Agora emails:
The brave people who signed the Manifesto against Totalitarianism have just had their first serious death threat. Links to the manifesto and a petition to support the manifesto are in the main article.
What follows are some excerpts from Agora’s translation of the original Jyllands-Posten article by Jørgen Ullerup. From “Death Threat against signers of Manifesto”:
According to one of the signers, the French writer Caroline Fourest, the threat was made this Saturday on the website ummah.net. It mentions a who’s who guide and a list of targets scheduled for termination.
The group urges its adherents to take their time but says it should happen soon. It adds that it isn’t necessary to first have a Fatwa from a religious leader, such as the one Ayatollah Khomeini issued in 1989 against Salman Rushdie’s life for having offended the religion.
“The threat is simply not acceptable. Our Manifesto urges to resistance by means of ideas. But the Islamists have answered with threats of violence. A proof – if such was necessary – of their rejection of democratic debate and of their totalitarianism,†Caroline Fourest says.
Unfortunately, resistance by means of “ideas” only matters when the ideas are considered materially different than the actions that both justify and animate them. To radical Islamists, the “book” they use to guide them is the divine tongue of Allah, and isn’t any less so for not occassionally licking its lips or trying to lick a bit of lipstick off one of its front teeth.
—This idea, incidentally, has been the subject of two long posts — which have in themselves prompted very interesting discussions—on whether or not Germany’s proposed Koran indictment carries any intellectual and strategic legitimacy. That is, can we view the proposed German legislation as an act against a portable, seditious, and violent collections of divine law (given physical form on paper, but less of a “text” than a paper conduit for the word of Allah himself) that are assertively anti-constitutional? Or must we view the Koran, as it is currently being used by the representative voices of Islam, as a religious text protected by the free speech, even as it is being used as political text that bases its political demands on what it considers divine mandate (and so is above the laws of those men and nations who do not adhere to its precepts).
Turkey has taken steps to secularize its law from Koranic law, to workable effect; similarly, one of the important steps taken by the allies after the defeat of Japan in WWII was to destroy the Emperor worship inherent in the ultranationalist brand of state Shinto that had taken over the as the ideological face of Shinto—clearing the ground for liberal democratic ideas (and allowing religion to separate back out from government, whether as jinja shinto, buddhism, etc).
So there are clearly precedents in recent history (might De-Nazification not offer an analogue, as well?) for suppressing political ideology—including political ideology tied to religion. The offer from the “state” being that the practice of religion is fine so long as it is able to coexist within the laws of the social contract. In the case of the US, our Constitution prevents even any hypothetical popular acceptance of, say, Sharia law, from taking hold; but there are countries whose “constitutions” don’t have the kinds of civil rights protections that we have.
And with German birthrates at their lowest since 1945 (h/t Allah)—and their large immigrant population—we might begin seeing the resurgence of a “soft” German nationalism, beginning with the proposed legislation to pushback against those living in the country who claim only to answer to Koranic law.
Incidentally, these kinds of ideas are becoming more frequent—from the British press to expel those Imams who preach against the country, to the French push to remove the trappings (burkas, etc) of religious identity in favor of promoting a French nationalism (though unfortunately, the French disdain for their immigrant population has hindered assimilation—the saving grace of the US, though we have gotten much worse at assimilating our own immigrant populations since we, too, embraced the pernicious form of multiculturalism that uses as its structural metaphor the quilt rather than the melting pot).
But back to these death threats against signatories of the anti-totalitarian manifesto—whose advocates this time can’t even be bothered to wait for official religious “permission” to slaughter those who “dissent” from the current face of Islamic teaching. Here is the thread at ummah.net where the threat appears (via LGF, who posted this Saturday, along with the text of the direct threat):
Abu Hurairah
The Father of a Kitten
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Catistan
Religion: Dean’ul Islaam
Posts: 2,635
Points: 4695
Rep Power: 49
Excellent- makes killing the kuffar all that bit easier…..
