Chesler Chronicles

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August 1st, 2008 10:08 am

Why Do So Many Westerners Refuse to “Get” That We Are At War?

People have all repeatedly asked me this question. Lately, their voices are more pained.

Westerners are in denial. And, the deniers are even more afraid of Jihad and terrorism than those of us who are crying out against it. Thus, like battered women, they seek to appease the violent offender; they also engage in self-blame in the misguided belief that if they do not “offend” their batterer that he will not batter them.

Thus, if the West had not published the “inflammatory” Danish cartoons and had not allowed the state of Israel to come into being and to stay right there, a mote in the eye of envious, corrupt, and lazy Muslim nations–then Arafat would not have launched his terrorist campaign, Muslim immigrants in Europe would not have launched their various Intifadas, and Al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, the Muslim Brotherhood would not have gained in strength.

Deniers also tend to blame it all on American foreign policy, Wall Street and the CIA. They rarely blame anything on Islamic gender and religious apartheid or on Jihad Rising.

What else other than fundamentalist Islam explains the Iranian stonings to death of perfectly innocent girls and women for the alleged crime of prostitution which is how female rape victims, those who dare allege rape, women who are not sufficiently “covered,” or who demonstrate for women’s rights– are all viewed. Read my book, The Death of Feminism for a longer discussion about this.

Read the foreign press. For example, I have just learned that the Saudi, UAE, and (to a lesser extent) Iranian governments will not allow female athletes to compete in the upcoming Olympics. This decision has nothing to do with the CIA. However, I would agree that America’s policy towards Saudi Arabia must radically change, both because of their mistreatment of women and in terms of our being held hostage to grossly inflated oil prices such that we have been funding the Islamist war against the West.

I have just also learned that the Pakistani-based Taliban has demanded that un-Islamic businesses “shut down” within fifteen days or “face dire consequences.” The businesses targeted are CD shops, internet cafes, and cable service providers. And, the Taliban are threatening any woman who is not wearing proper hijab with disfigurement by acid. (Read about it in the Daily Times of Pakistan).

Contrary to myth, the U.S. did not fund the Taliban to fight against the Soviet invaders. In fact, after the Soviet military withdrawal in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Washington simply washed its hands of Afghanistan. The Taliban did not even exist until about 1996, when Pakistan created them for its own purposes.

Finally, also in the Pakistani Punjab, (are we really allied with this awful country?–yes we are, and there is no choice), two Christian sisters, aged 10 and 13, were abducted by Muslim men who married them and forced them to convert to Islam. The local police refused to help the parents find their children. Now, a judge has ruled that the children cannot see their Muslim husbands or their Christian parents and has placed them in a woman’s shelter.

The persecution of infidels, forced conversions, and forced marriage to female children is typical of 7th century Islam which alas, is still alive and well today.

Folks: It’s not our fault. We didn’t break it (Islamic fundamentalism) and we may not be able to fix it. But we do have to prevent it from invading our shores. If not, all the Western women will be veiled, the intellectuals silenced, the technology used only for jihad, and not to spread modernity.

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20 Comments

1. Bruce:

Terrific essay, Dr. Chesler. This deserves to be seen across the world.

Aug 1, 2008 - 12:08 pm 2. Richard Cook:

It is just plain, garden variety cowardice.

Aug 1, 2008 - 8:26 pm 3. Steve:

Excellent article. We need to hear much more of this kind of thinking all around the western world.

Aug 2, 2008 - 10:18 pm 4. pranit:

Yes the Taliban did not exist in the 80’s, but they were called the mujahideen at the time and were comprised of maninly islamic foreign fighters. The CIA created a monster and now it has come to bite the hand that feeds them. Because of your unethical policies in the past, supporting dictator pakistan against a democratic india, you have come to reap what you sow. India has suffered at the hands of the islamists and we had our 9/11 ten years before america and no one noticed it. Atleast from now follow ethical policies and dont be selfish, have some concerns for the rest of the people.

Aug 3, 2008 - 12:23 am 5. Leo Hugh:

Excellent article. By being in denial the monster is being fed to become bigger and one day it will be a big problem for the whole world if its not already. Already ISLAM is one of the biggest problems in many countries and more disturbance than useful. Islam is in the 7th century to this day and they dont want to change. They want world as per their rules.Bend and u r bent further.

