49 Comments

1. Mark McGilvray:

The Wafa Sultan interview is as close to a cosmic event as I have seen on the internet in some time. I applaud her courage and perception. I sure hope she has some security.

Mar 11, 2006 - 11:42 am 2. Yehudit:

I’ve had the link emailed to me by people who I used to get into lefty-righty arguments with.

I think this cartoon thing really backfired on the Islamists.

Mar 11, 2006 - 12:54 pm 3. quickrob:

Her comments are most dangerous to Islam because the brand of Islam she spoke out against is so ripe for an intellectual backslap.

It’s good she lives in America because while she’s not nearly as safe as she was just two weeks ago, she is far safer in LA than she would be in the UK.

What she said is great – it needed saying. The more attention is called to the degenrate aspects of “modern” Islam, the better. Cartoons, talk shows, whatever. Moderate Muslims and non-Muslims need to take a look at this problem and Islamicists need to take a look in the mirror.

Any short-term backlash against people or countries will be nothing compared to the long term shift in thinking which will hopefully result from repeated discourse, mockery, and “public shaming” (or whatever we can call Dr. Wafa’s comments).

Right on. Let’s get it all out there in the open.

Mar 11, 2006 - 1:03 pm 4. Terrye:

I read the article and she is a very interesting and brave woman.

Yehudit, I don’t know if they backfired or not. I think the purpose of the cartoon riots was to create division between Muslims and the West and it seems to me that is just what happened. Right now more westerners are ready to give up on democracy in the ME and that makes realpolitick with its dictators and homegrown terrorists are more likely not less likely.

In her artlicle Dr. Sultan talked about the Muslim Brotherhood killing a professor of hers. More and more people I know are adopting the attitude that as long as the people they kill are each other they could really care less.

I guess that means we will have to give up on Iraq and Afghanistan too because I don’t see them turning into Methodists.

So while I think Dr. Sultan is a very big threat to the Islamists because she is rational and thoughtful and questions self destructive beliefs in the Muslim world…I think the whole cartoon fiasco was a propaganda boon to the mullahs.

Mar 11, 2006 - 1:08 pm 5. voletti:

Bravo, Dr. Wafa!

Islam did need a psychiatrist to break out the ugly truth, seems like.

Her life is indeed in danger. The fates of Hirsi Ali and Greert Wilders in Holland is pointer enough. Brave women such as hirsi ali an d Oriana Fallaci really get the goat of the medivial mullahs, seems like.

And the NYT really seems unable to decide whose side she’s on. For the gray old lady to have displayed enough dhimmitude to not publish the mohd cartoons speaks volumes about the proclivities of the editorial board, methinks.

Mar 11, 2006 - 1:08 pm 6. Baron Bodissey:

“Speaking the truth without mockery” is indeed necessary and important. Dr. Sultan is a heroine, to put her life on the line that way.

But let’s not downplay the importance of mockery as a weapon. I’m with Mark Steyn on that one — ridicule is a devastating weapon against the Islamists, and one which they don’t really have in their own arsenals.

Look what the cartoons did. Just think what would happen if we all published cartoons, or jokes, or ludicrous insults on our blogs every day, mocking the Islamists up one side and down the other. And (dream on!) suppose our newspapers and TV stations and radio stations joined in.

They couldn’t issue enough fatwas to destroy us all and reclaim their honor. And, in the meantime, we all get to laugh.

Dymphna and I are trying to make sure we post at least one new Mohammed cartoon a week. We’re too small and insignificant to have any effect — we’re not even worth a fatwa — but it’s the principle of the thing.

But if only one major American newspaper could grow a set of nads and print one of the cartoons…

And if only pigs could fly!

Mar 11, 2006 - 3:37 pm 7. Kevin Peters:

Roger:

I am religous and I normaly don’t like open ridicule of other peoples faiths, even ones that I have huge theological disputes with. But the bully boy tactics of a large portion of the Muslim world makes me want to agree with Baron. The West’s weak kneeded defense of the right of free speech and their simpering apologetic response to the vulgar muscle tactics of a portion of Islam makes me ill. I saw a great qoute on Volokh’s blog the other day. He wrote something similar to imagine if the Orthodox Jew’s burned down buildings everytime time someone wrote out the word God, a practice that is not allowed in their faith. I am not suprised by the Muslim reaction. I am shocked that any portion of the west and the MSM allowed a bunch of thugs cower them into not printing something. I don’t want to ridicule Mohhamed because I enjoy ridiculing religions. It’s because I don’t want that portion of Islam that thinks it can force the world to submit to their rule to think they can get away with what they are doing.It is never a bad tactic to offend fascists. Thinking that if you are polite to them they will reciprocate has always been a mistake.

Mar 11, 2006 - 5:27 pm 8. Luther McLeod:

No, they won’t print pictures of the Mohamed cartoons, nor will they print, or show, pictures of 9/11. They wish to sell newspapers etc., they somehow believe they will have a future in a multicultural (but suddenly and exclusively islamic) world. And, oddly, they will. But only to write what they are told to write, or feel the cold steel on their neck.

