"Radical" any religion in totalitarian control of a national gov't historically has not boded well for folks of other religions in that country.
Looks like Saudi Arabia hasn't been doing too badly. Did you read the article i posted above, or was it too long for you?
Yes, dear Byrnzie, I read your oh-so-long article, in both threads that you posted it. I've made it clear before what I think of your sources, so I'll ignore that for now. I know it's hard for you to understand, but not every debate is ended by bashing US foreign policy. Your Guardian article has nothing to do with the point I made about zealots in the proverbial "oval office". In fact, I believe it mentions Saudi Arabia once, only to note that it's the #1 breeding ground for violent jihadists.
Just so we're clear, I said (paraphrasing), "Radical religion in control of a national gov't is bad." You said "orly, did you read my article?" Is it your position that radical relgion (in particular Islam, from what I can gather from you) in control of a national gov't is actually preferrable?
Is it your position that radical relgion (in particular Islam, from what I can gather from you) in control of a national gov't is actually preferrable?
The west can no longer claim to be an honest broker in the search for peace
Egypt proved that our leaders see freedom as a question of strategy, not principle
Gary Younge
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 13 February 2011
'You think you know what Arab rage looks like," claimed an article in Time magazine last week. "Wild-eyed young men shouting bellicose verses from the Qur'an as they hurl themselves against authority, armed with anything from rocks to bomb vests."
But after some time witnessing Egypt's uprising the author had a revelation. Arabs had humanity and a range of attributes to go with it: humour, subtlety, sophistication, conviviality and, yes, anger – the full complement. "So who were these impostors gathered in Tahrir Square?" he asked, seeing his prejudice confronted by reality. "They were smiling and laughing, waving witty banners." Though he didn't mention them, many women were present too. And most of the weaponry on display, from teargas to tanks, was either made in, sponsored or subsidised by America.
The events of the last month in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere have challenged the way the west thinks of the Arab world (and how the Arab world thinks of itself). What remains to be seen is the extent to which these ongoing events confront the way in which western powers view themselves and their relationship to the Middle East.
Over the last decade in particular, the Arab world has increasingly been depicted in the west as a region in desperate need of being tamed so that it can be civilised. It has been portrayed as an area rooted in religious fervour, where freedom was a foreign concept and democracy a hostile imposition. Violence and terrorism was what they celebrated, and all they would ever understand. Liberty, our leaders insisted, would have to be forced on them through the barrel of a gun for they were not like us. The effect was to infantilise the Arab world in order to justify our active, or at least complicit, role in its brutalisation.
While this view has been intensified by the 9/11 terror attacks, the war on terror and the invasion of Iraq, it was not created by them. "There are westerners and there are Orientals," explained the late Edward Said, as he laid out the western establishment's prevailing attitude to the region at the turn of the last century, in his landmark work . "The former dominate, the latter must be dominated, which usually means having their land occupied, their internal affairs rigidly controlled, their blood and treasure put at the disposal of one or another western power."
So the sight of peaceful, pluralist, secular Arabs mobilising for freedom and democracy in ever greater numbers against a western-backed dictator forces a reckoning with the "clash of civilisations" narrative that has sought to overwhelm the past decade. It turns out there is a means of supporting democracy in this part of the world that does not involve invading, occupying, bombing, torturing and humiliating. Who knew?
Evidence of this dislocation between expectation and reality went way beyond the pages of Time magazine. Where the west predicted chaos in the aftermath of Hosni Mubarak's departure, protesters came to sweep up the rubbish in Tahrir Square. When women in headscarves (those supposedly submissive victims whom the French government pledges to rescue from themselves) were embroiled in physical confrontations with the Tunisian state, France sided with the state.
In the crude Manichean struggle between political Islam and democracy invented by a wrongheaded strand of western liberalism, it was the Muslim Brotherhood that marched for freedom while the self-appointed defenders of the Enlightenment prevaricated for tyranny.
Last week Tony Blair said Mubarak was "immensely courageous and a force for good". On Sunday he said Mubarak's departure could be a "pivotal moment for democracy in the Middle East". The man charged by the major world powers with bringing peace to the region can't make up his mind whether he is for despotism or democracy from one week to the next.
Such are just some of the contradictions, hypocrisies, tensions and inconsistencies of the west's policies towards the region over the last month.
Where the west's self-image is concerned the principal casualty has been the insistence that it is an honest broker seeking to expand democracy, peace and freedom in the region and anxious to avoid meddling in any nation's internal affairs. This was never true. "We are in Egypt not merely for the sake of the Egyptians," the former British prime minister Arthur Balfour told the House of Commons in 1910. "Though we are there for their sake, we are there also for the sake of Europe at large." But in the postcolonial era it was repeated often enough on both sides of the Atlantic that western leaders started to believe it themselves.
So the truth is that the west was already involved. It is simply not credible to arm a dictator for 30 years and then claim neutrality when opposition mounts against him.
The west supports democracy when democracy supports the west. But Egypt further proves that, for the west, freedom is a question of strategy not principle. That's why, while most of the world looked on at the throngs in Cairo with awe and admiration, western leaders eyed them with fear and suspicion. They know that if the Arab world gets to choose its own leaders, those leaders would be less supportive of everything from rendition and Iran to Iraq and the blockade of Gaza. The west's foreign policy in the region has not simply tolerated a lack of democracy, it has been actively dependent on dictatorship.
Moreover, it became apparent that while the west has been deeply complicit in what has happened in the region, it was not even remotely in control of what would happen next. Indeed, it was barely relevant. The protesters saw the US neither as the primary problem nor the solution. Washington's preferred option of replacing Mubarak with Omar Suleiman in return for the promise of democracy at some unspecified future date revealed how little it understood what was happening in Egypt. This would have been the equivalent of a huge US social movement ousting Bush only to find him replaced by Dick Cheney.
But nor apparently did the US fully understand the tenacity of the monster it had created. Mubarak's final national address was not just a rebuff to the demonstrators but also to the White House, which apparently had no idea what he was going to say until he'd said it. The problem wasn't that Washington had no horse in the race, but that its horse was lame – and when it bolted, it dragged the US into a ditch.
While the west has been wrongfooted, its ability to influence events has not been extinguished. Mubarak's departure was a massive achievement. However, revolution demands not only the upending of the old order but the establishment of a new one. Removing a man is one thing; transforming a system is quite another.
"Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793," wrote Albert Camus, referring to Louis XVI's execution after the French revolution. "But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty for ever."
The west's credibility in the region has been terminally damaged. But while it lacks influence, it still has power. The king has fled. But the kingmakers still wait in the wings.
So then why does your government keep propping them up?
A) Do you enjoy being irrelevant? What does "my" gov'ts stance on anything have to do with my personal viewpoint on things? The US gov't, like any gov't, supports factions/movements/govts that they believe will further their own cause, whatever that is. One cause of the US is democracy, another is domestic and international security, another is economic and political (for lack of better word) influence. Often these conflict, sometimes they don't.
C) You don't actually know where I live, but thanks for assuming.
Is it your position that radical relgion (in particular Islam, from what I can gather from you) in control of a national gov't is actually preferrable?
Islam is no more radical than Christianity.[/quote]
Your inability to answer questions directed at you is unparalleled. Your answer to any comment about any other part of the world, in particular the Middle East, is to quote the Guardian and say "but look at the US on this"...or..."Christianity did this once, about 800 years ago, too" It's your stock-in-trade, your M.O.; frankly, it's your crutch. It answers no questions, provokes no thought, and moves the debate or conversation backward. While I'm not on board with that soulfire guy, it was borderline comical to watch you two going 'round and 'round. He, completely unwilling to discuss anything other than Islam; you, completely unwilling to answer his statements and questions other than to say "what about Christianity, what about the US" as if that somehow justifies everything else bad that's going on in the world.