Aug 3, 2008 - 5:25 am 6. George Jochnowitz:

pranit,

Politics makes strange bedfellows. During World War II, the United States was allied with the USSR. It was an important alliance that won the war. The United States knew how bad the Soviet Union was, and for the next half century, fought the Cold War against the Soviets. Nevertheless, it was necessary and important to join with them in order to defeat Hitler.

Aug 3, 2008 - 6:45 am 7. massaraksh:

pranit,

I’m the first to admit the USA isn’t perfect and we’ve made plenty of mistakes, but we’ve nothing to learn from countries where thousands of people are slaughtered, raped, and robbed while the police looks the other way and politicians active encourage pogroms.

In case anybody’s “wondering” which country I’m talking about it’s the “largest democracy in the world” – India, and the pogrom which took place was in and Indian state Gujarat. India does look relatively good when one compares it with such monstrosities like Pakistan, but please, do spare us and don’t compare it with civilized countries.

Aug 3, 2008 - 11:59 am 8. massaraksh:

Dr. Chessler

I’ve admired your courage, honesty, and decency for a very long time, & I read everything you write with a great deal of interest. Thank God for people like you – it’s a pity we have so few intellectuals willing to stand up & fight for the truth the way you’ve done it.

Technically you’re right, we had nothing to do with Taliban – it was created by Pakistani ISI, but of course, its leaders were people we supported during the Jihad against the Soviets; at the same time, it’s true that Taliban’s enemies were also former anti-Soviet Jihadis. The war between Taliban & Northern Alliance was a fight between different ethnic groups, and we had nothing to do with it.

In hindsight, we probably would’ve been better off if we had cut a deal with the Afghani Communists – we could live with them (we’ve lived with the Communist Vietnam!), but we could never live with the likes of Taliban.

Aug 3, 2008 - 12:10 pm 9. Philip:

America’s looking more and more lonely up on the stage of “holdout” nations. We have no choice. We must fight, or we will die.

Aug 3, 2008 - 4:09 pm 10. narciso:

The mujadeen were represented by thePeshawar circle, that had support from the CIA and Saudi ISI and Pakistani ISI. The former backed Hekmatyar, Raisul SAyyaf and Maulvani Khalis. They killed more Afghans than Russians. The US and UK gave some support to Massoud; (who had a record of actually fighting the Soviets)Gilani (whose faction Karzai was a part of) Khalis was the mentor
of Mullah Omar and the father of the Taliban. Osama was loosely tied to Jalal Haqquani, but he recruited from the factions of Sayyaf and Hekmatyar.

Aug 3, 2008 - 6:00 pm 11. Dr S McCosker:

Dear Dr Chesler – I see it. I’ve read Spencer, Bat Yeor and Bostom, among others. I believe them.

All I can say is: we who do see the danger approaching, have to keep on sounding the alarm. Here’s a marvellous passage from J R R Tolkien’s epic fantasy Lord of the Rings – I was strongly reminded of it, when I read Oriana Fallaci’s The Rage and the Pride and The Force of Reason, and even more so, when Geert Wilders released ‘Fitna’ and it flashed all over the internet (I understand that teenagers were texting sites for seeing Fitna, to one another).

“In the dark without moon or stars a drawn blade gleamed…There was a blow, soft but heavy, and the door shuddered. ‘Open, in the name of Mordor!’ said a voice thin and menacing.

“At a second blow the door yielded and fell back…The dark figures passed swiftly in.

“At that moment, among the trees nearby, a horn rang out. I rent the night like fire on a hilltop.

‘AWAKE! FEAR! FIRE! FOES! AWAKE!’

‘Fatty Bolger had not been idle. As soon as he saw the dark shapes creep from the garden, he knew that he must run for it, or perish. And run he did, out of the back door, through the garden, and over the fields. When he reached the nearest house…he collapsed on the doorstep…It was some time before anyone could make out what he was babbling about. At last they got the idea that enemies were in Buckland…And then they lost no more time.

