Deafening Silence

Thursday Roundup

In a recent post, Snark Does Not Equal Wisdom, Donald Sensing reminds us that it is the quality of the thought that counts.  I think this applies especially to the blogosphere-both right and left.  I can think of more than one blog that I stopped reading when it devolved into an outlet for snotty put-downs.  Unfortunately, this kind of nastiness seems to draw a big readership.  Discouraging.

The ever-alert Miss Kelly dissects Harvard's recent decision to institute female-only gym hours to accommodate Muslim women students.  See also this article on the subject.  The attached comments lay out some interesting ideas.  And here is the website of the Harvard Islamic Society- note their connection to local mosques and Islamic centers.  Why did the Muslim students not approach one of these first?  Churches all over the country offer special "fun and fellowship" outreach programs to support the needs of Christian college students.  Perhaps more mosques should follow this model in cases such as these, offering time/space for "modesty gyms."   It is essentially a religious request, after all.

And speaking of religious requests, here's a doozy:

Muslim students in Melbourne want universities to arrange their class schedules around Muslim prayer times.  Oh, and provide a special private area where Muslim women can dine alone and unseen. I honestly forget where I first saw this story, so I'm giving the hat tip to Democratic Underground, believe it or not.  I find the fact that they even posted this story encouraging.

Both the above stories are really about the normalization of Sharia, in my view.  The effect of implementing the Harvard "females only" gym hours would be to make the gender apartheid of sharia less shocking to non-Muslims.  (Likewise the special "eat and relax" space demanded in Melbourne.) Making various aspects of Sharia a fact of life for the whole community- not just Muslims- is not just unfair, but a slippery slope.  How many white Southerners who came of age in the 40s and 50s believed that "Whites Only" signs were just a fact of life, simply because they'd never known anything different?  How many men at the turn of the century simply assumed that women "were not suited to" voting and politics, just because they'd never seen their sisters, mothers or wives vote?  When apartheid becomes a fact of life, few think to question it. 

The very separation they seek could even backfire on these students.  Sometimes "out of sight, out of mind" really means "out of sight, open to suspicion."  If regular contact between Muslim and non-Muslim students is gradually reduced due to demands such as these, it could help to support ugly stereotypes on both sides.  Ignorance is diss.

On a completely opposite and much more hopeful note:

Turkey is preparing to publish a document that represents a revolutionary reinterpretation of Islam - and a controversial and radical modernisation of the religion.

The country's powerful Department of Religious Affairs has commissioned a team of theologians at Ankara University to carry out a fundamental revision of the Hadith, the second most sacred text in Islam after the Koran.

This, according to an an article published by the BBC (hat tip: Jihad Watch).  To quote further from the article:

According to Fadi Hakura, an expert on Turkey from Chatham House in London, Turkey is doing nothing less than recreating Islam - changing it from a religion whose rules must be obeyed, to one designed to serve the needs of people in a modern secular democracy.

He says that to achieve it, the state is fashioning a new Islam.

"This is kind of akin to the Christian Reformation," he says.

I wonder how this will be received by Muslims worldwide.  It reminds me of a related story I saw some time ago:

The Lost Archive, which appeared in the Wall Street Journal. (hat tip: Mirabilis)

Again, some quotes:

On the night of April 24, 1944, British air force bombers hammered a former Jesuit college here housing the Bavarian Academy of Science. The 16th-century building crumpled in the inferno. Among the treasures lost, later lamented Anton Spitaler, an Arabic scholar at the academy, was a unique photo archive of ancient manuscripts of the Quran.

The 450 rolls of film had been assembled before the war for a bold venture: a study of the evolution of the Quran, the text Muslims view as the verbatim transcript of God’s word. The wartime destruction made the project "outright impossible...

...Or did it? This almost reads like the blurb for an action/adventure thriller- Indiana Jones and the Lost Archive.

That's it for now.  I hope to tune in next week with a proper post.  Thanks to everyone for their patience.

Blood, Bile and Ink

It appears that this picture is still worth a thousand words...

...and then some.  In the pre-dawn hours of Tuesday, February 12th, Danish police arrested three men on the outskirts of Aarghus, Denmark.  The three- one "Dane of Morroccan origin" and two Tunisians- were accused of plotting to murder Kurt Westergaard, the artist who created the above cartoon.

Westergaard, who is 73, is currently living under police protection.

On Wednesday, February 13th, several leading Danish newspapers reprinted the cartoon as part of their coverage of the alleged murder plot.