Your inability to answer questions directed at you is unparalleled. Your answer to any comment about any other part of the world, in particular the Middle East, is to quote the Guardian and say "but look at the US on this"...or..."Christianity did this once, about 800 years ago, too" It's your stock-in-trade, your M.O.; frankly, it's your crutch. It answers no questions, provokes no thought, and moves the debate or conversation backward. While I'm not on board with that soulfire guy, it was borderline comical to watch you two going 'round and 'round. He, completely unwilling to discuss anything other than Islam; you, completely unwilling to answer his statements and questions other than to say "what about Christianity, what about the US" as if that somehow justifies everything else bad that's going on in the world.
It's called perspective - clearly something you have no grasp of.
You used the word 'preferable'. My answer was a way of saying 'preferable to what?' considering that most countries in the West consider themselves Christian nations - regardless of the seperation of church and state, which in the U.S is pretty debatable.
But then, when the world is black and white I suppose it's pretty difficult for you to see the grey.
"Radical" any religion in totalitarian control of a national gov't historically has not boded well for folks of other religions in that country.
Looks like Saudi Arabia hasn't been doing too badly. Did you read the article i posted above, or was it too long for you?
Suadi Arabia is a breeding ground for terrorists, I dont agree that its a good example
And I do agree that you should bring The USA into the argument. It is they who have given massive si=ums of cash to hold up the now ended Regime
Its time for egypts people to have a say.
If they want a theorocrocy based on any religon that is their choice to make.
If they want a secular state thats their choice.
If they want to tear up areements made by a military dictator to be freinds with who they all call their enemy
ITS THEIR CHOICE
And Im so proud at the way they GOT their Choice
Funny how they didnt have to kill 100,000 civilians to bring FREEDOM to their country
oh sorry should bring in the USA their the pillar of world society
And I do agree that you should bring The USA into the argument.
Which is why I mentioned Saudi, considering the years of support they've recieved from the U.S. But some on this board think we shouldn't mention such inconvenient facts, and they like to pretend that everything happens in isolation.
Should Saudi be governed as an Islamist state? Probably not - though that hasn't prevented decades of support from the West, in particular the U.S.
Should the U.S and the U.K continue to be big-business dictatorships where the public are effectively politically redundant, and where 'democracy' means getting to endorse the same system with a tick on a piece of card once every four years? Probably not.
Our so-called Western 'democracies' are designed to prop-up and support 2% of the population whilst shafting the other 98%. And the majority of people are consistently fooled and cheated into believing that this is somehow acceptable.
You used the word 'preferable'. My answer was a way of saying 'preferable to what?' considering that most countries in the West consider themselves Christian nations - regardless of the seperation of church and state, which in the U.S is pretty debatable.
But then, when the world is black and white I suppose it's pretty difficult for you to see the grey.
Preferable to a secular gov't. Thought that was pretty clear, considering my previous religion-neutral posts.
Most of the time I'm left wondering where your grey is.
Our so-called Western 'democracies' are designed to prop-up and support 2% of the population whilst shafting the other 98%. And the majority of people are consistently fooled and cheated into believing that this is somehow acceptable.
Quite the exaggeration. Yes, "Western" democracy is far from perfect but to imply that 98% of Westerners have it so terrible only highlights your bias and, perhaps, ignorance.
The article, on the other hand, was very interesting and indeed an example of the imperfections of Western democracy. Corporations and gov't make terrible bedfellows.
The article, on the other hand, was very interesting and indeed an example of the imperfections of Western democracy. Corporations and gov't make terrible bedfellows.
Right. And I'm not sure which is better or worse; governments controlled and determined by religion, or governments controlled and determined by money.
Comments
Just so we're clear, I said (paraphrasing), "Radical religion in control of a national gov't is bad." You said "orly, did you read my article?" Is it your position that radical relgion (in particular Islam, from what I can gather from you) in control of a national gov't is actually preferrable?
So then why does your government keep propping them up?
Islam is no more radical than Christianity.
The west can no longer claim to be an honest broker in the search for peace
Egypt proved that our leaders see freedom as a question of strategy, not principle
Gary Younge
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 13 February 2011
'You think you know what Arab rage looks like," claimed an article in Time magazine last week. "Wild-eyed young men shouting bellicose verses from the Qur'an as they hurl themselves against authority, armed with anything from rocks to bomb vests."
