February 2007 Archives

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The Second Time Around

February 21, 2007 08:22 AM

Updated 2/24/07 below

Meant to post this a little while ago. It's from an interview with Hungarian Nobelist Imre Kertesz, in which the author and Auschwitz survivor reflects on the persistence of European anti-semitism. There's no happy ending.

Am I right then, that you think of anti-Semitism as something persistent? That you do not keep the hope that this problem will disappear after some time...

As long as it is considered a problem, it will neither cease nor disappear. In any case, the Nazi death camps established for the extermination of European Jews, combined with the creation of Israel constitute a new development – a new problem, if you like – not only in the history of Jews but also in that of anti-Semitism. For instance, there is no fitting anti-Semitic response to Auschwitz – if not the denial of the very facts of Auschwitz and the Holocaust. At first this denial seemed to be an act verging on the ridiculous. Today, however, it counts as "serious academic pursuit" and if anti-Semitism is ever elevated to the level of the state, if it is considered a state programme, then the officially supported, institutional falsification of history will become possible once again, as we saw in single-party dictatorships.

In democratic states, criticism of Israel provides a new and effective avenue for anti-Semitism – particularly when Israel does something that prompts criticism, which by the way other states do, too, whether or not they have to fight for their existence. A language has developed that I would like to call Euro-anti-Semitism. For a Euro-anti-Semite, it is no contradiction to recall the victims of the Holocaust in mournful tones, and in the next breath, under the guise of criticism of Israel, to utter anti-Semitic statements. Such things have been repeated so often that they are almost cliches. Remembrance of the Holocaust is important to stop such things from happening again. But, in fact, nothing has happened since Auschwitz that would prevent another Auschwitz from happening. On the contrary. Before Auschwitz, the extermination camp was unimaginable. Today, it can be imagined. Because Auschwitz really happened, it has permeated our imagination, become a permanent part of us. What we are able to imagine – because it really happened – can happen again. [My emphasis]

I have not seen this perspective anywhere else, since discussion among those who foresee a "Second Holocaust" - see, for instance, Ron Rosenbaum - tends to take European moral revulsion at the "first" for granted. In this view, modern Europeans either don't recognize or fail to give due consideration to the signs that history is repeating itself - particularly in the demonization and gradual dehumanization of the Jews and, in the modern version, "Zionists." This view assumes that if Europeans really knew "what was coming" they would move to prevent it. But what if Europeans do see the direction things are headed and simply aren't troubled by the consequences that may await the Jews? What if Auschwitz numbed Europeans to the horror of genocide? Worse, what if it actually whetted the appetite, by revealing that such a completely insane goal - the entire elimination of this rootless, problematic clan - was achievable? These are the implications of what Kertesz' observes in modern Europe.

MORE: Read this piece by Anne Bayefsky and despair at our own government's financial contribution to the furtherance of Jew-hatred.

Link · Europe | Israel | Jews | Modern Judaism

Ramadan goes Jesus

February 13, 2007 08:25 AM

Yet another auto-martyrdom from professional Euro-Muslim Tariq Ramadan.

I believe the administration refuses me entry into the United States because of my criticism of its Middle East policy and America's unconditional support for Israel, which has led it to acquiesce in flouting Palestinian rights. And undeniably, some American groups that strongly support Israel and will allow no criticism of American foreign policy toward it have been highly critical of me. But academics, intellectuals, and organizations that have supported me — like the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Academy of Religion (I presented a keynote address to its annual meeting late last year by videoconference, since the administration would not let me enter the country to speak in person), the American Association of University Professors, and the PEN American Center — have understood that the real issue is my freedom of speech, and they have continued to lend their weight to my legal appeal of the decision.

I am not the only person concerned. The "fear of ideas" that has taken root in the United States since September 11, 2001, with the refusal to grant visas to a number of academics and intellectuals, most of whom are Muslims, strikes at the very heart of American democracy. The muffling of critical opinion should be of immediate concern to all freethinking individuals. To accept such a state of affairs is to accept that the United States, in the name of the "global war on terror" and national security, requires all citizens to think the same way.

