Mark Steyn has turned into journalism’s great dark comedian, able to wring some humor out of the grimmest situations. Today’s column does it particulary well:
From Europe’s biggest-selling newspaper, the Sun: ”Furious Muslims have blasted adult shop [i.e., sex shop] Ann Summers for selling a blowup male doll called Mustafa Shag.”Not literally “blasted” in the Danish Embassy sense, or at least not yet. Quite how Britain’s Muslim Association found out about Mustafa Shag in order to be offended by him is not clear. It may be that there was some confusion: given that “blowup males” are one of Islam’s leading exports, perhaps some believers went along expecting to find Ahmed and Walid modeling the new line of Semtex belts. Instead, they were confronted by just another filthy infidel sex gag. The Muslim Association’s complaint, needless to say, is that the sex toy “insults the Prophet Muhammad — who also has the title al-Mustapha.”
It goes on from there with a bit of gentle critique of Albert Brooks’ latest:
In theory, this should have been the perfect moment for Albert Brooks to release his new film ”Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World.” Instead, life is effortlessly outpacing art. Brooks had an excellent premise and, somewhere between studio equivocation and his sense of self-preservation, it all got watered down, beginning with the decision to focus the plot on a trip to India. Which is a, er, mostly Hindu country.
I haven’t seen Brooks’ film. The reviews were pretty bad and kept me away. Also, traditional Hollywood libs like Brooks don’t seem to have the guts for satire anymore. That’s been left in the hands of the South Park gang. The Brooks crowd (all of them) are more worried about seeming “nice” these days then telling the truth. That’s death for comedy. Mark Steyn could give them lessons.
As Mark Steyn pointed out in this article, Albert Brooks set his movie, “Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World,” in India–a predominantly Hindu country. What courage from Hollywood! Maybe he could make a follow-up movie: “Looking for Comedy in the Christian World” and set it in Israel and the Palestinian territories.
apropos of Brooks filming in India:
the shocking disregard of Hollywood for
the death of Theo Van Gogh tears the cover off
any credibility they have for
“speaking truth to power”.
where,on the Net (or otherwise)
are there pictures published of the corpse
with the manifesto knifed into his chest?
why does it strike me that publication of a FACTUAL,
if horrific,image of that nature would drive the
Muslim world into a complete frenzy.
why does it strike me that publication
of direct images of such a tragic event
are Necessary,at this point?
if photos of grinning hillbilies
at the site of a lynching
are important and historical,
(they are)
so are the pictures of
Van Gogh’s crime scene.
Hmmm, since tinsel town has assumed the role of social activism through Art, I wonder if anyone in Hollywood would be interested in writing/producing a film titled “Death to Art”, a movie about a film director (Van Gogh) murdered for making a film titled “Submission”.
Of course, there will be lots of gore and such.
ìWe are at a crossroads of something very deep,î said Professor Tariq Ramadan, a visiting Islamic scholar at Oxford University. ìOn both sides there are fractures.î
Crossroads is right but what cheek to suggest that the fractures are on both sides. There is no fracture in the islamic world, the fracture is in the West, a self-inflicted one, as we still do not realise that multiculturalism is death to a nation state.
The reason that this has come to pass is the belief that multiculturalism is good for the nation. Yet we forget that the very concept of a nation is based on a people founding a community/nation of shared language and culture. It is for this reason that we have several European nations. Though we have a similar culture, the languages are different. This fracture has arisen as a direct consequence of multiculturalism, as it is in conflict with what constitutes a nation state.
Methinks it is not these cartoons of mohammed that are cause of the fury in the muslim world. Mohammed character, as his life clearly shows, was one of highway robbery, debauchery and mass murder.
What muslims or muslim religious leaders to be more precise, are trying to do in this cartoon affair, is to pre-empt the truth of mohammed’s character coming out for general view. They know that if they do not stop this here and right now, it won’t be long before a thorough examination of mohammed’s life and general character would be under the microscope. It does’nt surprise me one whit that the imams would not like this, and hence this outrage, which has been carefully orchestrated, over a few cartoons.
DP11 observes correctly and falsely about the cartoon crisis:
“Methinks it is not these cartoons of mohammed that are cause of the fury in the muslim world. Mohammed character, as his life clearly shows, was one of highway robbery, debauchery and mass murder.”
