I was watching an episode of “Cash Cab” the other day: The Discovery Channel game show where unwitting passengers find themselves in the titular vehicle, answering a series of trivia questions for cash prizes.
One of the questions posed by host/driver Ben Bailey was: “If you’re drinking through a six pack of beer, and you’re cracking open the penultimate can, which can of beer are you drinking?” The riders put their heads together, and one young woman who appeared to be the brains of the group said, “Well…a ‘pen…tagram’ is a five pointed star. And the pen…tagon has five sides. So the pen…ultimate can must be the fifth can!”
Now of course her reasoning was completely wrong, and I hope to God I don’t have to spell out for you why. But the answer was correct.
Now…author Elizabeth Moon wrote an essay regarding her views on Muslims on her website. You can read it in its entirety here.
I suspect you’ll find yourself nodding in agreement for much of it in regards to her feelings about citizenry. But then she starts complaining about Muslims, and what she perceives as people striving to accommodate a religion that has backward attitudes toward—among others—women. And that those attitudes, she asserted, should prompt Americans to want to reject them rather than welcome them as citizens. She points out (correctly) that immigrants typically have had a hard time when first arriving on our shores, and tolerance was only something that came over time and after a period of assimilation. (She doesn’t address the sticky question of, well, what if they were born here? Plenty of Muslims were, and have committed no crime nor would even dream of doing so.)
The paragraph that particularly sent people into a tizzy was the following:
“I feel that I personally (and many others) lean over backwards to put up with these things, to let Muslims believe stuff that unfits them for citizenship, on the grounds of their personal freedom. It would be helpful to have them understand what they’re demanding of me and others–how much more they’re asking than giving.”
The thing is, Moon has a germ of a valid point. To the casual observer, it seems that we really are bending over backwards to accommodate Muslim sensibilities. After all, crimes based on Anti-Semitism, and assaults on Hispanics or Blacks, still consume the majority of crime statistics. Yet everywhere it seems that people are being lectured on the need to take extra consideration lest they offend Muslims. Comedy Central, for instance (my example, not hers), ruthlessly censored “South Park” over jokes regarding Mohammad. Meantime, Jesus is portrayed as a talk show host, Satan is reasonably sympathetic, and God is some weird trollish creature, yet none of this gets censored even though I’m sure it doesn’t thrill devout Christians.
For this type of consideration, Moon believes, Muslims should be grateful and appreciative and try to clean up their act in a way that is presumably not expected of, for instance, Reform Jews on behalf of Orthodox Jews who don’t exactly have a great track record when it comes to the treatment of women.
The problem is: It’s Cash Cab logic. It’s looking at the surface and coming to a conclusion that seems right but is fundamentally flawed when you look below it.
Comedy Central, and other media outlets, don’t shy away from depicting Mohammad or try to avoid offending Muslims out of respect for their beliefs. They do it out of pure, stinking fear. They do it because Comedy Central doesn’t want to worry that someone’s going to come in and bomb “The Daily Show” in retribution. It’s not that Muslims are getting some sort of free pass or fast track to acceptance. People are scared that if they offend Muslims, something’s going to explode.
This is not something that is beneficial to law-abiding liberal Muslims in the least, nor something they should be grateful for on behalf of their “personal freedom.” Because—and I hate quoting “Star Wars,” but there’s no way to avoid it—fear leads to anger, and anger leads to hatred.
There’s no good reason to hate an entire religious group. But that’s what we’re seeing across the country: Hatred rooted in fear, spurred on by anger over the actions of a few. We can’t punish the guys who took down the Twin Towers; they’re dead. So we punish whoever we can, continuously, incessantly.
And for this, Muslims should be grateful?
I think they’d be far more appreciative if Americans didn’t fight them building their houses of worship from coast to coast out of concern that they’ll be used for terrorist training centers.
So in short, yes, Moon is right that Muslims are getting extra considerations and pleas for tolerance that aren’t extended to others who are suffering from crimes of bias and hatred, but it’s for all the wrong reasons and is leading down a path that won’t go anywhere good.
The thing is, any reasonable person can discern the flaws, the “Cash Cab” logic in her thinking. Elizabeth Moon is an extremely reasonable person. It’s been my experience that when someone reasonable acts in an unreasonable manner, there’s something else going on that’s not in evidence. I suspect that there’s something more at play—perhaps stemming from Moon’s time in the Marines, I don’t know—that prompted her to take this stance. That’s just speculation on my part.
What brought particular attention to her comments was that she was slated to be guest of honor at a feminist convention called Wiscon (the “Wis” derived from “Wisconsin” and not, as you probably assumed, Wisterias.) Presumably the purpose was to celebrate hundreds of thousands of words she had written over her lifetime that had a strong feminist sensibility. Instead the two thousand words she wrote about citizenship, five hundred or so of which related to Muslims, were given priority, and she has now been…well…dishonored, I guess. Uninvited for condemning a religion based partly upon attitudes some of them display toward women that feminists are outraged over.
All I can say is, thank God for that. Just imagine if Wiscon had stood firm on the principle of free expression. That might have set a dangerous precedent and made everyone feel that a writer’s work should be celebrated separately from whatever disagreeable attitudes or attributes they might have. Who knows where that might have led? Consider that a bullet dodged.
PAD
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I know what “penulimate” means thanks to comicbooks*. –“Next Issue: The Penulimate chapter to whatever big crossover we’re running!”
*And the dictionary, I had to go and look it up.
First, the caveat: I’m not a Wiscon member and I don’t speak for anyone in any position of authority anywhere, ever.
All I can say is, thank God for that. Just imagine if Wiscon had stood firm on the principle of free expression.
Elizabeth Moon is still able to express herself freely any place she dámņ well pleases. She’s a well known, published author. I think that she won’t have much trouble getting her voice heard if she chooses to speak on a topic.
I think that because she chose not to address the Wiscon member’s concerns that were brought to her publicly shortly after she made the post, that she neither stood by her statements or apologized for them, and that she chose to delete several of the comments that disagreed with her opinion, I think that she gave an impression that she was not a good fit for Wiscon. From everything I’ve seen, this was a difficult decision that was not made lightly.
That might have set a dangerous precedent and made everyone feel that a writer’s work should be celebrated separately from whatever disagreeable attitudes or attributes they might have. Who knows where that might have led? Consider that a bullet dodged.
“Everyone” is an awful lot of people, and “whatever disagreeable attitudes” is an awfully big bucket. While it’s reasonable for anyone to enjoy an author’s work despite whatever quirks pop up, I don’t owe that favor to anyone. There are a lot of unread books in the world, I can just move on.
And the irony of a feminist convention disinviting a GOH because she spoke out against a religion criticized for anti-feminist philosophies doesn’t factor in?
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Okay.
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I’ll be curious how many other people zero in on the last two grafs of my much longer essay.
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PAD
…says the guy who wrote “There’s no good reason to hate an entire religious group.”
Back in the 1970s in the U.S., Islam was seen as a religion practiced by a few members of the far left. Those people picked and choose which passages were most meaningful to them, just like all the faiths have always done.
None of the three Middle Eastern faiths have a monopoly on the oppression of women – especially the most literally minded of the groups.
Elizabeth Moon’s offensive, assimilationist rants, along with the deletion of any dissent, are a favor that I don’t appreciate. That she zeroed in on only the most maligned of the big three monofaiths does not demonstrate a concern for the welfare of the oppressed, IMHO.
…says the guy who wrote “There’s no good reason to hate an entire religious group.”
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Well…yeah. I said that. It was in criticizing Moon’s opinions. So I’m not sure why you’re quoting it as if I somehow just contradicted myself.
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Elizabeth Moon’s offensive, assimilationist rants, along with the deletion of any dissent, are a favor that I don’t appreciate.
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Odd. Deleting angry postings and locking down threads is SOP on many blogs…including blogs that are maintained by people condemning Moon for the same practice. My blog, however, does not do that. Yet I’m frequently accused of being intolerant, oftentimes by the same people who don’t tolerate dissent…but excoriate Elizabeth Moon for shutting down dissent.
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The Internet: Where irony goes to die.
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PAD
I guess the female members of said religion who attend WisCon and who belong to said religion because of their own deep commitment and belief don’t matter as much as your perception that the religion, as a whole, is anti-feminist. Thanks for mansplaining that for us.
All three Abrahamic faiths have elements that are anti-feminist, but I don’t see you wondering why Christian and Jewish people aren’t welcome at WisCon. The idea that Islam is any more anti-feminist than the other two as it’s core is, frankly, ridiculous. Painting Islam with a big old anti-feminist brush ignores Muslims who do not feel or live that way. It ignores the Muslim women who attend WisCon joyfully.
