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One of the Idols of the Age is that "People Are The Same The Whole World Over" or, in another variant, "Everyone Wants The Same Thing." George Bush believes it. He believes everyone wants something he calls "freedom," which bears in his view a remarkable resemblance to the head-counting that nowadays too often passes for democracy, combined with free-market fundamentalism. The editorial staff of the Wall Street Journal believes that everyone wants economic prosperity, and once that is achieved, all other resentments, grievances, and triumphalist aggressive impulses will fade away -- just as we are asked to believe, apparently, that they have faded away in Saudi Arabia, or the other oil-rich Muslim states.
The obverse of this medal is the belief that All People Are Bad In Just The Same Way. In a world of celebrated and often forced "diversity," in order to make that Diversity work, we must be taught that when there is discernible bad (an earlier era would have allowed the word "evil") linked to some ideology, then one must be quick to answer, without stopping to study or think, that "all" faiths are the same, "all" of them have their "fundamentalists" and "all these fundamentalisms" are not only dangerous but dangerous to exactly the same extent, in exactly the same way. Only thus can other idols be kept from toppling.
And thus it is that the greatest Idol of the Age in the benighted, put-upon, self-flagellating West, that is, Diversity, depends on the mental lock-step insistence on two things:
Diversity is a Good Thing, inside our (Western) countries, without any need for proof of its sheer wonderfulness, and
While Ever-Increasing Diversity Is a Good Thing, In The End, We All Are Equally Good or, When Bad, Are Equally Bad. No ideology, no inculcation, need be noticed, or compared, or contrasted. That might prove too upsetting.
Deep down, We Are All Exactly The Same. Why? Because the deep belief in "Diversity" depends on it.
If you caught Christiane Amanpour’s TV series on “fundamentalisms” awhile back, you may have seen the presentation of those "Christian fundamentalists" (read: Fanatics). You may have observed how carefully the cameramen captured those flags, and took shots of hands uplifted in prayer or hallelujahs, to make sure the viewer got the impression of a Nuremberg rally, with these "Christians" heil-hitlering all over the place. It was very carefully done, very artfully and deliberately done. She, Christine Amanpour, was of course determined to make this group of Christians look as bad as possible, and then to convince us that they represent a huge number of people.
She attempted the same thing with those wild-eyed fanatical Jews, those "Biblical settlers" who think -- imagine that! -- that the Land of Israel, that gigantic land, practically the size of Connecticut or is it Massachusetts, was given in a Covenant to the Jews. What a terrible thing, what a thing so utterly comparable, is it not, to the view in Islam that the entire world belongs to Muslims, and that they must, by right, dominate everywhere, everywhere Muslims must rule!
Did you see a little something not quite symmetrical in her view, in her presentation, or that of her crew, so willing to play ball? Meanwhile, one wonders how she and others like her can stand themselves. And why CNN and the other networks so obviously insult us, in reducing the menace of Islam, the menace that only a fool could ignore, and the full scope of which, based on immutable texts, becomes clearer to the intelligent every day, to something like the non-existent menace from those wild-eyed Nurembergian Christians, with Amanpour as their recording Riefenstahl, or those crazy "West Bank" settlers, in their trailers, choosing to live among a million Arabs -- "Palestinians" -- who of course have every right to be there, because...well, isn't the Middle East the same thing as the Arab World, after all? Where do those pesky remnants of Jews, Chaldeans, Assyrians, Copts, Maronites, Mandeans, Yazidis, Armenians, and all the others come from? Why don't they go back where they came from? The "Arab World," the "Muslim Arab World" -- now that's more like it. That's just the ticket.
Because, you see, Every Group Has Its Crazies. And those crazies, you see, are exactly alike, in what they want, and how they act, and the size of the demands they make on the rest of us. But exactly.
That's the point of the abortive Dutch documentary. That’s the point of Amanpour’s series. You didn't think there was another point, did you?
Posted by Hugh at March 1, 2008 7:41 AM
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Great essay Hugh. It inspired me to do the search
This brings up an interesting column.
"True liberalism is essential if we are to create a new disposition between Muslims and the west"
* Madeleine Bunting
* The Guardian,
* Monday October 15 2001
Although this column appears to attack liberal fundamentalism, in fact it seems to be an extreme form of it. It appears Bunting identifies liberal fundamentalism with what we now call neocons and with Bush.
