The American Spectator : Love Affair With Evil

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Love Affair With Evil

By P. David Hornik on 3.30.09 @ 6:05AM

United in Hate: The Left's Romance with Tyranny and Terror
By Jamie Glazov 
(WND Books, 264 pages, $25.95)

What drives an intelligent, successful Western person -- a professor, a movie star, a novelist -- to venerate totalitarian movements and even make pilgrimages to fawn over mass-murdering dictators? Jamie Glazov, managing editor of Frontpagemag.com (for which I've been writing for over five years), seeks answers to that question in this powerful book.

Allowing that, as a son of Soviet dissidents, "this leftist choice to support tyranny over freedom has always shocked and mystified me," Glazov starts with a portrait of the leftist believer. Such a person, he claims, suffers from "an acute sense of alienation from his own society -- an alienation to which he is, himself, completely blind." Moreover, the extreme leftist is "in denial about the character flaws that prevent him from bonding with his own people," and so he "fantasizes about building a perfect society where he will, finally, fit in."

Drawn for decades to the heinous Communist regimes of Stalin, Mao, Ho Chi Minh, Castro, and others -- and more recently to the likes of Khomeini, Arafat, Saddam, Hamas, or Hezbollah -- the Western leftist "consistently denies what is actually happening within the totalisms he worships…. But" -- and this is one of Glazov's central claims -- "privately he approves of the carnage; indeed, that is what attracts him in the first place."

If it may seem an excessive assertion, Glazov marshals impressive evidence for it. Drawing on the earlier insights of Paul Hollander, he notes, for instance, that the stream of Western pilgrims to the Soviet Union and Maoist China peaked, respectively, in the 1930s and the 1950s-1960s when the carnage was at its greatest. It was in the blood-drenched '30s that leftists like Walter Duranty, George Bernard Shaw, and Bertolt Brecht most sweetly sang the praises of Stalin's paradise; and Mao's monstrous Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution of the '50s and '60s brought breathless admirers like Simone de Beauvoir, Shirley MacLaine, and Orville Schell.

Then there was the reaction of many leftists to 9/11 itself. In the U.S., philosophy professor Robert Paul Churchill said that "what the terrorists despised and sought to defeat was our arrogance, our gluttonous way of life, our miserliness toward the poor…"; history professor Gerald Horne said "the bill has come due…it is time to pay"; Norman Mailer called the suicide hijackers "brilliant"; and Susan Sontag said "this was not a 'cowardly' attack on 'civilization' or 'liberty' or 'humanity' or 'the free world' but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed super-power, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions…."

Abroad, German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen said 9/11 was "the greatest work of art for the whole cosmos," and Italian Marxist and playwright Dario Fo opined: "The great speculators wallow in an economy that every year kills tens of millions of people with poverty -- so what is 20,000 dead in New York?" -- and all this is only a partial list of leftist encomiums to the massacre.

Indeed, as Glazov emphasizes, if a certain ideological coherence could be ascribed to the Western leftists' love affair with Communism with its ostensible values of equality and social justice, their later romance with Arab-Islamic radicalism conclusively tears the mask off any alleged humane underpinnings. Already in the late 1970s, Michel Foucault was calling Khomeini a "saint" and referring to the "rapture" of the bloody overthrow of Shah Reza Pahlavi's government; and by 2003 leftists were serving as human shields for Saddam Hussein and marching en masse along with Islamists and even neo-Nazis to "oppose the war" and save his regime.

Glazov points out, however, that in some ways the leftists' migration from the fallen hammer-and-sickle to the ascendant crescent entailed not only contradiction but also continuation.

MacLaine, for instance, wrote approvingly that in Maoist China "the uni-sex uniforms…de-emphasized sexuality…. Women had little need or even desire for such superficial things as frilly clothes and makeup…." As Glazov notes, this forced desexualized attire "especially enthralled [Western] believers." From there it was no huge leap to present-day Western feminists' deafening silence about misogynic abuses in the Islamic world -- or as Glazov aptly puts it, "Leftist feminists not only refuse to criticize the burqa, but romanticize and champion it, because they cherish the idea of a tyrannical force smothering the components of womanhood that they despise in their own societies and in themselves."