Mar 11, 2006 - 7:20 pm 9. Rhod:

Terrye:

I don’t think the ferocious reaction to the cartoons was anything more than the release of ideas and emotions that were latent, and they weren’t created by the few meddling mullahs who distributed the caricatures in the ME. They had no strategy other than scraping nerves that were already raw. By and large they’re very stupid, and as Glenn Reynolds mused, what’s the strategy behind having everyone hate you simultaneously?

It’s true that now more Americans than ever before (and perhaps Westerners in general) suspect that Islam itself is dysfunctional, and more prone to produce the awful things we attribute only to IslamISTS. But I also don’t think that correlates to cynicism about democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan as a means to change the dynamic.

No one that I know applies the Gangster Rule to Muslims, which is indifference to the killing as long as it’s contained within the group.

Mar 11, 2006 - 7:22 pm 10. dougf:

It’s true that now more Americans than ever before (and perhaps Westerners in general) suspect that Islam itself is dysfunctional, and more prone to produce the awful things we attribute only to IslamISTS. But I also don’t think that correlates to cynicism about democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan as a means to change the dynamic.

I’m not at all certain that this ‘new’ dynamic does not ” correlate to cynicism about democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan as a means to change the dynamic”. Speaking just for me, I am increasingly cynical. I have had it up to HERE with Islamic Theocrats of any variety, ‘moderate’ or not.

However WARS are not won by ‘moderation’. Never have been, never will be. Wars are won or lost while demonizing the ENEMY who then becomes ‘expendible’.

What the cartoons and subsequent actions and commentary have done is pre-condtioned many in the West to accept( if not demand) what will be done in the future. This is hardly an Islamist Victory. They could hardly have performed more miserably in an ‘objective’ sense.

The most telling point made by this brave woman is that in setting the table for this ‘clash of epochs’, and demanding their own way, Islam will LOSE . The fanatics should be very very concerned. That they are not, indicates that they are not merely fanatics. They are STUPID fanatics.

When push really does come to shove, they will be gone, and unless the ‘moderates’ step up to defeat them. Islam will be gone with them.

Mar 11, 2006 - 8:09 pm 11. Bruce Badger:

dougf,

Preach it brother!

I’ve read much handwringing prose the last several days about how we have offended our ME allies and “moderates” with the death of the UAE port deal. That this was such a crushing blow to the prospect of encouraging trust and cooperation between ME countries and our own. About what a terrible message of intolerance and suspision that we’ve sent. And how we have gravely offended those from whom we desire cooperation.

Hey, how about the ME nations becoming concerned with the messages they are sending US?! I hope they get the message that because of their actions they are NOT trusted. That perhaps they won’t get the cooperation they desire from US. That we are offended by their casual insults, bigotry, and threats.

Do you realize there are parts of Saudi Arabia in which non-Muslims cannot set foot. Because we are unclean infidels. IIRC, Jews are not allowed into the country at all. But we offended them with our reasonable concerns, legitimate or not, over our port security. I’m pretty sick of appologizing for the most generous, least imperial country in the world. The USA.

Let us all mock, shame, and threaten Islam. Perhaps some of the more sane among them will begin to realize that perhaps making the entire world hate them is not a strategy for success. That they are approaching the point where they will have bought themselves a war they cannot hope to win.

The Apocalypse is around the corner if reasonable voices are not soon heard. (God bless Ms. Sultan.) I don’t wish such a world, nor it’s aftermath, on my children. But I refuse to let them mature in a world ruled by Sharia either.

I’m not frightened by Islamic threats, I’m enraged. They have demonstrated themselves to be the very antithesis of every value that Americans treasure. Were we to talk, you would find me to be a very laidback, mildmannered guy. If I’m at the boiling point, how many other American’s are in a similar state of mind? How long before Muslims in our midst begin to suffer for the rantings and ravings of their brethren to whom they have lent their silent assent? These must be some VERY stupid people to not notice the table they are setting. And unless those like Ms. Sultan begin to make themselves heard – loudly and often – twill be a bitter meal indeed that they are shortly to be served.

Mar 11, 2006 - 11:14 pm 12. Terrye:

I am not in any way justifying the bizarre reaction to the cartoons, nor am I saying that we do not have the right to freedom of expression.

I am just saying that people seem to be ready to blame and comdemn a billion people, including the 50 million we just spent years liberating.

How can we hope for any kind of future in Iraq or Afghanistan if we are just going to assume that all Muslims are wacko?

The mullahs tell their followers time and again that the west is the enemy. The infidels will never be their friends and none of us can be trusted. I would say that using rhetoric which makes no distinction between the rent a mobs in the streets and the Iraqi National Gurdsman who is a Muslim is playing into their hands.

Pretty soon I guess we will start talking about “final solutions” to the Islamic problem.

Mar 12, 2006 - 2:53 am 13. Steve M:

Terrye, have you actually read Roger’s piece that you’re commenting on?

No one here is assuming that ‘all Muslims are wacko’. However, with your comments above and your belief that ‘the whole cartoon fiasco was a propaganda boon to the mullahs’ I strongly suspect that you’re more than a little ‘wacko’ yourself.

Mar 12, 2006 - 3:20 am 14. Terrye:

Steve:

I am wacko? Why because I said that I think the mullahs used the cartoons to create trouble? Or because I dared to disagree with you?