One wonders how much this is a knowing displacement of the real liberal fundamentalism espoused in the column and by Amanpour? How much self-reflection and cunning does Bunting have? Or Amanpour?
From 2005 sheds some light on how this was playing out in Britain from the Guardian perspective at that time.
Posted by: Old Atlantic![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jihadwatch.org/nav-commenters.gif)
at March 1, 2008 7:55 AM
“This is, in theory still a free country, but our politically correct, censorious times are such that many of us tremble to give vent to perfectly acceptable views for fear of condemnation. Freedom of speech is thereby imperiled, big questions go undebated, and great lies become accepted, unequivocally as great truths.”- Simon Heffer
"The philosophy of political correctness is now firmly entrenched over here (the UK), too, and at its core is a refusal to look the truth squarely in the face, unpalatable as it may be.
Political correctness is about denial, usually in the weasel circumlocutory jargon which distorts and evades and seldom stands up to honest analysis.
It comes in many guises, some of them so effective that the PC can be difficult to detect. The silly euphemisms, apparently harmless, but forever dripping to wear away common sense - the naivete of the phrase "a caring force for the future" on Remembrance poppy trays, which suggests that the army is some kind of peace corps, when in fact its true function is killing.
The continual attempt to soften and sanitise the harsh realities of life in the name of liberalism, in an effort to suppress truths unwelcome to the PC mind; the social engineering which plays down Christianity, demanding equal status for alien religions.
The selective distortions of history, so beloved by New Labour, denigrating Britain's past with such propaganda as hopelessly unbalanced accounts of the slave trade, laying all the blame on the white races, but carefully censoring the truth that not a slave could have come out of Africa without the active assistance of black slavers, and that the trade was only finally suppressed by the Royal Navy virtually single-handed.
In schools, the waging of war against examinations as "elitist" exercises which will undermine the confidence of those who fail - what an intelligent way to prepare children for real life in which competition and failure are inevitable, since both are what life, if not liberal lunacy, is about.
PC also demands that "stress", which used to be coped with by less sensitive generations, should now be compensated by huge cash payments lavished on griping incompetents who can't do their jobs, and on policemen and firemen "traumatised" by the normal hazards of work which their predecessors took for granted.
Furthermore, it makes grieving part of the national culture, as it was on such a nauseating scale when large areas were carpeted in rotting vegetation in "mourning" for the Princess of Wales; and it insists that anyone suffering ordinary hardship should be regarded as a "victim" - and, of course, be paid for it.
That PC should have become acceptable in Britain is a glaring symptom of the country's decline.
We were freer by far 50 years ago—yes, even with conscription, censorship, direction of labour, rationing, and shortages of everything that nowadays is regarded as essential to enjoyment.
We still had liberty beyond modern understanding because we had other freedoms, the really important ones, that are denied to the youth of today.
We could say what we liked; they can’t. We were not subject to the aggressive pressure of special-interest minority groups; they are. We had no worries about race or sexual orientation; they have. We could, and did, differ from fashionable opinion with impunity, and would have laughed PC to scorn, had our society been weak and stupid enough to let it exist.
We did not know the stifling tyranny of a liberal establishment, determined to impose its views, and beginning to resemble George Orwell’s Ministry of Truth.
Above all, we knew who we were and we lived in the knowledge that certain values and standards held true, and that our country, with all its faults and need for reforms, was sound at heart
George Macdonald Fraser. Epitath.
at March 1, 2008 8:02 AM
"That’s the point of Amanpour’s series. You didn't think there was another point, did you?"
-Hugh
Yes I did, Hugh: The one on top of Christine Amanpour's head.
Com'on, Hugh, you're just jealous. Stop whining, get a sex-change operation, adopt a funky accent, get into broadcast journalism and start making Big Bucks.
at March 1, 2008 8:03 AM
"Sex-change operation..."
I've had three or four. I keep changing my mind.
Posted by: Hugh at March 1, 2008 8:07 AM
@ Hugh
Have you been reading OLIVER JAMES, again?
What are you some sort of commie!
To be serious for a moment, AFFLUENZA makes some interesting points about our society and where it's heading.
at March 1, 2008 8:27 AM
There Was a Little Girl
There was a little girl,
Who had a little curl,
Right in the middle of her forehead.
When she was good,
She was very good indeed,
But when she was bad she was horrid.
-- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Written back in the day...
