My post at the New York Sun prompted a response accusing me of being an apologist for the "inherent" curelty of the Arab world. Here is my response, which was an interesitng way to start my writing for the day.
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To argue against you, Mr. Kaltenberg, I hope you won’t mind that I quote you quoting me.
"...The argument is reductive insofar as it denies the long and continuing history of Western involvement…."——thus whining is considered to be a valid proof of not whining?
If I understand your counterargument correctly, I am contradicting myself by reproducing the very critique I am attempting to debunk. Taken out of context, this would seem to be true. However, that sentence particularly, and a major part of my argument generally, was about locating the blame on Said alone. Hundreds of years of history cannot be laid aside for the sake of one scholar’s book that is a mere 40 years old. Said did not invent imperialism, or it’s bloody fallouts; rather, he describes one self-reproducing mechanism that allows for conquest without guilt. I am not sure how remembering, and articulating, the various histories that bring us to our present moment is “whining”?
On the subject of vocabulary and sentence shaping, I happily admit my own inadequacies, but also ask you not to use infantilizing words like “whining” to describe a heated political situation.
But returning to the argument proper: Historical amnesia is clearly not something you are in favor of either, if your invocation of “the western apologists of Stalinist purges and the American & Brit supporters of the nazi regime” is any evidence. Aside from its polemical force, a comparison between “the inherent and inexcusable cruelty” of the Arab world and systematic slaughter by Stalin or the Nazi regime is hyperbolic and inaccurate to say the least. Strangely, the use of these examples gives us an insight into a counterargument used by various Islamists, militant or not. Their argument, or my approximation of it, goes like this: “You say we are backward and you are modern, that we are lacking and need to catch up. If, however, being modern allows for the rise of concentration camps, atomic weapons, and other forms of mass violence, then perhaps we don’t want to be modern.” The argument is pertinent and one that greatly troubled the greatest “Western” minds of the early 20th century. What does it mean to be “modern”? Is there really such a thing as historical “progress,” if forward movement in time has just created more elaborate means of destruction? These are key questions “the West” must ask itself to understand why “backward” peoples continue in their “inherent and inexcusable” ways.
The opposite side, one where I sympathize with you and Mr. Warraq, recognizes in liberal democratic societies a greater distribution of civil liberties (never inherent, always battled for), and greater access to advanced medicine. I use “greater” as a qualifier because I don’t believe that these traits are inherent products of Western societies; claiming so would forget the battles fought to gain such rights.
My own position is still in the process of being formulated. I have no desire to see human rights abused, in the Arab world or otherwise, but I cannot claim to sit on an impossibly clean throne from which I can decide the innocence or guilt of others. If I apologize for anything, it is simply for not being able wholly to laud or condemn “East” or “West."
