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Thinking of Mumbai


Submitted by Jim Brown on November 28, 2008 - 12:46pm


I'm sure many Blogora readers are following the Mumbai situation closely and wondering how one might have hope for discussion, discourse, rhetoric...

I am distrubed by Marty Peretz's rant about "the reasonable Islam":

The reasonable Islam of the real world is unimaginably weak, simply overwhelmed by its tormentors, compromised by its putative leaders, deluded by its wealth, unsure of what it really believes, afraid that its supposed adherents actually support its enemies and, both metaphorically and practically, have their suitcases packed to decamp for Europe where, hope assures them, they can live perhaps another generation in smugness and comfort.

Overwhelmed, unsure, afraid. Who isn't? So, "reasonable Islam" is not macho enough? Not tough enough? I understand the frustration and anger, but it seems to me that such rhetorics are too quick to place blame. If "reasonable Islam" is to blame, it is not alone.

And placing blame at anyone's feet is part of the "war against civilization" narrative:

Militant Islam is in a war against civilization. Deny it if you want to. (Maybe you'd prefer to think that George Bush, simpleton, is at war with civilization.) We've already seen how pathetically reasonable Islam does against its Muslim enemies.

War requires clearly defined enemies, and this is why we seek out someone or something to blame. Peretz calls Pakistan (which Peretz thinks is probably not behind these recent terrorist acts) "barely" a state. It is not a democracy, it has no free press, it only has "the bomb." It is offered as an example of the "them" that is waging war against "us."

There is so much left out of such a discussion. How are we all responsible for Mumbai? How is globalization responsible for Mumbai? These are impossible questions. But I hope that we can develop an answer for the "war against civilization" narrative. We need an answer for this, one the recognizes that things are complicated.

My worries
Submitted by Jim Aune on November 28, 2008 - 2:42pm.

Learning is a good thing, and with enough of it reasonable people figure out that simple narratives like "the war against civilization" select and deflect a lot of reality. The Mumbai events are clearly getting more MSM coverage than recent Hindu fundamentalist attacks on Muslims and Christians in India. Indian Muslims lag behind other groups economically (perhaps--I don't know--along the sort of Weberian lines that until recently made French Catholics lag in Canada). But I sense a reluctance among many left-wing academics to apply the same standards to Islam that they apply to right-wing Zionists or to evangelical Christians. As Alan Krueger documented in his recent book on terrorism, it is not poverty per se that drives terrorism, but rather highly motivated and often educated young men who have no experience in their countries with religious tolerance and freedom of speech. Mumbai is a criminal act, just as 9/11 was. It is best treated as such--with no excuse-making by well-intentioned leftists and with no provocation to a holy war by the West or by Hindu nationalists.

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I agree
Submitted by Anonymous on November 28, 2008 - 4:42pm.

With nearly 200 million Muslims in India, if even a tiny fraction of them are actively engaged in radicalism it's quite a scary future. I think may who look to the Koran for totality want the power that free inquiry confers, without either the free inquiry or the philosophy and institutions that support free inquiry. Thus a dilemma: either abandon this religion of totality (a totality which the Koran seems to demand), or they can remain in the rear of technical advance. Neither alternative is very appealing and the tension between a desire for power and success in the modern world on the one hand, and their desire not to abandon their religion on the other, is resolvable for some only by explosion - that is, embracing evil in the name of good.

Islam is undergoing a civil war, and we should all hope the "liberals" win.

Jonathan

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