"Fear of ideas" - indeed. Criticism of Israel? Never heard of it. O when will America ever live up to the democratic example of Saudi Arabia - or maybe Syria - where Jews piously lecture the benighted yokels about the menace of their foreign policy?

We're all dreaming along with you, Tariq.

Link · Diplomacy | Islam | Israel | Middle East | War on Terror

Enter the Strawman

February 8, 2007 05:40 AM

Ian Buruma is starting to flail at his critics. Enter the strawman:

Professor Cliteur holds so dogmatically to his idea of secularism and the Enlightenment that any accommodation towards religious faith, specifically towards Islam, is tantamount to appeasement of religious extremism, or a form of self-hating nihilism. My objection is not to the Enlightenment as such, but to the ideological zeal of some of those who believe they are acting in its defence. If we wish to isolate and defeat religious extremism, we must must have mainstream European Muslims as our allies. The rather crude polemics spouted by Professor Cliteur will not be of much help in this endeavor.

Oh come on. There was nothing in Cliteur's essay to suggest that the defense of Enlightenment values demands the rejection of religious faith or practice. His point was only that critics such as Buruma are naive in their belief that "dogmatism" is the problem, rather than what people are dogmatic about. I'll go further. I'd wager that Cliteur would have little trouble with fundamentalism of the Christian kind, provided it made no purchase on his liberties - particularly the freedom to keep his head attached to his neck. He's keen to cite Spinoza as the "godfather of the Enlightenment," and Spinoza was no atheist. (If anything, he had too many gods - at least according to the Jewish elders who expelled him.)

Buruma, too, insists that he understands this difference. Really? As you can see above, he is quickly back to moaning about the "ideological zeal" of the world's Cliteurs. Then there's this:

I admire the achievements of the Enlightenment as much as Professor Cliteur appears to do, but I also believe that one of its greatest achievements is the rejection of dogmatism, of any kind.

So he's not a postmodernist, as Cliteur alleges; he's just fantastically enlightened - enlightened enough to see that one can be over-enlightened. This is a rejection of the "postmodernist" charge?

Link · Europe | Modern Islam

The Battle is Joined

February 5, 2007 12:07 PM

NOTE: Updated with criticism from Paul Cliteur below.

If you've been missing it, there's a fascinating debate continuing to unfold at signandsight.com over the recent Pascal Bruckner essay, excerpted below. Ian Buruma and Timothy Garton Ash have each responded separately to Bruckner's allegations (i.e. that they withhold Enlightenment liberalism from those who try to escape oppressive cultural archaisms). Both are a tad puzzled - not to say alarmed - by Bruckner's suggestion that their views are shared by Bush and Blair, and somewhat amused by Bruckner's evidently indestructible reverence for the "French model." Now comes feminist Turkish-German author Necla Kelek with a rebuke for the respondents. Buruma and Ash overlook the sinister measure of conformity in the Muslim Ummah as they laud the "diversity" among Muslims, she charges. So here's the current state of play:

Buruma - Islamic practice is not monolithic; where it is extreme, it won't likely be reformed by a shrill apostate (and avowed atheist) like Ayaan Hirsi Ali; Bruckner is a French wanker who probably hasn't left the inner confines of Paris in awhile.

Garton Ash - "Pascal Bruckner is the intellectual equivalent of a drunk meandering down the road, arguing loudly with some imaginary enemies." No further description can improve on that.

Kelek - Buruma (mostly) and Garton Ash ignore the startling degree to which extremist Muslim dogmas, if not universally accepted, are nonetheless the status quo in the societies where most Muslims live.

I recommend you give all the essays a read-through. This is going to continue for awhile.

