Hard News: The Solipsistic Left
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Really? I'd say the scourge of nationalism which is just tribalism writ large still haunts Europe and North America.
I agree that nationalism brings its own set of problems but I would argue that the nation state is a less violent means of social organisation than tribalism. (Violent death is proportionally greater in tribal societies than in nation states - even when one includes 20th century Europe). Rule by families is always feud ridden.
James, I disagree that there is such a fundamental flaw in Islam, or that there is any significant difference with Christianity. I do agree that at present there are more Muslims that aspire to spread their religion violently but I believe that is caused by young men coming from conservative tribal backgrounds and feeling alienated by modernity. With a few lunatics like bin Laden thrown in.
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I do agree that at present there are more Muslims that aspire to spread their religion violently but I believe that is caused by young men coming from conservative tribal backgrounds and feeling alienated by modernity. With a few lunatics like bin Laden thrown in.
i don't think i could agree with neil more.
james, basically you're trotting out a lot of very tired, very narrow neo-conservative talking points. all of which are baseless propaganda.
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RB,
Here, I agree with you. Opposing the hijab ban is one thing - I don't think a government has the right to tell me what I can or can't wear on my goddamn head - but even thinking about sharing a stage with such a person is lunatic.
Good! So we agree on something!
Unfortunately, as a few google searches and surfing of the web will show, examples of people like Ken Livingstone codling a crazed Islamic nutter cleric are a dime a dozen. And that is how to many of us, it looks like some on the left, to some or a significant degree, support or agree or enable some these clerics. Which all seems very strange.
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At the core of Islam is "submit or I will chop your head off". Islam has at its core the conquest of the world by Muslims, by war if necessary, for Allah. It is the only religion like this.
I'm no expert on religion as well, but the little knowledge that I have of Islam would indicate that this isn't true - or at least, it's a broad overstatement.
Indeed, the religion which has a more significant history of trying to conquer the world, often by incredibly bloody means, is Christianity.
And Mohammed conquered Mecca in a bloodless war in... 629 I think? Sure, some people have taken Islam and run with it in a pretty nasty direction, but it's not the only religion to have nuts sign up and go postal.
A lot of people associate the anger and violence that can come out of the Middle East with Islam. There's lots of islamic peoples and nations that live perfectly peacefully and happily in the world. I think the fact that the Middle East has been the playground of the Western World for a couple of centuries might have a bit more to do with it, not the religion that they happen to hold.
I mean America's a fairly aggressive country on the world stage. That doesn't then map across to all Christians in the world.
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Neil,
Mohammed Atta "came from conservative tribal backgrounds and feeling alienated by modernity". That seems a bit of a stretch.He was born to a middle class Egyptian family, went to university and then went to live in Germany where he got a graduate engineering degree from a German Universtity. This is a rather strange "conservative tribal background".
The other 9/11 guys came from quite well to do Saudi backgrounds. Many of the suicide bombers in Iraq have been well to do Saudis also.
How do these facts reconclie with your theory?
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Unfortunately, as a few google searches and surfing of the web will show, examples of people like Ken Livingstone codling a crazed Islamic nutter cleric are a dime a dozen.
would you care to provide these quotes?
and, the 11 september bombers are not the tribal muslims neil is talking about.
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Kyle,
Mohammed spread Islam with tremendous brutality. Apparently his army would approach a town or city. He would send out an emissary who would tell the people to convert to Islam or he would kill everyone in the town or city, which he did on several occasions. A hell of a lot more people were killed by Mohammed's armies during the spread of Islam than were killed during the crusades.
I didn't know this until relatively recently. I thought that all religions were pretty much of a much, but reading up on the history of Islam was a pretty sobering experience.
It is true that many Muslims live quite peacefully and happily and hopefully one day a lot more of them will be like that.
The most virulent strain of Islam which is causing so many problems today is Wahabism which developed in Saudi Arabia in the middle of the 19th century, while the Ottoman Empire was still dominant in the Middle East, and before the west started messing with the Middle East.
The Ottoman Empire had been declining for a long time due to its own internal problems, before the European powers finally administered the coup de gras after WW1.
It is a very popular view that the West's interference in the Middle East is the cause of the problems there today, but based on what I have read, this is not correct. The Middle East’s problems are mostly of its own making, but how those in the Middle East love to blame everyone else for their short comings. I mean to say, they blame Israel for just about every problem they have, which is just ridiculous.
