SIR,—At the risk of being condemned as an 'ill- educated
small businessman' I am impelled to say that
the best possible thing the Conservative Party could
do in their own interests so far as your readers are concerned would be to dissociate themselves entirely from the opinions expressed by Mr. Henry Fairlie (Spectator, September 13). If, as I expect, I vote Tory at the coming general election, it will be in spite of and not because of Mr. Fairlie's advocacy. His article is nothing more (or less) than sophisticated wall- chalking. It suggests that anyone who is not an organ- isation man, a bureaucrat or at least an enthusiastic supporter of the establishment, is irrational and ipso facto a fascist beast.
The kindest thing one could say about Mr. Fairlic's article would be that he is suffering from the effects of some kind of nightmare brought on by reading recent works which draw comparisons between Britain today and Germany under the Weimar Re- public. It may be the kindest thing, but I doubt it would not be true. It is too obvious that these works have supplied Mr. Fairlie with 'evidence' to use against the nearest political opponent in a manner already exemplified in only slightly coarser fashion by Goebbels and McCarthy. (So infectious is this name-calling technique that it seems to be impossible to protest against it without using it.) Apart from the sheer offensiveness of Mr. Fairlie's last two sentences, they contain the menacing implica- lion that all representation of protest against even the minors acts of established powers in government. industry or commerce will now be recognised as in- cipient nazism.
JACK HOLMES 62 Kelvingrore Street, Glasgow, C3
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