There is a strong apologetic content to [Taheri-azar’s] letters. He is engaging in da'wa, trying to convert those who read them to Islam. They are also revealing of the jihadist mindset. He also describes what he did on the day of the attack in great detail, including which sections of the Qur'an he read at which hours leading up to his attack. He also says that he rises at 3AM in his jail cell to...read the Qur'an.A few other observations about them:
1. Taheri-azar is not insane. He is articulate and perfectly in control of what he is saying.
2. He was not motivated by poverty or deprivation. Nor was he an ignorant bumpkin manipulated by sophisticated machiavels.
3. He firmly believes that he acted in obedience to Qur'anic dictates -- see the image above. (Yet in response we will no doubt get another flat statement from Islamic apologists, to the effect that the Qur'an absolutely condemns what he did and yet quoting no Qur'an, or if quoting any then only 5:32.) – Robert Spencer in this post
The son of Iranian exiles, secular in orientation, rediscovers in his mental desarroi the grid of Islam, the prism of Islam, Islam the System of Total Regulation, Islam the Complete Explanation for Everything. Islam -- That Is All Ye Know On Earth, and All Ye Need To Know.
So, this "moderate" Muslim who never before has given signs of being the other kind, the son of moderates himself, now gets in his powerful car, and drives to the place where his innocent fellow students stand around and chat, and he revs up the car, and aims it right at this one, and then at that one, hoping to kill or maim as many Infidels as he can.
And he writes out his whole little Message to The World, or rather to his lawyer, in longhand (one page of many has been put up at JW). And in it he shows that mingled blend of bits and pieces of Western learning. He mentions the phrase "clear and distinct ideas" which no doubt is all that remains in his not-very-impressive mind of his Phil. I course (the two weeks spent on Descartes). In his mind that makes him a thoughtful person, a learned person, a person who, having considered Western philosophy, has decided to jettison it for the Truths of Islam.
And the Truths of Islam also include attempting to kill Infidels among his fellow students at Chapel Hill. And include, of course, shouting -- and wishing -- "Death to Israel" at his hearing. He's not an Arab, much less a "Palestinian." He's someone raised from an early age in America. His parents are in exile from the Islamic Republic of Iran; they are not supporters of it. But still, he was told, and he believes, that he is "a Muslim." They did not tell him he was no longer a Muslim, or that they were in fact descendants of Zoroastrians, or Christians, or Jews, long ago converted under pressure -- the pressure of wishing to avoid the onerousness of the dhimmi status -- to Islam. They did not break, that is, with Islam. And having not broken with it, having allowed him, their son, to continue to think of himself as a Muslim, they allowed that mental virus of jihadist sympathies to remain within him, dormant, but still able to break out whenever his mental state disintegrated.
And so it did. And so he did what he did.
There is a moral here, for other quasi-Muslim or essentially non-believing Muslims. Don't, out of filial piety, continue to call yourselves Muslims. Make a clean break. Go with the best people - Ibn Warraq, Ali Sina, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Nonie Darwish, and all the rest. Just jettison Islam. Don't leave your children with the legacy of having to deal with the problem of reconciling this belief-system with what you know about the world, don't put them in the position of having out of filial piety to serve as apologists for Islam, and thus to put a permanent barrier between themselves and Infidels who may not take kindly to such apologetics, and will certainly limit the extent of their friendship for those who are apologists for such a belief-system.
Cut the cord. Be an apostate. You don't want your child, or grandchild, really "reverting" in a moment of depression or mental disarray dismay to that old-time religion, when the "religion" in question is Islam. You don't want anyone related to you turning into Taheri-azar, in Chapel Hill, or "Mike" Hawash, in Portland, Oregon.
Do you?
... his innocent fellow students stand...
Taheri-azar, a punk, will remain innocent only until convicted of Attempted Murder.
After that, give him 20 yrs in the state prison with a court order forbidding him access to the Koran and all other Islamic texts. Judges, who in America manage all jails and prisons, possess the fiat to do just that.
I love Hugh's mocking quotes he puts around "Mike" Hawash!
"desarroi" means consternation or dismay. i did not read further because there are other tasks, and the task of looking up the word in French took up the study time. not good.
