The Swiss popular vote to end its half-decade experiment with allowing unlimited immigration from European Union countries (of which Switzerland is not a member) had multiple causes. One is that the EU has kept expanding eastward into low wage countries. On January 1, residents of Romania and Bulgaria became eligible to move to any EU country (and therefore Switzerland, too).

Romania and Bulgaria are home to a lot of poor people, most of them not particularly troublesome except from the usual impact of driving down wages and raising housing costs.

But some — the Roma — are unwelcome anywhere they go. If you were a Romanian official, wouldn’t you want to put on a slideshow for your Gypsy residents (whose neighborhoods resemble Borat’s hometown — it was filmed in a Romanian Gypsy village) about the glories of life in gleaming Switzerland?

And now the E.U. is, under pressure from the U.S., gesturing toward letting in 45 million very low wage Ukrainians. The E.U. doesn’t really want to do that, but Davos Man is angry and emotional right now, and is looking to pick a fight with Russia over Ukraine, so Washington and NATO might pressure the E.U. into doing something very stupid.

More generally, Switzerland is probably the most famously beautiful country in the world, so its residents aren’t happy with the steadily rising population. Of course, in America, we know that Switzerland would look much better if it were transformed into the set from “Her” or “Elysium.” If you don’t believe me, just ask Matthew Yglesias or Ed Glaeser. Admit it: unless you grew up in barn, all those cows are just creepy. And those peasants with pitchforks …

Many in America can’t understand why the Swiss aren’t as enthusiastic about importing their co-ethnics to better battle for ethnic domination within Switzerland as American minorities are said to be. For example, the largest number of non-Swiss in Switzerland are Italians, but the Italian-speaking canton voted strongly to crack down on immigration from Italy.

Here in the U.S., Marco Rubio and Luis Gutierrez are celebrated in the media for agitating for more Hispanic immigration. In 21st Century America, race/ethnic loyalty is held to trump ties of citizenship (unless the race is white and the ethnicity is pre-Ellis Island, in which case race/ethnic loyalty is unspeakable).

The Swiss, in contrast, put much value on what I call Citizenism. A Swiss Italian is expected to value the welfare of his fellow Swiss citizens more highly than his fellow Italian co-ethnics. And they do. In contrast to the U.S. where the federal government constantly absorbs powers allotted under the Constitution to the states, the Swiss keep much of government power at the level of the cantons, which are mostly monolingual.

This lowers the urge to wage Elect a New People campaigns. If Italian citizens pour into Italian-speaking Ticino the way Mexicans pour into California, it doesn’t give Italian ethnic Swiss all that much more power nationally the way it it perceived as giving Hispanic ethnic (although non-Mexican) politicians such as Rubio more power.

But Swiss voters are highly nationalistic about a few important policies.

Moreover, Swiss voters understand the law of supply and demand well. More immigration from Italy into Italian-speaking Ticino drives down wages for Italian speakers and drives up land prices. Why is that good Swiss Italian citizens and their children?

Steve Sailer has been mining comedy gold in the rich seam of 21st-century feminism:

Feminism: “Feelings / Nothing more than Feelings”

From The Nation, an article about how black feminists scream at white feminists and then other white feminists pile on those vicious racist white feminists. And how “trans” feminists can get very, very upset at the Vagina Monologues-type feminists who actually have vaginas:

… In a revolution-eats-its-own irony, some online feminists have even deemed the word “vagina” problematic. In January, the actress and activist Martha Plimpton tweeted about a benefit for Texas abortion funds called “A Night of a Thousand Vaginas,” sponsored by A Is For, a reproductive rights organization she’s involved with. Plimpton was surprised when some offended Internet feminists urged people to stay away, arguing that emphasizing “vaginas” hurts trans men who don’t want their reproductive organs coded as female. …

Reading this more closely, I realize I may have gotten this backward. The protesters may be individuals who have vaginas but are objecting to the cultural stereotypes that encodes vaginas as being – in some socially constructed sense – female. (Feminism: “Feelings / Nothing more than Feelings”, iSteve, 29^th January 2013)

The article in question, Michelle Goldberg’s Feminism’s Toxic Twitter Wars (The Nation, 29^th January 2013), is simultaneously funny, freakish, frightening and fascinating. I was particularly struck by this paragraph:

Similarly, there’s a norm that intention doesn’t matter — indeed, if you offend someone and then try to explain that you were misunderstood, this is seen as compounding the original injury. Again, there’s a significant insight here: people often behave in bigoted ways without meaning to, and their benign intention doesn’t make the prejudice less painful for those subjected to it. However, “that became a rule where you say intentions never matter; there is no added value to understanding the intentions of the speaker,” Cross says.

The “norm” is obviously an attempt to turn Women of Color into mini-Popes: infallible and invulnerable to criticism. If a Woman of Color chooses to interpret a statement by a woman of Whiteness as “offensive,” the woman of Whiteness is permitted no defence. If she attempts one, she “compounds” the offence. In other words: “Shut up and obey.” This seems a good example of something I wrote about last year:

If parasitism [exists] among human beings, it will exploit some particular aspect of our biology. Wasps can easily inject chemicals into the brains of other insects. Human beings can easily inject ideas into the brains of other human beings. They do this using something called language. So words like “hate,” “bigotry,” “racism,” “antisemitism,” “homophobia,” “Islamophobia” and so on may be the verbal equivalents of a wasp’s neurotoxins: cheap and effective ways of inducing paralysis in a nutrient-laden host. (Verbal Venom: Biological Parallels for Western Pathologies, The Occidental Observer, 15^th October 2013)

When Black feminists claim “offence” and then deny their White opponents a right to defend themselves, they are clearly using verbal venom to paralyze a “nutrient-laden host.” But where does this tactic come from? Which group began the “more victimized than thou” competition? An article posted by Steve Sailer way back in 2007 gives the answer, from no less that the former rabbi-in-chief of the UK:

Britain’s top rabbi warns against multiculturalism; Sacks: Multiculturalism threatens democracy

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

Multiculturalism promotes segregation, stifles free speech and threatens liberal democracy, Britain’s top Jewish official warned in extracts from his book published Saturday.

Jonathan Sacks, Britain’s [former] chief rabbi, defined multiculturalism as an attempt to affirm Britain’s diverse communities and make ethnic and religious minorities more appreciated and respected. But in his book, “The Home We Build Together: Recreating Society,” he said the movement had run its course.

“Multiculturalism has led not to integration but to segregation,” Sacks wrote in his book, an extract of which was published in the Times of London.

“Liberal democracy is in danger,” Sacks said, adding later: “The politics of freedom risks descending into the politics of fear.”

Sacks said Britain’s politics had been poisoned by the rise of identity politics, as minorities and aggrieved groups jockeyed first for rights, then for special treatment.

The process, he said, began with Jews, before being taken up by blacks, women and gays. He said the effect had been “inexorably divisive.”

“A culture of victimhood sets group against group, each claiming that its pain, injury, oppression, humiliation is greater than that of others,” he said.

In an interview with the [London] Times, Sacks said he wanted his book to be “politically incorrect in the highest order.”

(Britain’s top rabbi warns against multiculturalism, iSteve, 20^th October, 2007; emphasis added)