This book -- concise, pungent, and a fast, addictive read -- has all the virtues of a tour-de-force while, tantalizingly, leaving some questions not fully answered. While "alienation" and "character flaws" that prevent bonding with one's own people are undoubtedly part of the pathology of the Left, can they suffice to explain the bonding by outwardly civilized people with murderous and even genocidal tyrannies and movements? Glazov's description of the psychosis is thoroughly compelling but only partly -- inevitably, I would suggest -- dispels the mystery of its motives.

There is also the question of the relation between the far-out leftists like terrorist-groupies Noam Chomsky and Jimmy Carter and ostensibly more mainstream figures; Glazov only hints at this in observing that it was the likes of Nancy Pelosi and Ted Kennedy -- "Carter's ideological soulmates," as he calls them -- who spearheaded the Left's agitation for the U.S. to abandon Iraq just when there was progress toward democracy there. But there is more -- how influential is the radical Left, and in what ways is it distinct or indistinct from the Democratic Party? -- that could have been explored here.

Those are just a couple of caveats about an astute, profound, important book that shouldn't be missed.

About the Author

P. David Hornik is a writer and translator in Beersheva, Israel, blogging at PDavidHornik.typepad.com.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (28) | Leave a comment

C. S. P. Schofield| 3.30.09 @ 6:56AM

It sounds as if this book has about half the story. The remaining pieces of the puzzle are;

1) The will to power. The Liberal Intelligencia are a self-selected elite that has a deep belief that they should be running things (not that this makes them unique). While in practice Communism ended up in the hands of thugs and psychotics, and liquidated intellectuals, it promised a system in which intellectuals ruled.

2) The absolute psychological necessity of denying their complicity in the routine atrocities committed by every Communist regime in history. The Liberal Intelligencia is made up of moral and intellectual lightweights. Admitting to themselves that they had a part in the murder of millions would destroy them, so their unconscious minds prevent them from confronting this obvious fact. This leads them to the position where they are ready to support Radical Islam against the United States, since the only possible justification for supporting the likes of Castro or Pol Pot would be if the United States was somehow worse. Since this position is based on the Psychological necessity of maintaining their delusions rather than any available facts, it makes no objective sense, and never will. They support the indefensible now to avoid dealing with the fact that they have supported the indefensible in the past.

Alienation, hubris, and delusion; the Liberal Left in a (you should pardon the expression) nutshell.

drudge ette obama| 3.30.09 @ 6:58AM

Well, I guess all that is left is to give Shirley MacLaine a Nobel Peace Prize...

I always knew that support for the cast of characters like Casto, Mao, etc. had to find its base in psychological abnormalities.

Willey| 3.30.09 @ 7:08AM

Liberalism is a mental disorder. Makes perfect sense to me.

Heather M| 3.30.09 @ 7:17AM

MacLaine has been nuts for years. She was probably kidnapped by aliens. Freak.

Becky| 3.30.09 @ 8:23AM

Two dimensional people in a three dimensional world.

Alice Moore| 3.30.09 @ 8:44AM

I have a theory why Hollywood seems to have a virulent hatred for the US. We know many performers did not originate in LA or NYC. It was probably some place like Peoria or Tulsa. In their formative years, these future citizens of Hollywood realized that a white picket fence, kids, and 9-5 job is not for them. A normal person would realize that they'd have to go to NYC and LA to slog through a long apprenticeship and an array of temp and part time jobs. Success would still not be a given even with the difficult irrevocable trade offs. What about the antipathy? Our would be entertainer from Peoria may have experienced taunts from the captain of the football team or if female from the head cheerleader. Most people can shrug it off to adolescence. For todays' entertainers,though, it has metastasized into a hatred that is reminiscent of Hitler's for the Jews. They probably project the captain of the football team as the evil business man in the movies. This is regardless of what the actual captain of the football team is doing in the present day. Of course, to add to the mix, NYC and LA have a contempt for flyover country.

E. L.| 3.30.09 @ 8:50AM

One name: Eric Hoffer. Read "The True Beliver."

Tim| 3.30.09 @ 9:20AM

Read "Atlas Shrugged"

Pete Noone| 3.30.09 @ 9:56AM

I'm glad to see this premise advanced. Liberals do want to destroy. And they enjoy being hateful. Thats is a hard thing to get a grasp of: enjoying hating. Why would a person deliberately, and it is willful, choose to hurt and destroy just for the sake of it? The answer must be a very dark one. Its critical that we understand this mindset and just how wild and dangerous it is.