It’s the same Cash cab reasoning as Elizabeth Moon.
Good for you. *pats on head*
Wow Tempest! Great post! And if I had said that I thought Moon was correct in her description of Muslim attitudes, it might even be relevant! As it is. . .It seems to me that you are explaining things to the wrong person. Perhaps you should take it up with Ms. Moon at WisCon. Good luck with that.
PAD
…and that she chose to delete several of the comments that disagreed with her opinion…
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Actually she blanked the entire comments section, not certain ones that were critical of her. There are a number of screencaps of them available online. And, while I tend to prefer the PAD approach of letting disagrement run its course, I kind of understand Moon’s decision. Lots of the posts were personally abusive of Moon, often expletive-laden. It seemed clear that many of the posters had no intention of engaging in a debate, so neither did Moon.
“… then there flashed through her head what her mother had said with her antepenultimate breath…”
“Oh my child, should you look on the wine that is red
Be prepared for a fate worse than death..”
I miss highly literate comedy.
I assumed the ‘Wis’ derived from ‘Wisent’, or ‘European bison’ as it is also known.
Per discussion of this on a convention organizers’ mailing list, it’s been said there were also pragmatic reasons for the disinvitation. Namely, a fair number of usual con volunteers (I’m not clear if this was up to the staff and concom level) and members were stating they’d boycott the con if Moon stayed as a GOH. It seems to have been a mess all around.
I’m not surprised.
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PAD
Feminists ganging up on someone perceived as not having the correct position? Color me unstunned. I would have been shocked if they hadn’t done that.
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Too many feminists and, in my opinion, a terrible percentage of those who are in charge of things like this, have the simple morality of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. Conservatives are always saying bad things about Islam, therefore: Muslims are a protected class that cannot be criticized. Also, many of them are brown skinned people so, well, there you are.
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Had she attacked catholics, baptists or even Christians in general, no problem. At all. But even the suggestion that islam has a woman problem, even the observation that the most horrible treatment of women is to be found in predominantly Muslim countries…verboten!
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And who does this ultimately hurt? Those brave Muslim men and women who are fighting to change these things. They are putting their lives and reputations on the line and not even getting the simple moral support from the very people you would think would be the first in line to offer it. But that would conflict with other agendas, it would seem.
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But that’s modern feminism! I’d sooner put my trust in 20 random people off the street than the best educated feminist writers and thinkers if it were a question of protecting my civil rights.
PAD, here’s the problem; it’s HARD to be a good citizen. No sarcasm intended, but to understand the plight of minorities (sorry to be insulting), you have THINK about what they go through, about what they represent, and about how they should be treated.
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To paraphrase “Men In Black”, I like a person; I just hate people. My next door neighbor is a swell guy, and if he’s a little different – he worships Allah, or he doesn’t celebrate Christmas, or his partner is male – I know him and I can understand that. But all of them, all over America? That’s where I have trouble understanding.
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(Incidentally, that’s a generic “I” in that previous paragraph… it is not my own personal beliefs being presented.)
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And that’s the problem; applying wisdom and compassion and common sense to each of these difficult situations. It’s far easier for Americans to go with the (loudly and irrationally presented) popular view… it always has been.
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Maybe that’s the whole problem… a person is smart. People are dumb. (And to really push it too far… what will they be dumb about tomorrow?)
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I remain,
Sincerely,
Eric L. Sofer
The Bad Clown
x<]:o){
PAD,
I admire your consistency on these issues but feel I occupy something of a middle ground.
That is to say, why were we reading her blog? Why does her opinion matter?
In that regard, it’s none of my business if comic book artist Joe Smith is a member of the KKK or tells racist jokes in the bathroom or is cheating on his wife. It will fall outside my interests as a reader whether or not to purchase his works. (Although I certainly wouldn’t be likely to purchase his work because he’s a nice guy, something I actually would do in some cases for people who impress me personally. The point is that he gets no negative deduction for the sake of work I’d be otherwise interested in.)
However, in publishing essays and creative works or in doing appearances as a result of said work, if Joe Smith launches into a hate filled tirade, I can say as a consumer that “we’re done professionally” because Joe Smith used his position for harm and I no longer would have a desire to support that position.
It’s for this reason that I can say I’d be more likely to support Mel Gibson acting projects (his directing and the values therein left me cold) whereas I probably wouldn’t give Kanye West a try. Gibson’s evil, psychotic behavior rarely if ever represented him capitalizing on his fame to spread that message. Supporting Gibson’s projects doesn’t seem like it supports the message in his leaked tapes; if anything, his career as an actor seems likely to make him suppress the messages found in those kinds of outbursts.
Whereas Kanye’s goofy but rude behavior is very much rooted in the public persona he marketed and continues to market.
Mel Gibson wasn’t using his stature to promote the views that leaked out so it’s irrelevant to his work for me. Kanye was and is using his stature to defend his behavior and provide a bully pulpit in defense of it so it would incline me against supporting it.
In this case, the author seems like she was trading on her stature to promote some offensive views so I can see commercial backlash/retaliation from those who disagree. The blog falls within her body of creative works in a way that it might not had she simply made the comment to a friend or used a pseudonym.
Doesn’t that encourage creative people to avoid at all costs participating in public debate on the issues? Seems to me those are the very people we should be encouraging to do that.
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I fera that one day PAD and people like him will just throw their hands up in the air and quit blogging entirely. Once you reach a certain level of success it is unlikely that blogging will win you more fans and far more likely that you will inevitably offend some of those who are going to put you on a list of Those Who Must Not Be Read.
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But I guess the best thing to do if you feel my way would be to buy something from Elizabeth Moon. (In college I used to make it a point to go see any play or movie that was being threatened by attacks from the right or left. Boy, did I go see a lot of crap (but they weren’t protesting the crappiness so the point stands!))
The funny thing is, I know plenty of people who feel the same way as Ms. Moon. Who have put forth a lot of effort to please a minority group and are not appreciated for it. Holding the door for them, calling them “Ma’am”, giving them discounted drinks at bars. I mean, really, women don’t know how good they have it, and they should be thanking men for letting them be citizens at all, right?
Ooooo…eeeeevil…
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PAD
At least on your blog, if people have objections to what you say you’ll let what they say stand here.
Ms. Moon’s response to some rather detailed and articulate replies to her stance was to delete every single comment.
She was not disinvited, she merely had her Guest of Honor status removed.
Her rights to free speech have not been trampled on. She remains free to say what she wants and WisCon remains free to decline to endorse it.
As for threats of Muslim violence, ask your wife about the time she almost went to Centennial Park, but didn’t, and what she avoided. Strange how we hardly ever talk about “Christian violence” when referring to that incident.
I already responded to the aspect of her deleting responses up thread, Sheila. As for the bombing during the Olympics, you’re more or less reiterating things I’ve said elsewhere, so I’m not sure of the point you’re making.
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As for her “merely” having her GOH status removed, if Wiscon is like any other convention I’ve ever been to, then the rescinding of the invitation is more involved. The airfare and hotel stay of the GOH is typically covered. Oftentimes there’s an honorarium. Plus you can make a decent amount of money selling your books.
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You tend to build your schedule around such things. You turn down other invitations that are at the same time, or around the same time. You don’t know what avenues of income Moon may have passed on because of her commitment.
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So basically the revoking of her GOH status boils down to financial punishment for her expressing opinions related to practices that she sees as anti-feminist, put upon her by a group of feminists who sponsor a convention that boasts of being a venue for expressing opinions.
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PAD
It sounds as though her real crime was to delete comments. That seems pretty petty.
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Her mistake was being far too general (you should always keep in mind that the word “some” can save your neck. Also, it probably makes your statement true.) and she wasn’t crazy enough. Should have ranted about how islam is a patriarchal oppressive male-centric paradigm designed to oppress wymyn, created by a woman hating pedophile who (etc etc)…basically just take the most out there feminist rant against the Catholic church or, I don’t know, Burger king, whatever. The crazier it is the less trouble you might get in. Bill O’reilly said something stupid and Joy Behar walked off. later that day or week she had on Jesse Ventura who thinks the US government painted the world trade towers with thermite paint. and that was A-ok.
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Frankly, Ms moon should count herself lucky, this con sounds like a whole lot of fun!
You people really should stop subjecting yourself to second wave feminism and start reading some third wave and self empowerment. Its a pity my favorite author writes in spanish because her work on pørņ is far more enlightening and fun than all the cliche’d crap some still drag from the 60s.
