AGENTS PROVOCATEURS
Mon. Jan. 4th, 2021
It's French.
It means someone who uses spy techniques and terrorist techniques, but mainly deception with malice aforethought, to make the opposite political party look like they are traitors.
I love the French language, so I'm happy to use this technical term. I'm happy to get into a discussion with anybody about how I pronounce it, how the French pronounce it, et cetera. But let me be brief. The French don't pronounce agent provocateur to where it sounds the way the word amateur sounds in English. But if you want to pronounce the term agent provocateur so that the -teur at the end of it sounds like the -teur at the end of amateur, I'm not going to fuss at you, and I'm not going to laugh. To refer to the Bible, I'm trying not to sit in the seat of the mockers.
But let me push my attention to the main point. The main point is that it is a sin to be an agent provocateur.
In Dante's long poem L'Inferno (Hell), he described a series of circles of Hell, which amounts to a classification of sins by levels of heinousness. Whether Dante was closely following the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church -- of which he was, I think, a baptized and confirmed member -- I cannot say.
But what I do want to say, is that in my opinion, Dante's classification of sins is incomplete. Agents provocateurs need to be included in any and every classification of sins.
The main thing people need to talk about is which circle of Hell being an agent provocateur should go in, and whether it is one of those sins which should also be against the law, in a modern nation. Relevant to the question of making it illegal, is the question of how difficult it would be to prove an accusation.
In my opinion, being an agent provocateur is a very grievous sin. But, also, in my opinion, being an agent provocateur is a highly unpatriotic act. When you use deception to make the opposite political party look like traitors, you are inflicting a terrible wound on your own country. Hitler conspired to hire an agent provocateur to burn down the Reichstag in 1933, and in Hitler's case, the wound he inflicted on his country Germany resulted in the deaths of millions of Germans, and millions of innocent people. The correct choice between Fascists and Communists is neither.
Frank Newton