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Hmmm. Supporting neither James nor Neil:
Money quote:
As a rule, Islamism's greatest appeal is among second- or third-generation "immigrants": maladapted youth whom the integration process has failed and who feel desperately torn between two worlds--their parents' country of origin, which many have never seen, and their adoptive European homeland. Sadly, psychologists have shown that, whereas depression is prominent among first-generation immigrants who experience adaptational difficulties, schizophrenia predominates among maladjusted second-generation migrants. Such youth turn to Islamism in order to resolve what is often a severe and protracted identity crisis. Given the prevailing logic of social exclusion, it is little wonder that Europe's immigrant ghetto communities are concentrated in dismal neighborhoods characterized by high unemployment, poverty and criminality. Under these circumstances, fundamentalist Islam provides "existential meaning," a sense of belonging as well as an astringent critique of Western mores, which are often perceived as "corrupt" and "materialistic"--a critique that resonates profoundly with the immigrants' own severe adaptational disappointments and failures.
These facts strongly suggest that converts to Islamic fundamentalism are made and not born.
As for the tribal thing, no one familiar with the history of Europe should be able to claim Christians are not tribal with a straight face. Virtually every country from Russia west has examples of sectarian-ethnic violence between Christian sects or between Christians and Muslims, or Christians and Jews. Some of those examples being very recent indeed. Any honest rating of major religions for intra and inter religious violence would leave Christianity and Islam vying for last place - I couldn't be arsed quibbling about just which belongs where.
Muslims believe that the Koran is the word of Allah and cannot be altered or reinterpreted in any way.
It blows my mind James that you claim to be in touch with the Southern USA, unlike us NZ residents, and yet seem unaware of the huge numbers of Christians around you who believe in the inerrancy of Scripture.
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The regular armies, moving by sea and by land, united in Constantinople in the last days of 1096; and June 24, 1097, Nicaea was captured; but Antioch was not taken until June 3, 1098; and Jerusalem not until July 15, 1099. All the Jews in the city were burnt alive in the synagogue: all the infidels - some say seventy thousand - were massacred. Through the desolate streets the victors went in a procession to the Church of the Resurrection, singing their hymns, and wading in blood.
this is a description of the first crusade.
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Stephen,
I am very well aware of the bible bashers around this part of the world. When I first came to the US I was very suspicious and uncomfortable with the relogiosity of the US. Now it doesn't bother me, not because I have become one, but because I have spent enough time around them to know that the sterotypes I held when I first arrived here are not correct.The main thing they seem to get out of bashing their bibles is the idea that you should "do unto others as you would have done to yourself", "turn the other cheek" and "one day you will be judged" so all they seem to want to run around and be nice to people and do good things to as many people as possible before their day of judgement.
And becuase of this those "Xtians" do some pretty amazing stuff. It is about 18 months since Katrina hit and there are still church groups from all over the South and across America coming to NOLA to help people clean up and fix their houses. It is amazing, it really is. Religious groups must have donated millions of hours of time to the clean up. And I have to say I haven't noted any secular groups, no "Atheists of Manhatten", no "Secular Progressives of Berkley", no "Humanists of San Fran". Just those damned Christians helping someone out every time you turn around.
So's that why Christians don't bother or worry me at all, they can play with their Scripture all they like for all I care.
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You said:
"Islam needs to go through some kind of change or modernization, but Muslims believe that the Koran is the word of Allah and cannot be altered or reinterpreted in any way."
And I pointed out that the very same thing is true of a group of Christians on your doorstep.
And you responded: the atheists didn't come to NOLA! Those Christians are great!
Which is a big fat non sequitur as far as I'm concerned.
Dude, the fact that fundamentalists are charitable is neat! But it isn't relevant to the point I thought you were trying to make, ie that there is some unique badness in Islam owing to Muslim literalism. Belief in inerrant scripture is a very Christian thing, and you have to admit that.
If you must derail in this way, allow me to point out that as well as being marvellous volunteers, those same groups are trying to wreck the education system, deny women their reproductive freedom, persecute homosexuals and other perceived deviants, and destroy the separation of church and state. Those are not benign goals. But we digress.
Your dig at atheists is irrelevant and gratuitous. But firstly, there are no organised groups of atheists, as you tacitly admit when constructing your straw men - this is because, being, you know, godless, we don't need them. I'm not sure what you can prove by the non-activities of non-existent organisations. And secondly, since most atheists don't feel impelled to witness like Christians or make a big of it, you don't know which of the many wonderful volunteers you saw outside Christian groups were atheists. Since we don't need to create an atheist separatist parallel culture, we can just participate as volunteers by joining any organisation that pleases us.