Ms. Moon’s response to some rather detailed and articulate replies to her stance was to delete every single comment.
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Again, I suggest reading the comments before giving Moon too much grief over blanking them. My favorite one concludes, “Please take your puffed-up offense on behalf of a few bigots and liars from my sight. I’m offended on behalf of decent human beings, and there are a lot more of us than there are of you.” That one is precious because, not only does it exclude Moon from the category of decent human beings, it tells her to get her writing from his sight, notwithstanding that it’s only in his sight because he is reading her blog.
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You’re technically correct that Moon’s free speech rights are not being violated. Censorship can rarely be attributed to a private actor, and it isn’t the right way of looking at this issue. We’re discussing shunning, not censorship. That isn’t a compliment.
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I think PAD identified the issue perfectly by pointing out that we were talking about maybe 2000 words versus her entire body of work. Think about the reason Moon was invited to begin with. She created a strong female character as the protagonist for a fantasy series, in a genre that has traditionally been male-dominated, and she did it 25 years ago. The Deed of Paksenarrion hasn’t gotten retroactively worse. So what has changed since she was initially invited? We know more about her opinions.
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Well, so what? Since when do the political opinions of an artist–or even an evaluation of the artist as a human being–affect our evaluation of the writer? The classic example of this is Orson Scott Card. A lot of people are greatly disappointed by some of the things Card has written about homosexuality. But if you were organizing a science fiction convention, could you say with a straight face that the guy who wrote Ender’s Game wouldn’t warrant being a guest of honor? Conventions don’t honor authors for being cool people. Conventions honor writers for being great (or at least very good) writers.
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Unless, of course, that convention is WisCon. In that case, the official policy (and website) promotes tolerance and free discussion. They just neglected to mention that they pick whom they tolerate.
Very well said and well reasoned. And enough to get you trashed as being a clueless idiot in plenty of blogs.
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PAD
he created a strong female character as the protagonist for a fantasy series, in a genre that has traditionally been male-dominated, and she did it 25 years ago. The Deed of Paksenarrion hasn’t gotten retroactively worse. So what has changed since she was initially invited? We know more about her opinions.
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One thing I am hoping comes out of this entire kerfuffle is the death of the notion that “a strong female character” and a female name are enough to make one a strong example of a feminist writer.
And yes, we know more about her opinions. And knowing something about someone’s opinions can, funny that, change your opinion of whether or not they’re to be honored.
lot of people are greatly disappointed by some of the things Card has written about homosexuality.
And a lot of people are downright livid. And a fair number of people have been in situations where it becomes rather uncomfortable (to say the least) to object on those grounds. That people do is, I submit, a step forward, not back.
But if you were organizing a science fiction convention, could you say with a straight face that the guy who wrote Ender’s Game wouldn’t warrant being a guest of honor?
Well, perhaps; but I’d recommend you read John Kessel’s essay as to why, as the margins of this blog are too small to contain my answer.
Some people can invite him as a guest of honor, and some can elect not to do so.
Conventions don’t honor authors for being cool people. Conventions honor writers for being great (or at least very good) writers.
Conventions honor people for different reasons. And conventions associate themselves with people for different reasons.
Also, may I recommend the Potlatch approach to you? A “book of honor”, which avoids having all those concerns about what the author might or might not say.
In that case, the official policy (and website) promotes tolerance and free discussion. They just neglected to mention that they pick whom they tolerate.
I’m glad you saw the light on censorship, above. Now, just to be clear; not being a Guest of Honor is not the same as not being tolerated.
She had removed from her a privileged platform from which she could speak; she was just as free to come and present her views as anyone else.
(And yes, I am aware that she also lost plane fare — well, actually, she may well have lost nothing, depending on how they handled it; WisCon may well have eaten her plane fare, or it may not have been purchased yet.)
She’d be uncomfortable at the convention, now? Well, discomfort when people react poorly to things you say is, indeed, a risk of saying things.
I just read through what she wrote. As I did so, I couldn’t help but think about the crackers who think the same sorts of things about black people all over the USA. They are savage (and they back this up with percentage of crimes committed by black people), they are lazy (and they back this up with talk of people on welfare) and that these two things make them unfit to be anywhere but Africa. Sure, they know one or two black people who work and stay away from malt liquor, but by and large…
On and on they go. It doesn’t matter what else they say. It’s racist and doesn’t contribute anything positive to the discourse. They are the people that the rest of us are waiting on to die so our discourse can move past the hate.
While Moon is free to say whatever she wants, the balance on free speech is once what you said is out there, you risk being ostracized.
Maybe I’m a little closer to the other side having spent my Peace Corps service working with Muslims who were mass deported in a day from their homeland by Stalin. These same Muslims are battling for the right to build houses in their homeland now.
Other than their active fight against racism, the only difference between them and me is I eat of the piggy and they don’t.
While Moon is free to say whatever she wants, the balance on free speech is once what you said is out there, you risk being ostracized.
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Oh, there’s no risk: You will be. By someone.
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PAD
Still trying to get Ms. Moon to Keycon sometime.
Anyway, how does this compare to NPR firing one of their people for making comments on O’Reilly’s show about how he feels nervous when he sees Muslims on the same flight as him? I’ll note I’m not looking this up, there may have been other comments, and he may very well have been fired for just showing up on O’Reilly’s show.
Well, as noted elsewhere, NPR has a specific Code of Ethics that all journalists in their employ are expected to abide by. Williams violated it, repeatedly. Either the rules apply to everyone or to no one.
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PAD
Like I said, I didn’t read up on it.
I read the Ombudsman’s statement now. I can see their point. BUT I think the expression was an honest one, and we should not criminalize thought, unless it’s expressed in a way to incite hatred (or some other particular offence).
And we DO criminalize that sort of speech. That’s why it always breaks me up when people declare that there should be consequences for speech. There ARE. There’s slander (for spoken) and libel (for written). There’s defamation of character. There’s incitement to riot. Probably some others I’m not thinking of.
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The fact that we’re THAT select in what we criminalize underscores just how important free speech is.
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If Moon were advocating violence, that’s a whole different story. But she didn’t. In fact, she specifically argued against it.
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PAD
Peter:
You got slightly sidetracked. I was referring to Juan Williams comments-and-result. Don’t like it, no matter if they had good reasons. Don’t think it’s bad to admit that you’re scared, as long as you recognize the why, and the limits.
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Sorry, I used ‘criminalized’ when I was referring mostly to being punished, as Juan was. We’re in agreement completely on this point.
Iain commented: “I was referring to Juan Williams comments-and-result. Don’t like it, no matter if they had good reasons. Don’t think it’s bad to admit that you’re scared, as long as you recognize the why, and the limits.”
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So, if a WHITE person had made the SAME comments, only substituting “black man” for “Muslim,” would those comments have been acceptable anywhere? Williams would likely be utterly appalled if a white woman said, “I can’t help but feel uncomfortable when I’m walking down the street and I see a Black man approaching me” or “When I’m in an elevator and a young Black man gets in, I can’t help but be scared.”
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As it could be said, “Muslim is the new Black.”
This post is going to go all over the place. Molly Norris, Elizabeth Moon, Juan Williams, the left is eating its own.
All of my friends are left of centre, I’m the only person I know who openly and vocally did not support Obama, as I thought he was an empty suit and his policies would hurt Canadians. Like the man said, judge a man by his character.
I have chosen not to discuss the Muslim issue with them. Just like I would not ask a blind person if this magenta shirt compliments my eyes. As they do not have the needed skills to make a proper decision.
A religion that is massively homophobic, anti-women……but going against them might make you a Bush acolyte.
RACISM they cry……but only if it fits their parameters.
Look I am a positive person and maybe a little naive but is racism really as bad as Brian Woods says it is? I have visited the southern US many time to visit, wait for it……my Nigerian friends – new immigrants, and I don’t see it.
Has the decades of work, mostly undertaken by lefties and liberals of old, with race relations not born any fruit? Cause I happily and stupidly think it has, are things not better?
And Brian Woods brought it up already so……I have 8 muslim friends formerly 10. One was dropped after he proclaimed that Hitler was misunderstood and started going on about the Zhoooos and the other when he admitted that Sharia law should be brought in and the gays should be killed.
The others…… Iranians who have lived under true oppression who openly support the regimes downfall but are of course worried about friends and family that would suffer when the needed violence takes place. They all say why is the media giving the extremists a voice, making them normal.
They cannot stand women in Burquas…..and there are many in the Greater Toronto Area.