But after some time witnessing Egypt's uprising the author had a revelation. Arabs had humanity and a range of attributes to go with it: humour, subtlety, sophistication, conviviality and, yes, anger – the full complement. "So who were these impostors gathered in Tahrir Square?" he asked, seeing his prejudice confronted by reality. "They were smiling and laughing, waving witty banners." Though he didn't mention them, many women were present too. And most of the weaponry on display, from teargas to tanks, was either made in, sponsored or subsidised by America.
The events of the last month in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere have challenged the way the west thinks of the Arab world (and how the Arab world thinks of itself). What remains to be seen is the extent to which these ongoing events confront the way in which western powers view themselves and their relationship to the Middle East.
Over the last decade in particular, the Arab world has increasingly been depicted in the west as a region in desperate need of being tamed so that it can be civilised. It has been portrayed as an area rooted in religious fervour, where freedom was a foreign concept and democracy a hostile imposition. Violence and terrorism was what they celebrated, and all they would ever understand. Liberty, our leaders insisted, would have to be forced on them through the barrel of a gun for they were not like us. The effect was to infantilise the Arab world in order to justify our active, or at least complicit, role in its brutalisation.
While this view has been intensified by the 9/11 terror attacks, the war on terror and the invasion of Iraq, it was not created by them. "There are westerners and there are Orientals," explained the late Edward Said, as he laid out the western establishment's prevailing attitude to the region at the turn of the last century, in his landmark work . "The former dominate, the latter must be dominated, which usually means having their land occupied, their internal affairs rigidly controlled, their blood and treasure put at the disposal of one or another western power."
So the sight of peaceful, pluralist, secular Arabs mobilising for freedom and democracy in ever greater numbers against a western-backed dictator forces a reckoning with the "clash of civilisations" narrative that has sought to overwhelm the past decade. It turns out there is a means of supporting democracy in this part of the world that does not involve invading, occupying, bombing, torturing and humiliating. Who knew?
Evidence of this dislocation between expectation and reality went way beyond the pages of Time magazine. Where the west predicted chaos in the aftermath of Hosni Mubarak's departure, protesters came to sweep up the rubbish in Tahrir Square. When women in headscarves (those supposedly submissive victims whom the French government pledges to rescue from themselves) were embroiled in physical confrontations with the Tunisian state, France sided with the state.
In the crude Manichean struggle between political Islam and democracy invented by a wrongheaded strand of western liberalism, it was the Muslim Brotherhood that marched for freedom while the self-appointed defenders of the Enlightenment prevaricated for tyranny.
Last week Tony Blair said Mubarak was "immensely courageous and a force for good". On Sunday he said Mubarak's departure could be a "pivotal moment for democracy in the Middle East". The man charged by the major world powers with bringing peace to the region can't make up his mind whether he is for despotism or democracy from one week to the next.
Such are just some of the contradictions, hypocrisies, tensions and inconsistencies of the west's policies towards the region over the last month.
Where the west's self-image is concerned the principal casualty has been the insistence that it is an honest broker seeking to expand democracy, peace and freedom in the region and anxious to avoid meddling in any nation's internal affairs. This was never true. "We are in Egypt not merely for the sake of the Egyptians," the former British prime minister Arthur Balfour told the House of Commons in 1910. "Though we are there for their sake, we are there also for the sake of Europe at large." But in the postcolonial era it was repeated often enough on both sides of the Atlantic that western leaders started to believe it themselves.
So the truth is that the west was already involved. It is simply not credible to arm a dictator for 30 years and then claim neutrality when opposition mounts against him.
The west supports democracy when democracy supports the west. But Egypt further proves that, for the west, freedom is a question of strategy not principle. That's why, while most of the world looked on at the throngs in Cairo with awe and admiration, western leaders eyed them with fear and suspicion. They know that if the Arab world gets to choose its own leaders, those leaders would be less supportive of everything from rendition and Iran to Iraq and the blockade of Gaza. The west's foreign policy in the region has not simply tolerated a lack of democracy, it has been actively dependent on dictatorship.