Posted by: Lex at March 1, 2008 8:57 AM
In truth, the diversity business is not really an equal opportunity employer which believes that "We are all equally good (or bad)." Under the rules of PC, being diverse is deemed better than non-diverse. Non-diverse equals being a part of the majority, established culture. Therefore, being part of the majority race, religion, or culture is bad, and steps must be taken to discourage a diminution of the majority, in order that we can "achieve diversity" and arrive at our utopian society.
However, PC rules do not apply to other cultures and societies. Nobody PC ever argues that Muslim or third-world countries would benefit from an influx of Western or Judeo-Christian immigration and cultural influence. Rather, PC argues that we need to respect the right of those cultures and nations to impose majority rule and to keep their populations pure and free of the taint of other cultures. If a Muslim country wishes to keep non-Muslims in a subordinate and dwindling status, for example, and to promote sharia law, that is a matter of respecting their right to run their country as they wish. And nobody PC ever argues that the West should increase birth rates to replacement values, or that the Muslim or third-world peoples should decrease theirs to prevent overpopulation.
It is hard to have affirmative action favoring one group over another, without simultaneously teaching an implicit lesson that the disfavored group is bad and deserves eventual extinction. And, once we start down that road, when do the rules change to end the institutionalized discrimination against the majority, or what once was the majority? When that group becomes a minority and no longer has the political power to effect such a change?
So, as in George Orwell's world, we are all equally good. But some people are more equal than others.
How did this all happen? Ironically, it was never intended. To achieve fairness, rules were set up to prevent discrimination based on various criteria, and to correct a perceived imbalance in the scales of justice. The thumb of PC was put on the scales to favor the "diverse" and minority members of our culture who had experienced historical wrongs. Those laws allowed lawsuits to be brought by members of the aggrieved groups, but not by the majority. An unintended side effect of those laws was that the protected groups were not really put on an equal footing, but were in fact armed with rights that the non-protected groups were not given.
There is an old saying that, if you have a frog in a pot of water, the best way to boil it alive is to turn up the heat slowly. Turn it up too fast, and the frog will jump out. The majority culture in the West is being slowly boiled alive by the cult of PC and diversity, and does not even realize it.
Posted by: Karl at March 1, 2008 9:05 AM
“And why CNN and the other networks so obviously insult us…"
They are a commercial for profit business and hence target only a small minority for insult (pesky intelligent self-educating people - who needs ‘em?). Thus they simplify without making distinctions since important distinctions require concentrated thought – for the producers too – and this is work and you don’t make big bucks asking your customers to work. Keep it simple stupid and keep the simple stupid.
at March 1, 2008 9:06 AM
I meant, under PC rules, "...steps must be taken to encourage a dimunition of the majority..."
Posted by: Karl at March 1, 2008 9:07 AM
HUGH: "Meanwhile, one wonders how she and others like her can stand themselves."
My experience is that the Left-wing, moral-equivalence crowd believes with all their conviction in the righteousness of their views. They see their tolerance of the so-obviously intolerant as a sign of intellectual sophistication and moral superiority.
For example, my Left-wing Brother, a teacher in our public school system, has been sufficiently influenced by me into understanding and acknowledging the malevolent nature of Islam. But his oft-pondered answer is that we show Muslims the way by jettisoning our own beliefs in Christian doctrine (and dogma)....to lead by example, if you will. His intellectual war on Islam has become a war on all religion...and in his wisdom, he has become an advocate of unilateral "disarmament"...(in the religious/ideological sphere).
It never occurs to him that
1) Muslims will not follow our example (as Hugh so adroitly tells it, we are not all the same)
2) By abandoning our Judeo-Christian patrimony, we would be further undermining our own loss of identity that began with the adoption of multi-culturalism in the 70s...and would be just paving the way for something else (Islam perhaps) to fill the vacuum
3) There is a degree of morality and utility in the Christian ethos that would be sorely missed in our society (and I acknowledge as much as a lapsed Christian)
Getting back to Christiane Amanpour and her ilk, we must understand that most of them are actually quite proud of what they perceive as their own enlightened, open-minded view of the world. Anyone who was ever a Liberal at one time in their life can't help but comprehend the mindset.
Posted by: Cornelius at March 1, 2008 12:35 PM
"One of the Idols of the Age is that "People Are The Same The Whole World Over" or, in another variant, "Everyone Wants The Same Thing."
I believe this is called relativism -- one of the most mindless ideas ever concocted in the mind of a man, but very much alive in the academic world today.
It gets trotted out whenever academics or politicians want to ignore an obvious evil -- unless it's a politically incorrect evil, in which case, they bring the full fury of their moral indignation down on it.
Islam just happens to be the darling of the relativist' today, and fundamentalist Christians and Zionist are anything but darlings.
Posted by: rational at March 1, 2008 1:12 PM
Increasing diversity in society, just for diversity's sake, is as silly as increasing entropy of a physical system just for entropy's sake; all you get is chaos and heat death.
Christiane Amanpour is a diversity fundamentalist. Imam's of the faith preach in universities and political pulpits throughout the West. This religiously indoctrinated diversity fundamentalism will prove just as deadly for civilization as the religious fanatics enabled by it. Then again, that's the aim of some of the preachers. But, unfortunately for their flock, when the civilization goes down, so will the church.
at March 1, 2008 1:19 PM
I had a sex change operation on 9/11/01.
I changed back into a man.
Posted by: poetcomic1 at March 1, 2008 1:27 PM
I'm sorry, but whining about political correctness, diversity etc is so tiring, overworked and repetitive. It is an industry in itself too. People yell into radio mikes and type into websites all day long about how PC is stifling and censoring them and is destroying the culture/country/world as they see it. It seems like every time you hear someone lecture or amuse us, they are telling us just how un-PC they are.
People and cultures aren't the same, and most people will acknowledge that. It gets to be that the alarmist telling us that the Muslims or the liberal censors are going to enslave us are just as repetitive and dishonest as everyone else. We survived the Commmunists, who had thousands of hydrogen bombs on top of missiles, space programs to other planets(unmanned), hundred thousand + tanks, millions of men under arms, countries in all corners of the globe and an incomparable fifth column. Yet we are supposed to tremble about some rag tag bands of primitive fanatics whose biggest coup to date was crashing a hijacked airliner into the WTC. Come' on, don't ignore the threat but keep it in perspective. We've survived way worse.
Posted by: Dumbo at March 1, 2008 1:38 PM
People and cultures aren't the same, and most people will acknowledge that.
Now you're getting the idea.
We survived the Commmunists, who had thousands of hydrogen bombs on top of missiles.
Communists, for all their utopian fantasies, are not suicidal. Islamists are, and they will need only one weapon to make a huge mess.
We've survived way worse.
Nice logic dumbo, some 70 million people lost their lives last time we ignored "some rag tag bands of primitive fanatics whose biggest coup to date was" breaking windows and burning books. What's your objective, to break that record?
Posted by: RalphInfidel at March 1, 2008 1:52 PM
Modern day truth-tellers like Geert Wilders, who dare to point out observable facts that contradict 'church doctrine' are to be slaughtered by savages who act with full acquiescence of the 'faithful'.
Posted by: Infidel33 at March 1, 2008 2:22 PM
Islam is the Anvil that Multiculturalism shall be pounded against. May the Smithy make a Sword of it.
Posted by: flowerknife_us at March 1, 2008 2:48 PM
The Equivalency axiom of Politically Correct Multi-Culturalism (PC MC) masks -- in some consciously, in others semi-consciously, and in others still unnoticed -- another, ulterior, axiom: the decidedly lopsided view that only the white West is evil and that the non-white Third World (the Noble Savage) is perpetually the "oppressed" victim of the white West. Often, these two axioms are held more or less in tandem, incoherently, by the votaries of PC MC. With that large segment of the PC MC West, whose illustrious exemplar is Pres. Bush, the ulterior axiom is not present in their thoughts and they would reject it if it were presented to them; but through the sea change in Western consciousness over the past 50-odd years, they have come to accept its siamese twin, the first axiom.
at March 1, 2008 3:48 PM
Racial and religious minorities in the US could be persuaded to the anti-jihadist viewpoint, but once you make the anti-jihadist movement to be a club with which to knock down the very heart of multiculturalism, I guarantee that you will see the various minorities in the United States--Asians, Hispanics and Blacks--as well as the liberals--swing against Anti-Jihadism out of sheer self-preservation.
Posted by: ibrahimX at March 1, 2008 4:36 PM
Man creates his own character.
It's a gradual process of making things automatic, from childhood on. Like speaking a language or riding a bike.
It's easier to learn new things than to unlearn old things. You can learn to skate easier than you can forget to ride a bike. You can learn a new language, but it is nearly impossible to forget your mother language.
The older you get the harder it is to change anything inside your head.
The bottom line is that by the age of 21, most people are nearly unchangeably good or unchangeably bad -- or unchangeably smart or unchangeably dumb.
As long as free will persists man can make changes in his own character.
But his options grow smaller with every year of life.
================
Cultures are deeply affected by this principle.
They give it far greater impact.
Take somebody out of their cultural context and they have a much greater chance of working a change in their outlook, for better or worse.
But of course, you can't do that with whole countries.
So people will inevitably reinforce each others habits of thought and feeling, making them even more resistant to change -- even assuming that they want to change something in themselves.
================
Cultures differ in the habits of feeling and thought they encourage and reward, or discourage and punish -- pretty much by definition, otherwise ... well, otherwise they wouldn't be different cultures, would they?
Cultures that encourage bad habits of thought and feeling will produce more people who have those habits and have them more strongly than others.
All this equality stuff is pure crap.
at March 1, 2008 5:11 PM
The raw material of which humanity is made probably is pretty close to the same the whole world over.
What men have made of that material, and must continue to make of it, is radically different from place to place.
Posted by: joeblough at March 1, 2008 5:20 PM
Humans are basically just animals and have the same basic requirements; food, security, and survival/continuation of the species. Animals are all God's creatures and they are neither good nor evil. It's beneficial to mix them together so each one can contribute to the whole of the animal kingdom by enhancing the range of diversity.
All animals also desire and deserve "freedom", so zoos should remove the cages and mix together, the lions, goats, snakes, mice, birds, etc for a wonderful example of diversity.
at March 1, 2008 5:43 PM
What needs to be is a forum for the Amanpour's and Wilders of the media crowd to join for media debates. Where one controversial view is rebutted by another. I mean, who could counter why and how for Amanpour's portrayal of a Christian seen "heil-hitlering?" Who could put this scene in context and perspective that renders such behavior inconsequential in comparison to the Muslim? I could.
For instance, and just off the top of my head now, I'm sure this next thought will need editing and polishing to bring it practical, bring for the audience to consider that the Christian is more open-minded and practical, sensible and rational when conducting themselves inside the events of daily life. Sure, both the Christian and Muslim reaches for the Tylenol to relieve the headache, but where and how did the Tylenol come to exist? Is Tylenol or any modern convenience or luxury or utility a product of an Islamic or Judeo-Christian mindset? And why are Islamic men not known for solving problems in daily life in creative and industrious manners? In comparison, only a small handful of Western minds thought to and produced so much invention that makes the West so great. Western culture cultivates creative and industrious behavior from the citizenry. Not so in any Islamic culture. There are no Islamic industrious types; nothing of value is wrought out from the Islamic mind. Wow, Wahabism. There's a bunch of real men over there ...
I don't have the time to collect my thoughts and articulate exactly what I want to say, though these media shouts from the likes of Amanpour and Wilders need to be directed towards each other, so that an audience will receive a prolonged and concentrated discourse that addresses the issues presented. Right now its as if people are just producing these shallow media presentations to any audiences that will gather around and listen for awhile. There should be a forum where there is more prolonged discourse between two parties. People now simply shout their opinions and then walk away undisturbed by rebuttals.
I mean, Islamic thought is so bogus (God allah wants this done, God allah wants that done, ... and we all need the Qu'ran to study and tell us females need their clitoris's removed) that anyone with the resources and desire to do so shouldn't have too much trouble finding things to present which renders the entire Islamic world to nonsense.
... well, I just found the need to employ the plural form of the word clitoris, and so I know its time to leave this thought, and this forum for another time.
Jihad Watch is my favorite forum.
Posted by: k24anson at March 1, 2008 6:39 PM
Dumbo,
if you think that the Islamists' "biggest achievement" was the 9-11 attack, then you haven't been paying much attention to Jihad Watch till now.
We believe the "biggest achievement" of the radical Islamists is actually the gradual subversion of Europe, through massive Muslim immigration.
You now have significant minority Muslim populations in the Netherlands, Britain, and France, who are day by day more militant and more aggressive. They are demanding to live under the Islamic law of sharia rather than under British civil law. As the native population of these lands declines due to insufficient birthrate, the proportion of militant Muslims to native Europeans will grow until they become highly influential, if not altogether dominant.