I read the article and I agree with the Dr. The greatest challenge facing Islam is the modern world. It is barbarism vs modernity.

The mullahs used the cartoons the same way they used the assanine “dumping the Koran in the toilet” incident and the overhyped Abu Ghraib photos. In their Aplocalyptic visions the west and Islam must collide. They are oppurtunistic and it would be helpful if we did not respond in a way that aided them. That does not mean I think it was wrong to publish the cartoons, but I do think it was wrong to punish Dubai Ports for the mobs.

My response came not to anything Roger said but to the tone of some of the commenters.

Please note that I did not say they were “wacko” I said that many people seemed to think all Muslims were. You responded by saying that was not true, but then again I am wacko.

Thanks for calling me names. I have been coming to Roger’s place here for years now and it is nice to know that if I fail to say what is expected of me I can expect name calling.

Mar 12, 2006 - 3:45 am 15. Terrye:

Rhod:

Of course there was a strategy. The Danish imams who did everything they could to create the situation actually added images to make it all more offensive because the cartoons were by and large quite mild.

And then they waited months to start really pushing it in the Muslim world. It was about as accidental as Pearl Harbor.

Mar 12, 2006 - 3:56 am 16. Terrye:

Steve:

BTW some of us who were regulars at Rogers for years have our own little blog now….and we made a point of publishing those cartoons for several days.

Mar 12, 2006 - 4:14 am 17. Rhod:

Terrye:

Perhaps it’s a fine point, but your original statement was that the mullahs used the cartoons to create divisions between Muslims and The West, and then identified this as a “strategy”. I defined it as a way to aggravate tensions, but your last scolding post to me seems to to be clarifying a difference in our comments. Read your first post again.

In it you wandered into the conlusion that the mullahs were seeking to intensify hatred for Muslims in The West, which, as a strategy, is somewhat like holding a gun to your temple and yelling “stop or I’ll shoot”.

Nothing up to now indicates that the thinkers among our enemies want to make us angrier. They want to pacify us through resignation, a sense of futility and fear. The cartoon “strategy” succeeded in hardening Western ideas about Islam, and didn’t do them much good.

Mar 12, 2006 - 5:50 am 18. Terrye:

Rhod:

Of course they want to make us angrier.

They do not kill Quakers, fly planes into buildings, blow up holy shrines, debate whether or not the holocaust ever happened, put out fatwas to kill Americans wherever you find them because they want to get along with us or because they want us to believe they are rational.

I hear practically nothing in the press about the anti terrorist marches in Iraq or about the letter from the Iraqi mayor praising our troops, but I heard plenty about the cartoon riots…which by the way the Syrians and the Iranians encouraged.

They want those feelings to harden, they want a confrontation. These people are not rational western political thinkers, they are fanatics.

Mar 12, 2006 - 6:28 am 19. Terrye:

Rhod:

And btw, after we invaded Afghanistan and Iraq I think that the idea that they were looking for submission from America pretty much went out the window.

My guess is that the next time it looks like there is going to be some positive development in the ME they will find something else to be outraged about and the rent a mobs will take to the streets again.

Mar 12, 2006 - 6:31 am 20. Rhod:

Terrye:

You don’t have to convince me of the enemy’s atttitudes. I have a very high personal stake in the theatres of war you mentioned, and communicate regularly with sons who see the situation in that place stupidly called “on the ground”. Where else would it be? I know a little about war and determined enemies myself, and the current ones are the worst in my lifetime and experience.

You and I disagree on their intentions. They long ago conceived of The West as a weakened dumping-ground for decadent post-modern lunacies, and envision their enemy (us) as no serious challenge.

We can argue the grievances-of-modernity BS until the end of time, but there are several factions, with the Iranians being the 12th-Imam craziest, and a majority of others who simply think we will be persuaded to withdraw and let history settle the arguments (with them ascendant).

I think the weight of belief on the Islamist side is in favor of Western capitulation and not in the full fury of Western disgust and military might. I don’t think they want us to cry havoc…but we will, eventually. It will be the end of them and the end to a lot of our illusions.

Mar 12, 2006 - 7:29 am 21. Rhod:

Terrye:

The more I think about it, my questions to you are: (1) do you think “they” want military confrontations everywhere across their sphere of influence, and (2) are Iraq and Afghanistan just proxy wars or the first engagements in their total war against The West?

Mar 12, 2006 - 7:42 am 22. Joe Schmoe:

This is an interesting debate.

I am not sure what to make of this. I agree that the protests were orchestrated. The cartoons were published several months before the “spontaneous show of rage” broke out, and a lot of the toothless demonstrators in the Pakistan had things like signs written in English, Danish flags, and other stuff that you wouldn’t normally expect to find in the remote tribal hinterlands.

But what was the PURPOSE of the orchestration? Was it to make the West ANGRY at Muslims, thereby prompting us to strike out, perciptate the clash of civilizations, etc?

Or was it to make us FEAR muslims, better not disrespect us or the howling mobs will start rioting, see, e.g. Europe.

Or were the demonstrations mostly geared towrd MUSLIMS, i.e. whipping up the masses into a fury. Maybe the English language signs, etc. just opportunistic, they have had a lot of experience with manipulating the Western media lately, maybe now whenever they orchestrate a demonstration they get someone to burn an English sign.

