a civil war due to Muslim immigration, but the Netherlands is a potential candidate as well.

Muslim immigration will cause civil war in Europe. A True Believer and a patriot would want to avoid civil war, using any means to prevent it.

And for the love of sanity, bear in mind that I am only culling a small percentage of the alarmist quotes from Fjordman available to me. From page 586:

Sweden was presented during the Cold War as a middle way between capitalism and Communism. When this model of a society collapses — and it will collapse, under the combined forces of Islamic Jihad, the European Union, multiculturalism and ideological overstretch — it is thus not just the Swedish state that will collapse but the symbol of Sweden, the showcase of an entire ideological world view. I wrote two years ago[3] that if the trend isn’t stopped, the Swedish nation will simply cease to exist in any meaningful way during the first half of this century. The country that gave us Bergman, ABBA and Volvo could become known as the Bosnia of northern Europe, and the “Swedish model” will be one of warning against ideological madness, not one of admiration. I still fear I was right in that assessment.

Ignore the trivialization of centuries of Swedish society summed up in “Bergman, Abba and Volvo.” Were those things not to have existed, I am sure the world and Sweden would have been just fine. Just pay attention to the panic implicit in the idea that Sweden is near collapse and may cease to exist unless something is done.

Some more panicky information for the True Believer, from page 521:

It is true that Jihad is not exclusively about violence, but it is very much about the constant threat of violence. Just like you don’t need to beat a donkey all the time to make it go where you want it to, Muslims don’t have to hit non-Muslims continuously. They bomb or kill every now and then, to make sure that the infidels are always properly submissive and know who’s boss.

We are becoming donkeys who will continue to be trained by violence until we are overcome. Something needs to interrupt this training process before it is too late.

Here Fjordman is discussing the imminent fall of France to Muslims, on page 287:

The impending downfall of France is bad news for the rest of the West. What will happen to French financial resources? Above all, who will inherit hundreds of nuclear warheads? Will these weapons fall into the hands of Jihadist Muslims, too?

This is clearly setting up the idea that the world is going to be in danger of a nuclear event if something does not stop Eurabia from becoming a reality. Nuclear warheads in the hands of terrorists would make the average person jittery. Imagine how such an idea can create a sense of utter urgency in the mind of a Eurabia believer.

More of Fjordman’s charged urgency from page 326:

New anti-discrimination laws to combat Islamophobia are to be enacted, as they already have been in Norway, where Norwegians need to mount proof of their own innocence[15] if Muslim immigrants accuse them of discrimination in any form, including discriminatory speech. The EU also wants to promote an official lexicon[16] shunning offensive and culturally insensitive terms such as “Islamic terrorism.”

Ah, so now Norwegians will have to prove their innocence much like those accused of witchcraft in the 17th century, in anti-Democratic attempts to label all Norwegians Islamophobics. Again, note the urgency and overblown horror, words meant to instill fear and a need to act in the reader.

Fjordman’s sense of impending doom includes all Europeans being put to death for Islamic blasphemies:

Remember that blasphemy against Islam carries the death penalty according to sharia. Multiculturalism in Europe is about to reach its openly totalitarian phase. Those who think this is a joke can look at the Dutch cartoonist Gregorius Nekschot[13] who was arrested in 2008 for cartoons that “insulted” Muslims. Several documents that are publicly available (but little known by the general public because they are never referred to by the mainstream media) state that the EU should “harmonise” the education and legal systems with the Arab “partner countries” within the coming decade. This is being negotiated as we speak, behind our backs.

So, Europeans will one day face the death penalty for criticizing Islam. Act now or we will all face the sword for criticizing Islam. According to Fjordman, the details are being decided now behind everyone’s backs.  Can we all agree that this would create a sense of urgency to act now in a True Believer?

Now here’s where things get sticky and ugly for anyone who really wants to maintain that Fjordman’s intent was never to inspire anyone to commit acts of the sort ABB committed. It is true that Fjordman describes a plan to defeat cultural Marxists and stop Muslim immigration. From page 330:

The best way to deal with the Islamic world is to have as little to do with it as possible. We should ban Muslim immigration. This could be done in creative and indirect ways, such as banning immigration from nations with citizens known to be engaged in terrorist activities. We should remove all Muslim non-citizens currently in the West. We should also change our laws to ensure that Muslim citizens who advocate sharia, preach Jihad, the inequality of “infidels” and of women should have their citizenship revoked and be deported back to their country of origin.

Okay, within the confines of his irrational, bigoted hated for Islam, this is not that incendiary. Changing laws sounds like a pretty middle of the road option. This would still be a bit iffy given the Eurabia theory that is behind it but overall one does not want to shake Fjordman by his shoulders until he sees reason.

Well, it would be somewhat acceptable if he did not go on at length, detailing in depth the fact that changing laws is impossible, that every reasonable move the Islamophobe in Europe can make is not only doomed to failure, but could in fact, be criminalized. Fjordman unfortunately makes his case about the dire, irrevocable situation Europe is in, being at the mercy of governments in collusion with Muslims. In the face of all that he writes, it is impossible for a True Believer in Eurabia to walk away with the sense that anything legal or sensible will end the plight of the native Europeans.

Here’s an example of this, from page 599:

In March 2007, native Dutch residents of the city of Utrecht rioted to protest against harassment by Muslim youths and government inaction to stop this. The authorities immediately suppressed the riots by sealing off the area and installing surveillance cameras to control Dutch non-Muslims, but they have done virtually nothing to address the underlying problem of violence from immigrant gangs. The case is far from unique.

Such incidents demonstrate that the authorities throughout Western Europe are now dedicated to implementing continued mass immigration and multiculturalism no matter what the natives think. If they object, they will be silenced. The Dutch voted “no” by a very large margin to the proposed EU Constitution that will formally dismantle their country, as did Irish and French voters, but they are simply ignored. At the same time, the EU elites obediently respond to calls from Islamic countries to ban “stereotypes and prejudice” targeting Islam. European political elites implement the agendas of our enemies and ignore the interests of their own people. They are thus collaborators and traitors and should be treated accordingly.

So from this example we see that peaceful protests do not work and result in an Orwellian crackdown on the protesters. Any attempt to speak out will result in being silenced. The political officials reject the will and the vote of the people and are allowing the enemy to take over. The governments are full of Islamic collaborators. What good will voting or waking up the “sheeple” do if the will of the voters is ignored anyway? What is the only option left for the patriotic True Believer when even peaceful protest is taken from him?

From page 599:

In Brussels, Belgium, gangs of Muslim immigrants harass the natives on a daily basis. We have had several recent cases where native girls have been gang raped by immigrants in the heart of the EU capital, yet when the natives wanted to protest against the Islamisation of their continent on September 11th 2007, the demonstration was banned by the Socialist mayor of Brussels, whose ruling party is heavily infiltrated by Muslims. Those who attempted to carry on with a peaceful protest were arrested by the police.

So, gang rapes are common and peaceful protest against Islamization is criminalized. The options for a patriot who wants to save his countrywomen from violent rape are becoming more and more limited in Fjordman’s rhetoric.

Then we have this strange passage from page 590:

Is it just a coincidence that the one country on the European continent that has avoided war for the longest period of time, Sweden, is also arguably the one Western nation where Political Correctness has reached the worst heights? Maybe the prolonged period of peace has created an environment where layers of ideological nonsense have been allowed to pile up for generations without stop. I don’t know what Sweden will look like a generation from now, but I’m pretty sure it won’t be viewed as a model society. And if the absence of war is one of the causes of its current weakness, I fear that is a problem that will soon be cured.