Plus I have 2 hardcore bible thumper friends, sweet as can be, they don’t swear & they don’t like Harry Potter…not a big deal, I give it a pass.
PS just bought 5 copies
“I’m the only person I know who openly and vocally did not support Obama, as I thought he was an empty suit and his policies would hurt Canadians.”
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Perhaps I’m out of line, but who gives a rat’s ášš? Obama was running for President of the UNITED STATES. His policies were supposed to help AMERICANS, not Canadians. Do you take as much interest in who becomes Prime Minister of the UK?
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“A religion that is massively homophobic, anti-women……but going against them might make you a Bush acolyte.”
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I have to ask you this, then. Do you feel the same way about, oh, the Roman Catholic Church or the Southern Baptist Convention? Both of those denominations are anti-women and very homophobic. A couple of years ago, the SBC reaffirmed that women should accept being subordinate to men, specifically that wives should “submit” to their husbands (the SBC, in an attempt at PR “damage control,” noted that men are supposed to submit to God–interestingly, a major point of being a Muslim is a submission to the will of Allah/God–but missing the more important point that God is a bit less likely to become physically abusive to a man who doesn’t “properly” submit). Many Southern Baptist churches will NOT accept a female minister (and the handful which do have female pastors have been excluded or even expelled from both their local Baptist organizations as well as the SBC as a whole).
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And one needn’t even look at those two groups to witness homophobia. All you have to do is look at the recent controversy in the Episcopal Church and its role in the Anglican Fellowship. African member churches of the Anglican Fellowship have been VERY vocal in opposing recent ordinations of both women and gay bishops in the US Episcopal Church, even to the point of accepting “conservative” (or
“traditional”) American Episcopalians under their guidance. I am BEYOND tired of the very hypocritical right-wing in the US lambasting Muslims for the so-called “anti-woman” and “anti-gay” measures while their own practices have been incredibly anti-woman and anti-gay. Look at the mostly-CHRISTIAN nation of Uganda. That country’s politicians actually proposed legislation that would not only make being gay a CAPITAL crime, but would also make having knowledge of, but not turning in, gays and lesbians punishable by imprisonment. And the scariest thing is that the politicians were more offended that other countries would think they had any right to intervene in Uganda’s politics. (I don’t know how much of the story broke into the mainstream press, but the gay press, including the Advocate, connected Uganda’s anti-gay legislation DIRECTLY to American right-wing Christian groups and a few specific American politicians.)
So for Islam it’s “so-called “anti-woman” and “anti-gay” measures” while for the Roman Catholic Church or the Southern Baptist Convention it’s “anti-women and very homophobic.” Interesting dichotomy.
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For the record, while both have a lonf way to go it would take an incredible amount of myopia to think that the position of the Catholic Church on gays (“homosexual thoughts are disordered but not sinful, homosexual acts are unnatural and sinful, but it is wrong top persecute or commit violence against gay people”) is on par with the reality faced by gays in many Muslim countries (“We kill you!”). (the more secular countries of Turkey, Indonesia, and Jordan do not imprison or kill gays and deserve commendation for bucking that trend).
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You are correct that the Uganda situation is horrible. So is the situation in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Mauritania, Yemen, Nigeria, and Sudan, all of which have the death penalty for homosexuality…and enforce it. (the number of executed gays in Iran is in the thousands) In the maldives, Bahrain, Algeria and Qatar, you just get fined and jailed. Afghanista has gotten better, for obvious reasons.
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Even in some countries where Islam is not the majority religion, the Muslim leadership has actively campaigned against any attempt to liberalize laws pertaining to gays.
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You don’t have to be a bigot to see what is in front of your own eyes. On gay rights, Islam has a long way to go, if we are to judge it from the actions of its adherents. The crazy, violent anti-gay people are on Christianity’s fringe. They are in Islam’s ruling classes. Hopefully that will change but it doesn’t help if one ignores the problem.
the reality faced by gays in many Muslim countries (“We kill you!”).
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Well, if you also look at those same countries, they probably treat their women and non-Muslims no better. So, I don’t know if this is a homosexual-specific issue in these countries.
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The reality faced by gays in many countries, regardless, is simply one of nonacceptance or worse. Over the weekend, we had an attack here, not far from where I live, that appears to have been motivated by hatred of gays. And there have been several other incidents in recent weeks, including suicides, due to bullying and attacks.
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So, I’m not ready to get up on the rooftop saying how great things are here compared to some places.
mmmm, no. I don’t doubt that the women and non-muslims are poorly treated but that is in no way shape or form equal to what happens to gays. They are put to death. If Saudi Arabia or Iran treated all their omen that way I think we’d know about it…also, killing all the women AND the homosexuals would really limit the options for lonely Iranian guys.
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So, I’m not ready to get up on the rooftop saying how great things are here compared to some places.
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I am. If the only mark of success is that gays will never ever be harassed or bullied or attacked, it will never be reached. I am wiling to say that country where such things are the acts of criminals who can expect to be punished if caught is vastly superior to one where the law states that such behavior is sanctioned by both the government and God almighty himself.
I’m not aware of any Christian countries that currently have the death penalty for homosexuality (other than the aforementioned Uganda), but there are still several that imprison people for it, particularly in the West Indies and some African countries. There are others where it is still an imprisonable offense, but the laws are rarely, or never, enforced.
Peter,
And just considering your central thesis (I think): You’re positing that Ms. Moon is not reacting reasonably because of something in her past, and that people don’t respond reasonably because of fear. That all this apparent-kowtowing is strictly because of fear.
And I think you may have derailed your, or her, point, by importing Comedy Central and other media’s censorship. Because that *is* largely motivated by fear. But not just of bombing, etc, but also motivated by the fear of the reaction of ‘liberal left’ like (say) the organizers of Wiscon, who label any dissent as racist, and the effect that would have on these big media-businesses.
You over simplified by attributing the fear to one cause. And that affects the next step.
You’re right, fear leads to anger. But the anger’s not just because of the fear of harm from Muslim terrorists and not being able to punish them, but the anger at being told that we (not necessarily directly including me) can’t criticize ANYTHING to do with Muslims, or its racist. And I don’t think it’s trite to say that there are some (a few? one?) Muslim practices (perhaps only practiced by a fraction of them, but still a fair number of them) that don’t fit in with the normal standards of Western civilization, and being told we must tolerate them means compromising some other principle – like the equality of all people, including jews and women.
And just to the side – does she have to pick out every other group that also oppresses women to make that one point? I’d say no – I imagine she doesn’t like their practices either, but that’s not the point.
I, personally, think this is a horribly complicated issue. Should we punish all Muslims for 9/11? Of course not. Should we oppose the construction of mosques (your) nationwide? No, I don’t think so. Should we punish those who admit to feeling nervous when they see Muslims, but aren’t advocating violence, aren’t advocating not letting them on flights, aren’t advocating taking away their rights? No.
Is it hard for reasonable people to straddle that line? Obviously. You and Elizabeth are both reasonable people. Quite obviously, there’s reasonable people on BOTH SIDES of this line.
“… the anger at being told that we (not necessarily directly including me) can’t criticize ANYTHING to do with Muslims, or its racist ”
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I’ve heard this argument a lot. So, from the perspective of a minority person who has been discriminated against in the past, let me tell you what this phrase means to me.
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I’ll simply re-write it. Because when a person says something along those lines, this is what I actually understand from the words:
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“… the anger at being told that we (not necessarily directly including me) can’t generalize a person by identifying them as the worst of their racial catagory without being called out for being racist.”
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Because, racism is at its foundation is a generalization of a catagory of people based on the actions of specific members. So, saying that you want to criticise all Muslims because of the practices of a few, or even the majority, is still racist.
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As others have said, if those same comments had been said about black people, or Hispanic people, or Germans / Japanese / Koreans / Russians / name your country of origin it would be considered racist. So, why isn’t it racist when said about Muslim people?
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Theno
Depends. I read “can’t criticize ANYTHING to do with Muslims” as meaning that one could not , say, criticize the religion of Islam, without being called racist.
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And of course that would be wrong. No religion should be free from the right of people to critize, mock, ridicule it.
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If it was meant as you read it, that one can’t criticize Muslims as some monolithic group that all think and act alike and are responsible for whatever any member of the group does or says, yeah, you’re spot-on.
On the subject of Islam and women…
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If we look at the situation of women in muslim countries right now and compare it to, say, the USA or France, we will all agree women in muslim countries have it worse. No argument on that.