I just don’t know.

Mar 12, 2006 - 8:34 am 23. Acheron:

Everything of substance takes place on the margin, that is, the final half of one-percent available after every major niche is occupied. Like a well-balanced but very long seesaw, events may persist in prior patterns seemingly forever… but then comes a tiny little tick, a marginal development so obscure as to totally escape notice, if indeed through the prevailing “noise” it is noticable at all.

So it is with “systems” such as Islam’s inchoate proto-fascism. The ranting, the sectarian violence, the sociopathic Mullahs continue over decades, even generations. Then a still, small voice –emphatically never an “intellectual’s”, a barnstorming politician’s or peculating oligarch’s– is heard to ask simply, “Why?”

Because there is no answer, and because the vast majority have Life, Liberty, and Happiness at stake, many will take up the cry. True, this cannot happen in Stalin’s Russia, Mao’s China, in States governed by rotting death-eaters such as Castro or Kim Jong-il– but once the cult-figure deliquesces in his grave, his captive people’s recovery to halfway decent self-respect is much accelerated. (Think Romania in Ceausescu’s aftermath.)

So statements even from a hated Female source may yet have bearing on Islam’s bigoted sectarian dogmatism. What we find truly inexplicable are Pinch Sulzberger and his ilk, craven cowards without even the commercial sense to understand upon which side their bread is buttered. Call it anti-Americanism, Leftism, pacifist PC… when “systems” abruptly reach marginal tipping-points –the proverbial “last straw”– everything slips unpredictably into wild reverse. Because in good Darwinian fashion, the vast majority of changes are for the worse, there is slim if any chance that a Prigogine-type “catastrophe” will represent improvement. But most certainly, everything WILL change, and our narcissistic Boomers’ Pinch-ification with it.

You thought Lenin supplanted just the Czar in 1917? Wait ’til a combination of Barry Goldwater and Huey Long incites a movement that takes PCBS by the neck and wrings it like a chicken.

Mar 12, 2006 - 9:25 am 24. Rhod:

Hmmm?

Mar 12, 2006 - 9:36 am 25. Terrye:

Rhod:

Among other things they want us to give up on modernizing Islam and go away. They know that if they force one crisis after another the west will either obliterate them or give up on them. If we continue to force the modern world on the radicals there is no place for them, they are lost. If however, they can pitch one hissy fit after another they might be able to force us to either fight, in which case they can play the victim and hope we lack the stomach for it…. or they can force us to say to hell with them and return to the old days of Realpolitick which really kinda worked for them. If they are lucky and enough antiMuslim feeling and isolationism takes hold we will withdraw altogether.

Dealing with people like this reminds me of stories about witch trials. Throw a suspected witch in the water and if she drowns she is innocent..if she floats she is guilty and then you can hang her or burn her at the stake. To the radical imams and the clerics who intend to rule the Muslim world or die trying…the rest of us are all witches. They have nothing to lose.

Mar 12, 2006 - 10:02 am 26. dougf:

If they are lucky and enough antiMuslim feeling and isolationism takes hold we will withdraw altogether.—Terrye

This may in fact be a correct analysis. But just as the Constitution is ‘not a suicide pact’, nor is any reaction to geo-political pressures.

Dialogue and ‘reasonableness’ are two way streets. I frankly have zero interest in a monologue with essentially myself ,simply because the perceived alternatives are ‘unpleasant’. I really don’t see ‘mainstream’ Islam stepping up to the plate, here. Which I guess brings us back to why Wafa Sultan did that interview.

What exactly are we supposed to ‘dialogue’ with Islam about? We are or at least we should be unwilling to accomodate ANY of the demands for Islamic Super-Status, and as far as the West is concerned all Islam can ever be but a ‘personal’ choice. It has no claim to be the ’social’ arbiter except as its followers so select it. None.

If ‘Extremist’ Islam wants to remain a medieval cult with what we would consider ‘barbaric’ social customs, and an atrophied intellectual culture, frankly I really don’t care. They can turn the whole Islamic World into a carbon copy of the Sudan, if they so choose. Sucks to be them.

What I care about is its stated intention to ‘reach out and touch someone’. The only reason that Afghansitan and Iraq are in the forefront is as you state the goal of ‘modernizing Islam’. But that goal is merely a means to an end, the end being the collapse of Islamic Terror directed at the ‘others’. The end is our self-interest. We can dress that up nicely with ‘moral’ imperatives, but in reality we are doing what we doing ONLY because it is intended to benefit us.

Frankly I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist to see that the ‘Democracy Experiments’ will not long survive the end of the Bush Presidency. Either they will be essentially successful or they will be declared as failures. It’s not really a matter of short attention spans, it’s a matter of practical reality.

I think what a lot of commenters on this post have been saying is that someone, somewhere, somehow, should be enlightening the ‘Islamic’ World that there is always a Plan ‘B’, and that Plan ‘B’ always comes before any Islamic Victory. Islamic ‘moderates’ should begin to appreciate the meaning of that and react accordingly to ‘reform’ their own house.