Of course Fjordman means Sweden got soft and allowed the cultural Marxists to run amok because of peace, but it can be seen as a call to arms to end the peace in Scandinavia. In this sense, peace means cultural death and ABB certainly interrupted any sense of Norwegian peace. And even if that is not the case, the last line implies a vicious war with Islam looms, another heavy idea for a True Believer who thinks he is in a cultural war with Islam.

More about peace and war, from page 522:

Furthermore, the Islamic world has not only the attitude of open war. There’s also war by infiltration, as we can see in Western countries now. Is there a possibility to end this dance of war? According to Moshe Sharon, the answer is, “No. Not in the foreseeable future. What we can do is reach a situation where for a few years we may have relative quiet.”

Fjordman makes the case that there are several ways that the Muslims are committing Jihad against the West, one of them being immigration and excessive child-bearing. So even in times of peace, the warrior must be preparing for war with Islam. Even if the Muslims in some areas are not creating the panoply of problems Fjordman talks about, they are quietly infiltrating and the canny Westerner must be ready, even in the face of “relative quiet.”

This bit from page 588 is a call to arms, pure and simple:

Why does the government dispense with the social contract and attack its own people like this? Well, for starters, because it can. Sweden is currently arguably the most politically repressive and totalitarian country in the Western world. It also has the highest tax rates. That could be a a coincidence, but I’m not sure that it is. The state has become so large and powerful that is has become an autonomous organism with a will of its own. The people are there to serve the state, not vice versa. And because state power penetrates every single corner of society, including the media, there are no places left to mount a defence if the state decides to attack you.

The governments are attacking their own people because they have no accountability anymore. The state is so large and so ominous that there is nothing anyone can do if the state decides to turn against them. The implication, of course, is that a True Believer must launch an offensive because all defensive moves are doomed to failure.

From page 587:

This is a government that knows perfectly well that their people will become a minority in their own country, yet is doing nothing to stop this. On the contrary. Pierre Schori, Minister for immigration, during a parliamentary debate in 1997 said that: “Racism and xenophobia should be banned and chased [away],” and that one should not accept “excuses, such as that there were flaws in the immigration and refugee policies.”

In other words: It should be viewed as a crime for the native population not to assist in wiping themselves out.

That is hardcore, right there, the idea that failure to cooperate will be a crime. If failing to cooperate is a crime, then it makes any other sort of action the only moral course, since we seem to be dealing in black and white. And once the case is made that there is no way to affect the government as they ignore the voters (which one presumes would make it difficult to “throw the bums out” as we used to say in America), that they turn against the native citizens at every provocation, that they have criminalized protest AND may criminalize non-compliance, there really is no course of action left for a True Believing patriot than to act against the government in a direct offensive.

There is no hope of change via the democratic process, from page 376:

In 2007, former German president Roman Herzog warned that parliamentary democracy was under threat from the European Union. Between 1999 and 2004, 84 percent of the legal acts in Germany – and the majority in all EU member states – stemmed from Brussels. According to Herzog, “EU policies suffer to an alarming degree from a lack of democracy and a de facto suspension of the separation of powers.” Despite this, the EU was largely a non-issue during the 2005 German elections. One gets the feeling that the real issues of substance are kept off the table and are not subject to public debate. National elections are becoming an increasingly empty ritual. The important issues have already been settled beforehand behind closed doors.

If there is no way to change things via a political process, is it surprising ABB took to his guns and bombs? Fjordman is raising these issues with the intention of waking up Westerners but if there is nothing legal they can do to stop immigration, what else is there for them to do when rhetoric wakes them up? Blog about it? Amusingly, that will come up in my discussion of ABB, a section wherein he takes a small jab at those awake and still writing and not acting.

In fact, here is a little snippet of Fjordman’s own strange, backhanded criticism of blogging. I will touch on his other inconsistencies in part two. From page 377:

In the eyes of American theorist Noam Chomsky, “The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum.” This is undoubtedly true, which is why it’s strange that Chomsky thinks that the Internet, currently the freest medium of all, is “a hideous timewaster.”

And yet Fjordman kept writing about all these horrors in a hideously timewasting manner. One wonders if ABB was trying to best his teacher by not wasting time.

There is no middle road for the Eurabia conspiracy True Believer to trust even mainstream Muslims, from pages 518-519:

Examples such as these leave non-Muslims with a very powerful dilemma: How can we ever trust assurances from self-proclaimed moderate Muslims when deception of non-Muslims is so widespread, and lying to infidels is an accepted and established way ofhiding Islamic goals? The answer, with all its difficult implications, is: We can’t.

Does this mean that ALL Muslims are lying about their true agenda, all of the time? No,of course not. Some are quite frank about their intentions.

So, even the moderate Muslims are lying about their true intentions and the only ones not lying are the ones telling the West to their faces that they plan to defeat them. Doesn’t really leave a lot of wiggle room for negotiations. People may be willing to say that Fjordman and writers like him are trying to wake up Westerners but to what avail? In the process of making their case for Eurabia conspiracy theory, writers like Fjordman painted themselves into corners. Fjordman gave lip service to changing the situation via changing laws but goes into excruciating depth about how it is impossible to do that to which he gave lip service.

It’s sad, in a way. Fjordman proved the Eurabia theory so well that his acolytes had no choice, if they wanted to change things, but to act violently. Of course, Fjordman was engaging in rhetoric. All politics is rhetoric, it seems at times. People who bloviate about conspiracy theory mainly want to be believed, and belief in the theory, the comaraderie of being among people whom you think are not deluded and see the world as you see it is one of the heady reasons conspiracy theory will never go away. It is comforting to have others who believe as you do, and there is a lovely sense of arrogance wherein all those people know they are right and the others are wrong. This arrogance fuels endless debates, it fuels political action, and when those arrogant folk throw around violent, urgent rhetoric that offers no peaceful recourse, they should not be surprised when someone who believes them takes action.

So we come to end of Fjordman: Part One. Come back in a couple of days for Fjordman: Part Two, where I will discuss things like Fjordman’s take on feminism, some of his strange notions, and other elements to his writing, like his misuse of literature and popular culture in his articles.  Next week I will post my discussion of ABB, but I need to mention again that I find Fjordman so much more interesting than ABB. Don’t be surprised if my analysis of Fjordman’s words far outweighs my analysis of ABB’s words.

Since I suspect these entries may attract new readers , please take a moment to read my comment policy.   And welcome!  Be sure to tune back in on Thursday for more from 2083.

72 thoughts on “2083 by Andrew Berwick, aka Anders Behring Breivik

  1. I hadn’t really paid too much attention to this Fjordman character, but after reading your critique of his writings, I have to believe he is stark raving CORRECT.

    Conspiracy theory exists when political correctness prevents alternative opinions from being heard. When the multicultural elite controls the media, these liberals tend denigrate any opposition as bigotry. (Or these selfsame do-gooders avoid specific complaints by using meaningless buzz-words like “the Other.”) What the Leftists call “hate” is merely an attempt to preserve indigenous European culture. Fjordman’s warnings are no more “hateful” than an American Indian tribe trying to preserve its identity when facing an influx of Anglo invaders.

