After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism.
We, writers, journalists, intellectuals, call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all.
The recent events, which occurred after the publication of drawings of Muhammed in European newspapers, have revealed the necessity of the struggle for these universal values. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the ideological field. It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats.
Like all totalitarianisms, Islamism is nurtured by fears and frustrations. The hate preachers bet on these feelings in order to form battalions destined to impose a liberticidal and unegalitarian world. But we clearly and firmly state: nothing, not even despair, justifies the choice of obscurantism, totalitarianism and hatred. Islamism is a reactionary ideology which kills equality, freedom and secularism wherever it is present. Its success can only lead to a world of domination: man’s domination of woman, the Islamists’ domination of all the others. To counter this, we must assure universal rights to oppressed or discriminated people.
We reject « cultural relativism », which consists in accepting that men and women of Muslim culture should be deprived of the right to equality, freedom and secular values in the name of respect for cultures and traditions. We refuse to renounce our critical spirit out of fear of being accused of “Islamophobia”, an unfortunate concept which confuses criticism of Islam as a religion with stigmatisation of its believers.
We plead for the universality of freedom of expression, so that a critical spirit may be exercised on all continents, against all abuses and all dogmas.
We appeal to democrats and free spirits of all countries that our century should be one of Enlightenment, not of obscurantism.
[My emphases]
Universal classical western liberal values; a rejection of the cultural relativism that grows from strong multiculturalism and manifests itself in the kind of identity politics that allow groups to develop their own narratives and restrict critique only to those deemed “authentic”.
Yes, I’ve written about this a thousand times (most recently here). And yes, I’m thrilled to see others engaging in the same type of argument, which points out the structural problems within the Islamic worldview itself and recognizes the need to counter these structural deficiencies with memetics of western liberalism—namely, the promotion of “universal” individual rights as a counter to pernicious group-based collectivist politicking.
12 signatures
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Chahla Chafiq
Caroline Fourest
Bernard-Henri Lévy
Irshad Manji
Mehdi Mozaffari
Maryam Namazie
Taslima Nasreen
Salman Rushdie
Antoine Sfeir
Philippe Val
Ibn Warraq
Presentations:
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, from somilian origin, is member of Dutch parliement, member of the liberal party VVD. Writter of the film Submission which caused the assasination of Theo Van Gogh by an islamist in november 2004, she lives under police protection.
Chahla Chafiq
Chahla Chafiq, writer from iranian origin, exiled in France is a novelist and an essayist. She’s the author of “Le nouvel homme islamiste , la prison politique en Iran “ (2002). She also wrote novels such as “Chemins et brouillard” (2005).
Caroline Fourest
Essayist, editor in chief of Prochoix (a review who defend liberties against dogmatic and integrist ideologies), author of several reference books on « laicité » and fanatism : Tirs Croisés : la laïcité àl’épreuve des intégrismes juif, chrétien et musulman (with Fiammetta Venner), Frère Tariq : discours, stratégie et méthode de Tariq Ramadan, et la Tentation obscurantiste (Grasset, 2005). She receieved the National prize of laicité in 2005.
Bernard-Henri Lévy
French philosoph, born in Algeria, engaged against all the XXth century « ism » (Fascism, antisemitism, totalitarism, terrorism), he is the author of La Barbarie àvisage humain, L’Idéologie française, La Pureté dangereuse, and more recently American Vertigo.
Irshad Manji
Irshad Manji is a Fellow at Yale University and the internationally best-selling author of “The Trouble with Islam Today: A Muslim’s Call for Reform in Her Faith” (en francais: “Musulmane Mais Libre”). She speaks out for free expression based on the Koran itself. Née en Ouganda, elle a fui ce pays avec sa famille musulmane d’origine indienne àl’âge de quatre ans et vit maintenant au Canada, où ses émissions et ses livres connaissent un énorme succès.
Mehdi Mozaffari
Mehdi Mozaffari, professor from iranian origin and exiled in Denmark, is the author of several articles and books on islam and islamism such as : Authority in Islam: From Muhammad to Khomeini, Fatwa: Violence and Discourtesy and Glaobalization and Civilizations.
Maryam Namazie
Writer, TV International English producer; Director of the Worker-communist Party of Iran’s International Relations; and 2005 winner of the National Secular Society’s Secularist of the Year award.