They might have nothing to lose but we do. We are also quite unwilling to lose it when ‘push comes to shove’. They might as you say be winning a few ‘tactical’ victories, but they are most assuredly losing the ’strategic’ battle. I don’t think they are intentially trying to make us ‘mad’. They just don’t have any respect for us, and conclude that we will cower before them at some point. Why should we not. We are just ‘infidels’ without the courage imparted by the ‘Way’.

They are dead wrong.

Mar 12, 2006 - 11:18 am 27. David Thomson:

ì…or they can force us to say to hell with them and return to the old days of Realpolitickî

Many Americans are no longer willing to distinguish between moderate Muslims and their more radical counterparts. They are now finding it easier to lump them all together and to dismiss them entirely. In other words, bigotry is rapidly becoming acceptable. The ìrealpolitickî option is an illusion. This only works when the enemy is a nation-state contained within certain geographical boundaries. Todayís conflict is worldwide and existential. It is literally a fight to the death between two entirely conflicting philosophies. We may wish to ìlive and let live,î but our opponents will not allow us to do so. They have every intention to dominate our lands. It is foolish to pretend otherwise.

Mar 12, 2006 - 11:20 am 28. Terrye:

dougf:

There are certain blogs I no longer visit because I find the hatred of all Muslims to be so offensive I don’t go there. So it seems to me that in a sense the Islamists have already won.

If it is true that the efforts to modernize the Muslim world do not survive Bush when where does that leave people like Dr. Sultan who can not leave places like Syria? Where does that leave any of us?

Right now in Afghanistan and Iraq, Muslims are risking their lives everyday in an effort to build a better life. But that is not good enough for us.
We want them to be braver than the editorial staff at NYT right here in NYC and we want them to be braver than the average citizen in a crime infested neighborhood who will not rat on a drug dealer.

So what is the alternative? Go find some guy like Saddam and look the other way while he fills the mass graves and say to ourselves, “He is a bastard, but he is our bastard and he keeps the rabble down”.??? Is this the alternative? Or do we just destroy them? What about the Koran, do we stop its publication and dessimination? Should we have camps for Muslims in the future, do we begin to look at them as criminals or just the enemy? In that case what about the Muslims here in the US? Do we trust them?

These guys have got it figured out. All they have to do to run us off and carry the day is a few well orchestrated demonstrations. And of course we respond by looking at more then 1 billion Muslims as if they were the Borg.

Mar 12, 2006 - 11:37 am 29. Steven Mitchell:

I think the situation is analogous to the child “Old Europe” behavior on defense. We’ve played the parent for so long, and *let them* be childish, that we make excuses for them when they throw a tantrum. Well, the fix to that is to “throw them out of the house”.

Same with Islamic moderates. You know they are out there, no matter how quite, because with that many millions of people, some will have some sense. (What the proportion is to the wackos, I wouldn’t begin to guess.) The correct approach, IMHO, is to expect all Muslims to be moderate and adult, then react appropriately for the exceptions (no matter how numerous). Ultimately, its condescending to treat the borderline ones as if they were fanatics.

Hold them to the same standard we would hold any civilized people. Some already easily measure up. Some will if they see it buys them something. Some will do it precisely *because* it is expected. That makes it easier to identify the remainder, and gives the moderates more incentive to handle them.

Dr. Sultan is being respectful of Islamic believers.

Mar 12, 2006 - 12:04 pm 30. Terrye:

Steven:

Yes, respect goes a long way. And remember, Dr. Sultan lives in CA. not the Middle East. She might not say these things if she were in Damascus, whatever her feelings were.

It is rather like the old South and the KKK.

Mar 12, 2006 - 12:18 pm 31. dougf:

The correct approach, IMHO, is to expect all Muslims to be moderate and adult, then react appropriately for the exceptions (no matter how numerous)–SM

I don’t see anything I can disagree with in the above comment by Steven. Which begs the questions of course :

A. What is ‘moderate and adult’ and who defines these concepts? I’m sure that to the ‘minority’ of extremists, they are being ‘moderate and adult’, or at least as moderate as their beliefs allow them to be.

B. What is ‘appropriate’ when dealing with the ‘exceptions’. Are we going to give them a serious lecture on civil society or will it be perhaps something a little stronger?

Terrye I don’t want to treat Muslims like the Borg. That is a rather demagogic construction of my comments. I like Winston Churchill way back when , clearly do not overly value Islam as a ’social system, nor in fact does Dr. Sultan who I think could best be described as an Islamic apostate, insofar as she has renounced Islam, and pronounces herself a ’secularist’.

I don’t have answers to your questions as to what should be done if or when the ‘experiments’ fail. No-one has those answers. I guess we will just have to play it by ear so to speak, but one of the answers will not be to run up the white flag in an attempt to be ‘moderate’ and ‘understanding’.

With that option foreclosed, I don’t see any of the alternatives as being overly attractive. I like you hope that it never becomes Them or Us , but should that happen, I would much prefer it to be them, ‘no matter how numerous’ as Steven aptly phrased the issue.

Good intentions aside, are you as confident or hopeful at this point of the ‘moderating’ influence of Democracy as perhaps you were 2 or 3 years ago? Honestly ?