    In all those words of your essay I do feel that you missed the point – you have not shown how the average European benefits from Muslim immigration. And as these very same migrants are responsible for increased crime and taxes and civil unrest, then the average Westerner is directly harmed by this alien influx. Because the average Caucasian is adversely affected, the only explanation must be some sort of ulterior motives on the part of the ruling elite that not only permits, but encourages, this invasion. Attempting to find reason behind this demographic disaster is what you call conspiracy theory.

    Think of European demographics in ecological terms. A mountain lake, for instance, exists in a state of stasis – but introduce an alien plant or a predatory fish and the entire eco-system is destroyed. Muslims are like that alien entity introduced into the Western civilization. Why is it wrong for Europeans to resist destruction the same way that Native Americans resisted their own cultural demise? Fjordman is merely depicting the harm to the European lifestyle from this nvasive species.

    What is the difference between Anders Berwick and Geronimo? Between Fjordman and Tecumseh?

    1. Geronimo and Tecumseh were actually fighting to save themselves and their nations from genocide. The assertion that “western civilization” is under a similar threat from non-European immigrants and refugees is delusional. This new fascism is the child of two misconceptions. First, that the economic pains that people in Europe and North America are suffering are the result of some kind of economic socialism, and second that immigration from the south to the north is the result of some kind of cultural socialism. Neither of those beliefs is correct. In fact, both of those outcomes, decreased economic stability and increased immigration, are the result of ever more liberalized capitalism. We have a socio-economic system which generates huge wealth for some and huge misery for others, and we have a large number of basically decent human beings who want to ameliorate the misery part. Weep all you want over wounds done to some mythical “western civilization” that has never existed. I prefer helping poor and working class people improve their lives, no matter where they were born, or what names they give to God or what food they eat or how they wear their clothes.

      1. No one does more harm in this world than a “basically decent human being.” No one causes more evil than a well-intentioned person. After all, Stalin really tried to improve economic conditions. Mao was only seeking to eliminate inequality. Hitler wanted to improve things for the average German. Kim Il-Sung only desires to eliminate poverty in North Korea. Lyndon B. Johnson launched a War on Poverty, and guess who won.

        1. You confuse good intentions with human decency. The two are not synonymous. Stalin and Mao are terrific examples of people who placed ideology over human life, with horrific consequences.

          1. Multiculturalism isn’t an ideology, it’s a byproduct of immigration and a free society.

          2. Multiculturalism is the terminal state of civilization: just ask the Romans at the end of their Empire, the Austro-Hungarians at the end of their nation, the Soviets after the collapse of their Union, the Yugoslavs at the breakup of their country, and the Americans as they descend into third-world depravity.

          3. If you don’t like multi-culturalism, why not increase immigration and integration, so that multiple cultures fuse into one? Enforcing separation of cultures ensures multi-cultural conflict.

          4. Ethnic conflict is a normal and natural part of the human condition. Trying to eliminate such strife only causes more evil in the long run. So just learn to live with conflict like every other generation of mankind.

          5. Far better to have that inevitable conflict in distant nations than between neighborhoods in Western cities.

          6. They placed (the acquiring of)power and absolute control over ideology, I don’t think human life entered the equation , and neither of them were known for personal sadism,they just were sociopathic enough to not care. Or to translate it into corporate (mindset and )jargon :a goal oriented assertive personality
            But let’s not forget that they weren’t alone in a basement loading up on ammo but relied on their society (call it the banality of evil) to achieve their goals. On the other spectrum we have ABB(a) aka Hans who disguised his lust for death under an apparent need for social change and control.

            Ps: ” Little lover” is one of the creepiest fucking songs ever devised. On the other hand, the posthumously released “Ride on” is so well written and played…just awesome

    2. Another load of drunken philosophy that Adam, Eve & God the Father already condemned. GOD IS NOT WILLING THAT ANY SHOULD PERISH, BUT THAT ALL MIGHT BELIEVE ON HIS NAME-JESUS. Repent & be baptized! Jesus said, “I am God there is none besides me.” “I am the Way, the Truth & the Life. No man comes to the Father except by me.” “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” “As many as received Him to them He gave the power to become the sons of God the Father even to those who believe on His name.” Jesus’ healing ministry began with adult baptism.
      17 years of darkened sun before July 29, 2081.
      July 29, 2081-the rapture of believers in Christ Jesus-all those who received the Holy Spirit-at the trumpet sound in heaven-1st the dead & then the living ascended to heaven in a twinkling of an eye
      July 29, 2081-2088-the Great Tribulation-God’s wrath is poured out on the earth, Judgment of the Believers in Christ Jesus & the Marriage Supper of the Lamb in heaven
      2088-3057-the Reign of Christ Jesus-(the Bible stated “1000 years” & in actuality it was 969 years)
      3057-3059-the Devil is loosed out of the pit –(the Bible stated “a time & a half” & in actuality it was 1 & three fourths years)-the battle of Armageddon-the nations are drawn together for the last battle in the Valley of Megiddo-the Lord Jesus comes down of a white horse with the words, “King of Kings, Lord of Lords” written on His thigh & a sword comes out of His mouth to destroy all who are in the battle. The bible says that the blood runs a “horses’ bridle high” & birds feed on the bodies.
      3059-the old heavens& the old earth pass away & the new heavens & new earth are created by the Lord Jesus Christ-at this point in time the Lord Jesus says,“Depart from me I never knew you.” to all who died in the battle of Armageddon, to those who took the mark of the beast in their right hand or forehead during the tribulation, to all who died during our time without receiving the Holy Spirit, & to all those who died during the flood of Noah’s day in wickedness. Jesus says, “In this world you shall have trouble, but I have overcome the world.”
      Jesus says, “If we confess our sins He is faithful & just to forgive us our sins & to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

    3. Never before in the history of blogging have so many blowhards felt intensive analysis of a document could be discounted because the author failed to respond to a single comment. In the hopes of encouraging those who still read these entries to read the actual words I wrote as opposed to engaging in “AHA, you didn’t respond to the one thing I consider important so therefore you’re wrong” bullshit, I am finally replying to Evil Gringo.

      Also, sorry to respond five years later, EG. By all means reply back if you get any sort of notification of this reply. It’s weird to reply this late but if it gets people to discuss the document and my analysis and not the conspiracies in their heads, especially in the face of recent events in Europe, then I feel it’s worth it. Sorry it had to happen to your comment, and all the more sorry because we did interact in other 2083 entries.

      What the Leftists call “hate” is merely an attempt to preserve indigenous European culture. Fjordman’s warnings are no more “hateful” than an American Indian tribe trying to preserve its identity when facing an influx of Anglo invaders.
      I was at an advantage here because I had read the whole of the document and had divided it mentally into subsections so you hadn’t had a chance to see the complete misogyny on Fjordman’s part wherein he decides that women -> Frankford movement -> cultural genocide. Perhaps you feel the same way, that it’s not hateful to blame every woman who disagrees with you politically for destroying your culture but it was indeed hateful to us leftists and many of us women.

      Moreover, the immigration in Europe is not comparable to European colonization of North America. Yeah, the Natives here have a lot to complain about. They weren’t given a choice and they were outmanned and victims of genuine cultural genocide. If Europeans want to stop the tide of legally approved immigration into their countries, they have many political options to stop it, though you wouldn’t know it to read Fjordman’s hopeless rhetoric.

