by Dan Flynn

Novelist Michel Houellebecq is currently standing trial in France. His alleged crime? Offending Muslims. In Houellebecq's book Platform, a bestseller in France, a central character confesses a "quiver of glee" upon the killings of Palestinians in Israel. Later, the author told an interviewer that Islam was "the dumbest religion of all." Major Islamic groups in France, including the largest mosques in Paris and Lyon, took offense and pursued the case against the controversial author. "It is anti-Muslim racism that is at the heart of the trial, not the personality or the provocative tastes of one successful author or another," representatives of the Mosques claim.

When freedom of speech and the "right" not to be offended clash, the modern state all too often sides with the latter value. This is particularly true when those expressing offense are members of protected "victim" groups.

The thought crimes case against the author is university speech codes writ large upon an entire nation. Looking at other countries in Europe, one might say it is speech codes writ large upon an entire continent. The case is also a microcosm of the issues that Paul Gottfried addresses in his new book, Multiculturalism and the Politics of Guilt: Toward a Secular Theocracy.

Multiculturalism and the Politics of Guilt takes off where the book's predecessor, After Liberalism, left off. In his last book, Gottfried detailed the evolution from the welfare state to the managerial state of modern government in the West. The old paradigm held that redistribution policies posed the greatest threat to personal freedom in the West. The world has changed, and thus, the threats to freedom have too. State power is no longer proportional to the amount of money the government expunges from the populace. In fact, government expenditures as a percentage of the gross domestic product are slightly less now in the United States than they were twenty years ago, with other Western nations seeing no major increase as well. Today, the state is able to direct the lives of its citizens through behavioral conditioning, legislation sanctioning non-criminal behavior, and regulations endorsing preferred ethnic, gender, and sexual groups, as well as through wealth redistribution. Socialism is still a problem, the author affirms, but the assault on Western culture may be a more pressing one, particularly since the assailants exhibit a religious fanaticism that exalts alleged victims and villifies supposed oppressors. Even though its adherents refuse to believe in a divinity, multiculturalism is seen as a divine calling.

Elites living in Western democracies needn't have the consent of the governed to achieve these ends. "Nonelected government officials can achieve an indeterminate power over American family life in return for a relatively small allocation of revenue," Gottfried maintains. "Social control by the state does not presuppose a socialized economy, and government interventions into child rearing, spousal relations, and intergroup dynamics can now go forward in conjunction with market forces." The vox populi, Gottfried seems to be saying, no longer carries the weight it once did. He points out that in a recent Roper poll, for instance, 83 percent of non-elite respondents agreed that controlling illegal immigration was an "important thing," while only 28 percent of elite respondents thought so. Not surprisingly, it is elite opinion and not public opinion that influences government policy on the issue of illegal immigration. The same enthusiasm amongst elites holds true for affirmative action, special rights for homosexuals, and other programs unpopular with Middle America.

The rationale for these new policies is multiculturalism, an amorphous concept at war with Western culture. Components of the new program include placing non-Western cultures on a higher plane than the West; unrestricted immigration; a purging of Christianity from the public sphere for fear of offending members of minority religions; encouraging immigrants to continue speaking their native tongue in favor of the lingua franca; and special rights and protections for minority group members-such as hate speech laws and affirmative action-that come at the expense of the majority. "But once having accepted the imposed prerequisites for decency, European regions and nations cease to be distinctive. They become atomized imitations of each other, even if they are permitted to have different theme-park decors and to retain linguistic particularities," the author writes. To oppose any of the multiculturalist's aims, one runs the risk of being labeled a racist, xenophobe, or some other term denoting bigotry. The threat of such labels, and the ramifications that they bring with them, are enough to modify behavior.

What are some concrete examples of the managerial state promoting multiculturalism?

In America, racial hate-crime laws target white males almost exclusively. Yet, black males are six times as likely to perpetrate interracial violence. Germany's highest appellate court ordered the removal of crucifixes from Bavaria's classrooms, despite widespread opposition to the removal of the crucifixes and the lack of a legal basis to do so. Even a local Protestant Bishop supported the move against the majority culture. "I consider a crucifix, that is the constant sight of a tortured man, to be of questionable value in a classroom," North Elban bishop Marie Jensen admitted. "I would object to hanging a cross there if I had my own child." Canada monitors politically incorrect statements, with Human Rights Commission member John Hucker remarking, "you can't rely on the free exchange of ideas to cleanse the environment of hate and intolerance."

It isn't just the goal of multiculturalism that is anti-Western. The methods used to achieve the goal are also contrary to Western values. Hate-crimes laws violate the rule of law by making conviction and punishment an arbitrary matter influenced by the race, gender, religion, and sexual orientation of the victim and the perpetrator. Vaguely worded speech codes run contrary to the Western value of free speech. Racial preferences and quotas place the rights of groups ahead of individual rights. The means to achieve the multiculturalist ends ride roughshod over the key ideals underlying Western civilization-individualism, self-government, the rule of law, etc.

"Unlike medieval Christianity, the enforced commonality in the current managerial setting is not shared ritual and sacramental mysteries of ecclesiastical authorities, but a tightening system of managerial control," contends the author. "It is one that requires its subjects to behave unnaturally, despising their ancestry and inherited morals and at least pretending to reach out for 'enrichment' to alien groups and to the practitioners of unconventional lifestyles. Submission to these behavioral and verbal guidelines, without the physical bullying carried out by the Nazi and Soviet states, can only be explained by looking at today's Western culture." That culture, in many ways, is one too weak to seek its own preservation.

The end of the Cold War and the emergence of the managerial state decreases the relevance of the liberal-conservative dichotomy. "The confrontation that has erupted is not between liberals and anti-liberals but between two postliberal concepts of democracy," Gottfried writes, "one, managerial-multicultural, and the other, plebiscitary-national or regional."

Gottfried's focus on the managerial state may not be on the radar screens of American conservatives and their brethren abroad. It should be. Preoccupation with taxes and spending blinds the public to other more invidious abuses of government power, which Gottfried exposes so adeptly. Writing in a palatable style foreign to too many academics, the Elizabethtown College professor has put together a brief and readable case against the drive by Western elites to water-down Western culture. Conservatives who seek to conserve Western civilization would be wise to heed its message.

French author Michel Houellebecq will likely be acquitted of the hate speech charges against him. Yet, the way France's thought-crimes laws are worded, Houellebecq is probably guilty as charged. Ostensibly, a contrarian wordsmith sits on trial in France for offending a protected "victim" group. What's really on trial in the case is the managerial state, which flouts the will of the majority by its attempts to erase Western culture through open-borders immigration, forcing Christianity from the public square, discouraging the use of the native language among newcomers, and awarding special rights and protections to protected groups at the expense of the majority-like the right of Muslims to not be offended.