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| Britain |
| Telegraph refuses to run Steyn column |
| 2004-10-12 |
| Whether or not it is, in the technical sense, a "joke", I find myself, with the benefit of hindsight, in agreement with Billy Connolly's now famous observation on Kenneth Bigley — "Aren't you the same as me, don't you wish they would just get on with it?" Had his killers "just got on with it", they would have decapitated Mr Bigley as swiftly as they did his two American confreres. But, sensing that there was political advantage to be gained in distinguishing the British subject from his fellow hostages, they didn't get on with it, and the intervening weeks reflected poorly on both Britain and Mr Bigley. None of us can know for certain how we would behave in his circumstances, and very few of us will ever face them. But, if I had to choose in advance the very last words I'd utter in this life, "Tony Blair has not done enough for me" would not be high up on the list. First, because it's the all but official slogan of modern Britain, the dull rote whine of the churlish citizen invited to opine on waiting lists or public transport, and thus unworthy of the uniquely grisly situation in which Mr Bigley found himself. And, secondly, because those words are so at odds with the spirit of a life spent, for the most part, far from these islands. Ken Bigley seems to have found contemporary Britain a dreary, insufficient place and I doubt he cared about who was Prime Minister from one decade to the next. Had things gone differently and had his fate befallen some other expatriate, and had he chanced upon a month-old London newspaper in his favourite karaoke bar up near the Thai-Cambodian border and read of the entire city of Liverpool going into a week of Dianysian emotional masturbation over some deceased prodigal son with no inclination to return whom none of the massed ranks of weeping Scousers from the Lord Mayor down had ever known, Mr Bigley would surely have thanked his lucky stars that he and his Thai bride were about as far from his native sod as it's possible to get. RTWT |
| Posted by:Mrs. Davis |
| #20 Wretchard has comments. |
| Posted by: Wuzzalib 2004-10-12 8:47:16 PM |
| #19 Hell,is this woman on the level with her article? I've been to England and Ireland several times in the last ten years without encountering this sort of s**t. Bulldog, Howard UK does this sound right to you? |
| Posted by: Secret Master 2004-10-12 7:53:10 PM |
| #18 Perhaps we have a Sherman now somewhere near Fallujah or Ramalla but GW "Don't take the gloves off" Bush is less of a Lincoln than you suppose? |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-12 5:46:37 PM |
| #17 Where's our Lincoln? I think he's in the White House. Both came to the White House after a deeply divisive election whose legitimacy some question. Unlike Lincoln, Bush came to the White House expecting to deal with problems different than those which have confronted him. But he has played the cards dealt him well. History is changing the world rapidly around him as it did to Lincoln. Because of the divisions in the nation, Bush has had to show a Lincolnian constancy and resolve. I'd imagine this has not been easy; not nearly as easy as being able to flip flop like Kerry. Thus the grimaces at the first debate. Bush has doen a good job of keeping the focus on our enemies, who try to hide from us and disguise themselves. If in 8 years Bush can deal successfully with Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and either Iran or North Korea, and "allies" in France and Germany, I suspect history will be kind to him. But one bad afternoon, and I'll change my mind. Where is our Sherman? The American people are not ready to accept one. After the next domestic mass civilian atrocity, things may change. I strongly recommend The Soul of Battle for an excellent discussion of liberating military leaders in history, including Sherman, by VD Hanson. If Bush, Cheney, Powell, Rice, and Rumsfeld can manage this conflict properly, perhaps we will not need a Sherman. If we do, woe is the Midle East and Islamofiscism. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2004-10-12 5:41:55 PM |
| #16 But, someday, someone important to you will die - and you will feel embarrased by your mean words One of my best friends was a contractor who disappeared from the area near Tikrit (his broken-down car and laptop were found) a year ago today. He was probably kidnapped, and is almost certainly dead. Aside from a wire service report, I have not seen any journalist's account of him or his fate. Nonetheless I have no doubt he died a brave man. I cannot say the same of Bigley or many of his compatriots. So here's my question to you: what lesson would you want your children to take from the Bigley affair? As for me, I will teach my son that the memory of a free man's honor, no matter how obscure that man was, outweighs the media-induced tears and sympathy of a million strangers. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-12 4:26:00 PM |
| #15 This teddy bear tendency needs to be stopped cold How about we let the body get cold first? Look - I understand what you are saying - and I'm not disagreeing with your overall point. But, someday, someone important to you will die - and you will feel embarrased by your mean words. |
| Posted by: 2b 2004-10-12 4:13:58 PM |
