Salman Rushdie: confusing "secular values" with freedom
Remember Salmon Rushdie? Yeah ya do.....decades ago THIS was the guy who was the canary in the coal mine warning to the west of Islamic fanaticism and it's fascist embodiment in Islamic governments. He's the guy who first warned us about fundamentalist Imams reinterpreting the Islamic theological texts to suit their new found love of totalitarian control over their people.....as a sign of gratitude Rushdie had a "fatwa" issued against him ( sort of a $2.8 million hit contract paid for by the foamy-mouthed Islamic church).
Well the recent "fatwa" these Islamist foamers have placed on Denmark for that nation's free press publishing some political cartoons the foaming Mullahs took exception to, has reaffirmed Rushdie's warnings about Islam. Rushdie's empathy with these Danish Cartoonists, who now have an Islamist bounty on their heads has inspired him to speak out against this Islamist madness in an Anti-Jihad manifesto. Unfortunately he was joined by some flakey French academics and as usual, they convolute the principles of civil freedom.
I applaud this man for risking his life to defend his and our right to freely speak our mind and to oppose totalitarian strictures on the right to read what we chose. Here is an except from Rushdie's recent " Anti-Jihad manifesto" :
“After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism. We, writers, journalists, intellectuals, call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all.
The recent events, which occurred after the publication of drawings of Muhammed in European newspapers, have revealed the necessity of the struggle for these universal values. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the ideological field. It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats.”
The above sentiment clearly displays Rushdie's passion and commitment to civil freedom but also the manifesto’s major philosophical defects. The defective reasoning is courtesy of the French leftists he has collaborated with on this anti-Islamist statement. It's true Islamism can be considered a perversion of religious faith however, the three terrors of the past century – Fascism, Nazism (National-Socialism) and Stalinism – were certainly secular ideologies which produced societies with enforced "secular values".
Neither Adolf Hitler nor Joseph Stalin were the theocrats to which they are being compared. It takes flakey leftist “French intellectuals” to use the main component of humanity's horribly failed experiment with National-Socialism and Stalinism to create an emotional trigger to oppose “religious totalitarianism” with a battle call for “secular values,” which they hold to be “universal values.” All this does is trade secular totalitarinism for non secular totalitarianism.
Secularism does not guarantee a civil society, just cultureor human rights as the various 20th century forms of secular statism have demonstrated. It escapes today's secular left (statists) that the civil freedom, human rights and democratic governing systems they enjoy in western free nations are the product of proto-libertarian thinkers and jurists who applied the ethics of the reformed Christian belief system into law, civil institutions and governing systems......the builders of Western culture's greatest triumphs: common law, civil rights, civil liberty, equality under rule of law and representative democracy, were anything but secular. Locke, Blackstone, Jefferson, Hobbs, Paine....all committed Christians who incorporated the inherent respect for life and dignity of the individual of moderated Christiandom into the law and governing institutions of the west's most civilly evolved nations.
Today's defenders of western Democracy and civil liberty have no doubt Islamism is a threat to freedom and human dignity. However, as rational libertarians have warned before, some people, undoubtedly brave and well intentioned, but nevertheless mistaken, are prepared to weaken certain basic freedoms, in their fight against Islam and religion in general.
Well the recent "fatwa" these Islamist foamers have placed on Denmark for that nation's free press publishing some political cartoons the foaming Mullahs took exception to, has reaffirmed Rushdie's warnings about Islam. Rushdie's empathy with these Danish Cartoonists, who now have an Islamist bounty on their heads has inspired him to speak out against this Islamist madness in an Anti-Jihad manifesto. Unfortunately he was joined by some flakey French academics and as usual, they convolute the principles of civil freedom.
I applaud this man for risking his life to defend his and our right to freely speak our mind and to oppose totalitarian strictures on the right to read what we chose. Here is an except from Rushdie's recent " Anti-Jihad manifesto" :
“After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism. We, writers, journalists, intellectuals, call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all.
The recent events, which occurred after the publication of drawings of Muhammed in European newspapers, have revealed the necessity of the struggle for these universal values. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the ideological field. It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats.”
The above sentiment clearly displays Rushdie's passion and commitment to civil freedom but also the manifesto’s major philosophical defects. The defective reasoning is courtesy of the French leftists he has collaborated with on this anti-Islamist statement. It's true Islamism can be considered a perversion of religious faith however, the three terrors of the past century – Fascism, Nazism (National-Socialism) and Stalinism – were certainly secular ideologies which produced societies with enforced "secular values".