Melvin| 3.30.09 @ 10:00AM

Try this theory, The extreme perverted love affair that Liberals with murdering tyrants and dictators is Sadomasochism.
Sadomasochism is the derivation of pleasure from the infliction of physical or mental pain either on others or on oneself.
Saddam Hussein had his rape rooms and wood chippers, Mao, Hitler,Stalin, Lenin, and Kim Jong-il to name a few of the more infamous murderers of our time.
Sadomasochism is not what we in a civilized society call, "normal behavior," it is the ultimate form of control that a person can force upon another person willingly or by force.
Most card carrying Liberals are deviants anyway and this is why that they extol that Mao, and Lenin weren't really that bad and we seriously misunderstood them despite their minor character flaws of mass murdering their countrymen.
Murder 100 people today, 500 the next week, then a million next month and this pleasure and control eventually will cycle itself out either by the dictator or tyrant being murdered themselves or someone or country intervenes.
Dictators and tyrants are in a way actors themselves because they have the ability to morph themselves into extremely charismatic beings that convince their citizens to go along with their warped and dangerous views upon how society should be.
When Americans say, "Liberalism is a mental disorder," they're right it is!

Dropping By| 3.30.09 @ 10:21AM

I agree with Alice Moore, to a point. In my own life, I've known people who journeyed from mainstream, middle-class life in suburban America to radical leftist politics. And for them, the reason was always religion. There may have been run-ins with bullies and whatnot, disenchangment with the white picket fence, but once they become intent on shucking off a Judeo-Christian childhood/background, they choose sides and will be FOR anything that Jews or Christians are AGAINST.

Since the U.S. has stood pretty consistently for things such as freedom and Israel's founding, they're against it -- and they're against anything that leads to or supports it (e.g., a strong U.S. military), and they're for anything that denigrates or undermines it (Middle Eastern tyrannies). I think the same is true of issues such as tyranny in the old Soviet Union or the Cultural Revolution in China. Newly-minted, anti-religious radicals are happiest when the world and its players reject Judeo-Christianity -- I guess misery loves company.

J Moore| 3.30.09 @ 11:08AM

V.S. Naipaul correctly diagnosed the soul of the spoiled American liberal through his main character in "Bend in the River." Salim, the Indian expatriate merchant in the Belgian Congo observed, as sanctimonious Joan Baez music played at a party, "You couldn’t listen to sweet songs about injustice unless you expected justice and received it much of the time. You couldn’t sing songs about the end of the world unless . . . you felt that the world was going on and you were safe in it. "

Richard Anderson| 3.30.09 @ 11:50AM

The biggest blind spot of the book (a must read that I swallowed whole) is the author completely ignores the Left's hatred of Christianity. This coutry's foundation consists of two pillars: Christianity and capitalism. Leftism can be defined by two hatreds:Christianity and Calitalism. This it seems to me is the source of the Leftist believer's "alienation from his own society and himself". But Glazov completely ignores this aspect of the Beliver's psychosis...

Charles Perry| 3.30.09 @ 1:32PM

I seem to recall that in 1967 Shirley MacLaine had gone to India along with the Beatles and started wearing saris, declaring that Western women were losing their femininity.

pete the mediocre| 3.30.09 @ 1:40PM

This sounds like an excellent companion to David Horowitz's "Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left."

I will be sure to read it.

Deborah| 3.30.09 @ 2:43PM

Lyle H. Rossiter, a general and forensic psychiatrist has diagnosed and treated mental disorders for more than 40 years. In his book The Liberal Mind - The Psychological Causes of Political Madness says, "Modern liberalism' irrationality can only be understood as the product of psychopathology. So extravagant are the patterns of thinking, emoting, behaving, and relating that characterize the liberal mind that its relentless protests and demands become understandable only as disorders of the psyche."

Much more in the book, but this seemed to put it in a nutshell. It's a "massive transference neurosis acted out in the world's political arenas, with devastating effects on the institutions of liberty."

There, from an expert.