An Islamicized Europe would be an geopolitical and strategic achievement that would dwarf all the anti-U.S. acts of terrorism combined.
at March 1, 2008 7:52 PM
For sure, we are all the same species, but that is a very abstract sort of commonality. When you consider what Islamic law allows against non-Muslims, e.g. jizya and dhimmi laws, and take that against the kinds of laws that civilized countries have in place for the treatment of non-citizens and the "Other", you immediately see the superiority of the non-Muslim world in this regard. Of course, it wasn't always thus and the non-Muslim world has come a long way and still has a ways to go in understanding and respecting strangers, but that's just the general human skepticism of the unknown talking, not a religiously-sanctioned superiority complex.
The ironic thing is that I think other components of multiculturalism have led to some good things, e.g. the acceptance of races as equal in principle, the immigration of large numbers of Indians to the US, increasing integration of blacks into mainstream society, etc. It's the inability to draw any kind of line at Islam and its destructive tendencies that make the committed multiculturalist such a damaging presence in the West. Can't we just be multiculturalist with an exception carved out for Islam? That's not to say that other cultures don't have their own flaws, including engrained sexism, lack of work ethic and general lassitude and fatalism, but none of them come close to the toxic nature of Islam. A world without Islam wouldn't be utopia, but it'd be a damn far sight closer to it than what we have now.
One of the other things that allows the Amanpour's of the world to continue blathering on about moral equivalence and fundamentalism is that they never really talk about what metrics they're using. By the metric "Number of actual terrorist attacks committed in the name of religion", Islam wins the gold, silver and bronze medals relative to all other religions. Islam not only has similar rhetorical fulminations coming out of the mouths of its fundamentalists (e.g., "All non-believers are going to hell", "My religion is the only true religion"), but they have the added "bonus" of actually taking the next step and trying to implement those judgements in reality, rather than letting heaven and hell sort themselves out.
Posted by: venividivici at March 1, 2008 9:33 PM
Christiane Amanpour is wrong about Islam. It can be proven that Islam is not a religion, but more of a cult and a political ideology. It's obvious, even with her father being a Muslim, that she's completely unfamiliar with the Qur'an and ahadith. Furthermore, she must not be a very good Christian if she is cherry-picking and distorting the Christian landscape. Clearly, there is something wrong with this picture: an educated Iranian who is a Christian goes out of her way to slam two of Islam's victims, Jews and Christians, and deliberately whitewashes the record of Islam. It makes me wonder if she is secretly a Muslim while pretending to be a Christian. Deep cover taqiyya and kitman.
at March 1, 2008 11:58 PM
Diversity suggests difference, which is true and clearly a good thing. Multi-culturalism demands sameness, to the self-negating extreme of tolerating intolerance, no matter how violently, hatefully, or methodologically carried out by others.
Multi-culturalism is clearly a bad thing. People are not the same and should be judged on how they behave in a civil society, their institutions, how they educate their children, how they treat women, how they treat religious & ethnic minorities, etc. All people do not behave the same in this regard. People are different, and this difference has meaning.
Diversity is a great thing providing proper civil behavior is communally accepted and enforced by the diverse that make up a common group. Armenians, Coptic Christians, Southern Jews, El Salvadorans, Japanese couples, El Salvadorans, Midwestern Americans, Sikhs, Canadians, British ex-pats…These are people we meet or see every day and with whom we share a civic sameness while appreciating differences in our respective cultures, faiths & identities. It is an ecumenical approach based on shared respect. Difference is a wondrous thing as long as the civic good is agreed upon.
Multi-culturalism insists on indiscriminate tolerance, which is bad. Indiscriminate tolerance is tolerance of intolerance. Multi-culturalism demands acceptance of forced intolerance.
It is said that we are all created in the Image of God, God anchoring the universal sameness that would equate all of us as human beings, or human civilizations, or cultures. If I am using the expression properly, does this not beg the question of the character, the nature, attitudinal, hermeneutical and otherwise, of the image itself? Cannot this image create a difference more powerful than the sameness insisted upon by multi-cultural dogma?