Neither Adolf Hitler nor Joseph Stalin were the theocrats to which they are being compared. It takes flakey leftist “French intellectuals” to use the main component of humanity's horribly failed experiment with National-Socialism and Stalinism to create an emotional trigger to oppose “religious totalitarianism” with a battle call for “secular values,” which they hold to be “universal values.” All this does is trade secular totalitarinism for non secular totalitarianism.
Secularism does not guarantee a civil society, just cultureor human rights as the various 20th century forms of secular statism have demonstrated. It escapes today's secular left (statists) that the civil freedom, human rights and democratic governing systems they enjoy in western free nations are the product of proto-libertarian thinkers and jurists who applied the ethics of the reformed Christian belief system into law, civil institutions and governing systems......the builders of Western culture's greatest triumphs: common law, civil rights, civil liberty, equality under rule of law and representative democracy, were anything but secular. Locke, Blackstone, Jefferson, Hobbs, Paine....all committed Christians who incorporated the inherent respect for life and dignity of the individual of moderated Christiandom into the law and governing institutions of the west's most civilly evolved nations.
Today's defenders of western Democracy and civil liberty have no doubt Islamism is a threat to freedom and human dignity. However, as rational libertarians have warned before, some people, undoubtedly brave and well intentioned, but nevertheless mistaken, are prepared to weaken certain basic freedoms, in their fight against Islam and religion in general.
posted by W.L. Mackenzie Redux | 9:31 AM
6 Comments:
Absolutely great observations Bill. I finished a post on this very same thing yesterday, with a different slant though. Your comentary has been duly noted, and will figure in my post tommorrow with a link. You've picked up on some angles I missed.
One thing I'll give Rushdie credit for, he's recognized the evil facing modern society. But, he's twisted historic reality to make it fit his "leftist" viewpoint. The upside is that he'll no longer be standing in the way while Europe tries desparately to rescue itself from extinction.
By the way, extinction for Europe may already be a forgone conclusion, unless European woman are willing to submit themselves to 3 to 4 child families and Europeans as a whole invite masses of immigrants from Latin America and non-Muslim Asia Proper. Demographics are a mathematical force that all the good will in the world can't undo. With a birth rate among traditional Euro populations running about 1.1; but running about 3.5 among Muslim populations, Europe is one or two generations away from cultural extinction. Add to that the fact that second and third generation Euro-Muslims are more radicalized than their parents and the picture is as ugly as hell. Enough to scare even Multi-culti lefties like Rushdie.
Hell, it scares me a whole ocean away.
Ya DT the key is the silly lefty concept that some mythical secularism in western culture keeps us free from religious percecution...but not political and it does not stop our constitutionally byffered democracy from being devolved into mob rule by either secular or non secular fanatics.
In the short term...We have to shut the borders to it until the cultural/political impasses with Islamist fanaticism are resolved.
Excellent Bill, and I couldn't agree with this statement more:
"In the short term...We have to shut the borders to it until the cultural/political impasses with Islamist fanaticism are resolved."
One problem guys: Closed borders don't deal with Islamist regimes that can get a hold of WMD; which in turn can be turned on us, either at home or abroad. Definately close the borders, but the real nasty part is in supporting Muslims who want to be peaceful. They don't have the capacity to protect themselves... so guess who'll have to do it?
Huh... Rushdie's leftist? Odd, as I thought all leftists were pro-terror, pro-Islamofascism, etc...
I guess there's a tiny number of exceptions. Even moonies can march to their own drummer, apparently.
I, too, raised an eyebrow at the word "secular" in the manifesto. But all in all, despite the fear the secularism concept conjures within me, a former staunch secularist-turned open-eyed, fully-awakened believer in traditional JudeoChristian values, which are actually the foundational values of modern world civilization even separate from the religion, I've openly endorsed the manifesto as it opposes Islamofascism.
The stakes are high enough to hold one's nose and be polite when our "secular" leftist friends come join us in an alliance against this great enemy. After all, the enemy of our enemy must necessarily be our friend... much like a certain feller named Warren was at least 'till we kicked Paulie's ass in the election...
Of course, they could and will still turn around following victory against the common enemy and themselves continue to lob doggie doo at us just 'cause they feel better from doing so...
Excellences and brilliance are difficult to capture in the same passage... but this was achieved with beauty and dignity.
Brutal honesty and truth come at such a high price it is easy to overlook the underlying sacrifice of this most stimulating comment...
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