I’ve been discerning the facts about the sociology of these protests. First, in most places like Syria and Lebanon, people are either too poor or too controlled by the state to have ven seen the cartoons, and thus we don’ treally know what they think. Second, a local radio station had a Greek named woman (associated with the Nixon Center) report from Istanbul, Turkey. This woman said that most of the Danish cartoons did not evoke objection – except the one with a bomb on Mohammid’s turban! THIS was offensive to Muslims, she said.
So the lesson is that it’s when you tell Muslim’s the truth about their hypocrisy – it is the TRUTH that offends them!
Therefore I’m embracing the Truth in bumper stickers and T-shirts. Let them see their hurtful hypocrisy! Because I’ve learned to hate Muslim’s for it.
Deal with it – they must!
Roger:
This sudden “respect for other cultures” bilge that is coming out of Hollywood and some of the West’s pols is a screen for cowardice, greed, and political dogma. Around the time of the Shah’s demise and the salon hippness of the Palestinian cause the left side of the west decided to bestow Arafat and his fellow travellers with martyr status. Thus, no matter what they did, it was always blamed on the U.S. and Israel and the left has been rationalizing every action of the Islamo Fascists ever since. Just as every deed of the Soviet Union was given a pass because The U.S. was the true source of all evil in the world and thus all their actions could be rationalized. And even when the IF’s have trained their sites on free expression in the West there is still a segment in the cultural elite that is doing handstands to explain the most horrid actions away.
The E.U. response to violent blackmail is spineless fear. They are so weak that the Arab street can get them to abandon any value that they hold dear. Their quick reversal from “We will defend the right of a Free Press” to “With the right of free expression there also comes responsibility” combined with “No one should intentionally offend another groups faith” the E.U. showed what a bunch of cowards they have become. There have been editorials, articles, movies and art work that have been written and performed all over the western world that have offended every Christian sensibility and there was very little concern about that faiths sensibilities. Not that they (nor I) would ever want to go back to 14th century bully tactics but if the religous leaders of Christianity wanted to stop things like “Piss Christ” they should have broken a few windows and stabbed a few artists. They wrote letters and had peaceful protests and achieved very little. The Muslim street shouts “jump” and the E.U. says “how high.” This has nothing to do with respect. It has to do with abject fear.
DP111 -
close examination of the prophet’s life
would not go well for the Da’wa.
As one of the chosen few to have seen the film in question I actually enjoyed it.
It wasn’t really about the Muslim world at all, rather it was a backdrop for another riff by Albert Brooks upon his own narcissism.
If you can stomach that then it’s funny, if that sounds like watching 90 minutes of a test pattern, then it’s awful.
It’s just a fish-out-of-water tale, and I think the relative lack of anti-Bush digs was what kept this film from getting top reviews.
He’s not nearly as irreverent regarding Islam as he could have, or maybe should have, been, but it’s still a sweet small film that doesn’t say much, but doesn’t try to.
Until the whole un-funny escalation of the cartoon flap, I took the whole “dhimmitude” meme with a large grain of salt.
Not anymore.
Not that I think any european leader, or any American liberal, actually thinks they’re submitting to the Mad Mullahs; the people advocating self-censorship and “sensitivity” do so because they think they’re protecting some kind of status quo with which they are comfortable.
After all, why risk a nice comfortable life by confronting the madmen?
Note to chattering classes: there ain’t no status quo. It’s all flux, and things that rhyme with it.
I have a tremendous amount of confidence that we Children of the Enlightenment will defeat the nutso elemements perverting the Children of the Book, once the fight gets ugly enough for our complacent technocrats who think they’re “managing” the situation to actually get bloodied themselves. I’m just really afraid by the time we get to that point, the fight will be fought with thermonuclear weapons and smallpox.
“Until the whole un-funny escalation
of the cartoon flap, I took
the whole “dhimmitude” meme
with a large grain of salt.
Not anymore.
…once the fight gets ugly enough for our complacent technocrats who think they’re “managing” the situation to actually get bloodied themselves. I’m just really afraid by the time we get to that point, the fight will be fought with thermonuclear weapons and smallpox.”