      It also asks the question of why it is that admitting Muslims has completely undermined European culture to the point that all anyone can do to stop it is to shoot European children. Why are Europeans so weak that hordes of people who have not even yet experienced a cultural renaissance can completely undo their cultures? The answer is, of course, that they aren’t that weak, and the recent influx of Syrian and other refugees have shown this. For every pink-haired girl encouraging the refugees into their countries, holding bold signs and denouncing their heritage, you have dozens more speaking out against the harms specific refugees have caused.

      And then that brings us back to conspiracy, the notion that the Muslims are playing their role in the Eurabia theory, acting as a monolithic entity intent on ruining Europe. For every loud mouth Muslim shouting about how he will outbreed the white man, you have far more who just want to get away from the damage done, mostly by the USA, to their countries and raise their children in peace. And if Scandinavians don’t want these people in their countries, they have many options to stop it that don’t require whole sale murder of potential cultural marxists.

      In all those words of your essay I do feel that you missed the point – you have not shown how the average European benefits from Muslim immigration. And as these very same migrants are responsible for increased crime and taxes and civil unrest, then the average Westerner is directly harmed by this alien influx.
      I don’t have to show that immigration benefits Europe, EG. That wasn’t the point of this analysis. This analysis was to show what it is that Fjordman, Breivik, et al., have said about immigration. I’ve already said I don’t have any standing to analyze the politics, economics and cultural impact of immigration in Europe. Showing the bizarre mindset of paranoiacs doesn’t equate proving the other side is correct – both can be wrong.

      In modern times, immigration seldom benefits the countries that accept immigrants, especially those coming in tides from repressive home countries. Humanitarian efforts are generally behind those immigration policies and the benefit to the countries are outweighed by the need to help people, be that good or bad. But all those people who are wringing their hands over multiculturalism need to understand that immigrants are not being let in because they will benefit society via diversity or new ideas or anything like that. They are being let in because their nations are hell holes compared to Europe – because Norway culturally, economically and socially is an infinitely better place than Syria or Somalia and only a lunatic would argue otherwise – and people and governments want to help. Benefit to nation isn’t an issue for them so it’s hardly a point I need to demonstrate.

      Because the average Caucasian is adversely affected, the only explanation must be some sort of ulterior motives on the part of the ruling elite that not only permits, but encourages, this invasion. Attempting to find reason behind this demographic disaster is what you call conspiracy theory.
      But that wasn’t proven in the texts read for this entry, EG. Fjordman did not make a prima facia case that Muslim immigration is harming Europeans. He cherry picked data, he engaged in violent hyperbole, he bashed women, he moaned about how bitches want Muslim men to dominate them, but he relied on a de facto acceptance of Eurabia to prove his point. Eurabia is conspiracy theory because it cannot be proven that the countries of Europe decided to destroy themselves by accepting immigration. Add to this that every step of Eurabia relies on happenstance and circumstance rather than actual conspiracy and any sensible person dismisses it. Lack of proof and reconstruction of prior events to fit current needs – Eurabia is a crappy theory.

      You can find reasons behind this disaster, as you call it, without resorting to fantasy. Reasons can exist without a complex series of Rube-Goldbergian shenanigans preceding them. Did the original settlers come to the USA with the sole intent of wiping out all the natives, or was that just what happened after a couple of centuries and a unified government post-revolution. Bad things happen without conspiracies to cause them.

      Think of European demographics in ecological terms. A mountain lake, for instance, exists in a state of stasis – but introduce an alien plant or a predatory fish and the entire eco-system is destroyed. Muslims are like that alien entity introduced into the Western civilization.
      And? The people of the world have been moving around since before recorded history and it seems like we only bemoan this when it serves our specific agenda. It’s a bit self-serving to be worried about human ecosystems when one is an American. It’s stranger still to be worried about just Europe when whites are still trying to hold onto colonized portions of Africa. What’s sauce for Johannesburg is sauce for Malmo is sauce for Austin. The world is in perpetual motion – we cannot erect human-proof fences and invasion and conquering built this world we are trying to save, using the metrics of what we feel worth saving rather than a concern for the entirety of the world and how immigration and invasion into native cultures is playing out all over the globe.

      Why is it wrong for Europeans to resist destruction the same way that Native Americans resisted their own cultural demise? Fjordman is merely depicting the harm to the European lifestyle from this nvasive species.
      I’ve handled why Fjordman didn’t come close to making a case that Muslim immigration is bad – he just whined about how hard it is out there for a white boy. But what destruction are Europeans experiencing? Have they had their churches banned? Is it illegal for them to wear native costumes on holidays? Are they being forcibly intermarried into the incoming hordes? Are they being deprived education or economic access? Is it illegal for them to speak their native languages? Have their local food sources that fed them for centuries been hunted to near extinction?

      The problem isn’t cultural destruction. The problem is economics. Most of Europe is socialist and give to their citizens economic benefits most Americans can only dream of (or loathe, given the libertarian nature of the country as of late). Immigration, especially of uneducated and culturally disadvantaged (or outright backward) people, have put a strain on the economics that support citizens. Destruction of economy is a serious problem but it’s not cultural genocide and nothing is gained from engaging in hyperbolic fear mongering when discussing it. And yes, I know the hilarity of me condemning hyperbolic language. Hypocrisy, we are all guilty of it.

      What is the difference between Anders Berwick and Geronimo?
      Geronimo knew who his enemy was and fought that enemy bravely on the field of battle. He didn’t retreat into a fantasy world wherein he was a secret leader of all mankind. He didn’t target weaker members of his own people to make a fatuous point. He didn’t specifically target weaker members of his tribe because he knew he lacked the skill and necessary bravery to attack opposing militias and armies. Geronimo didn’t live a life of luxury at his mama’s house before slaying children wholly unrelated to the battle for his tribe’s integrity. He didn’t quit his job, lie to everyone around him and preen like a peacock at local bars. Comparing an Apache warrior who lost his entire family to a Mexican militia, who waged wars on several fronts, who never once killed his own people in a megalomanical attempt to prove he was part of a hidden, glorious group, is laughable. Breivik is a worm who benefited so much from the system he thinks is corrupt that he was able to engage in rampant credit card fraud, sponge off his mother, and skip out on national military service as he made plans to kill via bombs and then slay unarmed children on an island they could not escape from. The two men are so wholly different in their motives and real actions that there is no way you can compare them.

      Between Fjordman and Tecumseh?
      I know very little about Tecumseh but I can tell you that he didn’t write dozens of articles under a pseudonym, encouraging war with urgent rhetoric and hyperbole, blame his failures on women and then deny everything when his words encouraged a madman to do his worst. Fjordman is a sad little man, indeed a Reichean Little Man, who talked tall under a nom de plume and hid in terror when people pointed out the objective reality of the words he wrote.

      Again, sorry Evil Gringo for not replying to this years ago especially since you may not know I’ve now replied and have a chance to reply in kind. Your comment had merit and I am unsure how it slipped through – I had such an onslaught of e-mails when this posted and went viral but I do apologize for not giving your comment its deserved response.

      And to those who read here and have used my lack of reply to EG as a “gotcha” to dismiss all this research while bringing nothing to the table other than your delusions and paranoia, you’re going to have to find another stick to wave at me. Maybe, you might actually read the goddamned 1500 page document for yourself and see what it really says? Ahahahaha, no conspiracy theorist would risk reading any thing that may affect their perception of subjective truth, so I know that won’t happen, but it’s nice to think about, commenters who want to discuss the text rather than their sad boy feels.