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mary Carol
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
Jezak’illah Ukthi, now we have drawn out a hit list of a ‘Who’s Who’ guide to slam into. Take you time but make sure their gone soon- oh and don’t hold out for a fatwah it isn’t really required here.
Has anyone got that Christian kaffir ‘Ibn Warraq’s’ real name yet?
Agora also translates another piece published in today’s edition of Jyllands-Posten, written by Poul Højlund of Pia Causa, which Agora characterizes as “good, conservative reasoning about this thing called Islam.” An excerpt from “Democracy Before Religion”:
[…] Apparently a lot of people in high places in our Democracy have a hard time understanding the simple fact that Islam as traditionally interpreted is not compatible with Democracy. In a reversal of priorities, they are defending Islam’s Freedom of Oppression by referring to the Freedom of Religion. Some even manage to bring the immigration debate into play: distancing oneself from the lack of Freedom in Islam is the same as discrimination or even racism.
Why is diminished Freedom acceptable when Religion is involved? Did not the Boers of South Africa call apartheid part of their faith? The Ku Klux Klan maintain their right to lynch black people as part of their faith – are they suddenly sacrosanct? No. None can be allowed to justify violations of Human Rights by invoking ‘Religious Beliefs’.
Only when it comes to Islam do some get all respectful and considerate of the intolerable. Where are the wrathful demonstrations against the massive oppression of free thought in the Moslem world? Against the grotesque oppression of women? Against the ongoing human rights violations? The standards by which we judge the Islamic world are obviously lower than the standards we apply to the rest of the world. To me, this seems like some kind of reverse racism, a twisted version of Kipling’s old say about ‘The White Man’s Burden‘.
I disagree with Højlund’s premise—after all, Islam and democracy co-exist here in the US and in other western liberal nations—but the breakdown of assimilation (and the primacy of pluralism) in favor of a balkanizing multiculturalism and competing identity politics is making it more difficult to push back against the extremists in any identity group, who, should they indeed manage to seize control of the group narrative, become those who “negotiate” on behalf of the group. And the underlying logic of cultural relativism that allowed a multiculturalist social order to take root in the first place is often unable (or intellectually unwilling) to marshal a case against the specific “authentic” demands of the Other. It is in this specific context that Højlund is correct: fundamentalist theocratic Islamism is incompatible with westernized liberal democracy, insofar as it disallows pluralism and provides no protection for individuals who don’t adhere to strict Islamic law.
So again I say: the fight begins at home. Until we re-embrace western liberalism, whose protections are both necessarilly and importantly extended to the individual, we will be hamstrung by the collectivism of identity politics, which allows for such ideological hijackings as we are now witnessing with radical Islam.
*****
related: Danes won’t prosecute Jyllands-Posten (h/t Allah, who notes a disappointing qualification in the decision:
“My decision is that there is no violation of the said rules of the Danish Criminal Code,” Fode said in a statement.
But Fode’s ruling also noted there was “no free and unrestricted right to express opinions about religious subjects” in Denmark. He said Jyllands-Posten had thus been wrong in writing that religious groups had to be ready to put up with “scorn, mockery and ridicule.”One of the cartoons that depicted Muhammad wearing a turban shaped like a bomb “may with good reason be understood as an affront and insult to the Prophet, who is an ideal for believing Muslims,” Fode said.
“However, such a depiction is not an expression of mockery or ridicule, and hardly scorn within the meaning of” Danish law.
Western liberalism is officially moribund—at least in Europe. What will it take to save it, I wonder?)
****
update: See also, Dr. Sanity (h/t Terry Hastings) on Kant and the left (a discussion Ardsgaine has been having separately in the comments to some of my posts).
****
update 2 Brea Canyon has a related post about “a 7-year-old poet in New York who performed a poem called ‘White Nationalism Put U In Bondage,’ which she supposedly wrote herself.”
More here.
Great article. Really saying what needs to be said. When will America wake up?
Here is a complementary article on which countries view America positively, and why.