Thereafter events moved swiftly.

On February 14th, the Iranian government summoned the Danish ambassador to Tehran to lodge an official protest.  According to the ambassador:

"There were some messages to the Danish government, including (a request) to distance itself from the reprint and prevent this from happening again."

By February 15th, Islamist parliamentarians in Kuwait were calling for a renewed boycott of all Danish products and demanding that the government set up a special fund to defend the image of the prophet.  (The Kuwaiti parliament lacked a quorum that day so no demands became official.)

A group of about 50 Pakistani students- members of the student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami, an Islamist party- burned a Danish flag in front of the Karachi Press Club.  The students held up signs, one of which read: "Prime Minister of Denmark and the Pope should apologise to the Muslim community."

On February 16th, the Danish Parliament's Foreign Policy Committee cancelled a planned visit to Tehran due to the dispute.

According to the Jerusalem Post, by Monday, February 18th a spokesman for the Popular Resistance Committees in the Gaza Strip told a flag-burning crowd that anyone involved in the drawing or printing of the cartoons should be "slaughtered."

It begins to look more and more like events in the fall of 2005, when at least 50 people in the middle east and africa died in riots dubbed "Cartoon Rage" by some bloggers.  Then, as now, the actions of politicians and mobs are said to be caused by the printing of the Jyllands-Posten cartoons.

At least, that's what a casual observer would assume.  Just look at some of the headlines I perused while working on this piece:

'Bomb, slaughter Danes due to republication of Muhammad caricatures,' Jerusalem Post

Pakistani students torch Danish flag over cartoon- NZHerald

Denmark: 3 arrests in cartoonist plot- Associated Press

Cartoons blamed for Danish riots- Associated Press

Iran summons Danish ambassador over reprint of Prophet Muhammad cartoons- International Herald Tribune

What powerful pictures!  Everyone from street mobs to politicians has fallen helplessly under their evil thrall and have no choice but to burn flags, shout at ambassadors and plot to kill old men.  Such terrible images should never again have seen the light of day!

What a large piece of hot-buttered nonsense.  If only images were so powerful; there might be more peace in the world.  The problems of the globe could be solved by an army of visual artists, slaying evil and doing justice by creating Pictures That Must Be Obeyed.

Violent criminals could be sentenced to a tour of the local art gallery.

The cartoons did nothing.  Viewing them caused nothing.  They are inanimate objects and blaming them for this or that event only lifts the burden of responsibility from those who deserve to carry it. 

As an example, let's look at the statements of the Iranian government as relayed by the Danish ambassador (whose name, btw, is Soeren Haslund):

"There were some messages to the Danish government...to distance itself from the reprint and prevent this from happening again."

This statement reveals more about the Iranian press- and the government's attitude toward press freedom- than it does about the cartoons.  The request for the Danish government to "distance itself" from the reprinting and "prevent this from happening again," implies that the press is an arm of the government and can be silenced by government decree.  It suggests that the government of Iran prefers to keep the press on a short leash- an attitude that predates the cartoons by decades and has nothing to do with them.

We can also look at the banner held up by the protesting students in Karachi- "Prime Minister of Denmark and the Pope should apologise to the Muslim community."  These students are assuming that Denmark is suffused and driven by Christianity, just as they wish Pakistan to be suffused and driven by Islam.  Why else would they assume that the Pope bore any responsibility?  They have framed the world in terms of Caliphate and Christendom, and consider the Pope a political leader in Denmark.  The cartoons had nothing to do with that.

And what of the alleged murder plot? If press and police reports are correct, 3 men plotted to kill a 73-year-old artist, but not because he drew a picture.  Had Kurt Westergaard published a handbill stating that he thought Mohammed was a terrorist, they would have been equally incensed.  Had he formed a barbershop quartet and recorded satiral songs about Islam, they would also have planned his death.  The cartoon was not responsible.  It was just a convenient excuse.

Using the cartoons as a shield for these actions could turn out, in the long run, to be as damaging as the threats and demonstrations themselves.  Frenzied shouting about a bunch of drawings allows everyone to put off serious discussions to another day.  And those discussions- about freedom of the press, secular democracy and religious pluralism- can't wait much longer.  That much is becoming obvious.

Or do I need to draw you a picture?