‘FEAR! FIRE! FOES! ‘

‘the Brandybucks were blowing the Horn Call of Buckland, that had not been sounded for more than a hundred years…’AWAKE! AWAKE!” [from Fellowship of the Ring, Bk I, chapter 10].

To use Tolkien’s language – you, and Oriana, and Wilders, and many others, are sounding the Horn Call.

AWAKE! FEAR! FIRE! FOES! AWAKE!

Tolkien was a medievalist. I think the entire sweep of his fantasy epic was shaped, more than anything else, by his knowledge of the West’s long effort of self-defence against the Jihad, from Charles Martel in 732 to Jan Sobieski and the charge of the Winged Hussars to lift the Muslim siege of Vienna in 1683.

Our other strangely prescient popular storyteller (also a medievalist) is J K Rowlings. In her ‘Order of the Phoenix’ most characters have their heads in the sand, obstinately refusing to believe that an enemy they had assumed defeated, in abeyance, has arisen again, armed and dangerous; Harry and Dumbledore’s warnings are ignored and ridiculed, and they themselves are persecuted and vilified. The fictional scenario – especially the business about He Who Must Not Be Named – is eerily similar to that faced by those who, today, are warning about the Jihad.

Millions of people fell in love with these stories, in print or in film; little knowing that if our civilisation is to survive, they themselves might be called upon to stand up and *be* like Tolkien’s heroes, or Rowlings’. One hopes that *because* they have read those stories, they will find it in themselves to do so: to name evil, and defy it.

Aug 3, 2008 - 9:30 pm 12. Jack-The-Ripper:

This Is A Problem That We As A Nation Must Defeat At All Cost,These People Don’t Care Anything About Appeasement Their Only Objective Is To Destroy America,,Period,And They Are Doing It Expeditiously To Our Youth And African Americans Community’s Whom They Know Will Overlook America As Their Country,But They See Us As Infidels.These Islamists Are Only Concerned With Their Agenda,And Will Kill Their Own People Just Because They Don’t Worship SATAN,But A Real God,And That My American Colleague’s,Has And Alway’s,And Still Are Their Agenda For The Entire World,Not Just America,Whom They Claim Are Responsible For All The Worlds Problem,We Are Considered The Head Of The Giant Monster,And By My Analasis,They Have Inspired Our Own Fellow Americans To Blame Their Very Acts On You Guessed It US,So Keep Continuing To Support These Fanatics Agenda Against Our Destruction American Youth,And The African American Community

Aug 4, 2008 - 5:40 am 13. J.J. Sefton:

It’s a perfect storm of left wing navel-gazing, multiculturalist clap-trap, retrograde communist propaganda bearing fruit decades after the fact (universities, MSM, entertainment biz) and unreconstructed Western European Jew hatred thinly veiled as anti-Zionism. Plus a healthy dose of “maybe if we ignore them, they’ll just go away…”

Fasten your seat belts. It’s gonna be a bumpy night.

Aug 4, 2008 - 7:22 am 14. drstenso:

i dont like this essay in the least sense.
part of the reason may be because i am a “westerner” and i am not in denial that we are at war..

i am just against it.
i dont blame the cia for the war. that doesnt even make sense

i feel that we should have done something about 9/11 in retaliation. not that we should go after a random terrorist that didnt attack us on 9/11 and then rebuild there country…

set and match

Aug 4, 2008 - 4:54 pm 15. Martellus:

A swing and a miss then a hit.
You are not taking into account the root causes of “denial,” and that is complete ignorance of the subject in the western hemisphere. Both the government and the mainstream media are to blame. The government’s unawareness of Islamist goals has been frighteningly short sighted. Neither the right nor the left have any moral ground when addressing this issue. The right is all to eager to sell out for short term goals and security, and the left all to fervent to through us under the bus in the name of multi culturalist polity. The main stream media are showing a disturbing lack judgment in whitewashing or just plain ignoring the “soft” jihad that is already well under way on this continent.
Jihad comes in two flavors, covert and overt. The latter is the one we are all familiar (the give away is the big pile of body parts). The former, owing to the dualistic nature of Islamism, is more insidious and extremely effective. Make no mistake, the Europeans have trained them in this art since the 1950’s, and they have mastered it.
You are dead on in concluding that appeasement is a mistake. Give an inch and they will take your head. The following I borrowed from Mr. Peter Hammond FrontPageMagazine.com | 4/21/2008. This portends to the future path of appeasement and unchecked immigration:

“As long as the Muslim population remains around 1% of any given country they will be regarded as a peace-loving minority and not as a threat to anyone. In fact, they may be featured in articles and films, stereotyped for their colorful uniqueness.
At 2% and 3% they begin to proselytize from other ethnic minorities and disaffected groups with major recruiting from the jails and among street gangs.
From 5% on they exercise an inordinate influence in proportion to their percentage of the population. They will push for the introduction of halal (clean by Islamic standards) food, thereby securing food preparation jobs for Muslims. They will increase pressure on supermarket chains to feature it on their shelves — along with threats for failure to comply (localized areas in the US).
At this point, they will work to get the ruling government to allow them to rule themselves under Sharia, the Islamic Law. The ultimate goal of Islam is not to convert the world but to establish Sharia law over the entire world.
When Muslims reach 10% of the population, they will increase lawlessness as a means of complaint about their conditions (Paris –car-burnings). Any non-Muslim action that offends Islam will result in uprisings and threats (Amsterdam – Mohammed cartoons).
After reaching 20% expect hair-trigger rioting, jihad militia formations, sporadic killings, church, and synagogue burning.
From 60% you may expect unfettered persecution of non-believers and other religions, sporadic ethnic cleansing (genocide), use of Sharia Law as a weapon and Jizya, the tax placed on infidels.
After 80% expect state run ethnic cleansing and genocide.
100% will usher in the peace of ‘Dar-es-Salaam’ — the Islamic House of Peace — there’s supposed to be peace because everybody is a Muslim.”

It’s not “Islamic extremists” it’s Islam.
It’s not “Islamic fundamentalism” it’s Islam.
Islam is not a religion; it is a totalitarian ideology by any definition. It must be treated no differently than communism, fascism, socialism, or nazism.
But what of the “moderate muslims?” Money, power, and small vocal minorities advance political ideologies. Islamist followers find themselves with no deficiencies in these areas. The moderates quickly “get with the program” or find themselves on the receiving end of their comrades wrath.
I commend you Ms. Chester, on spreading the word. I understand your stance on women’s rights vs. Islamism, but make no mistake this is a very real threat to all of humanity.

Aug 5, 2008 - 4:14 am 16. Stapelton:

Some of the worst offenders are aging liberal intellectuals who write for the NY Review of Books or the London Revie of books.

Fear is one reason, but it’s their hatred of Western values that is their main motivator.

Aug 5, 2008 - 7:04 pm 17. John Peter Maher:

Georgia. A big US anti-Russian espionage base was dismantled.
Sovereignty: anybody remember Panama, Grenada, Cuba, Iraq, Yugoslavia?

http://en.fondsk.ru/article.php?id=1566

Aug 20, 2008 - 9:57 am 18. Joseph:

Maybe, all the fundi’s will do the war thing and kill each other off, we will have to bite some bullets but we can give back by pointing out the enemy or better yet, see them into that wonderland.

Ciao ya’ll

Sep 4, 2008 - 11:02 pm 19. ehutch:

i disagree with your premise. we are NOT at war. while its true that the us should not ever allow itself to be bullied, it is prudent to examine our actions and have an understanding of those who wish us harm and why. this country is not always right and our opponents wrong. take iran for example, we proped up a ruthless dictator (the shah ) for our own selfish interests while he brutalized his people. this led to the uprising in 1979 along with the taking of us hostages. the students outrage was understandable. put yourself in their shoes and you would agree. our foreign policy has consequences and we need to tread carefully. the us must stand up for its interests but do so with the rest of the world in mind and try to coexist in a peaceful manor if possible. we will never please everyone everytime and fighting will sometimes be necessary but understand there are 2 sides to every story.

Dec 2, 2008 - 12:28 pm 20. BurningBeard:

I think the core of all these arguments is that Religion must be destroyed. For too long madmen have been given the shield of religion to murder and persecute the people.

Jan 18, 2009 - 2:43 pm