While I generally agree with you, I’ll point out that I am not permitted (by law) to buy liquor on Sunday where I live. Nor can I purchase beer before noon on Sunday. And frankly, sometimes I need some alcohol on Sunday mornings.
Is this some sort of islamist freeper?
– Josh,
I guess “totalitarianism†is in the eye of the beholder: one man’s evil dictator is another man’s muscularly secular leader.
Take Saddam Hussein for the sake of argument: the French, the Vatican and the Russians viewed him as a modernist/Westernized Arab head of state who protected women’s rights and enforced affirmative action programs in favor of Iraq’s tiny Catholic minority.
“Old Europe’s†foreign policy establishment viewed the Iraqi Baath party essentially as a strong bulwark against both Persian-Khomeinist fundamentalism and Saudi-Taleban terrorism.
The Israelis and Washington’s Neocons thought otherwise: now they have to deal with Hamas and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) which they have brought to power…
After having become the main recruiting agent for Osama Bin Laden in South Asia and the Middle-East, the Neocon clowns of Washington have succeeded in turning the former Iraqi president into an Arabian folk hero who’s not afraid of confronting America and the corrupt Kurdish judge in charge of overseeing the media circus that is his trial.
It was quite a spectacle earlier today to see Saddam take control of the courtroom, and roar in anger at the Pentagon-appointed judge: even though he spared no menace, Chief Justice Raouf Abdel-Rahman was unable to intimidate the aging lion of Baghdad. Saddam Hussein was raging with spirit and fight, willing to defend Iraq at all cost against the foreign occupiers who had come from afar to subjugate, torture and pillage in the name of “democracyâ€Â.
Never mind the rape rooms, gas attacks, mass graves, etc.
You really get a woody over the idea of Saddam the Lion of Baghdad, don’t you Viccy? You’re a sick, sick bastard.
Jeff
If we could convince some reasonable voices on the left of why multiculturism/identity politics is so very bad for the whole of us, then I think we would have a chance of reversing the current trend. Given that the kind of people we need to spread that message to those that listen to them view the right as the problem, it seems almost hopeless.
However, nothing is ever truly hopeless, so it must be tried. I cannot even begin to imagine how we could convince people like Kos about the dangers that confront us.
As to the posting the hit list, in a world that valued justice, this act would be considered a damn fine way to commit very public suicide.
Presumably if de la Vega had been writing in 1979 he would have come up with something like this:
TW: I feel confident in saying this because Victorino sure does love making excuses for mass murderers…
Yeah, some lion….from CNN’s story
“When reporters were allowed back in later, Hussein was not at all combative. He appeared to have a subdued demeanor and even raised his hand at one point when he wanted to speak.”
Somehow I think that the lion was tamed at least for today.
Even Ramsey Clark’s spin “Clark said Hussein argued comprehensively about the necessity and legality of what the government had to do during that violent period—wracked by its war with Iran, infiltration from Iran, treason and desertions.” …seems to imply that Saddam continues to admit to the killings but is attempting to claim that they were legal.
I’m wondering if the people who put together the Manifesto planned on this kind of reaction as a way to prove that what’s going on here is a totalitarian political movement as opposed to a cry for religious toleration. I mean, it’s seemed to play perfectly into their hands. We send out a Manifesto philosphically indicting the totalitarian ideals of the Islamofascist movement, they’ll reply to our ideaological affront with one of physical violence, and we’ll have all the proof we need that what we’re dealing with here is more akin to Nazism than it is to Islam.
Danes won’t prosecute Jyllands-Posten
Mighty white of ‘em.
Subtext: “But we could if we wanted to!”
SB: nation
MACMORRIS :
Of my nation! What ish my nation? Ish a villain,
and a bastard, and a knave, and a rascal. What ish
my nation? Who talks of my nation?
— Henry V, Act III
Never happen. Identity politics is the “perfect storm” of leftist ideology—Rousseau’s noble savage, Marx’s proletariat, anti-Western, and anti-individualist all at once. It gives the elites power by letting them carve out the niche they want to “speak” for without requiring them to actually accomplish anything, and gives them lots of hatreds and bigotry to manipulate people with.