Taslima Nasreen
Taslima Nasreen is born in Bangladesh. Doctor, her positions defending women and minorities brought her in trouble with a comittee of integrist called « Destroy Taslima » and to be persecuted as « apostate »
Salman Rushdie
Salman Rushdie is the author of nine novels, including Midnight’s Children, The Satanic Verses and, most recently, Shalimar the Clown. He has received many literary awards, including the Booker Prize, the Whitbread Prize for Best Novel, Germany’s Author of the Year Award, the European Union’s Aristeion Prize, the Budapest Grand Prize for Literature, the Premio Mantova, and the Austrian State Prize for European Literature. He is a Commandeur of the Ordre des Arts et Lettres, an Honorary Professor in the Humanities at M.I.T., and the president of PEN American Center. His books have been translated into over 40 languages.
Philippe Val
Director of publication of Charlie Hebdo (Leftwing french newspaper who have republished the cartoons on the prophet Muhammad by solidarity with the danish citizens targeted by islamists).
Ibn Warraq
Ibn Warraq , author notably of Why I am Not a Muslim ; Leaving Islam : Apostates Speak Out ; and The Origins of the Koran , is at present Research Fellow at a New York Institute conducting philological and historical research into the Origins of Islam and its Holy Book.
Antoine Sfeir
Born in Lebanon, christian, Antoine Sfeir choosed french nationality to live in an universalist and « laïc » (real secular) country. He is the director of Les cahiers de l’Orient and has published several reference books on islamism such as Les réseaux d’Allah (2001) et Liberté, égalité, Islam : la République face au communautarisme (2005).
****
h/t Tom Pechinski, via Agora.
this structural deficiencies indeed.
now that was all I had wanted to say—banning is so—unAmerican
To Jeff Goldstein,
Your blog is nothing more than any rare public speech from George W. Bush. If you don’t agree, you cannot attend.
[Then why are you here?]
Mac,
I have to ask. How do you feel about the maifesto that is the subject of the post?
I applaud the manifesto but is that the best they can do numbers wise? Liberals get more people to sign a full page ad in the New York Times to save the snail darter for God’s sake.
And if your enemy comes at you with a knife, do you simply wave a copy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in their face? I may sound cynical, but I am reluctantly coming to the conclusion that only a massive cataclysm – probably only a devastating war – will force Muslims to take a hard look at their beliefs and allow for a sea change in the internal dynamics of the religion.
Sadly, some similar kind of occurrence may have to occur for the inheritors of western liberal democratic values to wake up and defend themselves.
corvan,
Thanks for the response.
What I have to say here about the maifesto or any other topic is probably irrelevant because if it is contrary to Jeff’s view, or anti-Bush, it will be erased and I will not be able to defend myself.
That is my point.
Enjoy your day.
[Again. Then why are you here?]
Mac,
That’s a pretty transparent cop out.
Rick,
I hope you’re wrong. I fear you’re not. Still, there’s nothing to stop American leaders from signing on to the manifesto now. Maybe the movers and shakers in Academia, politics and the press will all hop on board. Sorry, for a second there I thought my name was Pollyanna.
Even if night shirts and plastic shoes take hold on the fashion minded upwardly mobile secular types, technology remains unprepared and ill-equipped to obfuscate the truth that the God of Isaac is NOT the God of Ishmael.
Silence is defying.
I thank God that someone as committed , articulate and prolific as Jeff Goldstein is speaking out.
Hmmm.
Congratulations! You’ve taken irrelevancy to a whole new height.
And I triple dog dare you to comment on the subject at hand with verve, accuracy, relevancy, knowledge and wit.
Frankly it takes something fairly excessive to get banned here. As an example I’m still commenting here and I frankly think I would have banned me a long time ago for being entirely too low-brow.
Hmmm.
In a way it’s strange the the manifesto is essentially against the infantilism of the Islamic world. Perhaps it’s because much of what underpins the militant and oppressive behavior is a dressed up version of “because I said so!”.
Since the issues cannot long survive introspection, considered thought and questioning, all such activities are inherently proscribed. Which means to be free of such proscriptions the individual must choose to be a heretic.
I’ll sign, but I don’t think they’re looking for my signature. Just to let you know that I’m on board.
…and to Rick Moran (now that I have a minute before I am banned from this site once again)…
<blockquote>… reluctantly coming to the conclusion that only a massive cataclysm – probably only a devastating war – will force Muslims to take a hard look at their beliefs and allow for a sea change in the internal dynamics of the religion.<blockquote>
Yes, I guess your right. Take the Iraq war, for example. Who in their right mind would “probably only” categorize this war as “devastating.” Snail darters? No, not nearly enough killed for that. Well, maybe only the liberal ones might call it “devastating.”