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The USA is a mainly protestant country and France is still mainly catholic. For most people, the correlation between Islam and the status of women is therefor automatic; Islam as a religion is oppresive to women. More than other religions. Moon seems to think that way and you PAD seem to agree with her on that point, since thats where you place the irony in her GoH status beign revoked.
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And I say that is, to use your words, Cash Cab logic.
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For the most part of Islam’s existence, the freedom and independence of muslim women was greater than that of women living in Christian countries. To an observer 300 years ago, Islam would be a far more enlightened religion when it came to women independence that most christian denominations. And the limitations of women liberties back then were also mainly attributed to religion.
35 (not a typo, thirty five) years ago, women in my country couldnt open a bank account without their father, husband or brother giving permission. Nor they could leave the country or make any purchase over a certain amount. And their property was to be at the dispossal of their male tutor. And to most observers, this was because Spain is a “very catholic country”. Once Franco died and democracy was reinstalled, those laws were gone, yet Spain as a country is still mainly catholic.
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“Armchair Feminists” usually slander Islam because they follow the same flawed Cash Cab logic Moon followed (not saying there arent many things to criticize, just not the usual suspects everyone seem to pick). Feminist anthropology and feminist economical studies have long dismised much of the weight put on religious dogma regarding the status of women, to look at the overall development of the society as a more accurate factor. And its an important distiction because if you are going to engage in activist work to change how a society treats its women you have to know where to place your efforts.
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Maybe, just maybe, WisCon board was a tad more educated about those notions than Moon and found her lacking when it came to modern feminism.
Whether or not Islamic countries once had more freedom than other countries is of small comfort to those now living.
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The excuses for the treatment of women in many–maybe even most?–of the majority muslim countries don’t impress me. People will say that the burkha (sp?) is liberating…fine. if someone feels that way I say let them wear it. But of course, many have no choice.
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Agreed, it is wrong to assume that Saudi Arabia is a “typical” muslim country. or Iran. Or Somalia.
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is there any islamic majority country where the rights of gays is anything better than death? Since gay rights is a large issue for most feminists (and other right minded people, to my way of thinking) one can see where the fact that gays are murdered by sanction of the state in some Muslim countries might stop people from thinking of them in a positive light.
Bill, I never tried to “excuse” anything. I just point out that religion is less of a factor, development is. Religion in christian countries didnt change that much yet societies changed and became more inclusive when echonomical and industrial development spreaded. In Christian countries where such development hasnt arrive yet (ie: Spain 32 years ago, Nicaragua today) opression lingers.
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So clearly religion was not the factor but the excuse behind the opression of women (and gays) in Christian countries, yet we quickly point at religion when it comes to THEIR problem. We could look at everything else that is different from our situation, and study our own process of change, but instead we choose the one factor we have less influence over, the most dificult to change and say “See? there it is… they’re screwed up because they are muslim”.
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Regarding the complex dichotomy of homosexuality in the muslim world I recomend reading anything by Abdelá Taia. Not a complacent view on muslim society by any mean, but an eye opener as to what’s what in that issue. On a more humorous tone, read about the abundant homoerotic tradition in pashtun poetry. yes, the same pashtun that form the backbone of the Taliban.
I think the larger problem may be that while some Christian countries remain backwards there is nothing inherently in the religion that would make that so. But–arguably–there are factors in Islam as it is generally practiced today that may make social advancement difficult.
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The fact that Christianity is so fractured, for example, makes Christians prtty much forced to accept that people of different religions have to be dealt with. No Christian sect is large enough to have a working society that actively oppresses the minority sects. note that this was not true when it was just Catholics and one or two protestant religions but now we have hundreds of christian sects and while each one feels they are the one true way they can’t really afford to knock off the others. The various groups within Islam, by contrast, still have adherents who seem to think they might be able to dispose of the heretics, one reason why, for all the talk about how the USA and Jews are killing Muslims it is Muslims who are doing a far better job of that than anyone else could imagine.
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I don’t think it is necessarily in the nature of the religion itself–many parts of which are quite admirable–as it is in a serious problem that i don;t see a solution for. Even those fundamentalist Christians who believe every word of the Bible is true realize that it is a translation and is of a time that is not now. That’s why they are selective about which parts of Leviticus they follow. But Muslims are supposed to believe that the Koran is the literal word of God, as dictated to Mohammad. Not a word, not a comma can be changed. No arguments about translations is possible, no context is permissible, to question a single jot is to blaspheme.
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Even religious christians and jews can find justifications in ignoring or at least explaining how certain passages of the Bibles no longer pertain to the modern world. Can Muslims do the same without appearing to be “bad” Muslims?
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A Islamic reformation would be the best thing to happen to it but would a Muslim Martin Luther live long enough to get the chance to do it?
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I have wondered how it is that the Islamic world was once so scientifically advanced compared to the christian one and frittered it away. i wonder if there is an element of looking to much to the past, seeing the lost age of Islamic supremacy as the best time on Earth and seeing the modern age and all of its aspects as something that ruined it.
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While I do not think this is the case–the evidence is very much still out–one has to consider the reality that not all religions can thrive under changing circumstances. It is their nature to remain rigid but in life it is those who can adapt to changing times that survive. Can Islam? Of course. Will it be allowed to? Remains to be seen.
Good post Bill.
This past week this blog (not only this post) has given me a lot to think about. Bravo for PAD for having it and bravo for almost all the people participating on it for keeping it civil.
Bill–
I’ve heard calls for an Islamic Reformation before (I recall Bill Maher talking about it on Politically Incorrect, for instance). It just strikes as a pretty naive idea, because it seems so obvious that an Islamic Reformation is exactly what is happening today, and has been for some time now.
I think you’re making the same error Maher did. You seem to believe that the Protestant Reformation in Europe was a movement towards greater tolerance and a more secular society. It wasn’t. It was the opposite. The Reformation was an eruption of competing forms of fanaticism. It was an age of brutal warfare and terrorism– the Thirty Years War, the Spanish Armada, Civil Wars in England and France, the Inquisition, the Gunpowder Plot– all of it was centred around disputes over which religion should dominate society.
Witch hunts were rare in the Middle Ages, and most accused witches were acquitted. During the Reformation, witch scares became common and took on the nature we think of today, with people being brutally executed based on nothing more than accusation.
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It seems to me that this is the sort of thing that is happening in many Islamic countries today. Old certainties of religion and culture have been called into question, leading to panic and fanaticism by those who feel their particular brand of religion must be restored to its rightfull place in the culture.
Salafi, or Wahabi, Islam, the type that dominates in Saudi Arabia, began about 200 years ago as a movement to purify the faith and return to the presumed values of the ‘original Islamic community’. It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to look at it as a form of Muslim Protestantism, perhaps as a sort of Calvinist variety.
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The violence of the European Reformation gradually subsided because no side was able to win, and tolerance came about simply because they just couldn’t fight any longer. I assume the same will happen in the Islamic countries which are currently in turmoil. It may already be happening in Lebanon (which has several varieties of both Islam and Christianity, none of which is large enough to dominate).
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I do think the important lesson that needs to be learned in the West is that the only ‘Clash Of Civilisations’ going on is between different views of Islam. It isn’t Us vs Them, it’s Them vs Them. We are just a minor sideline, and if we don’t try to interfere too much with what happens in Muslim countries, they’ll mostly leave us alone.
“…while some Christian countries remain backwards there is nothing inherently in the religion that would make that so”
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I’ve heard many people (usually protestant north-americans) expressing views about catholicism in latinoamerican countries much similar to yours about Islam. I dont believe its ill meant but its the root of paternalistic conolialism; “If only they could be more like us, they’d be better off”. But as Mary Warner pointed out, our road to where we are was a bumpy one, and we didnt even had to worry about overcoming neocolonialism and a a foreign-backed ruling class. Still, as Galileo said, Eppur si muove. And yet it moves.
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Still, your image of the christian world is pretty much based on the american example (and even there I could object to certain statements you made… dominionism creeps me out because I see it a more effective threat to my future freedom than any muslim mufti). Christians still try to “win countries for Christ” in many ways. Just read about Southern Baptism and the Guatemalan Junta. Or the US Air Force Academy infiltration by certain denominations. That is not to say “christians are worse” or even “everyone is the same”… the quality of the actions of extremists in one side speaks for itself. But the quality of the philosophies is pretty much equivalent, with the insidious certainty that extremist christians have a better chance of achieving their goal.
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Back to the issue… Islam can change. It has change in the past and it has accomodated many different interpretations (the Koran might not be a translation but it is still open for interpretation). There are only a few muslim denominations but many sects within them, some influenced by a very healthy sincretism, like the not-that-minoritarian sufí. Just ask youself how long would the Saudi goverment last without direct US backing (like that massive arms sale this week), and how powerful would Wahabbism be without the House of Saud.