References

"Terror plot" to kill Mohammed cartoonist- CNN.com

Newspapers reprint Prophet Mohammed cartoon- CNN.com

Denmark: 3 arrests in cartoonist plot- Jan M. Olsen, AP staff writer

3 Arrested in Plot to Kill Cartoonist- Dan Bilefsky, NY Times

Newspapers Reprint... Jan M. Olsen, AP

Danish Papers Reprint Muhammad Cartoon- CBS News

Danish legislators cancel Iran visit over controversial cartoons- DPA

Pakistani students torch Danish flag over cartoon- Reuters- NZ Herald

Iran summons Danish ambassador over reprint of Prophet Muhammad cartoons- AP-International Herald

Danish Cartoonist: 'No Regrets'- the Independent

'Bomb, slaughter Danes due to republication of Muhammad caricatures'- Jerusalem Post

Do You Believe in Miracles?

YESSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm not a sports fan.  I've only ever watched one hockey game in my whole life-

but it was this one.

This Friday is the anniversary of the Miracle on Ice.  Take a minute to remember-

And dare to believe....

Be Kind to Animals or We'll Kill You: Terrorists Strike Again

All terrorist movements either begin with or develop a messianic belief system.  Call it the Paradox of Extreme Virtue: having ascended to a higher moral plane, the terrorists are now entitled- no, enjoined- to Promote Virtue and Prevent Vice among us lower beings.  It becomes their priestly calling.  They don't consult other people to see if they agree with their definition of Virtue; Virtue does not consult.  Virtue exists for itself and is so obviously superior that it compels obedience.

So the Virtuous Terrorist begins to make decisions.  Selective ones.  This should be smashed.  That should burn.  Like herding cattle, the terrorist seeks to shape the path of society with clear and forceful examples.  Ideally, after much careful correction, just the snap of a whip next to an ear should be enough to direct the herd.

Deafening Silence, August 23, 2007

Domestic terrorists claiming to defend animal rights have struck again.  On February 6, 2008 a firebomb was detonated at the front door of the home of Edythe D. London, a professor at the University of California at Los Angeles.  The Animal Liberation Front claimed credit.

London's house had been vandalized by the group at least once before.  In October 2007, members of the Animal Liberation Front flooded the house using a garden hose, causing $20,000 worth of damage.

You can read the details of the latest attack here.

I suppose we should all be thankful that the ALF is as technically incompetent as it is vicious.  Apparently, this firebomb only succeeded in scorching the front door. Previous bombs have failed to ignite at all.

We are left to ponder what will happen when the ALF finally develops the expertise to match its hatred.

There is a tendency these days to pooh-pooh terrorist groups whose resources and techniques appear unsophisticated.  We are told to laugh at groups like the "Fort Dix Six" and the "Seas of David"- hapless bunglers more likely to hurt themselves than anybody else. 

Intent counts for nothing.  Drive and determination are meaningless.

I see a long line of people whistling past a graveyard.

In 1995 fuel oil and fertilizer packed into a Ryder truck brought down a multi-story federal building, killing 168 and maiming 800.  The perpetrators were portrayed as paranoid drifters and losers, unable to hold down a job and fit into society.

Suppose the bomb had not ignited.  Would we be laughing now?  Would we be calling for leniency on grounds of incompetence?

In 1993 a very similar device failed to bring down the World Trade Center. Six people were killed and over a thousand injured.

If the bomb had completely failed- if there had only been a flash of light and some smoke- would we have shrugged it off?

We wouldn't have been shrugging 8 years later.

The urge to coerce behavior by means of violence should never be ignored.  Once a person or group decides that their need for revenge and control trumps law and order, a kind of moral milestone has been passed.  The law no longer applies to them.  They will abrogate it.  They will replace it with their own improved version.

They develop a will to power.

It is this will to power that should concern us.  Terrorists acting in the name of animal rights, Islamofascism or government reform aren't interested in what the rest of us think. They have convinced themselves that we should all be frightened and punished into implementing their "improvements" to society.

They don't care if we call them buffoons.  They might even prefer it. 

When was the last time you saw anybody arrest a clown for buying fertilizer?

Two Essays; One Theme

After a week filled with reports of blood and destruction that are sadly becoming routine, two gifted essayists- NPRs Scott Simon and Kenya's Philip Ochieng- remind us of our humanity.

We are not just animals with guns.  We are Human beings, capable of reason, compassion and love.  But it's a fragile equation: strip one of these elements away and our baser nature will find a poisonous substitute- fanatacism, contempt, hatred- to put in its place.

A rational, moral being must always guard against becoming what it most fears.