Fundamentally, if I may use that word, you seem to want to claim that there is something uniquely nasty about Islam, and that's cool, but please actually demonstrate that with things that are genuinely unique.
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PS: please note I didn't use the terms "Xtians" or "bible-basher", 'cause I'm a polite and respectful person. Like most atheists :)
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There was a terrific article in the New Yorker recently about counter-insurgency and what makes people into insurgents. Sadly I can't find an on-line version: but if you're in the US, you can read it on-line here (crosses fingers and hopes this appears as a link?!) courtesy of your local library.
In a nutshell: religion is not a particularly important factor in making a terrorist. Social networks, family bonds and the desire to take part in a "great struggle" are more important.
(James- I know the New Yorker is written by and for The Atheists of Manhatten... but here they are propounding the ideas of Pentagon hired experts in counterinsurgency. If you're not too busy re-building your neighbours houses, its worth a read.) -
Small excerpt from above ref:
"I saw extremely similar behavior and extremely similar problems in an Islamic insurgency in West Java and a Christian-separatist insurgency in East Timor," he (Kilcullen, Australian army captain who did a PhD on counterinsurgency operations and now works for the Pentagon) said. "After 9/11, when a lot of people were saying, 'The problem is Islam,' I was thinking, It's something deeper than that. It's about human social networks and the way that they operate." -
WH,
James,
I agree that the left should not align itself with the excesses of Islamic fundamentalism, whatever those excesses might be. I would prefer to leave questions of comparative religion for another discussion, if thats okay.
As I interpret it, there is a broad desire on the left to ensure that the West deals with the world on just terms. Many of us would like to do better than we have done in this regard.
So, unlike the far left, I believe that the United States can help lead us to a better world and that radical Islam is bad. But everyone on the left is in agreement that that the approach actually taken by GWB has been counterproductive.
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i'll probably kick myself for getting involved in this, but had to share this, which i recieved today (take from it what you will):
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
U.S. MUSLIM GROUP SAYS EGYPT 'BACKSLIDING' ON REFORMS
CAIR: No 'business as usual' in dealing with undemocratic regimes
(WASHINGTON, D.C., 3/28/07) - A prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group today criticized the Egyptian government for "backsliding" on democratic reforms.The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) also rebuked the Bush administration for seeming to return to a policy of appeasing autocratic rulers in the Muslim world.
On Monday, Egyptian voters were asked to cast their ballots in favor of constitutional amendments that will, along with other measures, end independent judicial oversight of elections, restrict the formation of political parties and give the government powers to arrest and spy on citizens without a court order.
The Egyptian government claimed 27 percent of voters turned out to cast their ballots, but human rights groups said the real turnout figure was 3 to 5 percent. There are also allegations of vote rigging and ballot stuffing. Opposition parties boycotted the vote.
SEE: Egypt's Democrats Feeling Betrayed (Chicago Tribune)
SEE ALSO: Egypt Judges Reject Referendum Results (AFP)
In a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, CAIR Board Chairman Parvez Ahmed wrote in part:
"We wish to express our deep concern about the Egyptian government's backsliding on promised democratic reforms and about our government's tepid response to Egypt's heavy-handed actions to further curtail human rights and political participation. Such actions are counterproductive to peace and stability in the region and are contrary to our stated policy objective of democratization in the Muslim world.
"The constitutional amendments offered in Monday's apparently fraudulent referendum would freeze Egypt's political system in an authoritarian and anti-democratic time warp. It would essentially lock out any meaningful political opposition and solidify one-party rule. The constitutional changes would also lock in so-called 'emergency laws' that have been used to violate the human rights of that nation's citizens.
"Despite these dire developments, your response has been to term this tremendous setback to world democratization as merely 'disappointing.'
"Because Egypt is one of the world's top recipients of American taxpayer dollars and the most populous nation in the Arab-speaking world, the implementation of true democratic reforms in that nation could set a positive example for the entire region. Unfortunately, the example set by Monday's 'referendum' is one of despotism and lack of respect for the will of the people.
"Blocking any parties from taking part in the political process is counterproductive and only serves to push people to the margins of society. We ask that you urge the Egyptian government to be open in dealing with political opposition groups. Inclusiveness in any democratic political system is a strength, not a weakness.