Really Mac, how do you feel about the manifesto? Have the courage to answer this time.
ed,
Oh no, it does not take take something fairly excessive to get banned here. I am an example. All it takes is to write something anti-Bush.
Look to my posts under citizenme and then tell me what I wrote was excessive.
If you don’t believe me then try an experiment under another name.
Are you comfortable with that? Or do you just want to preach to the choir?
[Would you please stop your fucking whining? Maybe that’s why I banned you, who knows? You irritate me. And this thread illustrates why. Had I not banned you before I certainly would have now. As I say, life is too short to listen to idiots like you who feel they are entitled to take up my real estate. You aren’t. Later.]
I like it. Like this one better though. http://drsanity.blogspot.com/
TW- It was DESIGNED after a muslim protesters sign with a few changes.
Certainly the number of signatures are low, but it is who signed it. Remember, it was only one signature on a letter to President Roosevelt from Einstein (granted he didn’t write it, but they needed his clout) that started the Manhatten Project. The point is, if it takes pieces of paper to instill greater understanding in the minds of isolationist liberals what the free world believes, then I am all for it.
Finally, the differntiation and implicit point that we are dealing with a form of fascism is pointed out. It is not, nor has it been, a fight against a religion, but with those who would twist it and use it as a weapon. Simple argument and often said I know, but it has tended to be forgotten more so.
TW: It’s time to face the consequence/ For delivering the proof/ In the policy of truth
Okay corvan, I’ll respond to the manifesto.
I support it. The key words here are “This struggle will not be won by arms”.
The same could be said for the so-called war on terror.
I feel that nothing will be solved until we get to the core reason why “they” hate us.
The Bush neocon policy of “kill them all” will never work because the more you kill the more you create.
The majority of “them” feel oppressed by the western world.
The solution lies in getting to the reasons they feel this way.
If that’s too radical “liberal” for you, then say so. But I feel it’s the only way.
[NOW do you understand why I banned this simpleton? He was adding nothing at all to the discourse. Questions that he pretends haven’t been answered posed in a pseudo-serious way. Who needs it? Asked and answered. NEXT!]
Mac, scroll down to Mondays post titled “Lynching Buckley”, and read through the comments there. I think you will see that Jeff allows alot of discent and Bush-bashing.
Right now it just seems your spoiling for a fight, and baiting.
If you are really sincerly wanting to participate, just do it, if you’re just looking to push til you get banned, do us all a favour and just blow.
OK mac, what if the answer is your not muslim, and unless you submit to shaira law we will continue to hate you and try to kill you. What next?
lee,
Yes, you’re right, I “was” baiting but only because I “do” wish to participate and do not wish to be banned from here again.
But it is true that I wrote a few times and “was” banned. And it pissed me off because nothing of what I wrote was other than my honest views on a topic, however, these views were contrary to what Jeff’s were.
Then, as now, I’m eager to state my opinion, and argue it with anyone here.
It’s swell that these left-leaning intellectuals have taken a universalist/non relativist stand on human rights.
But the REAL issue is: what are they willing to do about it?!
Are they willing to support a proactive, bold, aggressive counter-attack – including preemptive military strikes?
Will they support an end to immigration without assimiliation? Will they support deportation? Will they demand that nations which don’t allow its citizens the four freedoms to be demoted to “observer status” at the UN?
Or do they just want to sign petitions and send strongly worded letters?
I suspect it’s the latter, and we don’t need them for that – we already got Blix and Baradei and Kofi for that!
I think there’s something key in macmets last post, something that will help us understand each other:
macmets, when you say “them” and “they” (such as why they hate us and [they] feel oppressed), can you quantify that? It’s not a trap; I’m curious.
GWB insists that it’s a small group of radicals. If you agree, then small minorities who hate us and feel oppressed–within a large peaceful group–should be indulged how? Should we be wary of attempting to change the “core reasons of why they hate us/feel oppressed?” Could we not alienate the majority by appeasing the minority? I don’t think we angered all those purple fingered Iraqis, but I don’t think we won the hearts and minds of the minority who hate us either. Do you have a better way?
In short, how far should we indulge this minority, from democracy to cartoons?