Let's begin with Scott Simon's essay, which aired on NPR's Weekend Edition Saturday, February 2, 2008.  In it, he discusses the previous week's bombing in Baghdad, where two women with Down's Syndrome were used as "martyrs."

As of now it's only available as an audio link, but it's well worth a listen.  Here's a quote:

"I noticed this morning that some news organizations characterized the bombings as the act of "militants."  To me that seems like calling Jack the Ripper as "anti-pornography activist"..."

"People don't have to know what you stand for, just what you're willing to do .  That's how the thugs in this world can make good people cower."

Our second essay comes to us via Baldilocks, who has the honor of calling its author her father. In this piece he discusses the current bloodshed in Kenya.

I reprint it in full, with selected paragraphs in bold:

Live for your country, don’t die for it

Story by PHILIP OCHIENG
Publication Date: 2/3/2008

I am a displaced person. Originally, I refused to move. After dispatching my family to various places, I locked myself up in my house to go on with my work. I had convinced myself that finishing the books I am writing was much more important than my safety.

Moreover, I thought that, at 70, if I died I would have lived a full life. But how illogical I was! If a fanatic killed me, how could I now dedicate my books to society? I recalled the philosopher’s admonition that no cause at all is worth dying for.

If you are so convinced that an ideal is vital for your society, then shouldn’t you make it your duty to live long enough to help your society to realise it? Once you are dead, of what use are you?

Thus only dastards can join battle with such swashbuckling as: “I am ready to die for democracy,” or: “I will die fighting for Kibaki.”

Nobody denies you your right to fight for Kibaki (or Odinga, Musyoka and Ruto).

The point is to do it intelligently. None of these individuals is worth your life.

Isaac Asimov, the American biochemist, once produced what he called “Three Laws of Robotics” to be written into the logico-mathematical pathways of each of his “positronic brains” to ensure that robots served human beings absolutely safely.

The third law is that a robot must keep itself intact every time it is deployed — unless this contradicts the first law (which is never to cause or allow any harm to a human user).

All the laws are actually central to all tool-making in human history. The third one makes the boomerang of the Australian native the most ingenious of all the tools ever made.

But, clearly, a soldier is much more important than a tool. That is why the law on self-preservation is even more significant to humans. Sure, a good soldier fights bravely in battle. But his bravery must include every stratagem that helps him to return to base unharmed.

Only then can he be available for another battle. Hence the saying: Live for your country: never deliberately die for it.

Patriotism is mental and manual commitment to one’s country for as long as possible. To die willingly, even in your country’s name, is treason.

Chest-thumping

To go to battle with chest-thumping carelessness – making yourself an easy prey to the enemy’s shrapnel — is to succumb to Shakespearean resignation: “Come what come may/Time and hour runs through the roughest day.” This is fatalism. Time has become your master, whereas time must flow in your own terms.

That is why, in the destructiveness of the present battle, you must protect yourself. There is no cowardice in dashing into hiding when necessary. Whatever the immediate factor, you save your life and make yourself available for a much more worthwhile battle.

If you die, I lose the chance to convince you that, at the moment, your weapons are aimed in the wrong direction. It is not the Kikuyu or the Kisii who have plunged us into Armageddon.

And, whoever it is, his targets are not the Kalenjin, the Luhya, the Luo or the Swahili.

No. Only individuals are guilty. Though they seek to hide under tribal labels, they have not done it to benefit their tribe but only themselves as individuals.

By taking arms to injure other Kenyans on the basis of their tribes, you are only making it easier for the culprits to hide under those labels. If Mr Samuel Fulani is the culprit, why attack the Swahili?

Indeed, you endanger your own lives. The crisis has revealed how desperately interdependent we are as tribes. Everything we do to another tribe boomerangs badly on us. However powerful its leaders may be, no tribe lives in a castle surrounded by a moat.

Every time you attack members of a tribe living in your area, you are digging the graves of your own relatives living in other tribal areas.

Once the revenge game begins, there can be no end to it. Why have we failed to learn even a single lesson from Somalia right next door? Yes, we wronged innocent Kikuyus and Kisiis. But, as Lewis Nguyai, my new MP, was telling my fellow constituents, a small spark of stupid reprisal is sure to turn into a national conflagration in which the arsonist himself is most likely to burn.

In other words, not a single tribe can gain even pesa nane from it. That was why I ran into safety – to be able, through writing, to continue to offer such advice. Maybe Robert Frost had Kenya and myself in mind when he wrote:

The wood is lovely, dark and deep;
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep.