(Isidor Gunsberg) wrote:
(Nick) wrote in message
. com...
(Isidor Gunsberg) wrote (to Rob Hill):
(snipped)
It is the elites with the "expertise" who are responsible for allowing the
rise of Pan-Islamic and Pan-Arab terrorism. As long as the policy makers
continue to make a muddle of things, there is a need--indeed, a duty--for
non-experts to voice their opinions.

"The incapacity of the United States to see Arabs as other human beings
is consistent with the ebbing of universalism within American society."
--Emmanuel Todd (After the Empire, p. 118)

"Isidor Gunsberg" may feel happier knowing that there are many American
"non-experts (who) voice their (ignorant) opinions" of bigotry, racism,
and hatred against all Arabs and all Muslims. (Aren't *they* all alike?)

Perhaps someone like 'Isidor Gunsberg' would approve of what
Brigitte Bardot (a strong supporter of the French neo-Fascist leader,
Jean-Marie Le Pen) has written about the Muslims in France:
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040610/325/evnbo.html

Well, I think the hard-hitting book by Orianna Fallaci has more merit,
but I'm sure that Bardot makes some useful points.

For the record, Brigitte Bardot (a retired French film star) was recently
convicted by a French court of inciting racial hatred against Muslims in
France in her book, of which "Isidor Gunsberg" is "*sure* that (it) makes
some *useful points*". Perhaps such as hating all Muslims must be 'useful'?

This is not to say that I necessarily agree with all of what
either Bardot of Fallaci have to say.

Perhaps "Isidor Gunsberg" would not necessarily agree with Brigitte Bardot's
(she's a strong supporter of the French neo-Facist leader, Jean-Marie Le Pen)
bigoted comments when they have been directed against Jews.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...922587-4551308

I followed the link *given by "Isidor Gunsberg" to Amazon.com, and there
I read this editorial review of Oriana Fallaci's book, "The Rage and the Pride":

"...Fallaci's 'Italy for Italians' diatribe, her ugly portrait of Muslims
as invading and violating her native Florence ('Terrorists, thieves, rapists.
Ex-convicts, prostitutes, beggars. Drug-dealers, contagiously ill.'), her
denial that there is a moderate Islam, will not sit well with American readers."
--"Publishers Weekly" (an American journal)

Evidently, "Isidor Gunsberg" admires Orina Fallaci's "ugly portrait of
Muslims" as being "'Terrorists, thieves, rapists. Ex-convicts, prostitutes,
beggars. Drug-dealers, contagiously ill.'"

(The following was quoted from the Yahoo news article.)
"Bardot fined for race hate book ...
Brigitte Bardot has been convicted of inciting racial hatred and
ordered to pay 5,000 euros

This says much about the extent of the French commitment to
Free Speach and open social debate.

Evidently, "Isidor Gunsberg" approves of Brigitte Bardot's "inciting racial
hatred" against all Muslims in France. If a neo-Nazi in Germany were to write
a book "inciting racial hatred" against Jews--which would be a serious crime
under German law--then would "Isidor Gunsberg" contend that it should be
published in Germany in order to further a "commitment to Free Speech and
open social debate" there? I suspect not.

...The Paris court sentenced Bardot, 69, on Thursday for remarks made
in her book, 'A Scream in the Silence', an outspoken attack on gays,
immigrants, and the jobless which shocked France last year. In the book,
she laments the 'Islamisation of France' and the 'underground and
dangerous infiltration of Islam'.
'Mdm Bardot presents Muslims as barbaric and cruel invaders,

The Arab Islamic invasions and conquests of other peoples and their lands,
was indeed both barbaric and cruel. This is even controversial?

The deliberate removal of comparative historical context seems objectionable.
*Many peoples*, including European Christians, have committed many terrible
crimes during their invasions of other lands and conquests of other peoples.
But Brigitte Bardot did *not* cite the historical evidence of those crimes in
any attempt to make European Christians (such as herself) appear subhuman.

By the way, as Simon ('chapman billy') and I have noted separately in posts
here, for centuries Islamic societies tended to practise more tolerance than
did European Christendom toward their Jewish minorities.

responsible for terrorist acts

Many Muslims are responsible for committing terrorist acts.

There may be about one billion (perhaps more) Muslims in the world today.
How many of these Muslims would "Isidor Gunsberg" condemn as "responsible
for committing terrorist acts"? Ten percent? One percent?

The majority of terrorist acts committed around the world are committed
by Muslims

"Much was made of al-Qa'ida's training camps in Afghanistan, the target of
American bombers. But these were kindergartens compared with the world's
leading university of terrorism at Fort Benning in Georgia. Known until
recently as the School of the Americas, it trained some 60,000 Latin American
soldiers, policemen, paramilitaries and intelligence agents. Forty per cent
of the Cabinet ministers who served in the genocidal regimes...in Guatemala
are graduates. In 1993, the UN Truth Commission for El Salvador named the
army officers who had committed the worst atrocities of the civil war;
two-thirds of them had been trained at Fort Benning....In Chile, the school's
graduates ran Pinochet's secret police and three principal concentration camps.
In 1996, the US government was forced to release copies of the school's
training manuals. For aspiring terrorists, these recommended blackmail,
torture, execution, and the arrest of witnesses' relatives.
....
Putting aside his mockery, (George) Monbiot pointed out that the only moral
difference between America's terrorism and that of al-Qa'ida is that the
latter was puny by comparison. ... The documentation of American terrorism
is voluminous, and because such truths cannot be rationally rebutted, those
who mention them, drawing the obvious connections between them, are often
abused as 'anti-American', regardless of whether or not they themselves are
American.
....
In the media age, this is reinforced by the repetition of received truths
disguised as news. For example, certain lives had media value while others
are expendable. The killing of those of 'us' counts as a crime; the rest
are unpeople."

--John Pilger (The New Rulers of the World, pp. 135-7)

(John Pilger is an Australian journalist, who's now based in London.)

(snipped)
Jack Shaheen is an American scholar who has devoted much of his
academic career to studying the (usually ignorant and negative)
stereotyping of Arabs and Muslims in United States culture.

Here are some books by Jack Shaheen:

'Arab and Muslim Stereotypes in American Popular Culture'
'The TV Arab'
'Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People'

'The incapacity of the United States to see Arabs as other human
beings is consistent with the ebbing of universalism within
American society.'
--Emmanuel Todd (After the Empire, p. 118)

Wow, three books on the topic! ...

Studying the American sterotypes of Arabs and Muslims seems politically
unfashionable (perhaps 'patriotically incorrect') in the United States.

--Nick