But doesn’t it mess up the marxist view that economics/material relations of production determine everything?
I didn’t say they were pure Marxists, or that they hadn’t adapted the ideologies they’ve drawn from.
Rousseau’s noble savage, Marx’s proletariat, anti-Western, and anti-individualist all at onceâ€Â
???
Robert, frankly I wonder if you’ve ever read a single line of J.J. Rousseau for the man was a staunch believer in individualism!
Actus, you’re quite right…
In fact one could argue that multi-culturalism and the “folklore” of identity politics started on the right of the political spectrum in the late 18th/early 19th century (mainly in Germany e.g. Fichte and the United Kingdom e.g. Burke, Carlyle), precisely as a reaction against French enlightenment, “progressivism†and economic materialism (d’Alembert, Condorcet et al.)
Ironically, these (originally) “reactionary†ideas transmigrated progressively towards the (American) left in the US circa 1965
Well you don’t have to be ‘pure marxist’ but the idea that material relations explains everything is a basic element of marxism, not an obscure one for the purists. Like, believing in the resurrection is not for ‘pure’ christians, but all of them.
I think you’re confusing concern for the poor, the laborer, with marxism.
That was the ideology used to stir up a following then. Post-modernism has abstracted from the specifics of the ideology to the essentials of the method.
« Post-modernism has abstracted from the specifics of the ideology to the essentials of the method. »
Sounds like “Neocon†Trotskyite hogwash to me…
Are you some kind of disciple of Norm Podhoretz or Charles Krauthemmer?
In other words, one’s membership within a certain group determines the content of one’s consciousness…
But only some types of groups—and according to your individual material relations of production. That’s not identity politics.
So a black person’s consciousness is conditioned by their material relations, not their race relations.
Are you some kind of puffed up pseudo-intellectual who thinks that the art of refutation consists of copping a superior attitude and sneering at people?
TW: Cause, like, if you are, I can do it too.
You understand what abstracting means, right?
To make the point clearer, the post-modernists have adopted the Marxist/Hegelian idea that membership in a group determines* one’s point of view. That is the philosophical basis of identity politics. Hegel developed it as a theory, Marx developed it as both theory and method of political agitation.
*Determines materialistically. This is the point of departure between classical liberalism and modern liberalism, the latter’s denial of free will. According to the latter, a person’s circumstances are always determined by his position in society, his position in the class/race/gender matrix. No allowance is made for, and no expectations can be predicated on, individual initiative. Those on the bottom of the heap can only be raised up by confiscating resources from those on the top of the heap via the government and redistributing them.
So we tip the scales in their favor in an attempt to even things out. This is far from a perfect solution as it seems to create as many problems as it solves, and even more importantly, without some sort of solid end line laid out, it starts to be more and more of an entitlement and a reason to think ourselves different in ways that we were supposed to have rejected.
And that’s just one identity group, there are many more each willing to get theirs at the expense of others and what’s worse, every time they succeed we move one step farther away from equality of opportunity.
Yes. but you said ‘in other words.’ I’m sure someone can abstract the hell out of marx.
Didn’t that idea exist before? Catholics thought one way, heathens another?
And you’re confusing an identity group with an interest group. Those aren’t the same. Marx’s is more like the latter. I’d be surprised if htey didn’t predate him.
Or maybe all the single lines of Rousseau Robert has read are from the chapter on the office of the censor in The Social Contract, and so Robert knows that anyone characterizing Rousseau as anything but the grandfather of fascism is…in this case, let’s say “a preening fraud.”
This single line is my personal favorite:
Straight outta Voltaire, that.
This coming from the asshat that pines for the return of Saddam’s tyranny—not exactly the judgement I’d trust on whether it was raining out, let alone politics.