| #14 Imagine how the jihadists must be interpreting Bigley's dying words: âTony Blair has not done enough for meâ. Do you think the jihadists and the muslim fellow travelers listening to that whimper are likely to be discouraged and dissuaded from further attacks? Osama contrasted the "strong horse" and the "weak horse", and said the muslim population of the world would place its bet on the strong horse. Little did he imagine a whinnying, pitifully cowering old nag. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-12 4:07:02 PM |
| #13 I disagree. I think the danger of creeping Bigley-ism is a far greater threat to us than any jihadist ever could be. This teddy bear tendency needs to be stopped cold in its tracks before we start going the way of the Spanish. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-12 4:05:40 PM |
| #12 I don't necessarily disagree with all of the comments above - but if I were the editor, I still would not have run it. Agree with rj that it would have been best to wait. Mr. Bigley is a human being and his family are real flesh and blood. He didn't ask to be made a symbol of the war, even if he became one. Regardless of how true Steyn's words are, it's more civilized to respect Bigley's death than it is to use it to further our own cause. Put yourself in the family's shoes. How would you feel if everyone was blaming your brother and using his death to further their own political agendas. I love Steyn. One of the very best writers around, but it was wrong for him to piss on this mans grave before the grass even had a chance to grow. |
| Posted by: 2b 2004-10-12 4:03:00 PM |
| #11 Where's our Sherman? Our Lincoln? |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-12 2:37:48 PM |
| #10 Steyn's column was brilliant in that it said what many were afraid to. As for me I aint going quietly or sheepishly. I live in a pretty quiet part of the U.S. (Northern California) but we have a very large Muslim population. To date I have not seen an incident that raises their loyalties to question. However I have seen many normal non-Muslims go over to the other side because they think this is some type of adolescent game. Also given the recruitment of Muslims itâs only a matter of time before we see another Hamdi or John Lindh try to start something within our (U.S.) borders. What Steyn should have added that Islamofacists only prey on the weak or easy. Most are poorly trained and are just a step above common thugs. Have a gun rack in your truck, put NRA stickers on the windows, and if you can carry a personal weapon. If you look like your are a difficult target, they will go look for someone else. If you donât want a gun get a tazer, pepper spray, or a knife. And learn how to use them and teach your kids how to use them! If nothing else we should learn that these Islamofacists care little about the whether you wear a uniform or not. Just look at that school in Russia and that should tell you enough. |
| Posted by: Cyber Sarge 2004-10-12 2:30:57 PM |
| #9 This is a perfect reply also to those weak, if not morally decadent, and foolish critics of Bush who complained he was not visiting and indulge in sob session with bereaved families of Iraq War casualties. We are a great nation upholding a proud and strong civilization. We are not victims, and we do not weep when savages take the lives of our citizens. We repay, and in spades. Those who suggest we should do otherwise are admitting defeat. Shame on such weak and cowardly fools. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-12 1:02:48 PM |
| #8 Re decadence, the Telegraph last week ran a brilliant opinion piece from one Dr Anthony Daniels that was actually much more scathing than Steyn's, and without the rather tasteless retelling of the Billy Connolly remark. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2004/10/10/do1002.xml Excerpt: Our reaction to Mr Bigley's death is immature, dishonest and decadent By Dr Anthony Daniels (Filed: 10/10/2004) It goes without saying that Mr Bigley's days of agony and terror were such as no human being ought ever to endure. It goes without saying that sympathy is due to his family, especially to his aged mother. However, what goes without saying ought to go unsaid. The very fact that we so often seem compelled nowadays to spell out the obvious, by means of public gestures and protestations, by breast-beating and generalised mawkishness, suggests that, far from having deep feelings for one another, we live in a world without any genuine feeling. Mawkishness is the tribute that indifference pays to solidarity. ...Thousands of people, in effect, will work themselves up into a state of grief. But it will only count as true or real grief if they express it in public. Leaving aside the question as to whether maximum public effect is precisely what the killers of Mr Bigley are aiming for, and that therefore each flower laid (other than by his family and friends), and each teddy bear bought, is a triumph and encouragement for them, what does this outpouring of imitation-emotion tell us about ourselves and the condition that we are in? ...What was done to Mr Bigley was not wrong, nor was it even made worse, because he might have been an exceptionally good man; it was wrong because it was barbaric, because no one should be treated in this fashion, and it would have been wrong to do