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| Africa North |
| Revolts: The Shame Factor |
| 2011-02-02 |
| Not long ago, a close comrade of mine was dining with a person who I can't identify beyond telling you that his father is a long-term absolutist ruler of an Arab Muslim state. "Tell me," said this scion to my friend, "is it true that there are now free elections in Albania?" My friend was able to confirm the (relative) truth of this, adding that he had once even acted as an international observer at the Albanian polls and could attest to a certain level of transparency and fairness. The effect of his remarks was galvanic. "In that case," exclaimed the heir-presumptive, thumping the table, "what does that make us? Are we peasants? Children?" The gloom only deepened, apparently, as the image of the Arab as a laughing stock--lagging behind Albania!--took hold of the conversation. rtwt. Where do we classify Egypt in file under? It's Chris Hitchins. Seriously, rtwt. |
| Posted by:Nimble Spemble |
| #13 And I agree with what you were generally saying. We are foolish to think all people did not yearn for freedom at some point in their lives. We are also foolish to think we can impose individual freedom on them after they have adopted a view that they have the right to impose submission to allan's will on others. The saying is you can only get to Jefferson through Martin Luther. Islam needs to find its Luther before before it can join the modern world. And until they do, they risk an end far less peaceful than the Protectorate's. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2011-02-02 16:51 |
| #12 Nimble, I'm basically in agreement with what you're saying; I was referring to categorical sorts of judgments, such as "Democracy is incompatible with Chinese cultural values." Individual liberty has to include individual responsibility or it doesn't work. |
| Posted by: Mike 2011-02-02 16:32 |
| #11 how do you make the distinction between those of God's children who have those unalienable Rights and those who don't? Domestically that is the purpose of the criminal justice system. We regularly deny people their rights when they are judged to have denied others theirs. Internationally, the distinction is made based on our willingness to have our children die for the principle. Our willingness varies depending on the extent to which others attempt to deny us our rights. And on what principle do you prevent some future elite or warlord or People's Revolutionary Vanguard from defining you into the second category? Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. or God grants liberty only to those who love it and are ready to guard and defend it. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2011-02-02 15:58 |
| #10 Call me a starry-eyed optimist, but.... I can remember a time not all that long ago when it was said by many wise and eminent persons with degrees from all the right schools and lifetime subscriptions to the conventional wisdom that the whole idea of governments deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, and using those powers to secure for their citizens natural rights which come from a source greater than any government (in other words, democracy, individual rights, and the rule of law) was fundamentally incompatible with Latin American culture, and it was an act of supreme arrogance on our part to even suggest that Chileans or Brazilians or any of them should be voting. It wasn't compatible with "Asian cultural values" either. Or European values. Or the superstitious Papist stuff those damned Irishmen believe. The Progressives asserted (and, to this day, still assert) that the optimal form of government is rule by carefully selected experts with degrees from all the right schools. Free elections, individual rights, and the rule of law--not to mention this whole concept of constitutionally-restrained limited government--just gets in the way of the efficiency of the perfect technocracy. The Progressives' ideological cousins, the socialists of various flavors, agreed with them about the inefficiency of free societies with limited government. Oh, and that "endowed by their Creator" bit? Superstitious nonsense! There is nothing higher than the State, and the State can remake its subjects into New Socialist Men/purebred Aryans/what-have-you. Tutto nello Stato, niente al di fuori dello Stato, nulla contro lo Stato! (“Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State”) As history has shown, and current events continue to show, all of these wise and eminent and hip, cool, and trendy people were and still are dead-ass wrong. Yes, Saudi-style Sharia is incompatible with a free society, and yes, the Arab world has a lot of catching-up to do. However, you either agree with the Declaration of Independence or you don't. When it says "all men are created equal, . . . endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights" it means all. Everybody. (See also Galatians 3:28.) The most benighted burkha-clad Bedouin grandma, the most pathetic peasant in the crappiest village east of Pyongyang, every Chinese, Cuban, Bangladeshi and Beylorussian, has the same Creator and the same unalienable Rights as you, and deserves liberty as much as you do. If you don't believe that the principles espoused in the Declaration apply equally in Cairo, Egypt and Cairo, Illinois, then pray tell, how do you make the distinction between those of God's children who have those unalienable Rights and those who don't? And on what principle do you prevent some future elite or warlord or People's Revolutionary Vanguard from defining you into the second category? |
| Posted by: Mike 2011-02-02 15:02 |
| #9 as the image of the Arab as a laughing stock--lagging behind Albania! An Instapundit reader raises the point, confirmed by Wikipedia, that the long-since overthrown King Farouk was part Albanian through his mother. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2011-02-02 14:35 |
| #8 JQC, you are basically correct, BUT, I think that you may have missed a key point. imams are selling their fundamentalist version of islam They aren't selling a fundamentalist version, they are selling the one and only version that their is. Old Mo spelled out in great detail every last thing about life and any variation is NOT allowed. Muslims have to reject Islam to introduce the concept of individual freedom. |
| Posted by: Alan Cramer 2011-02-02 13:37 |
| #7 The question is how do you imbue the concept of INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS in a subject people? Islam is submission pure and simple and that precludes any thought of the individual as a free thinking unit. The problem as I see is that islam is thought by many muslims to be a complete system of religion, politics, banking, and law. Every aspect of life is regulated by religious beliefs. There is also the notion built into islam is of a caliphate, supremacy over others, and subjugation. This precludes any notion of freedom of the individual. It precludes tolerance for other's beliefs. The view by muslims of islam would have to change. The current version uses the methods of subversion and where that is not possible, violence. I doubt that change is possible so long as the imams are selling their fundamentalist version of islam out of the mosques. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2011-02-02 10:42 |
| #6 Mike nailed it. The problem with Islamic "culture" is that they do not believe in the primacy of the individual. Without that all alternatives (including the faux democracy) are authoritarian at best. If individuals are not allowed to make their own choices about how to live life, free from coercion, than there is nothing but tyranny. The question is how do you imbue the concept of INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS in a subject people? Islam is submission pure and simple and that precludes any thought of the individual as a free thinking unit. |
| Posted by: Alan Cramer 2011-02-02 09:56 |
| #5 I would refer the gentleman to the Most Important Paragraph Ever Written in English: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.... It's as true today as in 1776, as true in Cairo and Caracas and Pyongyang and Mosul as it was in Philadelphia. Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, and their only legitimate purpose is to secure for their citizens natural rights which come from a source greater than any government. No other form of government is legitimate. Period, full stop. |
| Posted by: Mike 2011-02-02 09:20 |
| #4 ...no, it means they're too dense to understand how to do it with the facade of 'democracy' while maintaining the corruption and hereditary transfers of power, the Chicago Way(tm). |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2011-02-02 08:55 |
| #3 Makes me glad and proud to live in America. The BO Health Care law was shoved down our throats despite the will of the people. The donks paid heavily in the Congressional elections. There is really no model for democracy/free elections in muslim countries. Iraq is attempting such but they have a way to go. The Shah of Iran got ousted and they ended up with a far worse situation than they had. The mullahs (theocratic jackasses) imposed a much more destructive and harsh government on the people of Iran. The Taliban imposed draconian rule on the people of Afghanistan with their fundamentalism. The model in the Mideast is dictatorship, royalty, theocratic rule, or elitist rulers with rigged elections. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2011-02-02 08:55 |
| #2 To me the most interesting thing is that the idea that free elections mean his family is out on their ass doesn't seem to penetrate. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2011-02-02 02:36 |
| #1 "what does that make us? Are we peasants? Children?" Arabs would be my first guess. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2011-02-02 02:15 |