  2. Just thought you might like to look at the discussion of your review at Metafilter. After some initial GRAR by people who didn’t visit the link, some nice thoughtful comments on your piece. I haven’t finished reading it yet, but so far I’m finding it very educational — and thorough!

    1. Holy crap, Edward!

      I better get in gear on finishing Fjordman: Part 2.

      Thanks for giving me the link. I’m kind of stunned.

    2. Interesting. I finally read all the comments. It was surprising that there are people who are arguing the intent of the article (Hi, this is not a political blog!) and the notion that even reading or speaking about the manifesto will result in copycat killings based on juvenile offender data. Then it was less surprising when I read more comments and saw they had declared they would never read what I wrote.

      Sigh… Same as it ever was.

      But for once I disagree with the notion that I have done a bad, bad thing. 😉

    1. Thanks, Danios. I’m glad LoonWatch saw some merit in my verbose analysis. The comments over there were interesting, as well.

      1. It was amusing watching you grapple with reality, and completely fail to get the point.

        Europe is engaged in a cold civil war with cultural marxism. ABB turned it into a hot one.

        1. Wow. These three lines have completely changed my perspective. You, Fjordman and a mass murderer say it’s true so it must be true. I’m such an idiot for missing the point. Please forgive me?

          Yes, go vindicate the ideas of a bigoted, narcissistic, mass murderer of children, you sterling and brave thinker. Set an example of how to deal with reality. You owe it to the world to spread your genius. Go forth, you sage!

  3. Hello, and thanks for a very interesting essay. Just a thought though,

    “Christians invaded Scandinavia, replacing pagan and heathen ideals with Christian ideals in some quarters”

    No, they didn’t really, it was more a question of negotiations with kings. Sweden went Christian with the baptism of king Olof in 1008, but nobody held a sword to his throat. You could look at it more as joining a Medieval European Union than any kind of invasion. It’s true Finland was invaded by Sweden with the intent to spread Christianity (much in the way the counter jihadists never cease to remind us the Muslims used to back in the 7th century), but for most part, our corner of the world slipped quietly under the yoke of the church. Only in Norway did the authorities use force to estblish the new order, but the king, Olav Tryggvason, did not represent an invading foreign power but was the legitimate king of Norway.

    1. There had been Christians in Norway for 300 years before the battle of Stiklestad. Olav was not the first Christian king, Håkon the Good ran a peaceful campaign to Christianize the country before him. And at Stiklestad, there were Christians on both sides – it was about a lot more than religion.

    2. My European history is spotty at best – this was very interesting. Thanks for sharing all this, Daniel.

  4. It is probably no doubt the Fjordman is one of those who inspired ABB while he was planning his acts of terror. But it is not possible that Fjordman could have planted the seed in ABB’s mind to choose this path. ABB made his decision and started his planning nine years ago, in 2002, at the age of 23. Fjordman launched himself as a blogger in 2005.

    It has already been published some interesting biographical analyses on ABB here in Norway. They are pointing at several circumstances, events and political and cultural influences which formed the boy and later the young man into a political and cultural fanatic.

    In your article you are ignoring these facts, and you are giving Fjordman a role which he obviously could not have played. In this context, I believe an analysis of ABB would have been much more interesting, although Fjordman for sure is interesting to discuss, but in general, and not linked specifically to these events. At least not if it is meant to be an insightful analysis of ABB’s original ideas and deeper motives.

    1. It is probably no doubt the Fjordman is one of those who inspired ABB while he was planning his acts of terror.

      That was all I was really discussing. I don’t think Fjordman planted the seed to do this – the responsibility for the Norway murders are firmly at the feet of ABB. Rather, the point I am making is that when one engages in the sort of rhetoric Fjordman engaged in, it is rather disingenuous when the worst happens to distance one’s self from it as if one’s words existed in a vacuum. Fjordman was a key contributor to the thought hive that encouraged ABB. But I do find it interesting that even as I find his attempts to distance himself foolish, he did distance himself. Many of his comrades in thought have praised the killings, as he himself did before he understood the role he played in ABB’s thoughts. He is appalled. Geller, Spencer, and others of that ilk are not. I tend to think his disgust is genuine.

      I really do feel pity for the man. I think he had no idea the impact of his words on a man who was receptive to them and willing to do physical harm.

      I do plan to discuss ABB and alluded in Fjordman: Part Two to how I think it is that Fjordman became ABB’s favorite writers as he appealed to the misogynistic side of ABB, and the part of ABB who wanted to return to a land of no divorce, mom waiting at home after school with cookies, etc. I more or less dismiss ABB’s accusations that his Muslim friends when he was younger influenced this.

      But I disagree that he is the more interesting of the two. Of course, it is just a question of what I find interesting rather than any objective idea who is the more fascinating.

      But as always, mileage varies. Thanks for your opinion and for commenting!

      1. To put people and roles in the right perspective, ABB has mentioned one person specifically as his mentor, and that is Mr. Paul Ray, a UK wright wing activist.

        One reason for ABB to quote Fjordman more than other in his manifesto might be that Fjordman is Norwegian. What he writes and the ideas he presents is most likely easier to identify with. Well, this is my assumption.

        1. I’ve read that and it’s pretty interesting, that Paul Ray influenced the rampage. I mentioned him as the British man living in Malta who is cited as being an influence, because it’s clear Fjordman looked at the EDL as a model in some regards. But I did my best to limit myself to the text in the manifesto, and though I reacted to it because of outside actions, I tried to stay focused on the words in the manifesto. In that respect Fjordman’s influence is pretty clear.

          I think your assumption is worth exploring, however, not in terms of blame necessarily but to find out what all went on inside ABB’s head. I think he had a couple of big influences who inspired both his bigotry and his decision to kill. To be completely honest, I had not weighed the Norwegian versus English part. As an Ugly American I tend to forget that perhaps I am reading the translation and not the original. I had assumed all Fjordman’s articles were posted in English. That being the case, your assumption may be pretty sound.

          And again, just to anyone else reading this, unless there is found a larger group who funded ABB in some manner, I don’t think blame needs to be assigned to either May or Fjordman. Influence isn’t blame.

          1. I appreciate what you write in the last section. I believe that is a sound approach.

            Yes, Fjordman wrote everything in English. So did ABB. The Cyber version is his original. But you are right. Neither of them has English as their native language.

            Previously I wrote: “One reason for ABB to quote Fjordman more than other in his manifesto might be that Fjordman is Norwegian. What he writes and the ideas he presents is most likely easier to identify with.” I did not aim to language, but rather the way of thinking and a degree identification the ABB might have felt towards Fjordman.

          2. I have now read your part two on Fjordman.
            In case you have not googled Fjordman / Peder Jensen (which I guess you have), he was not originally a Muslim skeptic. On the contrary, he was interested in Arab culture. He even studied Arabic at a university in Cairo.

            When 9/11 happened, he was shocked as he experienced that Arabs were cheering and celebrating over the tragedy. That became a turning point for him. He was relating to the large growing Muslim population in Europe. If they (the Muslims / Arabs – and these were not extremists – can show that much joy, which in this context also can be interpreted as hate, towards the West, their people and values, he concluded that Europe is facing the same threat as the US. Mr. Pedersen experienced that he got his worries confirmed by the later bombings in London and Madrid. If I got it right Mr. Pedersen believe that the biggest threat for Europe is bombs and terror from Islamists, but the long term development of cultural take over by a growing population of ordinary Muslims which he saw were celebrating in Cairo after 9/11.