If ‘they’ (and rereading your post, don’t think you mean a small minority of malcontents) means vast swaths of the world–which is the only way the Left remains relevant in its ‘understanding’ meme…I mean, why bother otherwise?–then I’d say your version of who and what we are at war with is more right-wing than the neocons’ version.
swoon
macmets, I don’t like pulling this card, but how old are you?
Okay, by the way, I ask how old you are because this is a childish and juvenile characterization of the war strategy. Maybe the whole “democratize Iraq” deal is slipping by you. If the EEEEVIL neocon policy was REALLY “kill ‘em all”, then we’d have left Iraq for Iran and gone on a Middle Eastern-wide tour by now.
*Sigh*
Do you even know what neocon MEANS?!
“Jew”?
You forgot the “and let God sort them out” corollary. That thar’s red meat for us simple, rabid Bu$Hitler KKKultists.
Thanks for stopping by and stating your complex opinion on foreign policy matters.
Man. Why doesn’t Ayaan Hirsi Ali get nominated for a Nobel peace prize?
How do we make this happen?
Judging by how it is used, it means “stupid and evil”
THANX 4 TEH REASONED DISCOURSE MAC!!!!
Apparently the idea of simple decency eludes macmets. We are asking that Islamists respect our values. But Islamist values and Western values are in conflict. How is that conflict to be resolved?
Not by resorting to rants about Western sins or neocon malfeasance. That will not resolve the problem…Macmets they will kill you for a variety of reasons…whether you are a neocon is not one of them. You can’t appease your way out of their cross-hairs. But if you think its possible, lets hear it. Stop whining that Jeff might not like what you say.
So you were baiting to get banned, so you could participate?
A sterling example of your logic.
Well, if we “killed them all”, by definition there wouldn’t be any more to “create”.
Looking at the population of Iraq and Afghanistan, and comparing that to how many have been killed, we aren’t very good at this “killing them all” stuff. Maybe we need more practice.
You see, our restraint is one of the things that work against us. We are so loathe to incur casualties that we leave many who fade into the general public alone instead of “killing them all”.
Kill them all will not work. But Western resolve will. That will have to include the secular left, but in a sense the left is also an enemy of the West. So I expect that a wholesale change in attitudes on their part will be necessary. Macmets and his kind are as big a problem as the Islamists.
I feel that nothing will be solved until we get to the core reason why “they†hate us. The majority of “them†feel oppressed by the western world. The solution lies in getting to the reasons they feel this way.
Well, out with it macmet. Please set forth the specific actions you would have the United States take to make “them” agree not to attack us.
Because we won’t submit.
If you’d fucking pay attention to what they say, you’d be aware of that.
Obfuscation as performance art. I love it.
And if the answer comes back “because you are a Jew/Black/Woman/Gay/etc.” Then what?
It continues to amaze that people can know so much about the ideals which we hold dear in the west, but have no idea how these ideals came to be secured. For the dense, it was the appropriate use of violence.
Robert – if people such as macmeet would pay attention to what the Islamist enemy says and give that enemy sufficient respect to take it at its word, they would suffer severe cognitive dissonance. All of the usual reasons they give for all of the trouble in the world – Its All America’s Fault! – would be found to be inapplicable as the enemy’s reasons have very little to do with us and everything to do with its own desires for power over others.
No, it is much easier to blame America, Bush, neocons, capitalism, colonialism, imperialism, Halliburton, Jews, whatever than to actually treat the Islamists as real people with real agendas of their own that they are attempting to put in place, rather than the predesignated categories macmeet’s ideology assigns them.
while I do not disagree that they could do more (both in the sense of propose more specific solutions for this conflict and find something more weighted than words to support the democratic side of the struggle), I don’t think the above is something to sneeze at.
Part of the great weakness in the “Western” position (as Jeff continually points out) is that the philosophic underpinnings of western rationality have been enervated by bad philosophy- at some point western liberalism forgot all the Nietzsche it read and embraced the nihilism we had been trying to avoid. There is actual work to be done to remind people that “Western values” are not simply contingent values- and manifestos like this help compose that needed stance.
The important task of this manifesto, I believe, is to bring the stories of, say, Ayaan Hirsi Ali to more people. To confront those who say “they don’t want freedom” with a story of one that does then and spends their days wondering if they are going to be murdered in the streets by a fanatic. To emphasize a point Andrew Sullivan was making last week, why are there no movies being made about the suffering of women in the ME?
And regarding the number of signatures- Ayaan Hirsi Ali is worth 6 Cindy Shehans and 10 Michael Moores.
