If you think the left is twisting Norway’s tragedy, check out the neo-Nazis

Insular Japanese

My dictionary says that 'elision' means "the omission of a vowel, consonant, or syllable in pronunciation" not, as I suspect you erroneously meant, a 'combination' or 'merger' of "two states of mind..."

I send this sort of e-mail to the BBC website all the same. I'm not only 'insular', I'm pedantic, too!

Adam Maguire

I would image this Norwegians wild rampage must have been greeted within the offices of NI with certain (shall we say) quiet relief, that and Amy Winehouse signing out for good and all within a few hours of each other.

Phone Hacking scandal BOORRRRINGGGG!

Ach, it would appear that the devil really does look after his own.

Oedipus Rex

This kind of blame game is simply a form of conspiracy theory - the types who think like this are, by and large, people with low self-esteem, sometimes just a tad autistic so unable to understand human interaction at its more complex, and, more worryingly, reasonably 'intelligent'.
MOSSAD has been blamed for just about every event that's come to pass in my lifetime it would seem. Even as one of the goyim it absolutely floors me why this happens. But then again, religion and our religious history has much to answer for.
Some (certainly not the genuinely intelligent believers)just don't get causation, always seeing 'the hand of god' behind things; the non-believers (of whom I'm one) can be even worse, by substituting the acts of divine providence with imaginary political forces.

Surely the reality is closer to being 'Shit Happens'?

Anthony Bannister

Dear Mr Liddle,
Re your recent excellent article on Breivik and Norway's neo-nazis. However, his worst offence was to express criticism of Norway, an unforgivable crime. Henrik Ibsen did the same from some who saw his play "Brand", critical of Norwegian society ie educated Norwegians. He received so many death threats he fled to Italy. Ditto Axel Sandemose, author of "Janteloven", in which he reveals the 10 commandments of Norwegian society. He fled to Denmark.
There is an underlying passive-aggressive violent side to the Norwegian character which they do not wish to be shown to the world. Hypocrisy is much more comfortable. I lived there for some years and my brother is a Norwegian, going "native" to the point where we cannnot speak on politics, because he is always "correct". I would not return to Norway at gunpoint and would advise you to be very careful if you do visit.
Keep up the good work of exposing left-wing hypocrisy and bullshit.
Anthony Bannister

Ken Bishop

Anthony Bannister

An interesting contribution, many thanks for that. However, Wikipedia reveals that Sandemose was from Denmark, and didn't settle in Norway till he was 40. Perhaps what the Norwegians objected to was a foreigner picking holes in their society (not an uncommon reaction, in any country). And he ended his days in Norway, not Denmark.

His ten (or eleven) commandments are here, and very plausible they are, too:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jante_Law

Herbert Thornton

Ken Bishop -

Thanks for the link to Jarte Law - it's hilarious & I nearly spilled my coffee.

But know what? I then I thought about my being from the north of England - and I suddenly realised that a good many people in the small community where I grew up must have Scandinavian ancestry.

Christopher Bell

Insular Japanese: Elision does mean joining together. For instance "I will" becomes "I'll" on the elision of " wi".

EyeSee

I'm not a shrink, but if I had to point to an activity that described a detached mind, I would suggest blowing up a city centre and shooting, with great delight young people and all to support a political belief would probably be it. If he is considered sane, then it explains why some people think Polly Toynbee is.

Insular Japanese

Oh, yes...I can see that now. Arigatougozaimashita for correcting me, Christopher Bell. It's obvious when you think about it.

That'll (elision!) teach me to write and post a comment after one too many glasses of sake.

Haza

Wow. A reasonably rational article by spectator. Who knows, with the increasing incidence of such rare events, more people may walk with a spring in their step, more babies will giggle happily, and we might find some solutions to the climate change problem. Oh, I forgot. That's an international liberal/communist conspiracy. Sigh.

Mossytoddler

Surely there's been enough informed discussion by now for people to understand that psychopaths aren't considered to be insane. Their lack of normal human empathy makes them able to exploit the trust and goodwill of others. Nevertheless, in pursuit of their sometimes evil and always selfish goals, they think and behave rationally and are often very intelligent.

Sabra

Thank God (if s/he exists) there are still rational, intelligent human beings on this planet. To see the calibre of responses elicited by this article settles my fears that the whole world was descending into an abyss of irrational, ultra-left or ultra-right wing loonatics who've (elision) forgotten the basic principles of human kindness and decency.

tito perdue

"then it explains why some people think Polly Toynbee is."

Because it seems absolutely impossible that the descent of Polly from Arnold could have been so precipitous.