FOAD, choad.
actus,
Abu Hurayrah.
may i respectfully submit, the false Abu Hurayrah (the real one being long dead) that is issuing this so called fatwa, has no authority to issue a fatwa whatsoever, and is basically takfir, just some random internet punks talkin’ trash.
As unintellectual bigotry, maybe, but not as a (pseudo-)scientific philosophical doctrine.
No, the proletariat was not an “interest group”. The concept of interest groups belongs to democracy where otherwise disparate individuals combine to lobby for legislation favoring a shared interest. Marx did not see the proletariat that way, and if you know anything about Marxism, you know that. He scorned the kind of socialism that was only interested in promoting better conditions for the working class.
I’m roughly paraphrasing hegel’s metaphysics. Its been over a decade since I touched it.
So its an internet death threat? Looks like the muslim world is catching up.
I know. And I also don’t think marx thougth that way. But its closer to the way he thinks than identity politics.
Identity group politics is definately unmarxist. A Marxist would not think that a rich african american is as good as a poor one if you want the poor ones to be admitted to your elite schools with preferences. A marxist would certainly not argue for benefits and set asides to black owned busineses.
I would say that identity politics sits between interest groups and Marxism as an amalgam of the two. It has its philosophical basis in Marxist thought though.
Okay. But someone inspired by Marxism, someone who cut his ideological teeth on Marxist philosophy, might say that Marx was mostly right, but that we have to add race and gender into our understanding of the material factors which determine a person’s consciousness.
Yes, the Marxist purist believes that all other differences dissolve in the class struggle. That doesn’t negate the point that later students of Marxism, looking at the world from within one of those groups that was supposed to be made irrelevant by the class struggle, decided that their point of view as a member of that group would not be dissolved.
Let me try it this way. What Marx proposed can be described as group-subjectivism, the belief that the consciousness of individuals–their idea of reality–is determined by the material conditions of the group to which they belong. This is the same philosophical idea underlying identity politics. In that sense, the advocates of identity politics are in the Marxist tradition. Moreover, like Marx, the groups they exalt are those they identify as the oppressed, and their political activity is centered on redressing the grievances of those groups. For Marx, this meant a total reorganization of society resulting in the dictatorship of the proletariat. The advocates of identity politics would necessarily come into conflict if they advocated the domination of a single group, but they are united in their opposition to the group they see as the oppressor: rich white males. The rich white male is their bourgeoisie, the source of all evil in the world.
I guess so. You could also look at psychology, and say a person is treated a certain way because they’re black, and that makes their consciousness a certain way.
I don’t think he talked about their group. Maybe later people did, but I don’t think marx said that, for example, I’m conditioned by the material relations that my co-workers enter into. I think he said I’m conditioned by MY material relations.
My group doesn’t matter and my group can change. I don’t think identity politics allows for that.
You ain’t got no friends on the left! You’re right!
You ain’t got no friends on the right! You’re left!
Sound off! Hound dog!
Sound off! Tree frog!
Sound off!
Hound dog, Tree frog, Poontang!
That’s Right!
I like most of what you say and I agree that relativism (or multi-culturalism) discourages assimilation.
Let me suggest that multi-culturalism isn’t a problem that is confined to the left. Indeed, the idea that all religions are basically the same with their moderates and extremists is a form of multi-culturalism that is also accepted by both left and right. I’d argue that Islam, at its core, is very different from Christianity and can’t be expected to sustain liberal institutions. The “extremists†have the religious texts on their side. However, to argue that would take an extensive exposition.
The multi-culturalism of the right, actually a form of ecumenicalism, finds all long-standing religious traditions as equally valid and a worthy foundation for their respective societies. But this is a doctrine of faith accepted a priori. Some on the right can face the Islamic threat but most wallow in what I call the original multi-culturalism that goes back to the 18th century when Edmund Burke argued that religious establishments are required even if they are different religions for different people. Conservatives today have been shaped by Burke’s worldview more than any other single author. I apologize that I can only summarize this view and not argue it in a few paragraphs. I talk more about it here.