That’s low-balling their value, IMHO.
The problem with macs assertions is Bush has never said “kill them all”. Obviously, you’ve completely missed the point of building a democracy in Iraq- we can’t democratize the whole world on our own- what our lives and treasure HAVE been invested in is showing the muslim world the following :
A. Muslim lives will be better under a capitalist non-tribal focused society (ie their own lives will be further enriched materially- the true enemy of the middle east is poverty).
B. Western values can exist alongside Islam-if Islam says western values, which embrace the freedom to believe what you want, is incompatible with Islam, then the problem is Islam, not the west
C. The West can be a partner for growth and change in the middle east.
D. The West has no interest in converting Muslims to Christianity
E. That the West will hunt down and kill every terrorist it can find and will harm the countries that harbor these terrorists. The middle east respects strength more so then anything else- its why our 5th column press is doing such a disservice when it shows us as caving to pressures from Islam about something as silly as cartoons
Macs, just FYI, you are the first banning I’ve ever seen and considering actus’s general demeanor on this board, it is likely you did something fairly aggregious to be banned when actus continues to post.
Cindy Sheehan and Mike Moore have NEGATIVE value. Any numerically-positive combination of those two will, by default, be less than zero.
But, your point is taken.
Dittos to Matt, Esq and Some Guy.
Not to state the obvious, but the macmets of the planet won’t admit this reasoning. It’s kinda like facing the fact we’ll deal with psychopaths getting nukes from now until the very extinction of the race.
Leftists simply lack the courage to face this reality. Capitulation is the thin intellectual veneer that prevents them facing this fire. Condescention and word games are necessary to keep up these appearances and sanctimony. Plain speech is the first casulty of this policy, and asking these goobers to explain themselves feeds their egos.
Basically, leftism of this kind is, as we all know, a disorder. Accountability and reason go away in favor of fear, denial, and revisionism. With so much invested, there’s little to no hope of conversion back to logic.
Yes, this is simple stuff. Should be easy to take dismantle and refute if it’s false. Meanwhile, I think it’s just self evident.
Of course Bush never said “Kill them all,” though that’s what his base would like to believe he stands for. But Bush stands strictly for money and business. That is why he is still tight with the Saudis (15 of 19, etc.), can sell our port security to a state that recognized the Taliban, boycotts Israel, etc., and wants to sell off our public lands to the highest bidder. Bush is a corporatist. Always has been. He truly doesn’t care about the poor or working/middle class, he literally fiddled while New Orleans drowned, and he has no qualms about ordering the torture prisoners, in direct contradiction to our “western liberal ideals” and the Geneva Conventions. Clearly, Bush does not give a shit about the America most of us live in (re: jobs [“You work three jobs? Uniquely American, isn’t it? That’s fantastic”], deficits, civil liberties, clean air and water, open spaces, veteran’s health), but has made people think that American corporations = America, and that is his genius. But in no case should his be the face of the secular-humanist revolution, because it isn’t. Abu Ghraib took care of that. However, if you’re a corporation seeking a tax break or a sweetheart deal, or else a frightened American who needs to hear his “bring it on” rhetoric, then he’s your man.
you forgot to spell Bu$h with the $. Otherwise, you’ll never get a HuffPo blog.
Uh, I get the rest of your screed, it is pretty standard cut and past from DU or Kos, but what, exactly, does that first sentence actually mean?
Tragg
The Democrats are in the pocket of big business just as much as the Republicans. Stop deluding yourself.
Tragg,
Be honest and say what you really mean. “Bush is the biggest obstacle to turning this ridiculous Jeffersonian Democracy in to a proper Totalitarian Socialist State, and we hate him for it and will not rest until we have removed that obstacle.”
Of course we know what “neocon” means.
JEWS!
JOOOOOOOOOOOOS!
Dammit, Jeff, are you being a Bush Whore again? I thought Karl told you to tone it down at the last meeting.
Tragg…care to give us your thoughts on how we might deal with the conflict between Islamist and Western values? Sounds like you want to shit-can our whole deal but maybe I am misunderstanding you…do you really think substituting for example Hillary as CIC, a former coporate director for Wal-Mart, will fundamentally alter the reality of the conflict?
Hmmm.
@ Jeff
Ok I’ve got to say it. What we need are to Global War on Terror collectable trading cards!
I’ll trade you three Cindy Sheehans for a Billy Jack but not for a Ward Churchill.
