What is it to be a Norwegian? Yes, this applies to all nationalities. Your culture is under attack from social progressives.

Written by Helge Lurås,

Director of the

Centre for International and Strategic Analysis (SISA)  

Oslo, Norway and poorly translated by me with apologies to Helge.

In this article, Helge speaks to the complete contradiction in the belief system held by many social progressives. On the one hand, they dismiss their culture as having no intrinsic value yet on the other hand they state they have no culture. If culture is valueless why is it so important to strongly deny its very existence? Both assertions cannot be correct. But the illogic goes deeper. The detestation social progressives have for their own culture is not equally applied to the migrant's culture. To social progressives the migrant's culture must be respected to the point of being preferred to that of their own. This is insanity on lysergic diethylamide. The amount of cognitive dissonance created by such blatant contradictions should be sufficient to make a social progressive’s head explode. 

I apologize to Helge as well as to my readers for any inaccuracies in meaning in my translation of his wonderful article. It was necessary to reword some of it rather than transliterating it directly. Many phrases would have lost meaning if I had done so. Please share this blog post with your family and friends. We are in a war for the survival of our culture.

“What is a Norwegian? Yes, what is an ethnic Norwegian, and has these "Norwegians" some moral reason to still exist in two hundred years? This has actually been a highly topical, and controversial, issue in contemporary Norway. On Dagsnytt 18 (21.02.2017) a major Dagsnytt commentator Hege Ulstein stated no when she was asked if she saw any problem about ethnic Norwegians becoming the minority in Norway in the future. In 2017, the proportion of ethnic Norwegians between 77-84%, depending on how one calculates an ethnic Norwegian. When there was a halt in immigration in 1975, the proportion was about 97%.

But Ulstein went further than it. Having first recognized completely spontaneously that she had a sense of what an ethnic Norwegian was, she went on to question whether the term ethnic Norwegian should be used. For what is an ethnic Norwegian? What is the definition? What criteria should be the foundation? There were other guests in the studio who were given the task of trying to defend that ethnic Norwegians are actually something that exists. Culture and language was mentioned, and also a particular set of values. But the underlying question is very sensitive as to what role lineage, physical relationships, genes and biology have to say about "Norwegian" identity.

Ulstein and her many likeminded fellow progressives look to lure those who would use terms like "ethnic Norwegian" and also expresses concerns about those who are worried that ethnic Norwegians are becoming the minority in Norway and that national identity has a relationship to kinship and descent. As though those who use terms about how ethnic Norwegians appear should wish to deny that such a physical dimension is possible, as if this were a deeply damaging accusation.

This shows how uptight, guilt ridden and removed from reality we have become in Norway. We are human beings, we are physical individuals who (until further notice) are born of the merging of egg and sperm cells from a woman and a man. Our mind, culture and values cannot exist without the central nervous system, which is a physical thing. Therefore, unless one takes a child from the biological parents at birth, there is consistency between bloodlines and culture and values. When you come, for example, as a refugee to Norway as an adult, one has grown up and been socialized in a different culture than the one which exists in Norway. This you take with you.

It also a cultural ballast even if one has moved to Norway and takes Norwegian citizenship. And when a migrant in Norway has children, they would naturally bring at least parts of their original culture and values into the upbringing of their children. Thus, it takes a long time before a migrant will become "Norwegian" culturally, even if they wish it with all their hearts. And perhaps this may never happen, because the migrant wants to preserve parts of their culture and values even if they and their descendants reside in Norway. And biological conditions will also play a role in further assimilation. If a foreigner with Norwegian citizenship marries an ethnic Norwegian, their biological children will most likely receive more of the original Norwegian culture and values than the children of two foreigners who live (accidentally) in Norway.

And the proportion of foreigners with Norwegian citizenship living in Norway will of course have a bearing on how much of the original Norwegian culture is transferred to the immigrants. For if foreigners hardly meet Norwegians in their immediate environment, they have no opportunity to "learn to be Norwegian." Then there will be a lack of Norwegian values and culture to continue, but something else as well. And brought forward it will be characterized by the culture of those who moved here had with them as their cultural baggage.

There is thus a connection between kinship and descent on one side and the values and culture on the other. Hypersensitivity to think about the concepts of human and biological sciences in the same breath is due to, of course, the Western settlement with racism and Nazism after World War II, but it has led to some absurd fallacies and denials. The case is obvious, but will be denied the same way: it makes sense to talk about "Chinese", "Sherpas," "Eskimos" and "Swedes", it also provides meaning to talk about "Norwegians". And a person who is born of two Norwegian parents, with four Norwegian grandparents, has very high probability to have at least some other values and culture than a person born in Norway of two Somali parents. If people within the country live in a parallel society, these differences can persist in hundreds and thousands of years. And if the starting point is so in appearance different ethnic groups that Somalis and Norwegians, these cultural differences will also be visible for just as long, including for geneticists studying DNA.

It has become commonplace to ask the question: but what does it mean to be Norwegian? And it is not one single criterion or a single common denominator for this. But such a lack of absolute precision, is no different for the question about what it means to be Chinese. And strictly speaking, also not for the question of what it means to be Christian, or Muslim or Buddhist. But that does not mean it does not exist, or is meaningful to talk about Chinese people, Muslims, Norwegians, Christians and Buddhists. And all can relate in practical life to the fact that there are Muslims and Chinese people even though none of them manage to answer with one simple criterion what that would entail.

