COMensarations
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Marvin the Confused
A look at the latest misunderstandings on the part of a Pueblo Chieftain columnist.
Marvin Read has another ‘interesting’ column in the Pueblo Chieftain today.
In it Marvin marvels at the whys and wherefores of the Cartoon Jihad. He seems confused and disillusioned as to why we can’t all just ‘get along’.
There ARE reasons for the problem. And I’ve got some observations that might help him out.....
The increasingly violent brouhaha over Danish cartoons that lampoon the prophet Mohammed are a symbol of the almost impermeable wall that exists between Islam and the Western world.
This is true. Except, I think it’s not ‘almost impermeable’. I think it’s impenetrable. At least from the Western world to Islam.
There is neither a clear-cut right or wrong side, but the barrier is all too real and likely permanent.
This is patently ‘wrong’, if you look upon it from the Western perspective of “Freedom of Expression”. However, if one really doesn’t CARE about such freedoms, I guess it’s okay to say such a thing as what Marvin has said.
The division is older than the crusades of the 11th-13th centuries and as new as the latest riot, bombing, improvised explosive device, or attempt to force democracy on a culture unused to and unwanting of it.
This is true too. The division goes back to the 8th Century, when Islam invaded and conquered Spain. And again in the 9th Century when it crossed the Pyrenees into France to conquer the rest of Europe. It was only stopped from that goal by Charlemagne et al at the battle of Toulon.
I don’t understand why Marvin failed to mention that particular bit of history. Maybe he went to school where they already stopped teaching history because it was politically incorrect to teach children what had gone on before. I know I learned it when I was taught world history. Or maybe Marvin just found it convenient to ‘forget’ that business.
In some ways, the Mideast-West antagonism is as deep a rift as ever has split people. If racism, sexism and ageism are almost unsolvable and unresolvable, there yet have been some positive strides made in recent decades. On the other hand, there is today more hatred and murderous spirit between many Muslims and Christian nations than during those days of yore when, under the cross, armies went to “rescue” Jerusalem and other sites from Islam’s control.
There had been some positive strides, from the Western perspective. However, from the perspective of some people on the other side, such were considered anathema. From hence all the brouhaha.
The cartoon protests have become all but global: People have died, buildings burned, embassies attacked, ambassadors withdrawn, economies threatened. It is a new phase of a centuries-old war, limited for now but with the potential for expansion beyond either side’s grimmest nightmares.
I’ve been saying this for some time now. This is just another phase of the centuries old war. An offensive by Islam.
Why?
How is it that the Christian West and the Islamic Middle East have become so totally disrespectful, alienated and contemptuous toward each other?
Again, Marvin is being rather one-sided in this matter. Siding with the side that opposes his freedom of expression. And I have to ask myself the same question, “Why?”
The West is not contemptuous of Islam. If it were, it would not have allowed so many practitioners to move into it’s territory and practice its religion there. On the other hand, the nations that practice Islam as a national religion do not, repeat NOT, allow open expression of Christianity or Hinduism or Buddhism.
Why is Marvin missing this ‘clue’? Or ignoring it?
When the Quran admonishes: “Righteousness does not consist in whether you face towards the East or the West”; and “Let there become of you a community that shall call for righteousness, enjoin justice and forbid evil,” who is there to hear and heed those calls?
That book has more contradictions in it than that other old Book that predates it.
Case in point, let me point out THIS little tidbit from the Muslim book.....
“...kill the unbelievers wherever you find them” (Qur’an 9:5)
I don’t recall Christ saying such. Or maybe I missed something in all my readings of that Book from 1983 on; one chapter per night.
When the New Testament advises “Love one another as I have loved you”; and “Love your neighbor as you love yourself,” who is there to hear and heed those calls?
It’s hard to heed such a call when one can’t actually possess that Book. See Saudi Arabia. The Muslims seem to turn a deaf ear and a blind eye to what is written in there.
Christians hear that call and practice it. And they are subsequently slaughtered in Nigeria.
Were Muslims called to righteousness only among themselves? Were Christians called to love only one another? And if so, even that doesn’t seem to work.
Marvin seems to be forgetting a LOT of things written in the book that Christians follow. Including the parts about praying for those who despise you and wrongfully use you. And I wonder if he’s noticed that there are, to the best of my readings of the Muslim book, nothing to compare in their text with what I cited. Maybe he can point such passages out to me.
Does not the God who speaks through many prophets simply advise all members of the human race: “Get along with each other. Love.”
Yes. God does. However, I don’t think God and Allah are one in the same. Again, I’d like to see the passages in the Muslim book on the idea loving thy enemy.
Instead of any meaningful attempt to create some sort of a universal brotherhood, humans seemingly are run by leaders, governments, clerics and agents provocateurs who feed off of and utilize misperceptions of culture, religion and politics to create havoc, solidify division and, bottom line, grab wealth where possible and kill as opportunity avails itself.
The Muslims are very much interested in creating a ‘universal brotherhood’. They tool of choice, proven throughout this centuries old war, is the sword. I curious as to how Marvin doesn’t seem to recognize that?
In the matter of the cartoons, there are disparate issues involved: Freedom of the press, respect, prudence, tolerance, sensitivity and insensitivity. One cannot successfully argue from any viewpoint because, as the worldwide outburst of anger indicates, there simply is no acceptance of an opposing view.
Contrary to Marvin’s misconception, one CAN argue successfully from a particular viewpoint.
But maybe Marvin is getting SOMETHING of a clue. Which side is burning and killing over some image?
On the other hand, I don’t recall all the christians around the world rising up and burning and killing when the Piss Christ was displayed.
Is there SOMETHING of an ‘indicator’ there, Marvin?
No matter which side one takes, it is easy to agree with what the Austrian philosopher Karl Popper, in the 1940s, wrote in “The Open Society and Its Enemies”: One should not be tolerant with the intolerant.
Marvin might be getting on the right track here. However, he still seems a bit confused. Something to do with ‘tolerance’.
If I could talk with Karl Popper, I’d ask him, what are YOU ‘intolerant’ of? Nothing? I should hope not. Otherwise, would you tolerate a drunk in a bar fishing out his car keys and staggering towards the door?
As some other wag put it, “Tolerance is the virtue of those who have no convictions.”
This harkens back to my earlier observation that there is a ‘right’ and there is a ‘wrong’. Marvin seems confused about that sort of concept. But that’s nothing new for him, as I’ve seldom agreed with what he writes in his columns.
Although both sides are called to be tolerant, there are few who respond. Not in Denmark, the United States, Afghanistan, Pakistan or wherever the newest anti-cartoon riot breaks out or the latest newspaper editor decides to reprint the cartoons.
This sounds like a challenge for statistics. Again, I ask Marvin to show me the number of buildings burned and people killed as a result of the Piss Christ.
And, as the bombing of the Shiite Askariya shrine in Samarra and retaliation against Sunnis elsewhere in Iraq remind us, even the divisions within divisions grow.
Here is another indicator of the problems inside of Islam. I think the Christians, for the most part, got over this with the 30-Years War. There is still the ongoing issues in Ireland. But, by and large, the rest of us seem to get along fairly well.
We are a human race at war with ourselves. We are stubborn, incorrigible, hate-filled.
Speak for yourself Marvin. But if you’re amongst the Muslims, I counsel speaking VERY softly.
Maybe, in the long run, that’s the equally irresolvable difference between heaven and Earth.
You’ve definitely forgotten some of your education in christianity. There will be peace between heaven and Earth in due time....when His will is done on Earth as it is in Heaven.
Patience, friend. Patience......
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