How about it Jeff? Sounds goofy but interesting.
Tragg, a hint:
Paragraph breaks, bro. When you have so much useful content to offer, help the neocons out. Readability is key to enlightenment.
Oh, well, forget I said that.
Multiculturism. Cultural relativism.
Just scare words tending to mask nativist and anti-immigration politics.
In any event, I thought all that kulturkamph nonsense had disappeared along with the political fortunes of Pat Buchanan.
Multiculturism tends to foster tolerance. As does a belief in cultural relativism. What’s not to like?
But of course tolerance is something the Buchanites can’t understand.
Hmmm.
Wow. Pretty close to every single goofy liberal meme all in one ultra-linear paragraph.
I’m really curious to see what happens in January of 2009 and whether or not the Democrats continue with their strange BDS nonsense. Frankly I really don’t get the level of hate that Bush seems to generate.
Tolerance is great until the drunk across the street who you have tolerated for years decides not to tolerate you and blows you away with his shotgun.
True story.
Apparently nor can the Islamists. And their intolerance takes the form of rioting & burning effigies in the streets, and sometimes hijacking planes full of people and flying them into buildings. Whose intolerance do you think is a bigger problem?
Ha! Great punchline, except we do not live in a multicultural society, not even in New York or Detroit or LA or Miami. We live in a controlled society.
Real multiculturalism is Kosovo, and Baghdad, and Mogadishu, and Kashmir. That’s where you have the pogroms and the genocides and the clash of civilizations.
What you call multiculturalism is nothing of the sort. Thank God for the ineptness of liberals.
McCarthy = bad, J.Edgar Hoover = very bad (and gay, but still bad), Nixon = superultradocious bad,
Yeah, I think the Left can hold a grudge
No, it really doesn’t. Assimilation does.
Cultural relativism is moronic. The idea that societies are inherently equal is just plain wrong. Some cultures have proven themselves better, and some have struggled to make themselves better.
“You’ll be moved” he mumbled to himself, shuffling away from the singing protesters. “When the tear gas starts popping and the bulls move in with clubs swinging, you’ll be moved all right.”
…
Oh, sorry. I thought it was “Non-sequitor” day.
My bad.
If anything it looks like those places are trying to be unicultural, not multi. I’d say we in the US are more multi than europe.
Missing.The.Point.
The left wing’s punching bags through the years have been legion. One could include Reagan in there, as well–indeed the sneering descriptions of him were similar to those used on Bush (“cowboy”, “stupid”, “going to blow up the world”, “greatest terrorist in the world”, etc.)
What is it about a real TOUGH GUY approach to combatting evil that drives these loonie lefties over the edge?
Willful or simply unequipped? Discuss.
Meanwhile our man on the ground in Iraq has more:
It confronts them with their fears: That life is not guaranteed.
Yes. I wonder if the PERSON-WHO-SHALL-NEVER-BE-NAMED has actually ever seen another culture or if he speaks a foreign tongue. Most multicultis think culture is le theatre and wine, enjoy the delicious frivolities of the natives, Ha Ha Ha, I’m from Irvine, Ha Ha Ha, so they tend to miss, you know, things like actual culture and civilization.
But whatever, I *heart* multi-culti—it makes me so tolerant and accepting of brown folk, without actually having to learn anything at all about the poor savages.
Hmmm.
Logically multi-culturalism is a non-starter.
The idea that multiple highly divergent cultures could coexist within a single geographical point is frankly absurd. Without established points of commonality between these cultures there could be no possible means for members of one culture to interface with members of another culture. And it cannot be argued that such cultures come with such points of commonality as cultures are generated in relative isolation and self-preminence. So any such points of commonality must be derived from changing or modifying the cultures, which results not in the preservation of those original cultures but the creation of hybridized cultures.
In effect what multi-culturalism seeks to do is cause individual cultures to conform to a single established standard that creates a meta-culture structure within which separate cultures interoperate. But in doing so the individual manifestations of each culture must be subsumed within the structure of the meta-culture so they can hardly be called separate any longer.
Curious.
So what happens if one culture refuses to adjust to the meta-culture and does not incorporate the points of commonality? Inevitably there will be increasing levels of friction which should result in struggle for supremacy between the existing meta-culture and the rebellious culture with one or the other succeeding. If the meta-culture wins then the rebellious culture will adapt and incorporate the existent points of commonality. If the rebellious culture wins then the meta-culture is overthrown and replaced with a whole new set of points of commonality to augment or replace the existing set as the new meta-culture dictates.
