Still Disagreeing with Myers

PZ Myers has posted a follow up to his post on the Muslim caricatures, and while I think he's correct to say that some have caricatured his own position, I still think the uncaricatured position is problematic. Clearly, he is not arguing for Islamic radicalism, nor is he arguing that religion should never be satirized, nor is he arguing that the Danish newspaper should be forbidden from publishing such satire. To suggest otherwise is to argue against a straw man. But at the same time, it's a little difficult to flesh out exactly what his real position is.

He clearly has a very distinct reaction to such satire when it is aimed at a minority religious viewpoint rather than at a majority viewpoint. That seems to be the key distinction in his mind. When satire is aimed at the majority viewpoint, say Christianity in the United States, he is gleefully in favor of mockery and ridicule to the very limits of decency, and perhaps well beyond those limits. That's why on January 24th, he linked to this collection of cartoons about Jesus, some of which are extremely tasteless (and some of which were quite funny as well). But when aimed at what he perceives to be a "poor minority", his attitude changes considerably:

But here's the thing, that liberal-lefty perspective: those Muslims are people. You know, human beings with needs and desires and families and aspirations, etc. We have to live with them, unless you're calling for their extermination or banishment (and no, we aren't. I hope.) They've got this horrible, evil idea of religion stuck in their heads, and the long-term solution is to educate them and imbed more secular ideals in their communitiesâmy objection is that I don't see that the Danish newspaper was trying to do that. A majority poking a minority with a sharp stick is not a confrontation or an argument. It's just being mean and petty. It's yet another kick when they're down to a group of people who are already marginalized.

But I don't remember hearing any concern that Christians are people, and we of course have to live with them too. I certainly agree that the solution is education and the influence of secular ideas (the same things that have worked to reduce such radicalism in the Christian world since the Enlightenment, I might add). The other problem here, of course, is that while Muslims may be a minority in some countries, they are a dominant majority in others. In many nations, like Saudi Arabia and Iran, the Islamic radicals are in control (though in Saudi Arabia, frighteningly, the royal family isn't as bad as some of the loonies who oppose them, the Bin Laden followers). But still, in many places Islamic fundamentalists are the oppressor, not the oppressed.

And even where they are a minority, it doesn't necessarily follow that they are poor and oppressed. Muslim immigrants in Europe may be huddled into poor communities, but in the United States Muslim immigrants tend to be highly educated, particularly in the sciences, and be a much stronger presence in academic communities than anywhere else. Consequently, they tend to have above average incomes. That is also, of course, a reason why American Muslims tend not to be of the reactionary fundamentalist variety.

I suppose he could respond that because Muslim immigrants in Denmark tend to be a poor minority (if indeed they do, I really don't know), and the newspaper was in Denmark, the situation therefore constituted a "majority poking a minority with a sharp stick", but I still don't think the facts support that charge. Again, remember the context in which they were published. And remember that the newspaper published as many cartoons critical of themselves as the ones that were critical of Islam. They were not engaging in mockery of a poor minority, they were making a very legitimate point about the degree to which violent thugs had managed to impose de facto censorship on artists and writers in that country.

In the end, I agree completely with Christopher Hitchens' closing remarks in an article in Slate on this subject:

The question of "offensiveness" is easy to decide. First: Suppose that we all agreed to comport ourselves in order to avoid offending the believers? How could we ever be sure that we had taken enough precautions? On Saturday, I appeared on CNN, which was so terrified of reprisal that it "pixilated" the very cartoons that its viewers needed to see. And this ignoble fear in Atlanta, Ga., arose because of an illustration in a small Scandinavian newspaper of which nobody had ever heard before! Is it not clear, then, that those who are determined to be "offended" will discover a provocation somewhere? We cannot possibly adjust enough to please the fanatics, and it is degrading to make the attempt.

Second (and important enough to be insisted upon): Can the discussion be carried on without the threat of violence, or the automatic resort to it? When Salman Rushdie published The Satanic Verses in 1988, he did so in the hope of forwarding a discussion that was already opening in the Muslim world, between extreme Quranic literalists and those who hoped that the text could be interpreted. We know what his own reward was, and we sometimes forget that the fatwa was directed not just against him but against "all those involved in its publication," which led to the murder of the book's Japanese translator and the near-deaths of another translator and one publisher. I went on Crossfire at one point, to debate some spokesman for outraged faith, and said that we on our side would happily debate the propriety of using holy writ for literary and artistic purposes. But that we would not exchange a word until the person on the other side of the podium had put away his gun. (The menacing Muslim bigmouth on the other side refused to forswear state-sponsored suborning of assassination, and was of course backed up by the Catholic bigot Pat Buchanan.) The same point holds for international relations: There can be no negotiation under duress or under the threat of blackmail and assassination. And civil society means that free expression trumps the emotions of anyone to whom free expression might be inconvenient. It is depressing to have to restate these obvious precepts, and it is positively outrageous that the administration should have discarded them at the very first sign of a fight.

