Ayaan Hirsi Ali's op-ed in today' New York Times/Are there Islamic moderates?

Ah, the sound of one axe grinding.

i'm allowed to refer to irish people as micks and drunks.

We all refer to Irish people as micks and drunks.

Not the Scots, that would be the pot calling the kettle African-American

It is depressing to read about the incidents she brings up in the article. Fucking barbaric.

For example, I would welcome some guidance from that famous Muslim theologian of moderation, Tariq Ramadan.

Bit of professional envy going on here or what?

ban laurel, i've never been so offended.

under irish law, i could have you kneecapped for that.

Bit of professional envy going on here or what?

uh i think the subtext here is that she just hates tariq ramadan

Please, Irish boys are my downfall as it is. I've suffered enough.

uh i think the subtext here is that she just hates tariq ramadan

Well, he's a Muslim, so obviously she would

But the fact that he's not a poster boy for right wing Islamophobes is the main reason, I'd warrant

Asking "Where are the _____ voices speaking out against this?" is a classic technique for tarring an entire group, no matter how many _____ voices are actually already speaking out.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/466/story.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10480042

well, as i recall the major islamic groups in ireland spoke out pretty much immediately against both of the first two issues. i assumed that it was the same in the UK.

"...poster boy for right wing Islamophobes"

There's nothing more "right wing" than the mindset of the people who perpetrated the acts described in her article.

So?

does it matter if islamophobes are right wing are not?

or is it presumed that all right wingers are islamophobes and all left wingers aren't?

or is it presumed that all right wingers are islamophobes and all left wingers aren't?

You think I'm stupid or something?

general question, thrown out there.

You'd have to be stupid to presume that though

most boring potential thread derail ever

^^^ OTM

anyway- stupid to presume that you think it, or to presume that it's the case? i don't assume either is true.

Tom D serious question, do you know who tariq ramadan is?

big article from this summer by paul berman about him:
http://docs.google.com/View?docid=ah6sxjndq9qq_315dwk7qn

interview with FP:
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=2709

sorry to be a pedant

Now you think I'm stupid!

Jesus!

look i'm not trying to start shit w/ you, i honestly didn't get this: "But the fact that he's not a poster boy for right wing Islamophobes is the main reason, I'd warrant."

ramadan is that guy that doesn't eat, right?

xpost yeah, i didn't get that comment either, and no, i'm not picking a fight.

Considering that the consensus opinion in Islam is that she should be killed for apostasy, I can understand her search for 'moderates'.

um, how is that the "consensus opinion?"

how did you find out the consensus opinion, michael? did you take a survey of the world's 1.4 billion muslims?

if so, can i have their phone numbers?

Indeed. What I am implying is that Ayaan Hirsi Ali is very much the poster girl for right wing (or otherwise) Islamophobes the (Western) world over.

if so, can i have their phone numbers?

WHY BECAUSE THEY LOOK INTERSTING

Indeed. What I am implying is that Ayaan Hirsi Ali is very much the poster girl for right wing (or otherwise) Islamophobes the (Western) world over.

yup! but the substance of her beef with TR is not that he has a fanbase that she would like to have. unless you call that fanbase "europe," i guess.

The consensus among most Sunni and Shi'a commentators on Sharia, is that the punishment should be beheading. There are differing interpretations and the consensus opinion stems from the hadith and not any specific sura of The Koran, but that's what most of the scholars say.

i think tom is pointing toward the fact that hirsi ali has no room for "islamic moderates" who arent vehemently anti-islam

she's a hard woman to please, i guess

What defines "Islamic Moderates" in western opinion? Muslims who drink moderately?

I don't know exactly what her beef with Tariq Ramadan is, to be honest, I do think he would tend to be taken more seriously as a commetator on Islam than she would however - maybe only in Europe, I don't know, he does speak French, which might not go down too well with certain parties in the US, shall we say

the contradictions of AHA's fame are funny: in what other context would a militant athiest woman banging on about europe's secular intellectual heritage get a pass in the american conservative firmament? oh right, islam is bad.

