This comment piece is a follow-up to Craig Young's recent thoughts on the lessons we can learn from the Nazi's persecution, internment and extermination of unpopular minorities as exemplified by Auschwitz. -Ed. Some centre-right gay men argue that we shouldn't lump the late Dutch gay anti-immigrant racist politician Pim Fortuyn in with other odious self-haters like Roy Cohn and Ernest Rohm. Sorry, I disagree. (I'm not advocating any ideological purity test here. I accept that there are honourable and committed centre-right gay men and liberal feminist women in National and ACT. It is to these noble souls that we owe the fact that New Zealand politics is considerably less polarised along lines of morality and ethical debates than the United States or comparable jurisdictions. Regardless of philosophical differences, I regard them as honourable people.) Fortuyn's allegiances were never founded on the basis of LGBT identity politics. He was an anti-immigrant racist, first and foremost, albeit one who used a libertarian facade. He argued that Muslims formed an unassimilable minority that imported 'alien values' against the Netherlands tradition of liberal social experimentation and tolerance. Never mind that eighteenth century Amsterdam harboured mosques and synagogues without any trouble, and gay male networks were the scapegoats of a 'sodomy' panic in 1726 and 1730. See, that's the problem with scapegoating - ultimately, it may endanger us if we adopt opportunist or short-sighted political strategies. Yesterday, our communities were the victims of Netherlands intolerance and social exclusion, whereas Dutch Muslims are the current targets. Fortuyn's party list and its successor organisations lack any other visible lesbian or gay male participants. It escapes me why non-Dutch lesbians and gay men defend the late anti-immigrant racist merely due to his sexual orientation. It is not as if he were akin to Harvey Milk, the assassinated San Francisco city councillor from the seventies who was committed to LGBT rights, and died for it. Moreover, the list composition contains no obvious civil libertarians, apart from one Surinamese ex-Muslim. Granted too, Dutch Sunni Muslim fundamentalist elements shouldn't have assassinated Theo Van Gogh, who was making a documentary about Islamic sexism. However, that is no excuse for the current display of racist violence against individuals and property. One hate crime does not justify others. It is fundamentalism that is the enemy, not any particular organised religion, which contains liberal and fundamentalist elements. In any case, fundamentalist Protestant Christianity has been far more vociferous in attacking LGBT rights in North America, Australasia and Western Europe, as well as Singapore. I am not denying that we should stand in solidarity with LGBT Muslim victims of homophobic violence and antigay politics in societies like Iran, Pakistan and the Western Muslim diaspora. However, none of the great faiths are homogenous. Granted, we should support Muslim voices of tolerance, pluralism and diversity, for these do exist, as they do within Christianity, Judaism and Buddhism. However, let us not single out any one religion. In New Zealand, fundamentalist Protestant Christians and their conservative Catholic allies are primary Christian Right constituencies. And it is still overwhelmingly a "Christian" Right. Pim Fortuyn was an opportunist fool, who was more akin to Australia's Pauline Hanson than any mainstream LGBT figure. So he was gay, so what? Does that mean we should automatically spare him from any ethical scrutiny or critical political analysis? No, we should not. He did not die for LGBT rights, an animal rights fanatic shot him. We justly despise Roy Cohn and Ernest Rohm. Why should Pim Fortuyn be any different? Recommended Reading: The Nationalism of Pim Fortuyn: http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/pim-fortuyn.html Louis Crompton: Homosexuality and Civilisation: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press: Cambridge, Massachuesetts: 2003. Craig Young - 4th February 2005