"A man who...has nothing he cares about more than his own personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free"

In "An Ignored Manifesto," Diana West speaks with Jihad Watch Board member Ibn Warraq (author of Why I Am Not A Muslim) about the recent statement he signed against Islamic totalitarianism, and the death threats that followed it:

...A crude death threat has been posted at the British Muslim Web site, ummah.com -- the kind of Web site where, as Time magazine reported after the London Underground bombings last year, a poem said to have been posted by Abu Mousab al-Zarqawi glorified terror-bombings in Iraq, and another user wrote that "killing Americans is not murder, it is retaliation." This time, under a thread entitled "Writers Slam Islamic 'Totalitarianism,' " the names of the Free Expression 12 appeared and someone wrote:

"Now we have drawn out a hit list of a `Who's Who' guide to slam into. Take your time but make sure their [sic] gone soon -- oh, and don't hold out for a fatwa it isn't really required here." And then:

"Has anyone got that Christian kaffir 'Ibn Warraq's' real name yet?"

Scrolling through such illiterate spewings is a little like reading an interactive bathroom wall; but since the Internet has linked and even activated jihadi terrorists, it's not something to ignore. The poster continued: "Well them [sic] disbelievers [the signatories] have in effect signed a death wish via this statement so to hell with them, we'll just provide the help that they so dearly crave."

I asked Mr. Warraq, author of the superb "Why I Am Not a Muslim" written after the Salman Rushdie affair, about the threat. "We must take it seriously in one sense, but we mustn't let it stop us in our tracks," he said. He's right, of course; although most of the "world" writers, journalists, intellectuals -- have already been stopped in their tracks, intimidated, paralyzed, almost disfunctionally so. How to jump-start them again?...

So here we are, living in a world where a manifesto for free speech constitutes "[sticking] their necks out," draws death threats on the one hand, and silence on the other. Why did they sign it, then? Mr. Warraq offered the words of John Stuart Mill: "A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight; nothing he cares about more than his own personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by exertions of better men than himself."

Posted by Robert at March 17, 2006 6:27 AM
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