Saying she's a "right wing poster boy for Islamophobes" is a typical way of not having to deal with what she's saying, or the reality of the fact that tens of thousands of Muslims called for murder over a teddy bear named Mohammad.

tens of thousands? really

The consensus among most Sunni and Shi'a commentators on Sharia, is that the punishment should be beheading. There are differing interpretations and the consensus opinion stems from the hadith and not any specific sura of The Koran, but that's what most of the scholars say.

what consensus are you talking about?? note also that "consensus among commentators on sharia" is different from "consensus opinion in islam."

lots of made up "facts" on this thread

"Indeed. What I am implying is that Ayaan Hirsi Ali is very much the poster girl for right wing (or otherwise) Islamophobes the (Western) world over."

I certainly sympathize with her, and I'm neither. I think you're totally wrong.

You sympathize with the statement "It is this order to choose Allah above his sense of conscience and compassion that imprisons the Muslim in a mindset that is archaic and extreme."?

"tens of thousands of Muslims called for murder over a teddy bear named Mohammad" = the sudanese government hired a few hundred protesters to stir up controversy for a variety of political reasons

^^ the religious substance of the teddy bear thing can be easily misread: as much as western right wingers want to use that as another episode of muslim insanity, the controversy was equally cynical. the bear was christened (lol) months before the woman was arrested, it was drummed up for local, political purposes by the gov't (greatest hit: darfur).

ie both the Somali authorities and your mark steyn types would have you believe it was a spontaneous outpouring of true muslim sentiment, but it wasn't.

xps!

anyway we all know there is a problem with Muslim religious culture's denial of the passage of time and changing circumstances, the conflation of civil law with religious law, lack of open dialogue, etc. the question is what to do about it. There are changes that from a global/humanistic standpoint need to happen within Islam (ie can't we all agree on basic human rights), but they can't exactly be forced from without.

also fuck a subscription to Harper's

BIG HOOS, do you have a guru?

-- dally, Friday, December 7, 2007 11:34 PM

Nope. There's a guy I call my teacher, but he's hardly infallible.

Getting into the specifics of my beliefs is besides the point though. I was using myself as an example of the fact that you're painting all religions with an absurdly broad brush. You know it, and you're being disingenuous.

i hate dawkins and hitchens and all the other militant atheists, but srsly wtf max? religious people r nutty, get over it.

also fuck a subscription to Harper's

-- Shakey Mo Collier, Saturday, December 8, 2007 12:07 AM

wtf dude

Hands up anybody who thinks we'll ever be able to admit that "wars of religion" were really only ever about kings and other despots of varying titles using faith as an instrument to get poor folks to die in the name of their own completely secular and materialistic ego-driven goals

-- El Tomboto, Friday, December 7, 2007 9:27 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

not the whole truth.

choosing Hamas was fucking super-stupid, lolz what did they expect

Nah mean? I see your point, but nah mean?

Haha, wait, I totally fucked that post up.

I was going to put in "Bush" after the strike.

lol

also fuck a subscription to Harper's

-- Shakey Mo Collier, Saturday, December 8, 2007 12:07 AM

wtf dude

oh no biggie I just couldn't read the link

ah

i hate dawkins and hitchens and all the other militant atheists, but srsly wtf max? religious people r nutty, get over it.

-- That one guy that hit it and quit it, Friday, December 7, 2007 4:24 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Link

have you ever dealt with dally before?

i was going to write something else long and involved about relationships btw. "the west" and "the muslim world" (im going to use quotation marks b/c im dont want to pretend that either of these groups are homogenous or easy to categorize but for the sake of easy argument im going to anyway) but really i think tom is on point here: pretending that we of "the west" can do this from the outside "the muslim world," like we somehow have the solution to all their problems, not only helps exactly 0 people, it also makes "us" look like total dickwads. the dick-sucking worship of the enlightenment and the constant ritual "oh their customs are so barbaric" that seems to be endemic to even the most moderate views about the current geo-political situation is no more helpful than dropping a nuke on iran would be. this is a situation that dates back thousands of years, sure, but "dont throw stones at glass houses" is an easy way to pretend that the US and europe isnt at fault. guess what: we are, and we dont get to stand around acting morally superior to people who we've been shitting on for almost two centuries just because their anger has manifested itself as a rejection of the values we hold most dear.