UPDATE: Dutch law professor Paul Cliteur joins the fray, with a very thoughtful piece. He argues that "postmodern" tendencies among Western intellectuals have created categories of equivalence that are in fact illusory and, at the furthest end, fundamentally dangerous, because they deny even the right of self-defense to the heirs of the Enlightenment. Buruma's book "Murder in Amsterdam," about the death of Theo Van Gogh, continues to lie at the center of the debate:

What remains a mystery is why many intelligent people stick to the postmodern frame of mind, even though so many intelligent writers - Terry Eagleton and John Searle, to name just two - have thoroughly deconstructed its tenets. I think this has to do with the postmodernist conviction that an attitude that they see as relativistic and pragmatic would help in the struggle against religious terrorism. They hope that, if we abstain from radical criticism of the terrorist mindset, we can pacify the most radical elements. This is a great delusion, as Buruma himself would have understood had he thought more deeply about the material in his own book. For Buruma profiles not only protagonists of radical Enlightenment but also Amsterdam alderman Ahmed Aboutaleb and the city's mayor, Job Cohen. Buruma writes that he met Aboutaleb - a Moroccan-born Muslim who advocates pluralism - "surrounded by bodyguards. Like Ayaan Hirsi Ali, he needed full-time protection." That should have stimulated Buruma to further reflection on the nature of religious terrorism. As for Cohen, he has a reputation of being much too soft. He never employs strong language against ethnic and religious minorities. He is a man of "dialogue" and "respect," refraining from almost any kind of critique that might disturb the sensitivities of religious minorities. Yet Cohen was criticized by name in the letter that was left on the body of Theo van Gogh.

More to come.

Link · Europe | Modern Islam

Shepard Fairey Needs Some Help

February 4, 2007 03:20 PM

L.A.-based muralist Shepard Fairey, "one of the most visible artists in the world" (whatever that means), is among those on display in the "UsA" exhibit at the new Pinchuk Arts Center in Kyiv. Fairey "has been attacking public space with posters and stickers" for 17 years, says the literature.

Sounds like my kind of guy. But poor Shepard comes across as a bit confused. "Fairey's works question the difference between Soviet-style censorship and absolute media control with the American media machine that creates deception through the combination of abundant and conflicting information with easy, cheap access to entertainment," reads the handout. "It is not that the public is not informed or that it lacks access to information, they are just having too much fun shopping or watching TV to care."

Oh. So if tomorrow the American government seized control of the mass media, quashed alternatives, jailed critics and punished those who sought out "unauthorized" views, Shepard Fairey might not be able to judge the difference.

Guess he's just having too much fun shopping or watching TV to care.

Link · American Culture | Arts | Media

The Cowed Campus

February 1, 2007 08:23 AM

It is near impossible to convey the absurdity that pervaded American university campuses in the late 1980s and early 1990s to anyone who wasn't there to experience it for himself. (I use this last term generically, and not to exclude and thereby objectify women, who have faced unimaginable hardship over the Millennia.) We humble students were subjected to arbitrary speech codes and compelled to worship at the altar of a confusing and conflicted multiculturalism that aimed to "disempower" that half of the student body presumed to be basking in the privilege of its white-maleness. One of my fondest memories is from my cultural anthropology class, where the professor contended that the electron microscope was in no way superior to the lens of a cow's eye as an instrument of magnification. Perhaps this was true, if the object being magnified was the cow - but not if one were studying the atom. Elsewhere there were far more pernicious examples of this pedagogic tendency - such as the "feminist" biology class where men were invited to "listen, not talk," since the professor had been unable to have them excluded altogether. (She tried.) Speech and conduct codes on some other campuses - the Antioch College sex code, which presented highly detailed rules for physical contact between men and women, springs to mind - were substantively totalitarian. It is largely because of what I saw on campuses in those days that I rarely credit complaints from the political Left about various alleged intrusions on civil liberties, such as the Patriot Act. As Chuck D of Public Enemy once rapped, "Some of these G's ain't real/ I seen 'em once." As far as suppression goes, the government's a piker next to the campus Left. But why go on listening to me on this subject? John Leo lays it all out in the latest edition of City Journal.

Link · American Culture | Education