Mar 12, 2006 - 1:11 pm 32. Terrye:

dougf:

I will be honest, maybe it is my background growing up in south central Oklahoma in the Civil Rights era, but I never expected things to change that quickly. If that were likely it would have happened long ago and we would not be discussing it today. Too bad Jimmy Carter did not deal with the mullahs three decades ago, we might be further along today.

It took a century for blacks to get the right to vote in certain southern states. When dealing with bigotry and prejudice and engrained cultural belief systems two years is not a long time, in fact it is only a beginning.

If most countries of the region could even be as involved with the wider world as Dubai is or as eager for the future as many people in Afghanistan seem to be then we would have some hope. But if we are going to give up after two years and some street demonstrations, then I don’t know what we expected.

Mar 12, 2006 - 1:43 pm 33. Kevin Peters:

Terrye:

I have read your post’s in the past and I think i know that your arguments come from a good place and that you are only thinking of what is best for our country. But I am frankly tired of feeling sorry for the supposed insults that we have thrown at the muslim world. The ridicule of the cartoons and the low respect towards some portions of the Islamic community is well deserved. And this isn’t about me letting off steam in some rush of testosterone. The most disrespectful blog posts on blog sites, and there have been some nasty ones no doubt, do not compare to the physical actions of the Islamo fascists. The ridicule and lack of respect will stop when the actions stop. Of course this does not mean that all Muslims share this view. But the reponsibility is on the Islamic community is to cure their cancer before they bitch about our acne.The west sometimes wallows in guilt and recrimination over the slightest hint of racism or injustice and there is not the same reaction in the Muslim world. You may get “of course beheading kidnap victims is wrong” but it is almost always followed up by some form of “it is the lack of respect for Islam that is the cause” Sometimes you have to shake people or communities into the world of reality. The major problem in the Muslim world is not the non-Muslims lack of respect for them. It is the arrogance that somehow a set of cartoons in another country could incite such violence and that such a large portion of their community can rationalize some or all of these actions. I think it comes to a point where respect has to be earned by actions and that it isn’t just automatically given to a person or a community, or a religion.

Mar 12, 2006 - 2:27 pm 34. Terrye:

Kevin:

I am not talking about hurting people’s feelings. I am talking about making strategic blunders in the case of allies like the UAE because we are blaming them for the cartoon riots because they are Arab. This is called biting off your nose to spite your face.

Why do you think the Iranians and Syrians egged on the rioters? Do you think their feelings were hurt? No, they wanted us to react by lashing out at people we need in the War on Terror. They want the division, they make hey off the trouble, it is in their best interest.

We just liberated 50 million people, most of them are Muslims and right now they are on the front lines in this war. It is their shrines, their children, their homes and their cities that are being destroyed. AlQaida has made it plain that anyone who works with the Great Satan is a target.

It would be a lot easier for them to forget about democracy and they just might if we decide that all Muslims, including the dead Iraqis and the people of the UAE are the enemy because they are Muslim.

Mar 12, 2006 - 3:02 pm 35. Terrye:

BTW, get a map and look at where the Str. of Harmuz is. Two countries control it and with it the flow of oil…one of them is Iran, the other is the UAE.

Mar 12, 2006 - 3:40 pm 36. Kevin Peters:

Terrye:

I go back and forth on the ports deal. At this point I think that if the cartoons had never been printed we would not be any better off then if they had been printed in every paper in the world. There seems to be little to no sense of shame from a large portion of the Muslim world. We went to war to help the Muslim Bosnians and the Muslims of Kosovo. We helped Afghanistan throw off the Soviets and the Taliban. Yet a series of cartoons and a buisness deal has “ruined” our rep? Frankly, I am tired of walking on eggshells, especially considering the actions and the lack of respect that large sections of the Muslim world have towards other governments and other religions. The balls of the Muslim communities lecturing us when they show almost no shame over the outragious behaviour of many of their major leaders is a bit too much. of course I know the importance of the region. I don’t need a map. If I thought swallowing a bit of pride would bring peace to the region I would do it in a second.If I thought the ports deal would make a difference to the Arab street or their leaders I would push like mad for it. If I thought that apologizing for the cartoons would bring peace I might even consider that too. Maybe. But I honestly think it would not do a damn thing. I think we are being played and I think the moment the world tells the Islamo fascists and the “moderate” Muslim community that there is a certain level of civility that must be practiced before we show them respect the quicker they might think that they can’t yank our chains anytime they want. Is this an ugly scenario? You bet. But we a re there already and our treatment of them is not the problem.

Mar 12, 2006 - 5:04 pm 37. dougf:

My last kick at this poor bedraggled cat is to thank Terrye for the debate and to congratulate her for taking on all comers with verve and clarity.

I respect your position, Terrye. I once shared it completely, and still really do hope for its validation.

Just not as comfortably as once I did. I am now transitioning to the next available intellectual position consistent with defense of the civilization in which I believe. With any luck you will prove me wrong.

Here’s hoping.

Mar 12, 2006 - 6:09 pm 38. Steven Mitchell:

“A. What is ‘moderate and adult’ and who defines these concepts? I’m sure that to the ‘minority’ of extremists, they are being ‘moderate and adult’, or at least as moderate as their beliefs allow them to be.”