I'm always pleased to have to learn a new word. I guess that's what makes horse races.
Here's a classic example of a moderate muslim; at least an islamophobe doesn't go around driving over people just for spite ?
Hugh, my love. I have no objection to learning a word in English, the ignorance of which is my problem. And I can only hope that your publisher restricts what you have described as an impulse. As the copyeditor removes foreign words, I hope you will allow her judgment to hold sway, even if you think, "Marmalade aux couchons!" The goal is communication.
The rest of the essay was quite good.
"I hope you will allow her judgment to hold sway..."
-- from a posting above
Sorry. No can do.
For even more unedurable French, in a piece entirely unconcerned with mere "communication," go to
http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm?frm=5871&sec_id=5871
or this one:
http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm?frm=5870&sec_id=5870
or this one:
http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm?frm=5524&sec_id=5524
And there are more.
My bad. Proving erudition trumps communication.
Not "proving erudition." Having fun.
Ah, Dahlink Huge! I love your new words...they're so vocabularious!
"vocabularious...."
Not deliberately aiming to displease, of course, much less discombobulate, lest I must needs rejobulate.
The problem Mr. Fitzgerald is these people were jetisoned from their native lands, entered America during a period of financial upheaval and leftist propaganda, and, as a result being neither successful Americans as the media portrays Americans and stigmatized by their native lands....they revert back to what they know....
The haven of failures which empowers and enables low self esteem individuals to form a collective of misery loves company.
Islam is like a drug. It addicts and is always waiting to draw back those who recover from it. It will not work to jetison Islam as in times of stress they always revert to what they know.
"Not deliberately aiming to displease, of course, much less discombobulate, lest I must needs rejobulate."
Just so long as you are dignified about it and do not absquatulate. As my English teacher always said: "Eschew obfuscation."
Given the actual model of Muhammad as the perfect man, it shouldn't be a terribly tough sell for Muslims to convince their kids that a mass murdering, robbing, lying, slave-trading, rapist, pedophile, who was handed down divine revelations that happened so often and coincidentally to satisfy his base instincts, is most likely NOT the final prophet of God's word, let alone a prophet at all. And I think that realization is quite probably just within the grasp of many Muslims. But what is so thoroughly conditioned and which therefore lies quite outside the realm of reason, making so many Muslims unreachable, is the horrific fear of Hell as conjured in the Koran. It's just way too graphic for someone who was conditioned as a child to believe that the Koran is the actual word of God.
The thing I always come back to on a personal level, in order to try to understand the grip that the idea of Hell has over Muslims if they renounce the faith, is that having been raised a Catholic, I am emotionally convinced that if I commit suicide, I would go to hell (or at the very least be lost in some vague pergatory like that space guy - Major Tom I believe - left floating around in that David Bowie song) - even though I don't even really believe in hell – at least for others! So see how crazy and outside the reach of reason that early emotional conditioning can be?
On the whole, I would be hesitant to suggest deconditioning human beings out of the fear of hell altogether (who knows what you would get?!). But sometimes it sure seems like it would be a good idea to do that with Muslims in particular because it seems like the emotionally conditioned fear of Hell goes so very deep into the psyche from such a young age and plays such a major and decisive role in overriding their ability to see anything objectively, most especially their prophet, and the wisdom of emulating his behavior.
Hugh, my favorite toy is the English language and I have deep and abiding respect for those (such as yourself) who use it well.
I am, however, (perhaps chauvinistically) suspicious of those who employ gratuitous frogisms in place of the far more eloquent English.
While knowledge of French was once a sign of sophistication, the French have devalued it until it is now the mark of sophistry.
Je ne sais quoi has become je ne sais merde.
(Pardon my French.)
amusing.
absquatulate is defined (and the story of humorous Latinate words is explained) here:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/absquatulate
"rejobulate" is not a hughgenesis:
http://www.comp.utas.edu.au/users/rsmith/bomford3/BomfordChapter35.pdf
Nobody, but nobody does English better than Gagdad Bob over at One Cosmos....except for the Fab.Oh.Lous. Huge of Fitzgeraldic fame.