Interesting. I wonder if anybody could make a computer game out of this.
BTW, can we vote parliamentary style that anyone who has been banned from this blog, who now bitches about said banning ON this blog, shall be banned again, a ban that notwithstanding the grave sanction of such first banning, which is binding for ever and all eternity, or until such time as the exiled party can retype his email address in above-aforementioned field.
I hereby second, eh, myself. And vote Aye.
Does anyone else see the deep seated anger against all things related to “individual initiative is the sworn enemy of collectivism” in this deliberate mis-interpetation….
– or is it just me….
TW: “The hotel Liberal – You can check out, you just can’t figure out where the exit is”
And understanding them—their bloody rituals, their sawing other’s heads off—well, understanding them, that will change their behavior. Not that we don’t deserve it or anything.
No, really; it will. They’ll change.
No, I mean it.
Listen here, I know it will. I bet your life on it (I’m in Irvine, I hate you in Iraq. Imperialist!)
For fuck’s sake, listen!
Fucking Haliburton!
IT’S ALL BECAUSE OF BUSHCO!
Well said, ed. I wanted to write something on my blog to that effect, but what you wrote was about eight million times better written. It didn’t have any reference to the Cobra Kai or Daniel Larusso, but it was still better than the drivel I churn out.
6Gun – I blame it all on the results of several generations of “Mommyism”…. seeing the world from the comfort of that warm soft bossum, when the answers to all the worlds problems are just a squeeze and a nipple away….
Nope; it’s evident:
Hard, unforgiving, intolerant world > denial > reaction > protectionism > dependency > helplessness > lashing out against what can be changed (local reason) not what cannot (global intolerance) > denial of a hard, unforgiving, and intolerant world.
– In fact I’d love to see Jeff do a piece on “The Modernist Fem cultism – The deballing of the male Liberal mind”…..
Well, people are basically good—or was it God—so…
…so if people are basically good, something must force them into being bad, the po’ whittle victims of a cruel, cruel world. Bingo, everybody’s equal except for the evil, racist empire of evil imperial cracker males.
QED. Go and spread the wisdom, kids, I send you out as wolves amidst the goat-herd…or something.
Multiculturalism: Imaginary bogey held up by nativists and real-world force for good! It’s a potent combination.
The rage expressed by the moonbats on the recent Buckley threads at PW confirms this. Bush is not (to them anyway) the coddler they expect life should deliver them. And he has the gall to enact a foreign policy that makes them confront reality—in the news, in the body counts, in the reports of savage behavior.
They actually expect that the federal govt has one legitimate function, which is to nanny domestic life at literally all levels, thereby insulating them from the harshness of the world: Medicine, family law, social security, economic welfare, jobs, ethics, acceptable speech and “hate” crime legislation, abortion, and life itself.
When it’s going to get interesting—when the cold, stiff shock is going to set in, much as it did for not more than six weeks following 9/11 (remember NPR’s abrupt 180-degree rhetorical shift during that period?)—is when a major event occurs, which it will.
A large portion of the world wants to take it all to the edge. Reality will sober the leftists then and only then. But, assuming they/we survive it, that shock will last only as long as it takes them to recover from it and go right back to their denial.
tw: Arms. A sad, unavoidable fact of life.
I send you out as candy-stripers at the octogenarian porn-star convention?
Hmmm, I send thee out as rebels amidst the Death Star?
Hmmm, I send thee out as Rastafarians amidst the squares, man.
Hmmm, what was it again? It’s right there at the tip of my tongue…
Indeed. Domestic nannyism is just that. And legislated cultural castration is just another form of capitulating to what’s mistakenly seen as tolerance.
Gender feminism (militant, radical, sexist feminism) is the domestic version of terrorism: We’ll rant and rage and then when you give us what we want—when you capitulate—we’ll rant and rage until you do it again.
Verc – How about: “I send yee out as nipple clingers of truth, amongst the bra strap snappers of the world….”
Hey, that’s entirely to close to my own self-image. It’s patented, man, back off.
Its hard to communicate that you’re a tough guy over the internets.
Waw waw
– Apparently our resident “poltergiest of confusion”, monsuer’ actus, is unaquainted with FULL FRONTAL 8” CUT DICKIE WAGGING – PROPELLER ON.
– Tends to explain a lot – yes it does…..
TW: Size only counts if you actually possess one…..
