Freedom versus Religious Extremism
Cross-posted at Centrerion
(Forgive the generalization, as it is just that - obviously there are exceptions.)
One thing that continues to trouble me about, broadly, the "Left", is the tendency for leftists to ally themselves with brutal enemies of western civilization. There were many leftists during the Cold War who empathized with the
It troubles me because I identify much more strongly with left of centre values than I do with right of centre, yet the values of the left are so frequently and disturbingly used to make excuses for the twisted values of the far right. Political correctness is a decent idea in principle, but when it is used to justify the shutting down of free speech and expression, something is terribly wrong. Liberal ideas should not be used as a weapon against liberalism.
It becomes that much more perplexing when, as mentioned above, these same people will (again, correctly) vehemently opposed and attack the ignorant, irrational, anti-science, anti-freedom, anti-logic, anti-everything-that's-fun Christian right, but they will often go so far as to be apologists for the Islamic right.
Personally, I will have none of it. People of the left must start to recognize that what we are dealing with here is actually something even more dangerous than the Christian fundamentalists - they may be neurotic, sex-obsessed control-freaks, but they do not carry around guns and threaten to kidnap people in order to force "self"-censorship.
posted by Ryan Ringer @ 2/03/2006 05:06:00 a.m.
3 comments
3 Comments:
I think you exaggerate the left's support for Islam. If you check my blog you will see I link to the Workers Communist Party of Iran and Iraq who have fought hard as secularists against Islam, in particular around womens rights. Aslo my latest blog article on this issue is from the left and secular attack on the issue of blasphemy and freedom of speech.
Michael Moore was also making a point that not all insurgents were Terrorists, some had legitimate claims and still do. As we will see in the next few Weeks as Sunni's protest against the attacks by gunmen on their communities.
The American regime in Iraq banned unions, has held thousands of Iraqis with no charges, etc. etc. so that fuels resistance, which can be used by Islamic Fascists to fuel their cause. But that doesn't mean everyone in the Middle East is Islamicists, and the problem is that the Left in the Middle East often gets sidelined....in Lebanon it is stronger than anywhere else.....and again gets ignored.
See:The Need for Arab Anarchism
A brilliant post. You make a very valid point: the left needs to stop supporting Islamists. Partisanship has got the point where the expression 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' has gotten to be interpreted as the other side of the political spectrum is my enemy, so I can support rabid terrorists who oppose people who disagree with me on politics.
As to what Arnab said, it doens't surprise me that the NDP should be friendly to Hizballah supporters, because Svend Robinson has shown that the NDP is anti-Israel. Your example reinforces what Ryan said.
Again, a great post, and one I'm quite happy you cross-posted at centrerion. It was a while since ur last cross-post, but this was worth the wait. I'm going to add links at centrerion at the bottom of your post to posts of related interest, as selected by subject and author.
The "left" doesn't support Muslim extremists. The "left" supports Muslims. In other words, I, as a lefty for instance, support any Muslim who takes offense to these cartoons and reacts in a civilized manner with protests and/or boycotts or by speaking out against them. I do not support any Muslim extremist who reacts with violence or threats of violence.
Now lets talk about the "right" who does not support Muslims who react in a civilized manner because they see no difference between that and the actions of the extremists.
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