We can define “moderate” very loosely. I’d settle for any non-violent approach, no matter how hare-brained the reasoning behind it. “Adult” is one of those “know it when you see it” things, but I can tell you that the bare minimum is not engaging in paranoid conspiracy theories. Of course, we can’t *make* people act like adults. (See Old Europe on defense. See any number of American examples.) What we can do is not excuse the childish behavior when we see it.

As for who gets to say, we do. As my parents used to say, “If you didn’t want attention, you should have kept a lower profile. Now you have my attention. Deal with it.” Note that I’m not pledging America to police the world. Far from it. I am saying that when someone tries to give America a black eye, that we ought to assume they mean it.

“B. What is ‘appropriate’ when dealing with the ‘exceptions’. Are we going to give them a serious lecture on civil society or will it be perhaps something a little stronger?”

Appropriate is adult disagreement or punishment. If the actors qualify for minimum standards of civil society (see above), then we treat them like adults. We tell them we disagree, and we don’t sugar coat it. If they are particularly wrong-headed, a good mocking is in order. But neither do we insist on changes enforced by us. It is their society. They have to run it. If the actors don’t qualify for those minimum standards, we come down like a ton of bricks.

Also, I take the traditional view of “sovereign” control of a realm. To the degree that the adults in an area deal with their own problems in regards to terrorism, they are sovereign. To the degree that they do not, they are not sovereign.

Mar 12, 2006 - 6:15 pm 39. Terrye:

The terrorists have told the Muslim world that democracy means the open ridicule of their faith. I am only saying we do not need to prove them right. It is one thing for us to support freedom of speech and expression, we must…at the same time it is quite another for us to expect Muslims to say that the depiction of Mohammed in the papers is a good thing. That is not going to happen.

I am not idealistic, I just know that there are more than 1 billion Muslims in the world and a great many of them are in a region of such strategic significance we can not ignore them. I also know that we have more than 130,000 American troops in harm’s way and if we can not help them and their mission, it seems to me the least we can do is try and avoid throwing gas on fire when they are the ones most likely to get burned.

Mar 13, 2006 - 4:45 am 40. dougf:

It is one thing for us to support freedom of speech and expression, we must…at the same time it is quite another for us to expect Muslims to say that the depiction of Mohammed in the papers is a good thing. That is not going to happen.—Terrye

OK I lied. That was not my ‘last’ comment on this topic. I feel like Michael Corleone.

I hope you are not saying that we have some form of ‘responsibility’ to walk on eggshells because Muslims might take offense. While I do believe in not deliberately offending someone else just on the principle of being mannerly, that is the limit of my ‘goodwill’. It is a voluntary act. Not a compulsion.

I respect everyone’s beliefs. Well more precisely I respect their right to the belief. I might think they are profoundly wrong, but as long as they do not attempt to force their values on me or any others, I am content to ‘go-along-to-get-along’. I believe I already said that as far as I really cared, they could make their whole world into the Sudan . Their future happiness or lack thereof is a matter of some indifference to me. Not my job, man.

However when they demand that I respect their beliefs to the extent of not commenting on those beliefs, that is a bridge too far for me. I don’t care if they think depictions of Mohammed are a good thing or not. Fair enough. I have no problem with their displeasure. They are fully entitled. When they tell me that these depictions must not be done because they are offended, they can talk to the hand.

This appears to me to be a rather unbridgable gap. I am certainly not prepared to ‘adjust’ my behaviour to suit the internal demands of any ‘cult’ to which I personally do not belong. Not now— not ever. Perhaps this might be marginally acceptable for purely ‘tactical’ reasons( the fire warning in a crowded theatre exception), but there would have to be a very very very clear line between the actions and the expected results. And if there were that clear a line, then the ‘reasons’ to stay ‘involved’ would be very much in doubt, IMO.

No retreat or surrender of classic, secular, values in pursuit of peace with a conflicting value system. That way lies eventual defeat. There is simply no end to compromise once you compromise the essense of what you are. Incompatible is incompatible. You should not go out of your way to ‘offend’ but neither should you ‘take orders’ not to do so.

Mar 13, 2006 - 6:09 am 41. Terrye:

dougf:

I never said we should refrain from standing up for our beliefs, in fact I made a point of saying the opposite.

What I said is that we are basing our definition as to what a moderate Muslim is upon his or her willingness to say “Hey those cartoons are just fine with me”. I certainly do not think the over the top hysterical reaction of the mobs to the cartoons is ok, but I don’t think that expecting Muslims to endorse the cartoons is sensible either. They are not going to do it and if we try to force that then we are doing exactly what the Islamists want.

Think about the Pledge of Allegiance and the words Under God. Not a big deal, not the end of the world…but when some lawyer from California tried to get those words out of the Pledge the American people rejected it. Of course we did not go crazy in the streets either, that is not the way we are…but to a lot of moderate Muslims those cartoons are probably in the very least in bad taste and people are going out of their way to offend them. So, are they supposed to say it is ok with them if it is not just because we want them to? I think our definition as to what a moderate Muslim is should have something more to do with whether or not they have explosives strapped to their bodies than it does to whether or not they think it is ok to print some silly cartoons designed to create a reaction.

I mean come on, we are talking about cartoons here and as wrong as it is for those people to riot because of them it is no more reasonable for us to walk away from or turn away from or abandon an entire policy over the issue.