For some it’s hard to communicate a coherent thought over the internets.
TW: small. I ain’t touching that one (literally or figuratively).
Yesterday’s troll, tristero, has a long entry(back in 9/05) at his leeetle blog where he implores Michael Totten not to make his planned trip to Beirut. Apparently he was quite jealous that Totten, despite being a chicken hawk neocon, had more balls than he did. He even pronounced even odds that Totten would be murdered. Last I heard Totten is still alive in Iraq.
Given the lefties haven’t offered much requiring drawn out refutations, it’s time for a comment drive-by:
Cartoons?
But Bush stands strictly for money and business.
Actually, if you’re looking for root causes, Islam is extremely apathetic towards laissez-faire capitalism, and with good reason. Capitalism has a wonderfully corrupting influence on closed and overly moral societies. Liberals take all the credit for promoting secularism and free expression, but it’s easy when millions will pay $49.99 for a copy of Deep Throat.
He truly doesn’t care about the poor or working/middle class, he literally fiddled while New Orleans drowned
No, he literally played guitar. Please stop abusing that word, people. But if you care so much about he poor, please do offer a Katrina evacuee your apartment or dorm room, chickendove. Oh, and make sure the cable is paid up.
Multiculturism tends to foster tolerance.
As does a belief in cultural relativism.
Perhaps so, but both are horribly false premises. Cultural relativism seeks to replace the concept of universal truth, but in reality only dodges the question. To say that “what is right is defined by my culture” still leaves the question of how your culture defines what is right. In effect, you’re confusing acceptence with righteousness. Put another way, if the majority of Americans support, say, slavery, are you wrong in opposing it? Fortunately, people more arrogant and imperious decided this question without your counsel.
Now, admittedly, multiculturalism does often lead to tolerance (though this is often one-way, Easterners taken advantage of the tolerance of Western multi-culturalism). But to support the good that comes from multi-culturalism based upon the fallacy of cultural relativism is to deny yourself the benefit of the truth. And why would w e do this if there is a doctrine of universal truth and inalienable individual rights already prevolent in Western philosophy that achieves the exact same goal of tolerance without having to sacrifice the liberties of the majority?
Chair man – One needs to sacrifice the liberties of the majority in order to provide suckle to the whims of the collective….
I move to petition Messr Jeff Goldstein to put a classified ad on the Daily Kos or some such, ahem, Mecca of Left-leaning “learning”, for the purpose of enhancing his subpar trolling roster. Until then, I volunteer to criticise the infantile Bush-league posters here on this dread BLOG-OF-WAR [Mongering Chicken Hawks].
Oh, btw, did anyone catch Law and Order last night? It was a beaut…some woman getting fired from her office, because she smoked (the employer warned her and then fired her when she did not quit, vice you know, say dropping her from medical coverage). The defense was that “there exists a constitutional right” to privacy, so the employer could not fire her (vice, say, dropping her from the medical plan…sigh, idiots).
They actually used the words, “Scalia and his ilk” ‘are not trying this case.’ Muhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah. Ha. Ha.
Ha.Sigh. Ha ha tee hee.
Spock said that first and then he rose from his Fiberglas casket and flew on those rocket sneakers.
Fantasy – Liberal Screen writers….
Well yeh….that works
It would be interesting if a proponent of multi-culti would point to a working example of it, but then that would require thinking rather than repeating what others have thought.
I’m not too much of a multi-culti, but i think the US is a good example. Much more so than europe.
Another brave person…
VIDEO:
This WOMAN is standing up alone on TV.
I admire her guts!!
Its a MUST SEE video!!
Watch nr 1050:
http://www.memritv.org/Search.asp?ACT=S6#
– Arab-American Psychologist Wafa Sultan: There Is No Clash of Civilizations but a Clash between the Mentality of
the Middle Ages and That of the 21st Century
MC
http://ghomepages.googlepages.com/muhammedandcartoons
It damn sure is.
Ms. Wafa might claim to be secular but back home we call that Testifyin’!^^
Hehehe. Well-played, Atilla Girl.
*Commences shameless flirting.*
Perhaps, but only if you count the existance of chinatown in most of our cities as an example of multi-culti. Otherwise, I think most people work to assimilate.
Like the borg, we take the best of all cultures and make it part of the whole.
But assimilate into what? Here we have muslim-americans. In france? No. there is french and there is muslim. Not very multi. Rather two different cultures. Thats not how I understand multiculturalism.
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