i have encountered dally and debated him yeah.

in the uk you can't get away with 'the west' vs 'the muslim world' for pretty obvious reasons. or in europe generally, really. but you certainly don't get to claim that 'europe' has been 'shitting on' 'the muslim world' for two centuries -- it's way way way more complex than that. (for starters, 'europe' will shit on anyone who gets in its way; its pretty unideological about that.)

but to take an obvious and portentous example, the balkan wars & collapse of the ottoman empire, which obviously relates to israel and the modern middle east, cannot be reduced to a simple oppressor/oppressed dyad.

i'm not sure who is claiming to be morally superior to whom really. is enlightenment dick-sucking really less "helpful" than, like, all the things ali mentions in her article?

religious people r nutty, get over it.

Not the ones I know. But maybe they're the only ones who aren't.

sorry nrq--youre right, its obviously way more complex than im making it out to be. and i was pretty drunk when i wrote that. im mostly just responding to the stuff people are writing here on this thread, and the stuff i feel like i always hear said. there is pretty much nothing i find more sickening the self-righteous claims of moral superiority of westerners who lives, if affected at all by the movement of western imperialism, have only been improved. not that it would mean anything, but id be just as annoyed on a board populated with self-righteously moral muslims. but i maintain that the lazy complacency of "well everyone's at fault" or, worse, "dont let them get their hands on my pure enlightenment morals" is an easy way to avoid looking at the realities of the problem right now, which is that "the west" has power and "the muslim world" doesn't, and much of the blame lies at "our" feet.

sorry, to be clear--this is less about my own personal views on the issue and my irritation at the way people react (with "well, sure, we may have deposed democratically-elected leaders in the middle east, but they started the crusades" or "hey, they can do whatever they want in their backwater, barbaric country, just dont let them touch my beautiful, precious values of tolerance and freedom")

as long as max can find a way to blame the west, he's cool. what college are you attending, max?

Dally, from whence does the anti-Western anger of millions of Muslims arise?

what college did you attend dally?

how much money do you make?

where do you live?

what kind of car do you drive?

are there any other smirking irrelevant questions you can think of that might make you look more like the knotted diseased sphincter that you are

i said a quiet non-denominational prayer for all the sinners on this thread

knotted diseased sphinctersad boring townie

jesus dally you're like gzeus with a copy of strunk and white

i mean seriously i dont think ive seen anyone being as totally boringly, unoriginally "provocative" before

max check your webmail

uh woah townie's the wrong word i meant yuppie, and now i will stop posting on this thread forever and ever, remy your prayer has been answered, god bless :)

i need to stop posting on this thread before i make it a monument to "taking a troll too seriously"

I'm pretty sure gzeus was white. But dally is a troll and a racist and a cretin, so rilly, why engage
?

lol dude

i assume max meant "the elements of style by strunk & white," not that dally was/wasn't white.

yeah but hoos the clash can be bought a clerer view when examined through the concept of religious belief, not power relations; neo marxist type economic arguments that frame much of what could loosley be called western liberal angst dont have much to say about the central issues at stake here.

Dally, from whence does the anti-Western anger of millions of Muslims arise?

-- BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 9 December 2007 00:54 (10 hours ago) Link

what i was trying to get at is, this isn't about "Western". the bombers and would-be bombers in the UK were british-born or transnational professional men.

^^^ yes here

Something is going on which is closer to the spirit of the Unabomber and McVeigh than a straight-up anti-colonial war.

Also lol me for drunkenly misreading Strunk & White.

what i was trying to get at is, this isn't about "Western". the bombers and would-be bombers in the UK were british-born or transnational professional men.