            After all, this is what I have read and heard through various media since 7/22.

          3. I didn’t read any of the information about Fjordman until I was finished reading 2083 for fear I would mix things up too much, but I have read about him since.

            I read about the 9/11 cake parties he witnessed in Cairo. I find it interesting that he came to believe extremist reactions in parts of Egypt represented the whole of Islam. It’s also very interesting to me how dislike of Muslims became a belief in Bat Ye’or’s conspiracy theory. I would love to pick his brain to see how he came to that realization.

            However, even though Fjordman believes Europe is in danger of a Muslim hegemony, it is important to realize that he harbors very extreme ideas about liberalism in general. Those ideas of anti-liberalism are hand in glove with his ideas of Islamophobia. His anti-liberal ideas of the Marxists implementing political correctness, leading to feminism, with the end result being the women letting in the Muslims, you’ve got a bit more than just fears of Muslim occupation of Europe. When you add in the conspiracy that indicates that the EU is stealthily selling out Europe to Muslims, you have a lot more at work than just a fear of Islam overtaking Europe. And again, I think these multiple, overlapping and co-existing fears stems from his belief in conspiracy theory.

          4. Muslim immigration is a mainstream concern in Europe and it is an EU issue. Eg. If Turkey joins the EU then there will be a flood of Turkish immigrants migrating north. Many quite fairminded people have issues with that. It is quite plain that within Islam there is a huge radical jihadist type movement seeking to undermine the West. The fact it does not represent most muslims is besides the point. Islamoscepticism is not entirely irrational. You don’t have to agree with Fjordman to notice that.

          5. Ahhh… Okay, I follow you. Sorry about that. I think there are a lot of reasons Fjordman appealed to ABB, but I think a common country is a very big part of it. Fjordman’s fears likely seemed a far more real to ABB because they lived in the same country. I think you are definitely correct.

    2. Umm, that presupposes that ABB is not lying in his manifesto, something wich has been proved false. We do not know of any indications that he was seriously active in the counterjihad movement before… 2005 or 6, I think is the first appearance in the blogosphere (at LGF under the nick Kafir, if I remember right.) WHat we do know of his personal history is that he turned sharply rightwards around 2001, joined the FPU (Norways rightwing partys youth organization) and was active there for several years, not showing any extreme behaviour outside that partys normal parameters. (Wich are pretty extreme in certain circles)

      Oh, and to the article: Great work! I wrote an article about Fjordman/the counterjihad in 2009, and Ive been trying to point law-enforcment eyes that way ever since. I think one of the elements often overlooked is the martyr-element, like Theo van Gogh/Pim Fortune, and find that whole rhetoric strangely similar to the jihadists own rhetoric. For crying out loud, just calling yourself the “counter-jihad” should ring some law-enforcment bells…

  5. Wow, I knew Fjordman was an asshole but wow. tHis is some of the most nutty conspiracy theory crap I’ve seen in ages. By the way Loonwatch has actually referenced your article.

    1. He is an asshole, but he is a familiar asshole. I think most people are assholes in some way or other – it’s just his assholishness got shoved back in his face in the worst way possible, the poor bastard.

      I saw that! I found LoonWatch back when Geller started making such a fuss over the “mosque” near ground zero. It is very humbling they found my analysis worth reproducing.

  6. To your focus on Fjordman, it’s rather interesting to add what the Crown Prince Haakon of Norway said when addressing the nation days after ABB’s terror attack:

    “After 22 July, we can never again allow ourselves to think that our views and opinions are without meaning”

    Looking back, your focus on Fjordman is correct – and we don’t talk about giving Fjordman the responsibility for ABB’s actions. Still, even Fjordman can never again allow himselv to think that his views and opinions are without meaning …

    1. Arnvid, thanks for the comment. I worry that anyone will think my focus on Fjordman is an assignation of blame. I’m pleased to know you saw the distinction between being aware of the subtext (and at times Fjordman’s actual text) that Fjordman assigned to his words and thinking he is to blame or that he caused the murders.

      All the arguing I have seen wherein people defend Fjordman as non-violent is startling to me, because his words are so entrenched with violence. It is such a bad idea to think that the only way one can inspire violence is to explicitly call for it. As I say in the article, Fjordman is a cautionary tale for all of us who believe that words have the capacity to change or harm the world.

      1. Anita, let me tell you that we in Norway have seen so much “hand-washing” from Fjordman, Bawer, Storhaug and other “inspirators” to ABB – that I recently twittet that if I could sell them indulgence, well then I would get filthy rich pretty soon.

        Then there is facebook groups as the “Protest Action Against AP’s (Labour Party) Insertion of Islam in Norway”. I can assure that they are not tuning down their rhetoric, but they all wash their hands while stating that they do not support the actions of ABB. No, ABB was still alone in his actions – but that don’t at the same time say that their rhetoric don’t matter (if it didn’t matter, why do they still spread their conspiracy theory?).

        So, your analysis of Fjordman IS important to our work in highlighting this conspiracy theory in all it’s forms. The second part where you focus more on his hate for women, is a part I have not seen anyone dive into before – as important this part alone is.

        1. Umm, Bawer has refused any self-critiscism. He has gone back to the US rather than participate in the discussion, propably because his new employers at Pajamas Media has been spinning Glenn Becks “Hitler Youth” line, they deserved it as a lesson to cure their hatred of Israel and their vile vile anti-semite leanings.
          Sigh, the pro-Israelis sure know how to argue with tact.

      2. Of course it’s an assignation of blame, Anita. Otherwise you wouldn’t find Fjordman relevant to the issue.

        And of course your criticizing him -“his words are so entrenched with violence”- might motivate some nutjob to murder him, or to go around murdering right-wingers. Be careful of whom you judge.

        1. Bill, thanks for commenting.

          You and others have lost sight of the fact that this is a book discussion blog. Fjordman was not the issue. 2083 was the issue. A significant part of Fjordman’s body of work was reproduced in 2083, against his will to be sure, but nonetheless it was a part of the manifesto and there was no way to discuss the manifesto, which I repeat was the relevant issue, without discussing Fjordman.

          Since you didn’t bear in mind that I was discussing books and their merits as I see them, I can forgive your infantile reaction to me criticizing him. Of course I criticized him. I’ve criticized a lot of writers in the course of writing this blog. I can also forgive that you don’t seem to understand that despite the fact that many people claimed that there was no violence in Fjordman’s word, an almost cursory deconstruction proved otherwise. His words were indeed violent.

          But less understandable is why it is people like you are showing themselves so limited in their thinking that they assume deconstructing Fjordman is assigning blame. I proved his violent and hopeless rhetoric was violent and hopeless and it is clear he influenced ABB. Had he not served as an inspiration, 40 of his essays would not appear in 2083. But as an American, I feel his rhetoric, while violent, was not the irresponsible words that are not a part of free speech and no one can help if a person as clearly abnormal as ABB takes their words and does the worst.