-Posted by: Mark Poling 2:08PM
______________________________
Mark -
try a ‘Net search:
Daniel Pipes,”education by murder”.
____________________________
…also this quote on “the Cartoon War”
from the Weekly Standard via Wretchard at Belmont Club:
“Of all of Lee Smith’s observations, the most striking is his idea that Middle Eastern terrorist organizations had to remind Europe to remember that it was their b**ch. Why else would they strike the countries which had been most generous to them in the past
full in the face?
Lee Smith: “However, like many political bodies in the Arab world … only knows how to express itself through violence. … In the ’70s and ’80s Yasser Arafat’s PLO found an especially attractive venue in Europe. The continent was light on security and fat in the wallet. … Europeans would be wise to remember what Arafat’s shell game cost them because right now, leaders all over Europe are being reminded of what can happen when you try to de-fund Palestinian terrorists. The argument will look something like this: The “moderate” and responsible wing … needs to be empowered to take on its radical members who only want to kill nice Europeans.
_*It’s a protection racket.*_
(Wretchard had italicized Smith phrase there).
Damascus and Beirut are serving as rehearsal spaces for what might happen if the European Union stops signing checks.”
_______________________________
original quotes above from
“Belmont Club:Live your dream,die in someone else’s”
(contains link to the Weekly Standard article
as well):
http://fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com/
2006/02/live-your-dream-die-in-someone-else
orson2 posted: So the lesson is that it’s when you tell Muslim’s the truth about their hypocrisy – it is the TRUTH that offends them!
True enough. Yet what is important here is that any critical examination of mohammed upsets the imams, for they know that if this is not stopped immediately by death threats or any device, it wont be long before the truth of mohammed’s religion will come to light.
gumshoe:
You are right that DAWA will be affected. We do not realise that Dawa is part and parcel of Jihad i.e., to extend the dominion of islam.
This is a very unusual war, in the sense that it is a real physical war about the method or manner by which an individual can achieve redemtion. The muslim conducts Dawa for purely selfish reasons, in that by converting someone to islam, he expands the dominion of islam as well as achieves redemption. This is totally opposite reason for Christian evangelism.
If it were not so real, one would have thought that this was a Monty Python parody. But to get back to practicality, I think we need to realise, that this war we are in, can be considered a private and personal war, that each Muslim is waging on us non-Muslims. The most important aspect of this war is to extend the dominion of islam. This can take place by Dawa, as well as, getting us to accept the restrictive practices of islam in the West (re: Cartoon jihad). The other is to get Islam accepted as the pre-eminent social ideology in the West. In this aspect of the war, we as individuals must fight back, not just for us, but for millions of muslims, who are trapped in ideology that will not allow them to leave even if they want to. This is not a war that can be left to government, as by constitutional edict, it is blind to religion.
In any war, securing the home front is the first priority. A cursory examination of world history shows the mayhem that has resulted when muslim armies invaded non-muslim lands. Entire civilisations have been rent assundered. Closer to home, European thinkers from Voltaire, John Wesley, Alexis de Tocqueville, Marco Polo, G.K. Chesterton and finally Winston Churchill, have warned us of the perils of islam, and that but for some close shaves, Western civilisation as we know it now, would have been strangled at birth. No Western civilisation and no USA.
As I said in a previous post, the method that facilitates this war for islam is multiculturalism – an irony being that islam is totally monocultural and will not allow any but itself to exist. Multiculturalism and the nation state are mutually exclusive. We are in dire peril, and it is not the fault of muslims who are in the West who are to blame – it is us who should have known that this would happen. We had plenty of warnings from those such as Churchill, who could smell a fascist ideology a mile off. Yet our political elite, uneducated in history thought they knew better, prompted as they were in a competition of who was the most tolerant of them all, never considering that tolerance of the intolerant, is not something to be proud of.
I feel bitter, that after a long and tragic history, the West had achieved a modicum of peace. All that is now under threat. European nationalism is sooner or later going to raise its head. And as we know, European nationalism has a very dark and ruthless side, coupled as it is to European thoroughness.
I feel sad that all this has come about because of an almost absentminded implementation of policy that did not consider the rhythms of history.