so even if Mr Bigley had been a very bad man. To dwell on his good qualities in public is therefore not merely beside the point and grossly sentimental, it is morally very wrong: for it is to imply that, had he been (for example) a drunken embezzler, it might have been morally justified to treat him in such a way. He was an innocent man, we were told ad nauseam: if he had been guilty, then, should he have had his head sawn off with a knife by a group of heartless psychopaths? ... What kind of population ... would fail to understand that the holder of one of the great offices of state such as Jack Straw's cannot, or at least ought not to, devote himself to futile gestures of ersatz emotional support for a single grieving family? What kind of population fails to understand that the policy of the country, whether it be right or wrong, cannot be determined by the fate of one man, however horrible that fate might be? And this is so, irrespective of one's view of the Iraq war. The politics of the individual case is the politics of gusts of intense but shallow emotion. It is incompatible with the rational pursuit of long-term interests. There are several words to describe such a politics: immature, dishonest and decadent would do. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-12 12:53:50 PM |
| #7 I read the previous article about an American in London and then read this. The column needed to be run and the Brit population (not Blair) need to wake up to the threat that is within their midst. |
| Posted by: remote man 2004-10-12 12:26:25 PM |
| #6 "That being said, I think he's speaking the truth - it's just that this truth is too painful to be in print." All the more reason why it NEEDED to be said. " I would have run the column, but I would have delayed it a bit, to a point when emotions weren't so high and emotions so raw." No! Clamp the lid on, close the safety valve and crank the fire up! The sooner our society loses its collective patience, the better. Only then will we finally make the decisions necessary to do what has to be done. Ultimately, it is going to be necessary to exterminate Islam. Peabody |
| Posted by: Mr. Peabody 2004-10-12 12:04:58 PM |
| #5 Steyn's best thought: "If youâre kidnapped, accept youâre unlikely to survive, say âIâll show you how an Englishman diesâ, and wreck the video. If they want you to confess youâre a spy, make a little mischief: there are jihadi from Britain, Italy, France, Canada and other western nations all over Iraq â so say yes, youâre an MI6 agent, and so are those Muslims from Tipton and Luton who recently joined the al-Qaeda cells in Samarra and Ramadi. As Churchill recommended in a less timorous Britain: You can always take one with you." {He he he ...} I LIKE it! If you are captured, before you suffer your Quattrocchi fate, you act like the brave Italian... if any more Americans end up in this situation... Tell the man with the knife... "Yeah there is all those boys from Dearborn and Buffalo mosques hangin' out with you in Fallujah who are workin' with me & the CIA... Allah akhbar, baby..." |
| Posted by: BigEd 2004-10-12 11:30:16 AM |
| #4 I would have run the column, but I would have delayed it a bit, to a point when emotions weren't so high and emotions so raw. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2004-10-12 10:47:38 AM |
| #3 The Telegraph's decision is a reflection of the decadence and defeatism on display in Britain. Mr. Bigley's status is exactly the point of the column. He was not a victim, he was a combatant. One of the great ironies of this war is that those who are in the uniformed services are volunteers and the rest of us are involuntary draftees. And there is nothing we can do about it, except get it over with as rapidly as posible. Mr. Bigley's conduct, prior to and after his abduction did not contribute to this goal. Our enemy wants to destroy us all. It will continue to do so until we have done unto them as they would do unto us. Those who see Bigley as a victim deny this reality and wish to see this as a war fought by European standards or even as a law enforcement problem. Were this the case, Bigley would be a victim. But it is not. We are in a total war, whether we wish to be or not; and we do not yet. It is a war still awaiting a Sherman because we would not yet accept him even if we could find him. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2004-10-12 10:40:48 AM |
| #2 That being said, I think he's speaking the truth - it's just that this truth is too painful to be in print. |
| Posted by: 2b 2004-10-12 10:22:04 AM |
| #1 I think the Telegraph was right not to publish it. I think he could have made this point without blaming the victim: None of the above would have guaranteed Mr Bigleyâs life, but it would have given him, as it did Signor Quattrocchi, a less pitiful death, and it would have spared the world a glimpse of the feeble and unserious Britain of the last few weeks. The jihadists have become rather adept at devising tests customized for each group of infidels: Madrid got bombed, and the Spaniards failed their test three days later; the Australian Embassy in Jakarta got bombed, but the Aussies held firm and re-elected John Howardâs government anyway. With Britain, the Islamists will have drawn many useful lessons from the decadence and defeatism on display. |
| Posted by: 2b 2004-10-12 10:16:36 AM |