no harm, no foul
JERUSALEM, Aug. 27 — Two journalists kidnapped in Gaza were released unharmed today after being forced at gunpoint to say on a videotape that they had converted to Islam.
The Times continues to amaze. It has distilled its vast and willful blindness, and its unbounded hypocrisy, into a single crystalline sentence. Bravo. The author, Steven Erlanger, has outdone himself.
Here, let me try. Two women kidnapped in Gaza were released unharmed today after being forced at gunpoint to perform sexual acts on videotape. Do you see anything wrong with that sentence? Would the hypothetical women actually be unharmed?
I have criticized Christians and Christian doctrine in no uncertain terms. But in doing so I take Christianity, and religion, seriously. The Times does not; it’s all a sham, of no real importance. The Times does not recognize a conversion at gunpoint as harm. Nor for that matter does the Times recognize being kidnapped as harm. These are small matters, of no real consequence. The journalists were unharmed. They were guests of the Palestinian state. Their eyes were opened to the Truth. No harm.
I call that willful blindness.
Recall that if an American serviceman at Guantanamo showed disrespect to a copy of the Koran, to an object, that would constitute harm, that would be abuse, perhaps even torture. No, scratch that. Should it even be alleged that an American serviceman was insufficiently deferential to the Book, it would be torture.
Portraying a cartoon image of the Prophet is a grievous injury. Try to imagine what the Times would have said had American servicemen forced Muslim prisoners at gunpoint to convert to Christianity, or better yet, Judaism. The Times sees no harm in a gunpoint conversion to Islam.
The Times and Mr Erlanger are hypocrites utterly without shame.
Posted on August 29th, 2006 by pwyll
Filed under: General
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While your second paragraph analogy is somewhat hyperbolic, but your point is well taken.
I’d like to think that, if I were told to announce to the world, at gunpoint, that I had converted to Islam, I’d quickly have a bullet in my head. Not that I’ve got a problem with Islam, just don’t tell me what to say.
The problem I’ve had with this story all along is that these two kidnapped men are constantly referred to, as in the Times article, as journalists. Fox News is a right wing propaganda machine, not a source of sound reporting on the news. While the New York Times needs to be called to task on this story, Fox News needs to be called to task for its masking itself as a new organization.
In my view, at least the Times is trying.
It is interesting that you consider my analogy of forced conversion to forced sex hyperbolic. In your very next sentence say you would prefer to die than than suffer your autonomy to be violated by forced conversion.
All the news media have their agendas. They are no more dispassionate or neutral than is this site. Whatever Fox’s faults (I do not watch them) I believe they side with the US in this conflict. The NYT does not.
You often call your commenters to task for not carefully reading and addressing the points you make in a post. So, back at you.
First, my comment discusses “announc[ing] to the world, at gunpoint, that I had converted to Islam,” not actually coverting. Conversion is a matter of the heart. Saying that you have converted to Islam at gunpoint is quite different than actually converting, i.e., accepting the religion as your faith.
Assuming I had the courage to do so, and knowing myself, my objection would be to being forced to say something against my will. The topic of the forced statement is a secondary matter. My right to say what I believe is primary. Stated differently, my mouth has always gotten me into trouble.
I concede your point that “[a]ll the news media have their agendas.” But then you go on to credit Fox News for “sid[ing] with the US in this conflict.” If we are talking about Iraq, siding with the U.S. is nothing to be proud of, especially for a news organization. What the Iraq situation calls for is sound reporting of facts (to the degree they can be established in the fog of war), and responsible editorial analysis of those facts.
Whether the news organization supports the current U.S. government position, or opposes it, is not the criteria on which the quality of that organization should be judged.
I think the political affiliations of a news organization do matter. I do not trust the NYT to report facts for the same reason I do not trust Al Jazeera to do so. Both have made it abundantly clear that accurate reporting of facts is not their purpose. They have no qualms about lying to me to advance the agendas of people who would kill me without compunction.
I did not say that Fox is a good news agency, much less that they are so because they side with the US. But I will say that the NYT, Reuters, the BBC, et alia have become a dreadful news agencies because they have become a propaganda organs for the other side. I don’t know much about Fox because I don’t watch television news, but I prefer even a poor news agency that is on my side of a war to one that works for my enemy.
We disagree about the war. I believe Islamofacism should be fought everywhere. Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, no place is off limits. If Iraq is the current battleground, so be it. From a purely strategic point of view, Iraq is perfectly located for fighting in the middle east.
I know you think it is Vietnam all over again, but I supported that war too, and think it is a disgrace that the US abandoned South Vietnam and Cambodia to the likes of the Viet Cong and the Khmer Rouge.
Iraq is a chance to bulid something worthwhile out of a charnal house. Perhaps that may still happen, time will tell. But if the US fails in Iraq, if Iraq fails in Iraq, I fear the devastion that will come from it. Islamists want holy war, total war. Allah will not save them if they ever get their wish.
I agree with you that one cannot strictly speaking force a conversion because true conversion is a matter of the heart. I did not draw that distinction because it did not advance my argument. And coerced verbal assent to claims of conversion is an unwiely expression. I likened CVATCOC to rape. In both cases force is used to tear away dignity and autonomy. That the heart does not consent is not at issue in either case.
But since you bring it up, we might as well be proper multiculturalists and ask whether the savages who coerced a claim of conversion might not have a different opinion. I cannot speak for them, but I strongly suspect they see the announced claim of conversion as binding. And the penalty for apostasy as death. Muslims are old hands at forced conversion. They don’t care about your heart, as long as you submit. That is what it is all about, submission to Allah. It is a practical matter. No one gives a damn what you think, so long as you submit in word and deed.
At this point in our exchange, after making a few observations about your well crafted comment / rebuttal above, I hope we can agree to disagree and move on. On the other hand, feel free to rebut the hell out of what I say below.
1. You attribute to me the position that Iraq, today, for the United States, is Viet Nam all over again. That is not my position.
Iraq today is an example of a country descending into civil war after a dictator is toppled. The same thing happened in Yugoslavia after Tito was gone; and in Yugoslavia the result, eventually, was “ethnic cleansing”, i.e., genocide.
In Viet Nam, Nixon did “cut and run”, disgracefully. Setting aside whether or not our pre-emptive attack on Iraq was a mistake, we are only making the situation worse by staying; and we are staying because of Iraq’s geographic and oil reserve strategic importance.
2. My next point is definitional. It concerns your use of the term Islamofacism. Webster’s College Dictionary defines facism as “a totalitarian governmental system led by a dictator and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism, militarism, and often racism.” I do not think today’s Islamic Jihadist movement meets this definition.
Today’s Islamic Jidad is a whole new breed of enemy to the United States, and requires a term to define it other than facism.
3. In your last paragraph you state that “Muslims are old hands at forced conversion. They don’t care about your heart, as long as you submit.” This comment warrants a reminder that Christians are also “old hands at forced conversion.”
I can certainly agree to move on. I apologize for putting words in your mouth; I dredged up Vietnam, not you.
Christians were old hands at forced conversion, but they have given up on it. Big difference.
Noted.