Anthony| 3.30.09 @ 2:47PM

I would say that Mr. Glazof's initial insight into the leftist mind set is spot on. Most imperative to the leftist is the desire to matter. But that desire gets distorted by the inherent character flaws of the leftist, as Mr. Glazof observes. Both the desire and its perceived failure to achieve paradise then turns destructive, and that it when the nihilistic monster that dwells within all leftists demands satisfaction. And satisfaction come only through destruction, first by destroying those institutions, doctrines, entities and people deemed an anathama to the left, and then, ultimately, themselves. Hopefully, we will still be around to pick up the pieces, once again.

Marc Jeric| 3.30.09 @ 4:16PM

All cogent and convincing comments - and for once I have nothin to add. One question, though: American is full of refugees from communist countries, millions of them - then how come no writer has had the idea to interview a few thousand of them? That flavor of continuous fear, misery, lies, terror, poverty, dependence, thugs with absolute power - it has never been described by a noted American writer. And the sources are at hand - in every city, in every state.

Big Leo| 3.30.09 @ 5:23PM

When my grandparents and father would talk about the tyranny and murders of communism in the thirties and forties, they were denounced as tools of the Hearst press or White reactionaries. The received wisdom was the New York Times denial of any famine in the Ukraine and other places, the guilt of the defendants in the Moscow trials and a general air of approval of the Soviets by the intelligentsia that ruled the market of popular opinion. In the fifties and sixties it was accusations of McCarthyism and paranoia.

The friends of communism have always been strong and the enemies always maligned and weak. Even now, with the crimes of communism throughout the world a matter of historical fact and the failure of nearly all communist systems, we are still out of fashion. That is why the story has never been told. There are thousands of movies with Nazi villainy exposed-- now name the movies where the crimes of communism are the subject. The truth of the ordinary day to day undramatic suffering under communism is an even less-told tale. The communists' misinformation drive has outlasted most of the communists themselves.

mark| 3.30.09 @ 6:36PM

I've often felt that there is a segment of the U.S population that wishes to blame the U.S. for whatever evil exists because they subconsciously find evil to be far too frightening. They prefer to believe that we can change our behavior and thereby prevent the evil. For some, such rationalization is far less frightening that the realization that there are groups who glorify the indiscriminate killing of those who do not share their beliefs, e.g. Islamic radicals.

lynnrockets| 3.31.09 @ 12:49AM

I just think liberals have a lot of self-loathing. I understand that; I hate them, too.

Deborah| 3.31.09 @ 7:06AM

Not a whole lot of movies as was mentioned above by Big Leo. A recent movie, however, well worth watching is "The Lives of Others." It's about life in East Germany when the wall was still up. Well done. And it shows how those living under the contraints of communism had to whisper the truth to each other because they feared (and usually had a right to fear) being listened in on. This movie doesn't really show the atrocities as much as it shows the day-to-day abuse of the human spirit under the chains of a communist state that wants nothing but control and more control and more control. Go rent it.

jodru| 3.31.09 @ 7:44AM

You got the Stockhausen quote wrong:

"This is the biggest artwork that exists at all in the whole universe."

But more importantly, you bought into the myth that he was praising the attacks, which has been thoroughly and repeatedly debunked. Stockhausen spent close to 30 years writing an opera with Lucifer as a protagonist. In response to a question from the media about whether or not his Lucifer was a real force in the world or just an allegory in his opera, he pointed to the attacks as evidence that Lucifer exists. In speaking about how Lucifer acts in the world, he said that from the devil's perspective something like 9/11 is akin to a work of art.

Stockhausen was a politically conservative man, though intellectually liberal. He did not glorify 9/11, and you should correct your article.

Portia| 3.31.09 @ 10:59AM

Re Glazov's: "the extreme leftist is "in denial about the character flaws that prevent him from bonding with his own people," and so he "fantasizes about building a perfect society where he will, finally, fit in."
Glazov's comment also helps explain why many homosexuals flocked to nihilist movements like communism. As born outsiders, men like the Cambridge Five and Foucault sought revenge for society's rejection -- the unforgivable wound to their narcissism. Their reaction was to tear society down. It also explains why the persecuted, intellectual Jews from the 19th century ghettoes flocked to create international communism. They were intent on destroying Christian Europe's nation-states which had rejected them.

Jason Taylor| 4.5.09 @ 3:22AM

While it is always pleasant to diagnose one's opponents, it is a temptation that must be limited. Not only is it insufferably rude, it is ultimatly limiting in tactical efficiency.