Mary…that is a very interesting observation and one I am going to ponder over. Thank you.
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If you are right then I take it all back…the last thing we need is another reformation. Imagine the 30 year war with nukes.
One other little detail– About the Quran being inviolate– ‘not a word, not a comma can be changed’– Arabic, like Hebrew, has traditionally been written without vowells. Usualy, the Quran has diacritical marks added to indicate which vowells should be used, but these do not appear in the oldest versions. If I haven’t been misinformed about this, there are actually four different versions of the Quran in use today, with different vowells and punctuation present. I believe most of the differences are quite minor, but it does disprove the common fundamentalist claim that the Quran is perfect and unalterable.
I doubt the current Saudi regime would last very long without US backing. What do you think would replace it?
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I don’t know that I have much of a view of Christian countries as such. I see that there are actual countries that have some form of Christianity as their state religion. If I were to compare them to the countries that have Islam as their state religion…the results are pretty grim for Islam. The ones that have Christianity as an officail state religion are some of the better places on earth and the ones that have Islam include some of the very worst.
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Now the question is–why? there was a time when the Islamic countries were way ahead of the Christian ones. What went wrong? Is it that many of the Christian ones, while they have a state religion, don’t make much effort to make that meaningful while some of the Islamic countries make their Islamic identity a fundamental part of the culture? Maybe religion is inherently incompatible with a modern government.
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What would be the most successful country that has a large role for specific religious dogma in its governing politics/
Bill:
Drawing conclussions from grim comparisons is obviously a mistake. We both agree muslim countries once represented a better model than christian ones. A comparison back then, focused only on religion, would have drawn the opposite conclussions to the ones drawn today. Since those conclussions would have been proven wrong, why ever consider these?
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Now, What went wrong? thats the kind of question whole books try to awnser. Nothing and everything. Mongol and Timurid invasions ravaged most muslims centers of knowledge, displacing the intelectual axis far east. Reading about the terror both invasions arised in Europe is interesting and that the arab world buffered it is a factor in both the rise of european civilization and the decline of arab one. Turkoman tribes became the main power in the area because they were better suited to the new scenario and for the next centuries, there was no significant self determined arab state to speak of.
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See, its important to realize present day extremism has less to do with Islam and much more with five centuries of arab submission to foreign powers (first turks, then europeans). If you look at the two main historically self determined muslim people, the Turks and the Persians, you can see a muchless fractured pattern of development and social change. Hëll, even Rousseau, one of the intelectual fathers of western modern statehood, whose ideas resonated in your own country founding fathers, put the Ottoman empire meritocracy as an example of enlightment against european christian autocracies.
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Arabs went from one ruler they didnt like to another that didnt like them at all. British and french rule was intrumental in creating the dichotomy (thats twice I use the word today) between modernity and muslim orthodoxy. The french demanded apostasy to the arabs who wanted to prosper through civil service, de facto severing arab intellectual elite from contributing to religious debate (oh yeah, there is actually more theological discussion in Islam than in most christian denominations, since there is no real central authority). The british simply decided to gun down whoever got in their way and enthrone whoever served their purposes best, no matter how sinister. Doing the first they invaded Sudan and turned an obscure cult (Wahabbism) into a rally flag of arab nationalism. Doing the second they enthroned the House of Saud (see Lawrence of Arabia).
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Does this excuse Muslim extremists from whatever they do? No, but it is good to have it in mind when one despairs as to why those guys might be finding some support. There is a huge feeling of aggravation in the arab (not muslim, arab) psyche, and while some of it is just mythology, most of it is grounded in history, recent one even. It doesnt help either that every arab dictator and tyrant have been cozy with western powers because it renews the feelings of beign victims of foreign meddling. And there are a lot of reactions to it, but we usually see only the violent ones. Have you read anything about moroccan youth culture? I barely did but it is supposed to be a huge cultural phenomena that defies (and redefines) the boundaries of muslim society. Who knew… But see, the thing is if its local it wont turn a profit for us, so we dont promote it. Now, if they were to buy Lady Gaga records en masse… THAT would be a change we can swallow.
Hombre Malo, the depressing conclusion I draw from your analysis is that when men have their masculine pride damaged by submission to foreign rulers, they take it out on their women?
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Well, some men, at least. We do have a long history of poverty and submission to foreign powers in Latin America, but we never had that big an extent of oppresion against females here.
Have two things in mind, Rene:
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First, that arab lack of self determination didnt make them “take it out on their women”. It caused many reactions, one of them beign religious radicalism. The focus on gender oppression is ours because thats something easy to understand and point out, but the reality is the whole society that is opressed and alienated by extremism when it seizes power. Other self determination movements, like panarabism, did the exact opposite and granted rights and opportunities to women some latinoamerican countries (or mine) didnt had at that time.
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Second that latinoamerican countries are not a good example. They are the result of an hybridation and not just a foreign invasion. Latinoamerican states (and the USA for that matter) were created by Criollos (I dont know what name they had in Brazil) that usually had more in common with the european powers they fought than with the bulk of the population. the culture was hybrid too for the most part. In the places where that didnt happen (ie: the Altiplano) you can find examples mor eakin to arab religious or political radicalism, but in this came self determination is sought not from foreign powers but from local criollos.
Hombre– If I may make a minor correction, the royal dynasty imposed by Britain, as shown in Lawrence of Arabia, was the Hashemites, not the House of Saud. The Hashemites were given the thrones of the UK mandates Jordan (which they still rule) and Iraq. Ibn Saud united the tribes of Arabia and established his dynasty largely on his own in the 1920s and ’30s. There was no real colonial power in central Arabia as the territory seemed pretty worthless to Europeans at the time. (Oil wasn’t discovered until ibn Saud was already in charge.)
Mary, the House of Saud ruled a British protectorate opposing the Ottomans just before the creation of modern Saudi Arabaia, and ever since has received military backing of western powers (American, British and French) whenever needed. I remembered Lawrence contributing to enthrone an arab dinasty and knew the British had cemented the House of Saud position in arabia during WWI, so I got it all mixed together. My bad.
Moon seems to think that way and you PAD seem to agree with her on that point, since thats where you place the irony in her GoH status beign revoked.
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As a point of information, I didn’t say I agreed with her; I said that she was asserting a feminist argument and was subsequently rejected by feminists, which I thought was ironic.
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There are plenty of Muslim women (including some of my acquaintance) who are as equal as anyone else. As I noted, you’re on a slippery slope when disparaging the validity of an entire religion based on some factions having an anti-female bias, because on that basis, Muslims are no different than Jews…or, for that matter–if you count forbidding women from being priests–Christianity.
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PAD
True, PAD, I overlooked the mention to orthodox jews and women. Or better said, I didnt take it into account on the precise subject I was trying to adress. But, once I do…
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…where do you see the irony in WisCon revoking GoH status to Moon? To me it’s almost logical, if somewhat more enlightened than the usual feminist mainstream organizations.
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That is, unless they are doing this for all the wrong reasons.
They’re doing it, one figures, because some percentage of their membership is urging them to. The women who actually ran the convention were apparently resisting it until they couldn’t do it anymore. Whether that’s a right or wrong reason depends upon one’s point of view. As for the irony…I thought it spoke for itself.
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PAD
Oh, it’s not just in being priests, PAD – based on one or two lines in one of the books of (IIRC) James, taken out of context and without considering how temple was run at the time, Christians have historically been against women speaking in church at all, until about the last century or so.
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Let’s face it, none of the Abrahamic faiths have been innocent as regards “anti-female bias” – recall that the tale of the Fall, from Genesis, places a large portion of the blame on Eve, even though neither of the humans had been given any instruction about how to avoid being influenced by the blandishments of the Serpent. (Honestly, God doesn’t come across very well in that tale at all – creating things people weren’t supposed to touch, creating people with vast curiosity, warning them in Schmuck-Bait terms, sticking the Serpent in there too, and then walking off and ignoring the whole thing for days at a time – and then, when the inevitable happens, overreacting horribly. If I were to take it as anything other than a cautionary tale, I might start to think He was the villain of the piece…)
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Now, for myself, I understand that Ms. Moon is poorly thought of in the autistic community, due to her treatment of autistic characters in one or two of her books. I haven’t read them, myself (my entertainment dollars are strictly limited, and I must spend them only on things that I’m pretty sure will actually entertain me), so can’t speak to the validity of the complaint, but at least it’s a complaint about her work, not about attitudes attributed to her. What, was baiting Harlan so much fun that now we’re going to start critiquing everybody in SF for attitudes they supposedly have outside their writing?
