Anarchism: the glue that binds extremists of every stripe

There's one belief that's shared by so many different sorts of politically active people: "My way or the highway." i.e. a contempt for democracy. This becomes anarchism when an ideologue acts on his beliefs even when they violate his country's laws--asserting that he is, all by himself, a sovereign nation.

Recently a Swedish art historian and cartoonist was physically assaulted by Swedish Islamists at the start of a talk he was giving at a university in Sweden. University cops intervened and rescued him but the Islamists succeeded in preventing him from speaking.

His crime? Drawing and publishing the cartoon shown here. It's hard for Westerners to imagine how offensive this is to Muslims. You might compare it to how a Christian might react to a pornographic drawing involving Jesus, since Muslims consider dogs unclean and forbid any depiction of Muhammed whatsoever.

Islamic extremists believe they have an obligation to murder whoever drew or published such a drawing, while in a comparable circumstance Christian fundamentalists would simply be very offended, and if the publisher were a mainstream publication they'd agitate for something like an advertiser boycott.

Which gibes with what Obama bin Ladin said about Muslims being in love with death, while Christians (and I suppose Jews) were in love with life. He meant that as a criticism of the West. Seriously.

But let's not delude ourselves into thinking that opposition to freedom of speech and of the press is limited to Islamic fascists. Recently, in Canada, leftists disrupted a campus speech by right wing harpy Ann Coulter--and they were enabled to successfully stop the speech by yet another spineless university administration. And both right- and left- wing acitivists have worked ceaselessly to eliminate the other side's point of view from American textbooks.

Ideological extremism always opposes democracy, always believe that "everyone is entitled to my point of view." Islamic fascism only represents the most extreme flavor.

But they all join in dismissing the advantages we all gain by living within framework of a country--a framework that always requires surrendering a certain amount of personal freedom in exchange for the collective freedom a nation confers on its citizens. Most such people would never call themselves anarchists--indeed they often present themselves as hyper-patriots. This simply makes them hypocrites as well as anarchists. At least leftist anarchists are slightly more honest.

Still, I always wait for those who set their own beliefs above our nation's laws to forego the benefits they get from this framework. To go off the grid, to never call the cops, even after armed gangbangers have invaded their home; to never call the fire department, even as the flames rise around them; to never flush a toilet that's connected to a sewer system; to never all the American consulate when they're arrested in a foreign country.

I'm invariably disappointed.