And in that time in Europe we see a political movement rise which does not do anything else than exploiting resentment. It stimulates anger, is not really interested in solutions and has no ideas. A movement that does not want solutions, because it needs the abuses to be able to continue scolding and hating. For that is its most important characteristic: scolding for the sake of scolding and hating for the sake of hating. The social resentment is vented towards a scapegoat which is blamed for everything. At the same time, this movement looks at itself as the eternal victim of “left wing” of “the elite”, and it cherishes a deep aversion towards intellectuals, cosmopolites and everyone and everything that is “different”. These politics are not so much fed by stupidity as by half civilization, recognizable by the continuous usage of slogans and phrases. It’s a reactionary kind of politics that states that everything was better in the past and that everything will become better once the own people have been purified from alien elements which always screw up everything.
This was said by Menno ter Braak in 1937