“Christians have historically been against women speaking in church at all, until about the last century or so.”
Go to a small town Church of Christ (which I grew up in)…
Still alive and kicking on that one.
Years ago, our local Conservative synagogue decided that Bat Mitzvah girls would no longer be allowed to read Torah as part of the ceremony. That honor would be reserved for the boys. I pulled my family out immediately. There was no way I was subjecting my daughters to being second class citizens.
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PAD
Moon is poorly thought of in the autistic community?
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That’s curious considering she has an autistic son.
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PAD
Yes, but apparently one of her novels involves an autistic viewpoint character (I understand the plot involved inducing an autistic state in order to enable greater concentration on the part of researchers), and some activists felt that the portrayal of the character “dehumanized” him. Also, they felt that the novel emphasized what’s been called the “curebie” attitude – that even for those of us on the high-functioning end, our autism needs to be cured, to make us “better”.
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As I said, I haven’t read the work or works in question – I only brought it up to make the point that when you’re critiquing a writer, it should be for what that writer says in his/her work, not in a more personal conversation (or blog).
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OTOH, just having an autistic child doesn’t get one off scot-free; Alison Singer, former president of Autism Speaks, was excoriated in the community after appearing on an HBO special about the condition with her autistic daughter, and admitting on camera (and with her daughter right there!) to occasionally wanting to drive right off the George Washington Bridge to “spare” the poor girl the “burden” of having to live as an autistic. Speaking as a member of the community, I don’t feel burdened by autism – I feel burdened by people who don’t care to understand. My daughter’s favorite shirt sums it up nicely, I think: “Yes, I am autistic. Stare if you must – I’m not paying attention to you anyway.”
As I said, I haven’t read the work or works in question – I only brought it up to make the point that when you’re critiquing a writer, it should be for what that writer says in his/her work, not in a more personal conversation (or blog).
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No argument there, obviously. Moon was going to be honored for her body of feminist work. None of that work has changed.
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Speaking as a member of the community, I don’t feel burdened by autism – I feel burdened by people who don’t care to understand. My daughter’s favorite shirt sums it up nicely, I think: “Yes, I am autistic. Stare if you must – I’m not paying attention to you anyway.”
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And I totally respect and sympathize with that. On the other hand, if Elizabeth Moon’s son was wearing that shirt, I can very easily imagine someone saying to her, “There she goes again, being insensitive! Autism isn’t something you joke about!” and excoriating her on that basis. True?
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In any event, if you ever have a chance to read the story, report back what you thought. I’d be interested to know since, as someone who lives with it, your viewpoint would be instructive.
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PAD
“But–arguably–there are factors in Islam as it is generally practiced today that may make social advancement difficult.”
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The fact that you have to use all those qualifies makes your claim that it is anything inherent to Islam completely meaningless. I mean, the way Islam used to be practiced (whatever that means) allowed them to conquor the known world, rule in a pretty enlightened fashion for the time, and make advances in Art and Science that are still meaningful over a thousand years later.
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And if you knew any Southern Baptists or members of ELCA, you wouldn’t be so quick to claim that Christianity recognizes it is too big to purge all the heretics. It’s just that America is a big place, and the crazies are too far apart to rumble.
Paraphrasing Muhammed Ali….”No Christian, Jew, Hindu, Sikh or Bhuddhist ever threatened me or my kids lives.”
“They” Extreme socilaists are not interested in winning the argument but in denying you the opportunity to have one
[i]Really[/i], Anthony??
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Even leaving aside the historical elephant in the room, plenty of Jews (and others) have been threatened and killed by white supremacist organizations in the US. Sikh and Hindi have been killing each other in India since shortly after first encountering each other. Residents of Palestine in, say, 1947 might argue the part about Jews not threatening anyone.
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I’ll grant you that to the best of my knowledge, Buddhists tend not to go about killing people for religious reasons – but they seem to be alone in this.
“I’ll grant you that to the best of my knowledge, Buddhists tend not to go about killing people for religious reasons – but they seem to be alone in this.”
I believe some buddhist sects took an active part in the violent prosecution of christians in Japan. More recently, buddhist Tamils targeted muslim and christian buildings and people in an ethnic cleansing with religious overtones. Thai nationalism is rabidly buddhist and uses both mob and state violence against muslim minorities.
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As an atheist, buddhists seem easier to get along with than other religious types, but their adherence to non-violence is as strong as most other people’s adherence to the good dogma in their religion… best not tested.
I thought Tamils were Hindu. Sinhalese, who persecute the Tamils are Buddhists. I don’t know anything about persecution of Muslims or Christians in Sri Lanka, so I can’t really say who might persecute them the most.
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(By the way, I don’t know if this statistic still holds– I read about it around seven or eight years ago– but at least in the ’80s and ’90s, Hindu Tamils were responsible for more suicide bombings than all Muslim terrorists put together. Not just in Sri Lanka, but some in India as well. That was how Rajiv Gandhi died, remember? And yet I continually hear Americans say they’ve never heard of any suicide bombers other than Muslims.)
You are right Mary. I think I’ve read something about religious extremism linked to Tamil terrorism and some ethnic cleansing some time ago and though Tamils were buddhists. But now that you mention Rajiv Gandhi I remember reading about radical hinduism associated with that murder. A quick wiki search would have prevented my mistake.
I can see both sides of the argument, but I tend to agree more with Bill Mulligan.
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PAD may be right that many people give Muslims a wide berth out of fear, not respect. But I do think many people also cut them too much slack out of sheer political correctness, because they don’t want to be seen as racist imperialistic conservatives. In other words, if a white Christian country did it, the Left would’ve been screaming bloody murder with no regrets.
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Emily’s posts seem to carry this sort of attitude. Zeus knows I’m no fan of Christianity. Actually, many people think I’m rabid anti-Christian, ’cause I defend gay rights, right to choose an abortion, euthanasia, right to have any kind of consensual sex you want whenever you want, and I think the current Pope is a dìçk too. So I’m not being an hypocritical Christian when I say the rap sheet of current Muslim societies is far worse than the one from current Christian societies when it comes to women and gay rights, and trying for moral equivalence smacks of brain-dead PCism to me.
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But Mary and El Hombre make some good points too that the root of the problem isn’t the religion, but economic and political factors, and the religion is just the tool of oppression. But really, when people denounce Muslims, many of them are refering to Muslims as a society, and that includes many other factors besides religion. Even Bush himself, as wrong-headed as he was (I am a Bush hater too, if you’re wondering), never said the problem was with the Muslim faith.
“But really, when people denounce Muslims, many of them are refering to Muslims as a society, and that includes many other factors besides religion”
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Yet the issue with Moon’s words is that they seem to be aimed mostly at muslims living in the USA. Muslims that work, pay their taxes and obey the law, and only differ from other citizens in that they follow Islam instead of other religions or no religion at all.
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In other words, if a white Christian country did it, the Left would’ve been screaming bloody murder with no regrets.
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Um, before you get all “holier-than-thou” (pardon the pun) against “the Left,” bear in mind that the Muslim terrorists who actually attacked the US on 9/11 originated in Saudi Arabia–a country which the US has befriended for a VERY long time. Don’t forget the real reason for attacking Iraq in 1991 was to protect SAUDI oil fields–the “liberation” of Kuwait was largely a secondary matter to the US government but presented to the American public as THE reason. (It’s also worth noting that Bill who largely started this most recent kerfluffle doesn’t seem to be all that scared of Muslims since one key investor in the Fox News Network happens to be not only a Muslim, but part of the Saudi royal family, and a very good friend of Rupert Murdoch.)
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Now, on a secondary note, the US has NOT been attacked by any Muslim COUNTRY, so your comparison is less than apt in this instance. The US, for a VERY long time, has dealt with CHRISTIAN-based terrorists. Read up on the history of the Ku Klux Klan. The group initially was formed to terrorize freed slaves in the Reconstruction-era South, but its second incarnation (that started in the WWI era) began targeting not only Blacks, but also included Jews and Catholics as targets. Even earlier, than the KKK were the very violent actions taken by self-proclaimed Christians against the newly-developed Mormon community (the sect’s founder was murdered in the name of defending “Christianity”).
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If you want to discuss more recent history, look up the name “Eric Robert Rudolph” or “Jim Adkisson.”
