Laughable and ridiculous, but powerfully backed, the assault on all things conservative continues with new demonisations and ridiculous vignettes drawing associations between nut-cases and the right almost weekly it seems.
The full-on free publicity for anti-right conspiracy theorists saw red-radio and Dom-Pravda this week endorsing Histories of Hate: The Radical Right in Aotearoa as worthy somehow. Described as a set of ‘historical essays’ informing of conservatives’ almost genetic deplorability and over-reach into decent society, it could only have been written by academics.
Dragging out familiar demons we get a repeat of the Lionel Terry (a raving lunatic) incident, shooting and killing a Chinese man in Wellington’s Haining Street as ‘proof’. In fact, Terry incubated his hatred of Chinese while working as a miners’ union secretary in Canada: that’s inconvenient for the ‘far-right’ narrative; so too is the fact that beloved Saint Mickey Savage of Labour Inc was a vile anti-Chinese racist. How’s that far-right going?
In a double-page spread we have to wait to paragraph 39 for a hint of the truth regarding this collection of conspiracy theories, described deceitfully as ‘anomalies’, we hear: “Racists weren’t always right-wing and the strongest anti-Chinese racism in the late 19th-century came from the left.” No kidding. So what’s it doing in a book demonising the right? Simple, stupid – because they’re getting paid to say it.
A better title for the ‘book’ would be: Over-paid Performers Obsess over Favourite Right-wing Caricature Fetishes: Some of which Is Actually True, Much of which Is Pure Tosh, available at your bookseller now, or pick it up at the tip in a few weeks.