-- That one guy that hit it and quit it, Sunday, December 9, 2007 11:37 AM

point taken.

enrique im interested to hear what you think the bombers would say this is about--i understand that using terms like "west" vs. "muslims" is fantastically problematic for a huge number of reasons but unfortunately enough those terms--those ideas--are the ones used by a lot of the "major players" (as it were) in this "conflict"--the terrorists especially!!

what the bombers would say this is about, if it isn't about "Western"

"Western" culture is the culture that many of the bombers grew up in - their ideas, at least in part, are products of that culture. Revolution is a very enlightenment ideal.

what the bombers would say this is about, if it isn't about "Western"

-- max, Sunday, December 9, 2007 5:21 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

i guess *they'd* say it was about the evil imperialist "west"'s ill deeds in the middle east, in chechnya, or more obscurely in kosovo.

it's hard for me to see a coherent position there, coming from people who either grew up in the UK, or lived, like, 200 metres from where i'm sitting now.

so i've taken the position that i'm less interested in what the young'uns say (ie the 07/07 guys) than in their psychological state + the ideology put out by the preacher guys the french had no qualms about deporting in the mid-90s, who were able to get a strong position in some british mosques.

the more recent attempted lamer bombers of this last summer, who were significantly older and held positions of responsiblity -- i guess they might say it was about establishing a caliphate in the west too, what with the attempting bombing of the nightclub 'slags'? i dunno, i'm just saying.

theirs is obviously the flipside of the 'clash of civilizations' argument.

Political Islam in the Service of Imperialism

i dont disagree with you. really, im just using the terms that michael and dally and whoever seemed to be using. i dont have a dog in this fight except for being really annoyed by people who find it really easy to a) categorize and label people, countries and ideologies as "western" or "muslim" (something that i obviously am doing too) and then b) describe those things as "barbaric" or "backward" with no desire to look at those people/countries/ideologies they think of as "western" and therefore their own with a critical eye.

well, sure, we may have deposed democratically-elected leaders in the middle east, but they started the crusades" or "hey, they can do whatever they want in their backwater, barbaric country, just dont let them touch my beautiful, precious values of tolerance and freedom")

max, I think this is a little unfair and while I shan't take it to heart, I do think I am at least one of your targets here. I have not denied the misdeeds of the West wrt the Middle East or, indeed, other parts of the world, but I was simply pointing out that the selective attention and memory of people decrying the use of the word 'crusader' (as ill-advised as I accept that to be) while there are Islamic (or should I say 'Islamic' lest you think I think that there's a monolithic Sudanese government consisting of nothing but clones) governments who either actively or passively support jihad against non-Muslims and (my original point) who recall the unpleasant and unwanted nature of the Xtian forays into the Levant while failing to recall that their earlier conquest was equally unwanted, is a form of intellectual dishonesty at worst and wishful and ideological thinking at best. Why anyone should choose defend such weak thinking is beyond me.

As to the second point, I don't think you can have it both ways. If you're arguing against an arrogant and interventionist West, then you are going to leave various countries to their own devices, some of which I think are barbaric, cruel, regressive and decadent. That is not to say that I don't think many policies in the West aren't the same, but just becuase I don't approve of waterboarding, the death penalty, the use of mercenaries, and the de facto death of Habeas Corpus in no way allays my duty to my own conscience to decry honor killings, the de facto status of other religions of the book as second class (not to mention the status of 'heathen' religions, the killing of proseltyzers of other faiths, etc... I am well aware of the evil and hypocrisy here in my country and in quite a few other Western countries but it has almost no bearing on whether other countries or cultures are similarly or differently hypocritical or evil.