          What we can do, in the blogosphere, is be aware of what we write and not lie about what we have written if our words, god forbid, inspire madmen to do the worst they can do. It is not as assignation of blame to ask bloggers to own their words – all of them. Not limit their free speech but own it when challenged. It is not an assignation of blame to find violence in Jensen’s words. And it is not an assignation of blame to dislike Fjordman’s repellent beliefs.

          And of course your criticizing him -”his words are so entrenched with violence”- might motivate some nutjob to murder him, or to go around murdering right-wingers. Be careful of whom you judge.
          See, this is how I know you didn’t read carefully. I specifically addressed how it is all of us in the blogosphere need to own the fact that our words and rhetoric could reach the wrong people and not shy away from the hard truths of how it is that the Internet has more or less taken control of how we are perceived and understood away from us.

          But should that happen, Bill, – should my book critiques end up inspiring a leftist madman who kills people – my reaction will not be to deny the power of what I wrote in a sniveling attempt to distance myself from the words I produced and the consequences that may arise from my exercise of my free speech and judgment.

          Own your shit, Bill. That’s what I hope you take away from this book discussion should you ever read it again.

  7. Thank you for this post.

    I would have used the word “excellent”, had it not been for the grave nature of the subject matter. I have read quite a lot of the Fjordman blogs, quite a lot of the other stuff on Gates of Vienna, Brussels Journal, and their likes, quite a lot of other anti-islamist sites, and some of the ABB Manifesto. You pull it all together, eloquently, pointed, matter-of-factly.

    Scarily.

    Yes. In a sense, it becomes more scary this way. You describe so well the parallel universe in which Fjordman lives and thinks, or hopefully lived and thought. Hopefully he reflects now.

    He is rhetorically well fitted, and I know others of his thinking are even better. The selective approach to facts combined with the ability to manipulate them with words, spiced with real problems real people face in their real lives, is dynamite. I believe a large percentage of the population could nod their heads to parts, fragments, of the conspirational assembly of words and sentences that Fjordman and his likes utter, and that ABB devoured. They ferment and nurture these seeds of discontent by hateful language and assembled facts. The best way to fight that is by deconstruction, as you have done.

    It was difficult to read (I am Norwegian), but important.

    1. Arnulf, thank you for your praise. It is indeed scary the way that some conspiracy theories come together, in defiance of facts. Or worse, twisting facts into shapes that meet the conspirator’s needs.

      Like most natural born Americans, I can speak only the one language, but desk.no will be translating the first article and possibly the others into Norwegian. I believe this particular article will be online on Monday. Thank you for struggling through in my wordy English – hopefully the translation will prove easier to read.

      1. Looking forward to it!

        Just a clarification; your English is excellent, of course, very well-written and well-read. The statement “difficult to read” related to the fact that this stirs some emotional strings, it today being an official day of mourning and tomorrow being exactly a month after the horrors took place. It hit all of us extremely hard.

  8. Nice job–

    One quibble, though;Paul McCartney never wrote a song a bout the fall of a civilization. I presume you are referring to ‘Helter Skelter’ which is a British term for what Americans would call a children’s slide. It compares a relationship with its ups and downs to this playground activity. Manson got it wrong. So, unfortunately, have you.

    Can’t wait for part two!

    1. Heh. Don’t put too much stock in this because it was years and years ago, but I recall an interview with Paul McCartney wherein he said “Helter Skelter” was his attempt to create a socially relevant song, a loud, nasty piece that was meant to bring to mind the fall of the Roman empire. If not the Roman empire, then some ancient civilization. He wanted it to be discordant, as he would imagine the screams of a dying world would sound like. And the trope of the slide was to indicate it was cyclical, up and down, that it was happening to Britain as he wrote it. I also recall John Lennon saying that he hated the song, that it represented a societal hopelessness that he felt no kinship with.

      But that’s the horror of a song or any work of art – you put it out there and all kinds of interpretations can be made. Fjordman thinks Beckett was describing a Europe too dumb and passive to act, I think “Helter Skelter” is about a civilization falling, and Manson thinks it meant to start a revolution. Given the capacity to creatively interpret, it’s a miracle anyone is still brave enough to create.

      Thanks for the comment, and thanks so much for reading!

      1. INteresting, but I can cite several interviews where he insists ont he slide reading, period, including the Beatles by Bob Spitz and The Betles in their Own Words… Perhaps he is being disingenuous, I don’t know, but read the lyrics yourself:

        When I get to the bottom
        I go back to the top of the slide..etc…

        ‘..and I get to the bottom and I see youa gain!

        DO you or don’t you want you to love me?
        I’m coming down fast, but you’re miles above me
        Tell me tell me tell me tha nswer
        you amy be a lover but you ain’t no dancer’

        IS a bit difficult to relate to the Fall of the Roman Empire.

        1. Just for fun, I Googled to see what was what and I got Wikipedia for the first link. And of course, a Wikipedia entry is never the best arbiter for accurate information, but here you go:

          “McCartney then “wrote ‘Helter Skelter’ to be the most raucous vocal, the loudest drums, et cetera” and said he was “using the symbol of a helter skelter as a ride from the top to the bottom—the rise and fall of the Roman Empire—and this was the fall, the demise.”[4] In British English, the term helter-skelter not only has its meaning of “in disorderly haste or confusion” but is the name of a spiralling amusement park slide.”

          Who knows. We probably both correct because rock stars change their minds when they have lots of time to ruminate about their songs. But at the very least, if your version is correct, then Manson really, really got it wrong. 😉

  9. Whoa, I am amazed at your patience, your writing and your analytic skills. I found your post via twitter, and I’m so thankful. I do not want to read ABBs manifesto, but I do want to know what it is all about in a more thourough way than a simple newspaper-article can explain.

    And here it is. Thankyou! When I first saw the lengt of your post I thought ‘oh,no’ – but you explain it so well and your words flow so easily. Also, creds for sticking to the text and supressing every wish to comment on fact flaws and the like. I think it makes your analysis more credible – you’re not trying to force some political agenda og view of the world on the reader.

    1. Thank you so much for this praise. I will admit that if you haven’t read part 2 yet, you may find I react emotionally to the text because feminist bashing and misuse of literature annoy me fiercely. But as a book critic more than a political critic, I hope my emotions are understandable. 🙂

      Thanks again for the kind words and thank you even more for reading!

  10. I still think that you have yet to answer the points made by your first commentator, “The Evil Gringo”, in his (?) first posted comment.

    Incidentally, you show a poor understanding of population statistics when you fail to consider how a total population of 9 per cent of Muslims MIGHT POSSIBLY be responsible for 33 per cent of births. (Darrell Huff’s classic, “How To Lie With Statistics” should be on your list of non-odd books to read in 2012.)

    1. If you check part two, I apologize to Evil Gringo for not having the time to respond to all of his points. Many people did not get a direct reply as I wrote these entries but I am sure he is ecstatic to know you are so concerned about his efforts going unanswered. Please note that I am so sick of discussing intellectual racism and bad ideas that his responses will continue to go unanswered here. But cry not for the Evil Gringo for we have had some e-mail correspondence on this issue and he is far less concerned about my lack of reply than you are.

      But to be clear, this is a book blog, not a political blog. I discuss what I read and as in most literary forums, even those that do not address solely the strange, no one feels compelled to counter every point made. If you need that sort of give and take, there are thousands of sites out there for you.

