There are people whose actions and ideas make them the enemies of social progress–those who dedicate themselves to supporting, advancing and justifying the tiny majority that profits and rules. Tom Flanagan is such an enemy.

As a socialist, I want to see these enemies defeated. But I am not indifferent to how they are defeated. Are they brought down by pressure from below? Does the cause of their defeat advance our movement?

Tom Flanagan has been an important ideological prop for the neo-liberal agenda epitomized by the Reform Party and Stephen Harper’s Tories. He has been at the centre of “the Calgary school” based at the University of Calgary, dedicated to giving academic cover for Tar Sands exploitation, the militarization of Canadian society, and the dismantling of the social safety net (and particularly universal health care).

Among Flanagan’s specialties has been racist attacks on First Nations status and culture. In his book First Nations? Second Thoughts he wrote: “Call it assimilation, call it integration, call it adaptation, call it whatever you want: it has to happen.” For Flanagan, extinguishing First Nations claim to sovereignty over the land was necessary for full-throttle corporate exploitation of natural resources.

No wonder then that news that Idle No More activists had drawn questionable comments from Flanagan on the subject of child pornography spread like wildfire. Within hours Flanagan was dumped from his position as a pundit on CBC TV, kicked out of any association with Alberta’s Wild Rose party (he was campaign manager during the last election), and unceremoniously “retired” from the University of Calgary.

Compare this reaction to the last Flanagan flap. Reacting to attempts to arrest Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, Flanagan told his CBC audience that President Obama “should put out a contract and maybe use a drone or something. I think Assange should be assassinated, actually.” A few voices were raised in protest, but his right wing friends just laughed and patted him on the back.

To me those comments were far more abhorrent that his child pornography quote: “It’s a real issue of personal liberty and to what extent we put people in jail for doing something in which they do not harm another person.” Personally, I think those who consume such images need to be helped, educated and healed, not jailed.

Flanagan’s comments and his public destruction have excited an air of moral hysteria, and a giddy celebration on the part of most people who, like me, consider Flanagan a public enemy. Had there been a groundswell of anger over his public call for the murder of Assange, sufficient to drive him from public life, I would have been delighted and our movement would have been strengthened. Had we built solidarity with First Nations such that Flanagan’s public statements in favour of cultural genocide–because that is exactly what “assimilation” is­–would be enough to drive him into early retirement and disgrace, I would be celebrating a real victory for our side.

But Flanagan has merely been destroyed as an individual. His ideas and the organizations he helped build are left unscathed. There are a dozen Flanagans, right-wing talking point pundits, waiting in the wings to take his seat at the CBC. And our important movements have not been built or moved forward as a result.

I suspect that the moral hysteria, because of Flanagan’s name on the mailing list of the North American Man/Boy Love Association, will do more to fuel homophobia. That remains to be seen. At any rate, while I feel no personal sympathy for Flanagan, I think I’ll sit out the celebration of his fall.