As a non-American, I don’t really care that much about the US government’s policies. And I know a Muslim country didn’t attack the US. What I meant was simply that, if a white, Christian country had barbaric customs, the Left would not feel a need to qualify or even withdraw their criticism.
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Anyone ever said the Apartheid in South Africa was just a matter of a different culture that had to be respected? Or that Apartheid was less evil because it could no doubt be explained by economic-socio-cultural factors? The only mitigator to criticisms of South Africa used to be that the US was worse than South Africa, because at least there they hated openly (i.e., less a praise of Apartheid, and more an example of the Left taking every opportunity possible to lambast the US).
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To my eyes, the Right never had any credibility in the first place. But the Left has let me down constantly by being overly-supportive and forgiving of anyone that is targeted by Conservatives, even when said enemies of Conservatism did pretty rotten things, like the Soviets.
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Now, I think Mary and El Hombre Malo are probably right. Let the Muslim sort things out among themselves in their countries, don’t launch any more catastrophic foreign interventions. But I don’t see why we can’t call a spade and spade, and say a repressive society is a repressive society that uses a religion (perhaps noble in older times) as a tool of said oppression.
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The Muslims are human beings gifted with free will, and many of them are adults (except for the Muslim children, that is), they CAN be criticized when they do bad things, you know.
I agree, Rene. If someone says “I am fed up with these guys” I barely raise an eyebrow. You wont hear me object to the most obscene and vitriolic tirade about Osama Bin Laden. But usually, that is followed by an explanation of how they are backward, ignorant, barbarous… because of their religion. Or issue maximalist statements about the violence inherent to Islam.
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Countries or demographics are not persons. They are composed of a lot of people that you can judge on a moral basis, one by one. But as a group you dont use moral to judge their actions, you use sociology, anthropology… you look at the bigger picture. And that doesnt excuse the actions of any given individual within that group, but puts it into context.
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Change the context and you reduce the occurence of certain actions. Its not infantilization, its just statistics. Its the context that’s repressive, the religion is not even a tool… in repressive societies every aspect of it contributes to repression. Schools are repressive in dictatorships but we dont see them as inherently evil because since we have them too, we know schools can be a force of good. But since we dont see or really understand Islam, since is alien to us, we quickly identify it as the source of the evils that plague that society… which is actually insulting to the many muslims able to carry on their life within democratic systems. And false.
I bow to the awesomeness of knowledge I’ve gained from this conversation.
It has been pretty awesome. Be cool if Elizabeth chimed in.
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PAD
So, nothing on the absolutely wonderful appearance of Ben Bailey and CASH CAB on 30 ROCK last week?
I think we’re getting away from the most important point, which is that Cash Cab is awesome. In fact, all they have to do is get all the Muslims and Christians and Jews together and play Cash Cab. World peace would then ensue. That’s a fact.
Sounds like the setup for a joke: A Muslim, a Christian and a Jew got into a cab…
The game show derivation of your neologism notwithstanding, Peter, I use the phrase Astroturf Logic to denote the definition you provided: Looking at the surface and coming to a conclusion that seems right but is fundamentally flawed when you look below it.
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I love Cash Cab, but I don’t know how many people watch it, whereas Astroturf has been around for over four decades. But that’s just me. 🙂
I never heard of Cash Cab until I saw this column.
“Odd. Deleting angry postings and locking down threads is SOP on many blogs…including blogs that are maintained by people condemning Moon for the same practice. My blog, however, does not do that.”
Except for one particular thread on the Adventurers’ Club … which would serve very well as the exception that proves the rule.
Somewhat off topic, I know, but ….
As you say: The number of times I’ve had to step in is so staggeringly infrequent that the exception proves the rule.
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Consider, on the other hand, Moon’s actions as compared to those on other blogs maintained by the same people who called for her ouster as GOH. She condemned a practice that she felt was harmful to women. Check. She obviously expected comments along the lines of “Great post!” and reacted negatively to attacks on her opinion, regardless as to whether they were well-reasoned or not. Check. She took steps ranging from shutting down conversation to disappearing negative comments because she probably felt her blog should be a safe place. Check.
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I’m not saying she did nothing wrong. I’m saying she did nothing different than a lot of other bloggers do.
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And I suppose the most ironic thing of all are the cries from commentators who declare that people should be held responsible for the things they say…but they post from behind fake names so they can voice their opinions with impunity.
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PAD
As someone who was a contestant on Cash Cab (and won), my biggest regret is not giving Ben Bailey the tip he deserved. I thought of that after the filming was over. Anybody who appears on Cash Cab in the future, remember to tip your driver.
How much did you win? Did you go for the double-or-nothing? And how do they do those shots of people actually entering the cab? I always figured that they filmed that separately once you agreed to participate.
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PAD
I’ve often wondered about LOTS things that I imagined would present logistical nightmares to produce that show.
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What happens if you get a really obnoxious or incoherent passenger, or someone who’s just so dense or clueless that they ask Ben to repeat the question over and over? Or a tourist with a less-than-perfect grasp of English? Hëll, what happens if someone tries to hold up Ben? (I know there are cameras there, but there’s no bullet-resistant partition between Ben and the back seat.)
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For that matter, how many people do they get who are so misinformed that they can barely get a few blocks before getting three strikes? Do cab patrons tend to be more educated or literate?
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How often do they get some lefty hippie conspiracy nut who doesn’t want to be filmed, and runs away as soon as Ben tells them they’re on camera?
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All of the episodes apparently involve Manhattan-to-Manhattan trips. Do they never get people who need to go to the airport, or for that matter, to Jersey? Are M2M trips required in order to comply with the production’s filming license? What do they do in those cases?
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For that matter, what happens when a guy or two gets in, a bit tipsy, and says, “Take me to Chinatown! We’re gonna get a hotel room, some booze, and some høøkërš!” Does Ben say, “Sorry, buddy, that’s a different taxicab show.”?
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Does anyone who gets three strikes ever give Ben any grief about having to be dumped on the sidewalk in the rain? Do any litigious jerks ever threaten to sue him because they don’t have an umbrella, and blame him for getting wet because it wasn’t raining when they got in, and expected to get to their location without getting wet?
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Btw, for those who haven’t seen Ben’s half hour Comedy Central standup (I think it was an episode of Comedy Central Presents) try to see it when it airs on online. He’s hilarious.
The two of us in the cab won $950 (it was Cash Cab at Night). There was no way in hëll I was going to do the double-or-nothing because I view that as practically unwinnable. There is a screening process for the show so they don’t get any lunatics in the cab. If you’d like more details, PAD, e-mail me offline.
It is interesting how much “conversation” this topic has encouraged.
When I was first told of the controversy, my first thought was that I didn’t want to go to a feminist convention because of the times I tried attending feminist panels at World Cons. I was put off lo those many years ago by primarily the Fat Feminist Fandom panel at some World Con or other. The women on the panel started out with legitimate complaints about the plight of women but soon the panel degenerated into man bashing because men didn’t find large women in chain mail attractive. What?! How did that relate to our not being paid the same as men or not having the same opportunities to rise to the top in the corporate world? Huh?
Now, I feel put off because a feminist convention’s stance on a woman expressing her personal views in her personal blog is that if it offends them in some way, the woman is no good. For all I know, she thinks large women in chain mail are unattractive and that’s the real problem but probably not.
This is just SILLY. If you get rid of your convention guest of honor because you don’t share his or her personal views, aren’t you going to have to look at all future guests of honor in a different light. Won’t you have to delve into what their personal views are? I think so, if you are fair minded. Speaking as a person who helps organize a convention and who does all the sorting of guests for the convention, I would never suggest we “unGoH” someone because of her or his personal views.
I’m sure I don’t share all of our former guests of honor’s views but who cares. We don’t invite our guests based on their personal views on religion, politics or other social issues. We invite them based on their contribution to the science fiction, fantasy and horror genres.
In fact, Mr. Peter David has been a guest of honor twice at the convention on which I work. I found him to be a wonderful guest of honor and I imagine we share many views but almost certainly not all and, you know what, I don’t care.
Wiscon has shot itself in the foot, if a convention can have even a figurative foot, because it’s reputation is now sullied. It has marked itself as a prejudiced organization and many women who want equality in this world understand that unguesting the guest of honor because some people don’t agree with her is showing prejudice.
As Terry Pratchett says, “It’s a funny old world.”
Peace,
Ann
So is Arthur Pendragon the fifth dragon or the second-to-last dragon?
No, Arthur’s the one whose writing is so hot that it’ll change your life. The letters get kind of smeared, though.
You know, because he has a pen dragon…and he’s dragon it across the page.