The Cloning of Fjordman

In a recent essay at Front Page Fjordman ruminates upon the continued inspection of his fine self by the Norweegie MSM. A country so deeply obsessed with niceness at the expense of any robust moral gravitas is bound to end up as, well, to be blunt, “poor little rich Norway”. I’ve never seen a place so terrified of looking inward at the workings of its shadow side. It’s not a good idea to spend much time investigating this aspect of NiceNiceNorway, unless perhaps you’re being paid to do serious research on the long-term effects of governmental repression on a nation’s psyche. Or even on an individual’s emotional retardation under the thumb of the Nanny State with the big stick. Nice-nice people are those who’ve never been permitted to grow up completely. Peter Pan would’ve flourished in Norway.

Yeah, looking at this tiny country is fascinating in a sick kind of way… like watching a… never mind, you can supply your own icky images for what they are compelled to do to maintain a stable internal sense of self. At least Sderot knows the etiology of its city-wide PTSD. Norway is too protected by its wealth to have to bother with the pain of looking.

However, I’ve heard from enough expatriates who felt a transformative freedom when they fled their native land. There is deep sadness, though, as they work through the realization that their homeland, which they wanted to love, refused to accept them as they were. As I told Fjordman when they were hunting him down so they could put his image up in the newspaper next to Quisling, if you live in a totalitarian society that doesn’t respect your right to your own beliefs, you have three choices:

• Flee
• Lie
• Surrender your mind to the rulers’ philosophy.

As I pointed out, those were the choices every person who lived under Nazi rule had to make, as did those under Stalin, etc. There are no other paths, except maybe suicide; many Russians chose that route. Here in America large swathes of people are learning that what our Secretary of State said is true: shunning and shaming will keep them quiet. No one wants to live in an environment of finger-pointing. We get so many sad emails from Americans who feel isolated and alone.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

Fjordman helpfully linked to one of the obsession columns in his essay — scroll down to the fifth paragraph to find it. Thanks to the wonders of Google’s page translations, you’ll be able to read it easily — and somewhat queasily if you choose to slog through five pages of comments.

What Fjordman chose to link (he certainly has hundreds from which to choose at this point) seems to be from a website devoted to religion in Norway. It posts a variety of essays on religious issues. The particular link he left from Verdidbatt.no dates from August 2011 — back when no one knew much about this fellow Fjordman. It was early in the witch hunt, but they got down to business right quick. Until I noticed the date, I was all set to post my comment. However so far past the date of its writing, anything I said there would be like echoing in a time capsule.

The most intriguing point is one I’ve seen posited and repeated by American critics, too. They seem to find questionable the notion that Fjordie could be just one person How could just one person write so prolifically and across such a wide range of subjects? How, indeed. It’s not physically or intellectually possible to know so much, never mind put all those ideas on paper.

Right? Right?

The truth must be told. That Fjordman fellow? He’s six people.

Six men, to be precise and they’re chained in the basement forced to write for twelve hours a day. The poor Baron has to edit their prose for English readers, so he’s stuck at his computer, too. They’re fine fellows, are Jens, Bjørn, Per, Lars, Mikael, Oddbjørn and Knut. The last two are new replacements for Geir and Anders. G&A were part of the original crew of scribes, but they escaped and started their own circus, which quickly drew a large following. We’ve tightened security since their escape, so that shouldn’t happen again.

We’re not slave-drivers. As long as they keep up production, they’re treated well. Lots of computer games — the non-violent kind of course; we learned our lesson with Anders — and plenty of their favorite foods. Things like gomme, rakfisk, and smalahove keep them content.

For some strange reason, I scare them more than the Baron does. Since their output is so high and their volume keeps the Baron so busy, it has fallen to me to use whatever discipline might be necessary to keep their output high. You know how boys are; they have to be encouraged. They all know by now if they don’t behave they’ll be subjected to a visit from Ingrid and her mother. The former will flirt with them mercilessly, while her momma, using that special Norwegian mean-mother-voice, will rant relentlessly, telling them all how useless they are compared to her accomplished Ingrid.

About an hour of that keeps them out of trouble for weeks. It has worked so well that now all I have to do is mention Ingrid and momma — they fold immediately and return to production with renewed zeal.

Each of them has his own area of expertise, but who-is-who remains a proprietary secret. Can’t have people snooping, doing linguistic forensic analysis trying to pin down who writes what. But let’s just say that Lars will never write on the history of the shoelace while Mikael finds any subject after the 15th century boring. Each of them has his endearing quirks.

Too bad those intrepid Norwegian journalists were able to suss out the truth. But the dungeon here at the Gates of Hell is so well hidden the Norwegian Security Police will never find our crew. Meanwhile, our “Fjordmen” keep the words flowing out, and Mossad keeps the shekels flowing in.

Just in case the greenies are ready with a complaint, no snail darters or wood rats are ever harmed in the making of our essays. The boys just keep on tippy-tapping away and the world keeps on spinning.

Hey, it’s a living. Quitcher bitchin’, y’all. Just think: we’ve kept numerous Norwegian jornolists busy for a long time, making the “news” industry a growth sector over there.

If anyone sees Geir or Anders, tell them we said ‘hey’ and that “Fjordman” misses them. But not much. The boys sure don’t miss Anders’ “dumb costumes” (that’s Jens talking) or Geir’s compulsion to speechify. Lordy that boy sure could talk up a storm. Mikael with his blankie, and Oddbjørn’s ant farm are much easier than those two escapees.

Oh, and be sure to let them know Ingrid’s momma is not a happy camper atall atall. She demands to know why they didn’t cut her in on the deal… sometimes I hear her muttering about finding Anders and “fixing his wagon”. When I ask for specifics she merely glowers, muttering, “Cold coffee? That’ll be the least of his worries… ” A woman spurned. Oh my.

Ingrid, on the other hand, just shrugs and waves her hands in the air. She does that a lot — the hand-waving bit. It took me a while to figure out she was drying her latest application of nail polish. Not a terribly expressive young lady, but she has a magnificent pout. I caught her in front of the mirror practicing the other day. When she saw me — well, yeah, she shrugged, but she also raised an eyebrow in my general direction. That’s a depth I hadn’t seen before.

Oops, I’d better check on the boys. Time for their vitamins and a meal. Talk about pouty — I swan, those boys are a caution when I’m late with their gomme.