"I respectfully request that you communicate to the Egyptian government in no uncertain terms that the United States has not returned to 'business as usual' in dealing with undemocratic regimes. I also urge you to make U.S. aid to Egypt conditional on progress made toward meaningful democratization."
CAIR, America's largest Islamic civil liberties group, has 32 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.
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oops, the link thingies didn't come through, so here they are:
CAIR: http://www.cair.com/
chicago tribune article: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0703270505mar28,1,7295145.story?ctrack=1&cset=true
AFP article: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070327/wl_afp/egyptconstitution_070327115149
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i'll probably kick myself for getting involved in this, but had to share this, which i recieved today (take from it what you will):
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
Hi Anjum - thanks for this. And I hope you don't have to kick yourself :-)
The idea here is that it's a lively debate where everyone feels safe to contribute.
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James, I disagree that there is such a fundamental flaw in Islam, or that there is any significant difference with Christianity. I do agree that at present there are more Muslims that aspire to spread their religion violently but I believe that is caused by young men coming from conservative tribal backgrounds and feeling alienated by modernity. With a few lunatics like bin Laden thrown in.
The wahabists can count more than a few well-educated, modern young men in their ranks. Indeed, their recruiting methods concentrate in part on wooing young men in Western universities. They're a little like the old communist states in that respect, and perhaps others too.
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And while that dividing line might be somewhat gray, that honor killings, the cultural acceptance of wife beatings etc are over that line? This seems perfectly reasonable to me, or is that just neo Nazi neocon thinking?
And yet James I live in a country, 86% Muslim which has an almost negligible rate of domestic abuse. Indonesia, based on human rights NGO reports (if you read Indonesian I can forward you the link, but here is a Jakarta Post summary) had, last year some 22,000 reported cases of domestic violence. Now, there would be, in a nation such as this (and indeed most counties) a very heavy under reporting..so lets say 1 in 20 is reported, which is the UN rule of thumb (and bearing in mind that each village has a person whose job is to report such things to the Police). Then compare that to US figures (Indonesia has a population of about 230m, the US some 300 m) some of which are found here "Physical violence is estimated to occur in 4 to 6 million intimate relationships each year in the United States."
Which nation seems more accepting of violence against women
In the largely matriarchal Javanese and Sumatran societies violence against women is a major taboo. And indeed, on a day to day basis violence in general is less prevalent, both on an anecdotal and statistical level. Interpol figures (which I had but can't find again as their site is now behind a Police only firewall) show that you are some 230 times more likely to be assaulted, even allowing for underreporting, in the US, than in Muslim Indonesia. We have no road rage (which is a good thing on our roads) and the violence that does occur, especially the likes of the Bali bombs and terrible inter community fighting in Ambon tend to be aberrations and imported. The Bali bombers were turned in, in disgust, by local, (Muslim) communities.
I know I feel a damn sight safer walking the Muslim streets of Jakarta.as does my wife, than much of the Western Christian world
It's really the tribalism that's to blame for there being more trouble overall with Muslims than Christians, not the religion as such.
absolutely...hence the on/off simmering mess in Poso, so often referenced.
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It is a very popular view that the West's interference in the Middle East is the cause of the problems there today, but based on what I have read, this is not correct. The Middle East’s problems are mostly of its own making, but how those in the Middle East love to blame everyone else for their short comings. I mean to say, they blame Israel for just about every problem they have, which is just ridiculous.
Well I can't say I agree with your history.
But regardless of that, my point was that there are many Islamic countries and countries with lots of Islamic people which are sane, rational, peaceful, and good members of the international community. The key factor clearly isn't Islam, because there's a big set of Islamic countries which aren't exhibiting violent expansive behaviour. There's also non-Islamic countries exhibiting violent expansive behaviour.
Islam isn't the problem. The world isn't that simple.
Even the West Wing knows that - Isaac and Ishmael: http://dmca.free.fr/scripts/thewestwing/season3/thewestwing-300.txt
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And yet James I live in a country, 86% Muslim which has an almost negligible rate of domestic abuse. Indonesia, ...
And we mustn't forget that since Simon lives there, he must be absolutely correct, irrespective of anything you have heard to the contrary.
:)
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merc,
Owned.
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The wahabists are one thing, but it's the wasabists who really get up your nose.
OK, I'm sorry. Couldn't help it.
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Juha,
please let me be the first to groan very loudly :)
Neil,
Troops in Saudi were necessary for protecting oil supplies not the sanctions regime. Iran's border with Iraq is long and porous and their were no troops their. Yet sanctions we're effective enough.
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