We are not all the same. We are different. We are diverse. We are not all the same.
at March 2, 2008 1:35 AM
Ibe
You mention Asians, in addition to Hispanics and Blacks. Why is it that Asians (and I mean people from China, Taiwan, Korea, India, Thailand, Philippines, Vietnam) don't have the same issues with mainstream Americans that Muslims do? Sure, you have your share of Chinatowns and other cultural footprints in various places, but you don't see any of these groups trying to change the US culturally in the way Muslims do.
Also, those Asians who have experienced Muslim misbehavior first hand (think Indians, Thai, Filipinos) are more likely to join the anti-Jihad cause (and I'm not counting Liberals among them). Even though some of these groups are hesitant to support the GOP because of a perceived Christian bias, they are even less likely to support Muslims. As an example, just look at your favorite group -the Joooos, who have traditionally been a safe Democrat vote bank, but have trended Republican in recent years due to Muslim supremacy being given more sympathetic a hearing on the Left than on the Right.
Posted by: Infidel Pride at March 2, 2008 2:07 AM
"One of the Idols of the Age is that "People Are The Same The Whole World Over" or, in another variant, "Everyone Wants The Same Thing."
This kind of meaningless twaddle is what Nabokov called 'Poshlost', and it is the way the post-modernist way of reasoning is spread.
Posted by: Warhorse at March 2, 2008 2:08 AM
Goofs like the Dalai Lama mouth off about the global need for peaceful solutions. Too bad that runs counter to the islam murder cult. They forsee end-times where non-muslims are slaughtered. For our academics, muslimania is a scrutiny free zone. See no evil and speak only good are the watchwords.
Posted by: supercargo at March 2, 2008 2:12 AM
"Everyone Wants The Same Thing." George Bush believes it. He believes everyone wants something he calls "freedom,"
.. And Americans re-elected him. As they say: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twise..
at March 2, 2008 6:01 AM
In his famous discusssion of Poshlost' or "Poshlust" (as he initially enjoyed spelling it) Nabokov does give one example of politico-moral equivalence, where the "flowers of poshlust' bloom": "We all share in Germany's guilt."
That unforgettable pinpointing may have led you to connect the word with other examples of easy moral equivalence, such as those I offered above. But the main meaning of the word has little to do with politics, and should be kept in mind. Nabokov again: Poshlost' "is not only the obviously trashy but mainly the falsely important, the falsely beautiful, the falsely clever, the falsely attractive." The cult of Diversity, which paradoxically relies upon, insists upon, the notiion that People Are The Same The Whole World Over, is not an example of Poshlost'.
Historically false, and idiotic, but not an example of poshlost'.
Posted by: Hugh at March 2, 2008 9:03 AM
Evan Sayet at the Heritage Foundation summed up the leftist mindset best- if you haven't seen the video, it's must see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaE98w1KZ-c
I myself like to sum it up as "evil is the victim of Good". It's not evil's fault it has a bad reputation- we should give it a chance! It's that big meanie Good always sticking it to evil- poor evil.... ~And that's how the left thinks in a nutshell.
Posted by: Sharmuta at March 2, 2008 9:52 AM
One of the more amusing things about the diversity crowd is how they love to announce that everybody is "the same".
But then, where's the diversity?
Posted by: joeblough at March 2, 2008 2:55 PM
Posted by: ibrahimX
Racial and religious minorities in the US could be persuaded to the anti-jihadist viewpoint, but once you make the anti-jihadist movement to be a club with which to knock down the very heart of multiculturalism, I guarantee that you will see the various minorities in the United States--Asians, Hispanics and Blacks--as well as the liberals--swing against Anti-Jihadism out of sheer self-preservation.
What's wrong with a pluralistic melting pot?
By allowing multiculturalism and political correctness to paralyze our thought processes to the point we won't discriminate between good and bad ideology, we give oxygen to a menagerie of violent ideologies; from the racism of the Nation of Islam and the KKK, to cultural fascism of Islam.
Self preservation is the best reason the groups you mention, as well as everyone else, should work toward revitalizing the idea of a pluralistic melting pot culture. Islam makes no allowance for differing viewpoints, minority or not.
at March 2, 2008 9:56 PM
I myself like to sum it up as "evil is the victim of Good". It's not evil's fault it has a bad reputation- we should give it a chance! It's that big meanie Good always sticking it to evil- poor evil.... ~And that's how the left thinks in a nutshell.
That nutshell leaves out the crucial factor of Reverse Racism: West is bad, Third World (pre-eminently Islam now) is good.
at March 2, 2008 11:20 PM
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