So, the problem is not that there is no single criterion for what it means to be Norwegian/ethnic Norwegian (we are now forced to call some ethnic Norwegian rather than simply Norwegian because e.g. a Somali with Norwegian citizenship in the political correct sense will also be called "Norwegian"). The problem is rather that anyone would expect there to be any single criteria for what it means to belong to a specific ethnic or national group, that is, that one at all ask the question: what will it mean to be Norwegian, Chinese etc.? And that one would expect a concrete answer.

To make a diagnosis in psychiatry one needs to meet the "diagnostic criteria" for various conditions and diseases. There can, for example, be twenty different criteria that are related to a personality disorder such as psychopathy. Patients are not expected to meet all of these criteria. But one can, for example, assert that the condition is met if one turns out of 14 of the 20 criteria, or one to get ‘so and so’ many "points" in a total "score for psychopathy." So, we can also understand the suffering "ethnic Norwegian." Now it is fortunate that we need not make such research on ethnicity as we do for a disease such as psychopathy, but for both the "Norwegian" and "psychopathy", there will be obvious cases after cases where we can rule out that one is a Norwegian or a psychopath.

Keep this in mind the next time people with utopian ideas of social and political experimentation trying to put you on the defensive with questions such as: what does it really mean to be Norwegian? Most will likely understand very well and intuitively if they are ethnically Norwegian, if they are partial Norwegian ethnics or if they are of foreign ethnicity who hold Norwegian citizenship. And when such people want to remove the concept of Norwegian and ethnic Norwegian from the vocabulary, then it is indicative of an extreme desire to change the social and political realities. Hege Ulstein and Company are probably not always conscious of it themselves, but such a social manipulative system of political correctness was perfected in the Soviet Union, and it is totalitarian.”

'I shall reveal unto you a mystery'

And the latest in my 'I shall reveal unto you a mystery' series is as follows: I spent a great deal of my career as a quality resource and lean consultant diligently looking for ways to reduce waste, cost and variation. Why? Because to service the customer better private industry must produce component 'X' at ever higher quality at increasingly lower cost. If you hope to understand why bureaucracy is failing the reason lies there. Instead of creating a culture of energetic hunters of waste they diligently set about creating a culture where fewer and poorer services are provided at ever increasing cost. Thus, bureaucracy grows. It then also follows that bureaucrats will often support those political parties most willing to continue to increase funding to them thereby entrenching ever greater wastefulness. If you take this same paradigm and apply it to the private sector it would equate to managers reducing the shareholders' dividends as well as losing market share due to their products and/or services, no longer remaining competitive in an open market. Of course, such a manager would be fired if they were foolish enough to pursue such a course. In the public sector, however, managers who pursue this course of action (inaction) are rewarded for 'sector loyalty'. This is also why they are dead set against permitting the government from offering solutions in the private sector since bureaucracies cannot compete in an open market.

And the second assertion in 'I shall reveal unto you a mystery' today is this: This explains why socialism will always fail to provide what it has promised. Equality of opportunity to compete is replaced with equality of outcome. Let me cite a few examples; Obama increased the cost of American healthcare under Obamacare hence the new administration looking for more cost-effective options to better serve Americans to ensure they have access to affordable and superb health care. Yet, social progressives are behaving as though the new administration wishes to rob Americans of affordable health care instead of helping them obtain it at a lower cost. You see, progressives loathe the very idea of competition and choice. It precludes Big Sister from doing their thinking for them and in the progressive mind free market capitalism is anathema. The same also applies to the incredible and inexplicable increase in cost of K-12 education here in Ontario. The entrenched and gross inefficiency in Ontario's education system serves the government's agenda while absolutely destroying our children's future thereby making them ever more beholden to and indoctrinated by Big Sister. https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/education-spending-in-canada-whats-actually-happening.pdf

And my third and final assertion in today’s, 'I shall reveal unto you a mystery': “Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.” - Winston Churchill. I quote Winston in this regard as it reminds us, albeit in simplistic terms, the real mojo which lies behind socialism and modern social progressivism. Yesterday I asserted that progressive doctrine is dependant on self-pity, self-loathing, and self-righteousness, for they lie at the heart of the illness, but let us examine the illness’s symptoms beginning with envy. To define this, I will borrow an idea with which I am lamentably all too familiar having lived in Scandinavia; ‘Janteloven’, otherwise known as ‘The Law of Jante’. If I were to attempt to define it, I would say that it's a principle placing importance on equality and egalitarianism while disparaging individuality and personal achievements or otherwise challenging the status quo. Here are its ten principles:

1.   You're not to think you are anything special.

2.   You're not to think you are as good as we are.

3.   You're not to think you are smarter than we are.

4.   You're not to convince yourself that you are better than we are.

5.   You're not to think you know more than we do.

6.   You're not to think you are more important than we are.

7.   You're not to think you are good at anything.

8.   You're not to laugh at us.

9.   You're not to think anyone cares about you.

10. You're not to think you can teach us anything.

I believe that I can make a very good argument supporting that this is the overwhelming consensus of thought behind social progressivism. It is no wonder that it has taken hold so well in Scandinavia since the cultural framework which would support social progressivism already pre-existed socialism. Also since laissez-faire capitalism is completely dependant on individualism and the honouring of individual achievement, it follows that Scandinavia was the perfect place where socialism would take hold. In Norway, the Scandinavian country with which I am most familiar, there are only two areas where personal achievements are lauded: arts and sports, since both may be used to further the state’s socialist agenda. This trait is also common to all socialist states. I certainly see the same situation here in Canada where virtually all the artists whom I know, and I know a great many personally, are social progressives. I hope I have challenged a few of you to think and perhaps offended more who cannot abide free thinking, it was my intention to do so.