Pim Fortuyn, the murdered Dutch politician and gay sociology professor supported liberal social policies but free-market economic ones.  He argued that governments should leave people alone to do as they wish, just so long as they do not harm others.  Keep taxes low and government small so people can choose for themselves how to spend their earnings. 

He lambasted mainstream politicians, for their unprincipled cosy coalitions, and the way they provide jobs for their supporters.  He not only attacked the Dutch welfare state and its bloated bureaucracy, but also the free schools and health care, which the middle classes were so skilful at manipulating for their own advantage.  He was murdered by one of the new authoritarians, an animal rights and green activist who apparently objected to his plans to repeal a ban on mink-farming?  

So why, until his death, did the BBC and all mainstream European politicians label him a dangerous right-winger like Jean-Marie Le Pen in France or Jorg Haider in Austria?   Because he recognised that some branches of Islam threatened the sort of social tolerance he espoused.  He didn’t presume to tell other countries how to run themselves, but he did speak out against those Muslims in Holland who were damaging the very society that attracted them away from their homes in the first place.  He had good reason; one imam in Rotterdam had said that gays were worse than pigs. 

Despite the Dutch reputation for tolerance there are many things that no one can speak about in Holland.   Mainstream politicians are gagged by political correctness.  Dutch newspapers won’t even report the race of a criminal, although ethnic minorities, who make up ten percent of the population, account for over half of those in prison.   Pim claimed with some justification to be the only politician brave enough to say what everyone else was thinking.   He argued fiercely that immigrants should integrate in their adopted society, learn the language, and send their children to Dutch schools.  In the language of the politically correct he was opposed to “multi-culturalism”, the encouragement of different communities to maintain their traditional ways of life in their adopted countries.  Although he also argued that further immigration should be reduced because “Holland is full”, he never suggested, as Le Pen has, that any recent immigrants should be forcibly repatriated. 

Did that make him a racist?  David Blunkett opposes “multiculturalism”, and wants to limit immigration because asylum seekers are “swamping” local services.   Mrs. Thatcher once expressed sympathy with people who felt “rather swamped” by immigrants.  We may disagree with them, but neither is racist.  They simply express the real concerns of ordinary working people.  Pim was a great admirer of Margaret Thatcher. 

The middle classes support multiculturalism only after they’ve moved to neighbourhoods with schools with only a few students from ethnic minorities.  It took a gay man from Rotterdam to expose their hypocrisy.  

Iain Duncan-Smith should take a look.   Pim is now a martyr. If the mainstream ignores his message, the far right won’t.   Let him be a martyr to real liberalism and free speech, not to racial hatred.   

Jim Thornton. Nottingham 10 May 2002

Read the iGreen take on his murder here, and the policy positions of the Lijst Pim Fortuyn here, or if you are in a rush read them here