My apologies, but I’m really unclear as to what you’re getting at. Just because Dreyfus was unfairly accused means that all blood and soil traditionalism must be tossed out the window? That seems like a rather bold jump.

“I’m currently resident in England and I have far more in common with immigrants who come from Hindu and Sikh cultures than with native yobs face down in the gutter.”

That’s lovely, but I don’t know how the native yobs feel about losing their country. Yes, they may not be the paladins of “Western Civilization”, but I don’t really see why they are thus damned to lose a nation that has belonged to their ancestors for tens of thousands of years just because Hindu and Sikh immigrants can speak and conduct themselves better.

“I’ll refer you Ibn Warraq’s Defending the West for further proof.”

Haven’t read it, but I’ll look for a copy at the library.

“The glory of the West has always been its veneration of reason, its universalism, and its self-criticism.”

Why do you think the “West” is so universal? Do you think that through mass immigration, free trade, and overthrowing regimes that Western Civilization will prevail even if the historic populations that built this very civilization fade into oblivion? What evidence do you see of this?

“The veneration of an unchosen, unalterable heritage over consciously chosen values is a mark of the Oriental Despot, not the Graeco-Roman tradition.”

Well the ancient Greeks and Romans no longer exist as peoples, so I’m not sure if the Greco-Roman tradition when it comes to nationalism is such a good model to pursue. At any rate, most European peoples never embraced “universalism”, so I don’t think the “Greco-Roman” tradition has been the orthodox practice of the West until the 1960’s. In other words, blood and soil traditionalism has been the mark of the West for much longer than universalism. Incidentally, ever since we embraced universalism, we’re now dealing with population replacements and other problems. Kind of make me think that universalism isn’t that great of a belief when put into practice.

[For sure, and he supported the American Revolution]

Quite. The revolutionaries and liberals were for it, and the conservatives were against it, precisely because it was a matter of, as it were, intelligent design, instead of organic development.

John, one isn’t entitled to rewrite history. The denunciations of Dreyfuss and his defenders were that they were, yes, deracinated. That they were examples of the luftmensch. The rootless cosmopolitan.

You’re quite right that the blood and soil mentality has existed throughout mankind’s history. A brief glance at that history shows its effects. I’m currently resident in England and I have far more in common with immigrants who come from Hindu and Sikh cultures than with native yobs face down in the gutter.

I am second to none in my admiration the magnificent heritage of Western civilization. And it is my knowledge of that that leads me to oppose the blood-and-soil (mud) traditionalists. The glory of the West has always been its veneration of reason, its universalism, and its self-criticism. I’ll refer you Ibn Warraq’s Defending the West for further proof. The veneration of an unchosen, unalterable heritage over consciously chosen values is a mark of the Oriental Despot, not the Graeco-Roman tradition.

It’s true that blood and soil traditionalists have undergone ugly deviations, it is true, but those instances need to be isolated and condemned. Pride and celebration of shared identity through heritage is not something that must be ugly.

That comment was addressed to Myron Pauli. My apologies for the confusion.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard90.html

As regards the “multiculturalims aspect”, the complaint that America is a written republic founded on ideas, rather than blood-and-soil loyalties is one with a very long pedigree, none of it laudatory, and none of it part of the Enlightenment.