I think it is getting to the place where it is surreal.

Mar 13, 2006 - 6:32 am 42. Steven Mitchell:

“However when they demand that I respect their beliefs to the extent of not commenting on those beliefs, that is a bridge too far for me.”

It’s a bridge too far for them, too. That’s how they got into the mess they are in now.

As far as I’m concerned, a moderate Muslim can have any opinion on the cartoons versus respect he wants. Rather, any opinion as long as he agrees that it wasn’t worth rioting over–then he is still a moderate. Once he crosses that line, he loses any claim to “moderate”, and has my attention as a voter of a nation with a policy that happens to conflict with his view of the world.

Mar 13, 2006 - 6:43 am 43. Terrye:

Steven:

You make a very good point.

Mar 13, 2006 - 7:04 am 44. waterdragon52:

Rhod:

The cartoon riots could be passed off as mere venting if they hadn’t been so heavily and so obviously orchestrated, from Abu Laban’s well-financed roadshow replete with three images that were extremely offensive that were not from Jyllens-Posten, but rather created by the imams to inspire a reaction. Then there’s the curious availability of a huge supply of Danish flags for burning, the embassy attacks in Syria and Iran — two countries were this could not have happened without official sanction — and, of course the curious timing, months and months after publication in an Egyptian newspaper. No the various middle eastern governments saw an opportunity to distract public attention at home and abroad from various events like the debacle at the Hadj, the sinking of that Egyptian ferryboat full of pilgrims, Iran’s nuke project and the crackdown on striking transit workers and Syria’s continued “activities” in Lebanon.

Mar 13, 2006 - 7:30 am 45. Terrye:

In fact I would say that the attitude I see and hear today in regards to this issue remind of the response to the Rushdie fatwa, a sort of weary disgust. But considering the fact that Iran is working on the bomb now it does not seem to be the case that our disgust has hurt them much.

Mar 13, 2006 - 7:30 am 46. Bruce Wechsler:

Nice debate.

While home for lunch, I begrudgingly watched part of a dramatization film of the 9-11 terrorists in the pre-9-11 preparation period.

In one scene, an angry and insulted terrorist is leaving a U.S. consulate office whining like a spoiled child to his buddy that they refused his visa “just because I am an Arab. Do you think a Jew would be denied? No, they would say where would you like to go and when?”

I don’t know who wrote the screenplay for this, but it rang true that an Islamist could and would simultaneously be able to be offended for being refused a visa for a trip to the U.S. while knowing full well that that purpose of getting the visa was to enable him to come here and mass murder its citizens.

I grow more weary every day of any call for senstivity to this enemy’s proclivity to taking offense. At the same time, there are countless cartoons that could and should be made and disseminated that ridicule the Muslim extremists that will disgrace them a’plenty without needing to include a depiction of their Prophet. Having the right to depict him in a cartoon and actually doing it are two different things. In this war, we must stir up many bees nests to bring the killer bees out of hiding. But stirring up all of them is not a plan for success.

Shaming, humiliating and disgracing the thugs and terrorists is the best weapon to have them lose stature, face and power in the wider Muslim world. But it must be smart-bombed.

Mar 13, 2006 - 12:18 pm 47. Terrye:

Bruce:

I am not talking about senstivity I am talking about not putting our troops in more danger than they are already in just so we can sit back safe and sound here in the US and show the ragheads whose boss.

As I said before we published the pics on our blog. I am not going to refuse to do that because of a mob. But at the same time I am not holding everyone in the region responsible for the behavior of that mob either and when we respond by attacking the entire religion and everyone who practices it, we are simply giving ammunition to the terrorists.

I fail to understand why that is so difficult to grasp.

Mar 13, 2006 - 12:54 pm 48. Bruce Wechsler:

Terrye:

I think your failure of understanding was that you thought I was characterizing YOUR views as urging sensitivity. I was not. Essentially I agree with you. Re-read my last two paragraphs and I think that will be more clear now.

Nor do I hold everyone in the region responsible for the terrorists and those who preach it (though the longer this “everyone” sits pat and allows the mob to distort and disgrace their religion in the eyes of the world, the more culpable they will become in my eyes).

Mar 13, 2006 - 1:23 pm 49. Rhod:

Waterdragon:

I know, and I haven’t said that the cartoon manias were “mere venting”, or that the manipulation of the cartoons for political gain wasn’t planned. I disagreed with Terrye’s analysis of their intentions.

I reject the idea that the reaction to the cartoons was created from nothing, rather than simply provoked, and that the goal of the strategy was to anger both The West and the Islamic world.

This theory only holds together if you believe that the Islamic World, ALL of it, wants total war with America and others. What they want, as I believe, is to encourage fear, futility and resignation in the West with a view to our withdrawl and retrenchement. Not bellicosity.

If I’m right, they failed, at least if we discount the craven reaction of media outlets everywhere that refused to publish the cartoons. But I’m unsurprised that the print variety of the chattering classes folded and ran at the first sign of danger. Call it Ink Courage.

What we see now, except in the bunkers of The Left, is a gathering disgust with Islam in general, which is loosening the ropes on the dogs of war. And that’s good, but I don’t think that’s what the mullahs had in mind.

Mar 14, 2006 - 5:08 am

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