You can sneer ("precious values of tolerance and freedom") and swagger rhetorically ("enlightenment dick-sucking") but I actually do see many of those values as worthy of struggle to retain and not merely some eternally acquired heritage not to be fretted over. I also have no qualms about being accused of having a Western bias. I am a Westerner inasmuch as I was raised in the West and in my attachments to many of the mainstream values of the West. Those values, surrounded as they are by 'native born' obscurantists and totalitarians, imperialists and protectionists, are hardly monolithic. If I categorize a country which is 97% Muslim, such as Iraq, as Muslim, I am not implying that it is monolithic nor lacking in complexity (that would be the job of the neo-cons). I am merely pointing out that most of its people directly, obliquely, explicitly or implicitly make some reference to a sacred text, a religious culture and a theology which do not apply to, say, Tibet or Iceland. I also find it worrisome and tedious that you infer things from what I say that I have neither never actually said nor thought. If you wish to have a discussion, even a pointed one full of disagreements, at least have the decency to engage with me and not your own bêtes noires and strawmen.

All the currents that claim adherence to political Islam proclaim the “specificity of Islam.” According to them, Islam knows nothing of the separation between politics and religion, something supposedly distinctive of Christianity. It would accomplish nothing to remind them, as I have done, that their remarks reproduce, almost word for word, what European reactionaries at the beginning of the nineteenth century (such as Bonald and de Maistre) said to condemn the rupture that the Enlightenment and the French Revolution had produced in the history of the Christian West!

this is an interesting point

It's interesting to note that in India it's the Muslims who are calling for a return to the ideals of secular democracy, as protection against what they consider to be the encroachment of religion into the public sphere, through the rise of Hindu nationalist parties such as the BJP.

I don't know anyone who was offended by the word "crusade". Mostly they pointed towards it as a freudian slip on Bush's part.

max, I think this is a little unfair and while I shan't take it to heart, I do think I am at least one of your targets here. I have not denied the misdeeds of the West wrt the Middle East or, indeed, other parts of the world, but I was simply pointing out that the selective attention and memory of people decrying the use of the word 'crusader' (as ill-advised as I accept that to be) while there are Islamic (or should I say 'Islamic' lest you think I think that there's a monolithic Sudanese government consisting of nothing but clones) governments who either actively or passively support jihad against non-Muslims and (my original point) who recall the unpleasant and unwanted nature of the Xtian forays into the Levant while failing to recall that their earlier conquest was equally unwanted, is a form of intellectual dishonesty at worst and wishful and ideological thinking at best. Why anyone should choose defend such weak thinking is beyond me.

As to the second point, I don't think you can have it both ways. If you're arguing against an arrogant and interventionist West, then you are going to leave various countries to their own devices, some of which I think are barbaric, cruel, regressive and decadent. That is not to say that I don't think many policies in the West aren't the same, but just becuase I don't approve of waterboarding, the death penalty, the use of mercenaries, and the de facto death of Habeas Corpus in no way allays my duty to my own conscience to decry honor killings, the de facto status of other religions of the book as second class (not to mention the status of 'heathen' religions, the killing of proseltyzers of other faiths, etc... I am well aware of the evil and hypocrisy here in my country and in quite a few other Western countries but it has almost no bearing on whether other countries or cultures are similarly or differently hypocritical or evil.

You can sneer ("precious values of tolerance and freedom") and swagger rhetorically ("enlightenment dick-sucking") but I actually do see many of those values as worthy of struggle to retain and not merely some eternally acquired heritage not to be fretted over. I also have no qualms about being accused of having a Western bias. I am a Westerner inasmuch as I was raised in the West and in my attachments to many of the mainstream values of the West. Those values, surrounded as they are by 'native born' obscurantists and totalitarians, imperialists and protectionists, are hardly monolithic. If I categorize a country which is 97% Muslim, such as Iraq, as Muslim, I am not implying that it is monolithic nor lacking in complexity (that would be the job of the neo-cons). I am merely pointing out that most of its people directly, obliquely, explicitly or implicitly make some reference to a sacred text, a religious culture and a theology which do not apply to, say, Tibet or Iceland. I also find it worrisome and tedious that you infer things from what I say that I have neither never actually said nor thought. If you wish to have a discussion, even a pointed one full of disagreements, at least have the decency to engage with me and not your own bêtes noires and strawmen.

-- Michael White, Monday, December 10, 2007 5:26 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark Link

also, luna was a dude

Mordant retort that one, and what, you wag.