The Inquisition was a Good Thing

I hadn't heard about the Nazi-wanna-be group "Youth for Western Civilization" until I heard about Tom Tancredo getting run out of UNC-CH by a broken window, that I wrote about yesterday. The founder of the chapter of that group at UNC-CH, Riley Matheson, gave an interview before that whole fiasco, going on about the views and goals of the group. The one thing that struck me as absurd above all the others, of course I love medieval history, so it might just be me, was his comments about the Inquisition.

At the same time, YWC promotes a celebration of western European culture. On the YWC Web site and Facebook group, there are numerous historical references to European culture. I was wondering how that plays into your role at UNC.

"The problem with university students and faculty is that there is basically, in our opinion, a deep mistrust and hatred of Western heritage. We're constantly focusing on the sins of our past. It's not to say they weren't sins. It's just to say that we need to revitalize our culture and not constantly talk about mistakes we might have made. We've long since made up for the sins we might have committed."

Do you mean slavery and the Inquisition?

"I can definitely say that slavery's one of the sins. When it comes to things like the Inquisition, I'd rather not comment—I don't want to condemn it. That's a personal opinion, and not really a club opinion."

You have got to be kidding me. You don't want to condemn the torture and murder of hundreds of thousands of people because of thought crimes? WTF are these people smoking? The Inquisition tortured people to extract confessions. They wanted to know if anyone else might be heretics or were skiving off of their Catholic duties. They used waterboarding, the rack, and in certain times and places, things worse than that. The Spanish Inquisition, which is probably the most well known thanks to Monty Python's Flying Circus, was apparently renowned for their creative torturing of prisoners. But they weren't the only Inquisition. There were plenty of others that operated all over Europe from the mid-13th century when it was founded to combat Catharism in the Languedoc to the 19th century. In fact, the Holy Office of the Inquisition still exists to this day in Catholicism, albeit under a different name, The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

When someone wouldn't give in under torture and condemn other people, and renounce any thoughts that they had that were contrary to the "good" teachings of the Catholic church, they were turned over to the secular arm of the government and burned at the stake, or in certain other times and places drawn and quartered, dragged by horses and/or hanged. Sometimes if the "crime" was a small one, they were given penance, and if they relapsed into their heresy, they didn't get a third chance. The second trial was a certain death sentence. And this stupid bastard doesn't want to condemn any of that, indeed, it seems that he wasn't keen on telling the interviewer what he really thought about it since he didn't want to comment on it. I wonder why? Could it be because he fancies doing that sort of thing to people?

Tom Tancredo and the Broken Window: A Tale from UNC-CH

Tancredo got run off from the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill, by a small, broken window pane. Apparently some students protested the fact that a Nazi-style club called "Youth for Western Civilization" invited him to come and give what amounts to a hate speech against illegal immigrants and their children receiving in-state tuition. You can see the video on the link to their site there. It's mostly boring, but worth watching I suppose, if only to see the persecution complex these people have.

Tancredo is an ass. He believes that immigrants should give up their culture, language and identity if they want to come live here and that they should forget their native language and speak English. Tom Tancredo, tu es un grand imbécile. Anyway, what makes this stupid and ironic, is that the first generation of his ancestors probably didn't do so. He isn't Native American, so I really don't know what his problem is. We are a nation of immigrants. Some of mine came here before there were laws concerning immigration, in 1638. The first generation of immigrants often don't learn the language, and they usually don't fully assimilate. It is possible, but not likely, unless they have means. The poor are typically disadvantaged in this area. They usually don't have the resources to spend on classes to learn English, nor do they have the time when they work to support themselves. The poor probably don't even have an education in their own language, so to expect them to learn English is a stretch, unless you're going to fund it, and help them with it. Now the second generation of immigrants are usually more at home here. Often by the third or fourth generation, they have no ties to the original country. As my father used to tell me, have some patience, things take time.


What this all boils down to is an underlying hatred of dark skinned people, or people of other religions. It used to be the Irish Catholics (no Irish need apply) that caught all sorts of discrimination when they immigrated here in the late 19th century, now it's mostly Catholic Hispanics from central and south America.

I am a firm supporter of education, and these people have already risked life itself in search of what we take for granted every day. I truly believe that this world would be a better place if people would put themselves into the shoes of others, if only for a moment, to think about the struggles they must have faced. To imagine for a moment, the shoe on the other foot. If a university wants to allow them to apply as residents because they have lived in the state for more than a year or for scholarships, they should let them. It should be up to the university, not up to racist demagogues.

Now, the protesters perhaps weren't as effective as they could have been. I'm assuming the window was broken on accident. It was reported that someone hit on it with their hand too hard, not that they threw anything through it. As much as it pains us, we have to let even racists bastards speak. Packing the room in silence wearing all black and carrying small signs would have gone further in my opinion.

As for the person who took the video comparing this to Kristallnacht. Shame on you, sir! Some stupid college student accidentally breaking a ten inch square window does not even begin to compare to thirty thousand Jews being rounded up and taken to concentration camps and having their property confiscated. And it's even more ironic that this person's organization promoting western "culture" rings of the rhetoric of the Hitler Youth. And their logo, an arm in black and white holding what looks like a war hammer, struck me as familiar in style and design. One of the Hitler Youth's flags was an eagle holding a hammer, also in black and white. Go figure. If that's the style they're going for, they've accomplished it.

As an aside, I'm from North Carolina. They don't mess around with racists down in Chapel Hill. Those of us from that area remember the race riots, and the Greensboro massacre. There's a ton of KKK and Christian Identity around there, who are violent and hate immigrants and blacks. All it takes is a single word to act as a spark to set everyone off. It's like screaming "FIRE" in a crowded theater. Tancredo should go and think hard on what he says. He should truly re-examine his life. I have an idea that he doesn't really believe what he says all that much, except that it wins him support and followers from the haters. If he truly was willing to fight for what he says he believes, a broken window wouldn't have deterred him.