Hear, hear.

Categories

More like this

Wow, but this post has inspired so many misconceptions. I do not think Muslims should be insulated from satire. I do not think there is parity between a cartoonist drawing a picture someone doesn't like and a Muslim calling for the execution of the cartoonist. I am not on the Muslim's side here,…
When it comes to the science of evolution, PZ Myers and I are in almost complete agreement; when it comes to other issues, it's scarcely possible that we could be further apart. The latest example of this is his essay on the Muhammed caricatures and the attending controversy. PZ appears to believe…
I've read several posts about the Danish caricatures, including at least one by someone who comments here, that says something to this effect: "I wouldn't post the Danish caricatures on my blog because I found them crude and based on stereotypes and I see no reason to make fun of these people."…
Ali Eteraz has an article titled Mistaken identity in The Guardian which is a long rambling reflection on Islamic identity, and specifically his Islamic identity. He is somewhat confused by the conflation of Islam with a quasi-ethnic identity. There are a few distinct issues here; though in the…

I have to agree with you on this Ed. It is, to borrow from a recent Krauthammer op-ed on Hamas, infantilizing Muslims to not hold them to the same standards that we hold non-Muslims.

I wonder where we might be today in men like Voltaire and Diderot had worried about hurting the feelings of peoples whose religion they satirized.

Ed, you have been dead on from the start. And Hitchens said it just right.

But it's worse than just the guy across the podium having a gun.

From Reuters:

But Iran saw things differently, saying the cartoons "launched an anti-Islamic and Islamophobic current which will be answered."

"It was an ugly measure. The Islamic Republic of Iran is prepared to sacrifice its life for its belief in Islam and the honor of the holy Prophet," Iran's government spokesman Gholamhossein Elham told a news conference on Monday.

I wonder if they mean what they say. I tend to think they do.

It's bad enough that there are people who are willing to sacrifice their lives to avenge perceived insult. But what happens when a STATE takes that position? And suppose they have nuclear capability?

Bush was wrong on Iraq (well-intentioned and stupid, or lying, or both), and it cost us in terms of international credibility. We might need that credibility someday when it really matters...

I'm totally fine with the condescending attitude toward the wicked, overwraught muslims in this situation. Just as long as you take the same condescending attitude toward James Dobson over his recent success in hounding NBC into cancelling The Book of Daniel...thekeez

You know... there are a hell of a lot of things that I find offensive and rotten about the muslim world. The almost general mistreatment of women's rights, lack of religious freedoms, anti-intellectualism, lack of free speech, willingness to allow dictatorships... lots of things spring to mind that are almost universal around the muslim world.

But you don't see me burning mosques, you don't see me advocating violence. The best way to deal with things that are offensive to you is trying to change them through peaceful means. If muslims don't like the way their faith is being portrayed, then why not educate people.

I am distrurbed by this concept that I am supposed to respect religions. I respect peoples rights to have different faiths. I respect the rights of New Age people ass much as I respect practicing Jews. But that the religions themselves are somehow deserving of some fundemental respect is crap. I will give them credit where they put forward good ideas like treating people like you would yourself like to be treated, but I am going to call them on the evil, stupid and pointless stuff.

thekeez wrote:

I'm totally fine with the condescending attitude toward the wicked, overwraught muslims in this situation. Just as long as you take the same condescending attitude toward James Dobson over his recent success in hounding NBC into cancelling The Book of Daniel

Well, I've hammered Dobson enough on my blog for the last 2 and a half years that I can hardly be accused of not being evenhanded here. But I still think it's important to note that there is a huge difference between Dobson and the Islamic radicals. Dobson's campaign against that show used entirely legal means, letter writing and petitions, to protest the content of the show. They didn't bomb anything or threaten anyone's life. I am still bothered by the fact that NBC caved in to them, but not by the means they used.

I'm usually on PZ's side of the fence politically. However, Ed is on the right side on this issue, I think. I'm appalled at how much sympathy religious fanatics rioting over cartoons are garnering from my fellow travelers on the left. I'm also baffled that so many people in Europe cannot seem to distinguish between endorsement of an statement on one hand and support for the right to freely make that statement on the other. When the Enlightenment lept over the Atlantic, did it also leave the Old World? This notion that insulting editorial cartoons might be a crime in some countries is just bewildering.

A religion that promotes honor killings is now provoking riots over satirical cartoons? It's not just hypocrisy or a lack of self-awareness anymore. It's madness. It's Wonderland.

The Christian Right has plenty of madness to go around, but at least Larry Flynt was shot by a lone lunatic and not ripped to pieces by a mob of 20,000.

By Andrew_Wyatt (not verified) on 06 Feb 2006 #permalink