Should one ally with those with whom one disagrees?
Posted by Robert on May 19, 2006 6:18 PM
Paul Weyrich once told me that I should never hesitate to ally with someone with whom I had disagreements on some issues. Allies are hard to come by in any case, and agreement on one issue didn't require agreement on all issues. There are some with whom one should never ally, but they are few. I think it's good advice.
This is important today, as I have called repeatedly for Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists and others to unite against the global jihad. This will require working with people with whom one disagrees. This has come up because [1] Lawrence Auster, a conservative writer, has been attacking me on a more or less regular basis lately for defending Hirsi Ali and other sins -- including the contention that I'm a "neoconservative." So I write this not to convince Auster of anything, but to try to clarify these issues for people of good will who may read this.
It isn't important if Auster thinks what I am doing is conservative or neoconservative or liberal or yellow or blue. The jihad targets conservatives and liberals and neocons alike. But he is attempting to portray me as actually opposing the West, and playing into the hands of the jihadists. [2] He says, referring to me and people like me:
He sees himself as a defender of a besieged Judeo-Christian civilization which he hopes to save and restore. These feelings and allegiances make him a conservative; certainly they make him one in his own eyes. But what does this civilization to which Spencer the conservative is devoted consist of? It consists of a “vision of human dignity,” of “principles of the equality of dignity of all people, the freedom of conscience, and the other principles that are derived ultimately from Judaism and Christianity.” These are all liberal principles, as Spencer himself makes clear when he says of them, not that they are Jewish and Christian, but that they are derived from Judaism and Christianity. Liberalism is, of course, the secularized offshoot of Christianity. And it is to this liberal ideal that Spencer has given his heart...
The opposition that he sets up here is absurd. Because I speak of values derived from Judaism and Christianity, therefore I somehow oppose or don't value Judeo-Christian civilization itself? The equality of dignity of all people and the freedom of conscience are affirmed by the Catholic Church at the Second Vatican Council and in the Catechism of the Catholic Church as principles derived from the nature of man as created in God's image. These aren't Christian principles, but liberal ones and somehow ultimately anti-Christian ones? I know that strong statements of the freedom of conscience can be found as far back as St. Augustine -- another notorious neo-con, no doubt. And the equality of dignity of all people is as old as Genesis' statement about men and women being created in the image of God. If Auster thinks that defending them is somehow "neoconservative" and "liberal" and opposed to an authentic defense of Judeo-Christian civilization, I would submit that he has a narrow, pinched, idiosyncratic and ahistorical view of that civilization.
His thesis is based on his false statement that I have "often spoken, not in terms of defending the West from Islam, but of defending 'secular values' from Islam." In fact, to support his statements he refers (and can refer) only to one article, in which I used "secularism" to mean "non-establishment." I acknowledged that was imprecise (because "secular values" can be taken to mean the relativist materialism of modern culture, which I do not endorse) when he attacked me on it at the time, and have not repeated it. In contrast, I have referred countless times, as anyone who reads this site can attest, to the need to defend "the West."
But Auster doesn't seem to have much interest in factual accuracy, but rather exhibits a taste for ad hominem smears. Not only does he sling the mud at Hirsi Ali and me, but at Jihad Watch Board member Ibn Warraq. [3] He scores "Ibn Warraq’s aggressive, wise-guy atheism" and says he told Andrew Bostom: “You’ve got to tell Warraq that if he wants the support of conservatives, he can’t go around mocking God and attacking Christianity. His subject is Islam, he should stick to that and not attack religion in general.” He adds: "I said this to him several times, with utmost seriousness. I said Christians can work with secularists, if there is mutual tolerance. The message never got through."
Oh really? I called Andy Bostom myself about this. It's true that Ibn Warraq is an atheist, and that he attacked Christianity in [4] Why I Am Not A Muslim in a way that I thought was gratuitous -- although even there he compares Jesus favorably to Muhammad, as I do in [5] Islam Unveiled and [6] The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades). And I wouldn't characterize even the material in Why I Am Not A Muslim as an "aggressive, wise-guy" attack. It's a reasoned discussion of historical criticism -- I disagree with it, but that doesn't make it shrill or hysterical. Anyone who knows Ibn Warraq personally knows that he just isn't the "aggressive, wise-guy" type, but is courteous, cultured, erudite, witty, measured, and scholarly.
Anyway, since Why I Am Not A Muslim I have never seen Ibn Warraq speak or write about Christianity; I called to ask Andy if he had, since Auster had ostensibly spoken with him about it. No, Andy said; Why I Am Not A Muslim was written over ten years ago, and Ibn Warraq doesn't speak about Christianity now, and in fact he speaks -- and is well-received by -- Evangelical audiences. (More liberals, no doubt.) What's more, Andy told me that he explained all this to Auster -- but there is no trace of that in Auster's smear of Ibn Warraq.
Anyway, the heart of Auster's pique at me is that [7] he believes that by defending Hirsi Ali, an atheist liberal, I am allying with someone who would destroy what I am ostensibly defending. He calls her "an enemy of our civilization."
I don't believe Hirsi Ali is an "enemy of our civilization." She holds to some positions with which I disagree, but the key difference between her and the Islamic jihadists is that I am confident Hirsi Ali will never try to murder me. We can work out our differences in peace in the public sphere, in rational discourse and debate. It may be that she and I will be in the position of Murray Rothbard and William F. Buckley; Rothbard told Buckley, according to Auster, that although they were allies against Communism, they would be on opposite sides after Communism was defeated. That may be, but at this point I am only concerned with defeating the jihad -- and if that future break with Hirsi Ali or someone else does happen, it will happen within the political arena, and not play out with guns and bombs.
It may be that I will be on opposite sides with many of my present allies if Islamic jihad is defeated and we all survive to work out our disagreements after that. But Auster is picking unnecessary fights with me and with so many other anti-jihadists instead of fighting the mujahedin. In setting himself up as the Grand Inquisitor of the West and its defense, he is actually weakening that defense -- chucking soldiers out of the foxholes instead of letting them fight, at a time when we need every warrior we can get.
I have indeed often spoken about the values that the jihadists threaten today without always hammering home that they are Judeo-Christian -- not because I don't know and value that fact, but because they have now become near-universal outside the Islamic world, and we have a chance to build an international Resistance on their basis. I have often said that we need a broad coalition of Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, and more -- everyone threatened by the jihad -- in order to defeat the jihad. I stand by that statement, because as far as I can tell, no single one of those groups is strong enough to defeat the jihad by itself. And likewise not strong enough to defeat the jihad by itself is the tiny and ever-dwindling number of those whose views are acceptable to a dyspeptic misanthrope like Lawrence Auster.
Article printed from Jihad Watch: http://www.jihadwatch.org/2006/05/should-one-ally-with-those-with-whom-one-disagrees.html
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