      But still, because you are clearly a person who craves response to the point that you are concerned about my failure to respond to others, let’s discuss your comment. You need to understand that I am not using statistics in any manner to refute the France’s birth statistics. I am not a statistician. The person who made that assertion in Fjordman’s article is the person who used statistics and I simply said that on its face the facts asserted made no sense. In fact, it appears to me that the idea that Muslim women account for 33% of all live births in France is itself a way of lying with statistics. Whether you are supporting the idea that the 33% is a lie or confronting me because I am somehow too dense to see how the 33% is not a lie, my response is the same. Believe me, I didn’t fail to consider anything when I wrote my response.

      Let’s break it down, shall we? There are approximately 65 million people in France. 9% are Muslims, which means that there are approximately 6 million Muslims in France.

      There are no breakdowns I can find that show how many women make up that population of Muslims but given the way immigration often works, one can assume men would outnumber the women. Even so, I will be generous and assign half of that number to women. That means that there are 3 million Muslim women in France.

      Here’s where it gets dicey. There are no easily accessible numbers explaining how many women in France are of childbearing age, which consists of women from age 15-49. In other developed nations, the percentage of women who are of childbearing age tends towards 18-21%. Let’s say France has 20% of women in childbearing age and that this number extends to the total of the Muslim women, meaning that at any given time, there are 600,000 fertile Muslim women in France, which includes the pre-menopausal, a group not notoriously known for being especially fecund.

      In 2010, there were approximately 800,000 live births in France, and the number may be higher because that number is skewed for urban areas. Still, it gives us a base number to go on and has to be similar to the numbers used for the 33% assertion.

      So according to the statistic stated in Fjordman’s essay extrapolated to 2010 numbers, Muslim women are responsible for 264,000 live births a year. That means 44% of the Muslim female population of childbearing age in France give birth each year. One out of every two childbearing women is pregnant and giving birth every year. If you can find a country wherein 44% of the women of childbearing age give birth EVERY year, I will tip my hat to you, but I suspect you will find that there is no such place and that the idea that 44% of Muslim women of childbearing age in France giving birth annually is an outrageous percentage that, while not impossible, is certainly extremely unlikely. Even taking into account that immigration numbers are skewed toward the young, this number is not replicated anywhere on earth.

      But then again, since France does not gather statistics on birth rate by religion, all attempts to discuss this are moot. Not even France knows the exact number of Muslim children born each year and to attempt to assign that number a statistic is probably a lie. And since I can already see too clearly how statistics are used to lie, I suspect I may already know the gist of the book and how it would apply to the 33%. Some racist shitstain pulled a percentage out of his or her ass, racists were OMG, one of three French babies is born to Islamic parents, and one of them shot some Norwegian socialist children to show how wrong Muslim childbirth is. At the end of it all, I was just discussing the document of a mass murderer. It feels cheap and stupid to get too involved in how he used or misused statistics.

      Thanks for commenting.

  11. Anita, you wrote a four entry review of a 1500-page pile of hatred and madness. What value is there in responding to a troll commenter who criticizes you for not responding to someone else’s comment, then cherry-picks some tiny part so they can use hasty generalization to dismiss the entire thing?

    These comments bring nothing new to the conversation, just pointless argument. I recommend we close the comments on the ABB manifesto and move on with our lives.

    1. I’ll think about it. I admit the sort of discussion that has happened on these entries as of late has been pretty pointless. Just people picking apart little bits of information thinking that if I got something wrong somewhere it magically means everything I wrote is of no value. The tacit implication being, of course, that the manifesto of a mass murderer of children has value. Increasingly the only emotion I feel anymore in the ABB entries is exhaustion because of the pedantic responses. So I will give it some consideration.

  12. Hi,

    I just wanted to say that I completely agree with you when you say that merely dismissing ABB as a lunatic is a dangerous over-simplification. It only serves to let everyone in Europe who holds paranoid anti-Islamic views off the hook (and there are a lot of them, although they don’t all believe in the Eurabia conspiracy). They don’t need to examine their own hatred or the bile printed in the tabloid press, because he is not like them. He is sick. Yet these are the same people who want to hold all Muslims responsible for Islamic terror attacks.

    In the hours after the Norwegian terror attack, when people still thought it was the work of Islamists, they were more than ready to hold the ideology behind the horror to account. And rightly so. But as soon as it turned out to be a white bigot, they decided he was simple a single insane individual.

    That’s one of the reasons why what you have done here is useful and interesting. Thanks.

  13. Your verbose responses to so many of the commenters here make your excuse for not responding to Evil Gringo’s excellent points so completely hollow. And then, the extremely verbose chiding of the person who called you on it only underlines it. You put forth your false political agenda(doing exactly what Evil Gringo describes), all the while claiming to be neutral, or, at least, trying to keep your bias out of the article/review. I don’t know when you wrote this piece, but the breaking of strong nations using the Kalergi(sp?) plan is now so obvious I imagine you have reversed your viewpoint. If not, you would have to be a propagandist. I mean, come on, it’s kinda hard to miss these days. And don’t even get me started on multiculturalism…..the biggest sham perpetrated on the modern times.

    1. Cameron, I wrote 50,000 + words on a 1500 page murder manifesto. When one does this level of research and writing it’s baffling and tiresome when people decide that the writer must then answer every single question put to them, even if it steps outside the purview of the research at hand.

      Your accusations of my false political agenda and biases are hilarious because they would not have been false had they agreed with yours. You call me false because you disagree, not because you have a clear idea of what is happening here. Furthermore your condemnation is tempered by your inability to determine that this entry was written for a blog devoted to odd literature by a woman whose spends many hours and many words analyzing various forms of unusual media. That failure makes it seem like you think this is a political blog. I read and/or react to a lot of things here from pop art to comics to music to hundreds and hundreds of books, some with political overtones, some without. I react to all text in a deeply personal way but I am always reacting to the text.

      The Coudenhove/Kalergi plan did not appear in ABB’s manifesto and therefore doesn’t have any place in an examination of the documents. ABB was mostly shaped by Ba’at Yeor’s Eurabia and Fjordman’s writing and I responded to those sources within the document. Should another mass murderer go on a rampage based on the Kalergi race-mixing theory, I promise I will discuss it, should I be masochistic to engage in this sort of thing again.

      Oh, the Evil Gringo. So many interested in his plight. The guy annoyed that I overlooked Evil Gringo chided me MONTHS after EG’s comment, when I had a lot more time because I had moved on to another topic. EG’s comment was the first among many on this sole entry and now I am unsure why his reply on this page got overlooked – I suspect it was because I saw him engaged in conversation with others and at the time he and several of the commenters were repeat commenters on this site. We interacted with each other here so I just moved on unthinkingly. It was rude but I did indeed apologize to him.

      But never fear! This is a four-part series. EG got the first comment on the second entry on 2083 and I made it a priority to reply to him because his input mattered to me. The entry is teeming with our back and forth, which occurred months before someone was offended that I didn’t reply to him. I did reply to him. More than once by a bunch. Why am I surprised that people who have no idea what my site is about, who didn’t read 2083, and didn’t read the entirety of my discussion enough to even see time stamps are still scolding me five years later for not handling a critical analysis of a document to their satisfaction because they think Evil Gringo was treated unfairly?

      Next time please respond to what I wrote about the document. How I choose to react to comments and the number of words I use to do so are none of your concern but your reactions to 2083, my reactions to 2083, and the media fall out after ABB’s rampage are always on the table for future discussions.

      Be well.

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