Moreover, it became apparent that while the west has been deeply complicit in what has happened in the region, it was not even remotely in control of what would happen next. Indeed, it was barely relevant. The protesters saw the US neither as the primary problem nor the solution. Washington's preferred option of replacing Mubarak with Omar Suleiman in return for the promise of democracy at some unspecified future date revealed how little it understood what was happening in Egypt. This would have been the equivalent of a huge US social movement ousting Bush only to find him replaced by Dick Cheney.
But nor apparently did the US fully understand the tenacity of the monster it had created. Mubarak's final national address was not just a rebuff to the demonstrators but also to the White House, which apparently had no idea what he was going to say until he'd said it. The problem wasn't that Washington had no horse in the race, but that its horse was lame – and when it bolted, it dragged the US into a ditch.
While the west has been wrongfooted, its ability to influence events has not been extinguished. Mubarak's departure was a massive achievement. However, revolution demands not only the upending of the old order but the establishment of a new one. Removing a man is one thing; transforming a system is quite another.
"Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793," wrote Albert Camus, referring to Louis XVI's execution after the French revolution. "But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty for ever."
The west's credibility in the region has been terminally damaged. But while it lacks influence, it still has power. The king has fled. But the kingmakers still wait in the wings.
C) You don't actually know where I live, but thanks for assuming.
Islam is no more radical than Christianity.[/quote]
Your inability to answer questions directed at you is unparalleled. Your answer to any comment about any other part of the world, in particular the Middle East, is to quote the Guardian and say "but look at the US on this"...or..."Christianity did this once, about 800 years ago, too" It's your stock-in-trade, your M.O.; frankly, it's your crutch. It answers no questions, provokes no thought, and moves the debate or conversation backward. While I'm not on board with that soulfire guy, it was borderline comical to watch you two going 'round and 'round. He, completely unwilling to discuss anything other than Islam; you, completely unwilling to answer his statements and questions other than to say "what about Christianity, what about the US" as if that somehow justifies everything else bad that's going on in the world.
It's called perspective - clearly something you have no grasp of.
You used the word 'preferable'. My answer was a way of saying 'preferable to what?' considering that most countries in the West consider themselves Christian nations - regardless of the seperation of church and state, which in the U.S is pretty debatable.
But then, when the world is black and white I suppose it's pretty difficult for you to see the grey.
Suadi Arabia is a breeding ground for terrorists, I dont agree that its a good example
And I do agree that you should bring The USA into the argument. It is they who have given massive si=ums of cash to hold up the now ended Regime
Its time for egypts people to have a say.
If they want a theorocrocy based on any religon that is their choice to make.
If they want a secular state thats their choice.
If they want to tear up areements made by a military dictator to be freinds with who they all call their enemy
ITS THEIR CHOICE
And Im so proud at the way they GOT their Choice
Funny how they didnt have to kill 100,000 civilians to bring FREEDOM to their country
oh sorry should bring in the USA their the pillar of world society
Which is why I mentioned Saudi, considering the years of support they've recieved from the U.S. But some on this board think we shouldn't mention such inconvenient facts, and they like to pretend that everything happens in isolation.
Should Saudi be governed as an Islamist state? Probably not - though that hasn't prevented decades of support from the West, in particular the U.S.
Should the U.S and the U.K continue to be big-business dictatorships where the public are effectively politically redundant, and where 'democracy' means getting to endorse the same system with a tick on a piece of card once every four years? Probably not.
Our so-called Western 'democracies' are designed to prop-up and support 2% of the population whilst shafting the other 98%. And the majority of people are consistently fooled and cheated into believing that this is somehow acceptable.
The following article is a perfect example of this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... of-century
But I just feel the need to point these things out.
That's all.
Preferable to a secular gov't. Thought that was pretty clear, considering my previous religion-neutral posts.
Most of the time I'm left wondering where your grey is.
Quite the exaggeration. Yes, "Western" democracy is far from perfect but to imply that 98% of Westerners have it so terrible only highlights your bias and, perhaps, ignorance.
The article, on the other hand, was very interesting and indeed an example of the imperfections of Western democracy. Corporations and gov't make terrible bedfellows.
Right. And I'm not sure which is better or worse; governments controlled and determined by religion, or governments controlled and determined by money.