I thought you might be interested to see by Timothy Garton Ash, in , in which he discusses what name to give to Muslims who bomb Western targets. He rejects "Islamo-fascist", and "Islamist", in favour of "jihadist".
I wonder if you agree with his reasoning.
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It's a misguided article, the kind of thinking ´óÏó´«Ã½ uses to skew the news by its choice of words. Small wonder it interviewed Noam Chomsky some years ago, he is the master of twisting the meaning of words to define them as he sees fit. He takes a pejorative term and applies it as he wishes. From the broadcast; "The United States is a rogue nation." Later he tells you that a rouge nation (according to his invented definition) is any state which acts on its own self interests. That of course includes every other country in the world as well, a small detail he conveniently omits. ´óÏó´«Ã½ does much the same among the many arrows it has in its quiver used to make the news fit its own political agenda.
I have only heard ´óÏó´«Ã½ use the term "terrorist" once without ascribing it to someone else such as "Mr. Bush's so called war on terror." The one exception was shortly after Alan Johnston disappeared in Gaza, ´óÏó´«Ã½ said he was captured by "a terrorist group." Other than that, ´óÏó´«Ã½ often refers to suicide bombers and their ilk as "militants." This deliberately dilutes not only the connotation of the heinousness of their crimes but obscures the fact that their object was to terrorize and terrify people into compliance with their political agenda. In Spain after the Madrid train bombings, it was clear that it worked, the Spaniards voted out their government which supported the invasion of Iraq and voted in a government which opposed it. The terrorists won. This shows the true mettle of the Spaniards and it came as no surprise to me having visited Spain and seen the Spaniards first hand. On the other hand, it has not worked in America or Israel. Quite the opposite, despite a small percentage who would surrender, most are determined to fight back harder than ever. What a difference in the kind of people who make up a civilization.
The article in the Guardian was way off the mark trying to discredit the term "Islamofascist." From the article;
"In the form "Islamofascism", and with the added spice of references to "totalitarianism", the label elides two things that need to be kept separate. One is the mentality of death-seeking and death-delivering fanatics. The other is a totalitarian political system that controls major states. This is, if you will, the difference between 1921 in Europe and 1938, when fascism controlled Germany, Italy and Spain."
It is clear that the Guardian deliberately ignored that besides being a religion, that there is a clear political agenda of Islam which is to subject the entire world by force to its will, its laws as defined in the Quran. The Quran gives non Moslems three choices, to convert to Islam, to live subservient to Moslems and pay a tax to them, or to be killed. The murder of non Moslems is the Qurans only sure prescription for a path to paradise for Moslems. How is this different from fascism? So the term terrorist refers to the method, the term Islamofascist refers to the political agenda. Small wonder most people who speak the English language use them interchangeably. We do have terrorists who are not Islamofascists, Timothy McVay for example who blew up the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995 was not an Islamofascist but there are no true Islamofascists who are not terrorists. Islamist means someone who to one degree or another would impose Islam on all people but I'm not sure all of them are prepared to resort to terrorism except as a last resort. In my mind, this still makes them terrorists. Finally, the word jihadist. Jihad as I understand it translates into "struggle" in English. But what kind of struggle are they referring to? Some say it might be a personal inner struggle. But most often the term is used to describe the struggle to impose Islam on the entire world which brings us right back full circle to Islamofascist terrorist. No getting around it, all of these terms refer to ruthless mass murderers who would impose Islam on the world at the cost of anyone's life, often including their own. And in my mind, because ´óÏó´«Ã½ refuses to use these terms when it is clearly appropriate to describe crimes and people who commit them, to a degree it is their ally.
Complain about this postAt 04:23 AM on 23 Nov 2007, Mark wrote:
"It's a misguided article, the kind of thinking ´óÏó´«Ã½ uses to skew the news by its choice of words."
Mark then does what he accuses others of doing by ignoring the fact that Chomsky defined "rogue states" as countries that pursued their own interests outside the rule of international law -as indeed the US has done (by invading Iraq -for example).
Mark also says: "The Quran gives non Moslems three choices, to convert to Islam, to live subservient to Moslems and pay a tax to them, or to be killed. The murder of non Moslems is the Qurans only sure prescription for a path to paradise for Moslems. How is this different from fascism?"
As always, in a discussion it is wise to define our terms before engaging in dispute. However, if we take "fascism" to broadly (and metaphorically) equate with "totalitarian systems" -then it may well be possible to argue that such systems may not always offer even the limited choice Mark claims that Islam offers. What choice does the world have -for example with regard to US hegemony -and the global commercialism that it promotes? Over the years, the US and its allies have carefully built a nexus of cultural indoctrination backed up by educatonal and cultural systems, media, international organisations and laws that make any non-violent but practical dissent extremely difficult.
Personally, I find the MCVay case extremely interesting -and it is perhaps highly significant that Mark simply dismisses it as a case of "terrorism".
From the (few) news reports that I have seen -it seems to me that McVay was simply excercizing his rights as a US citizen to "bear arms against unjust government". From reports -it appears that it was his own belief that he was a veteran and a patriot fighting unjust government -and the deaths were simply the kind of "collateral damage" that one often sees by US military actions. However, I have never seen any public discussion of the constitutional aspects of the MCVay case.
Indeed, Mark's comments seem to confirm my own suspicions that the major international problem today is that basically our global socio-political-economic system is in the hands of the US military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about. However, this time it has mutated into the military-industrial-entertainment complex -which is now able to indoctrinate as it commercialises -or else (thanks to the technology it is constantly developing for commercial and military ends) impose its will upon the world using military force when peaceful means fail.
Such a system is globally destructive -not only socially, economically and politically -but also intellectually. However what is worse -is that it is (as the profits mount up) becoming increasingly less tolerant of any dissent.
Under these conditions -we should be even more aware of the dialectic that claims that "one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter".
Without allowing more effective forms of non-violent opposition -it becomes the US lead west that is increasingly imposing totalitarianism upon the world -iether by legal or illegal force or through the commercialized emotional and intellectual corruption of people's hearts and minds.
Complain about this postI disapprove of tems like Islamist, Islamofascist, and even jihadist. Political labels should be those chosen by the people professing views, and our coloration of those labels should be based on their words and actions and not on preconceived attitudes invoked by our choice of words in labelling them.
However, political activism and the promotion or perpetration of violence are not the same thing and should be kept separate.
The people who commit atrocities are terrorists. Nothing more, nothing less. Those who refuse to condemn atrocities are apologists. In my view, when reporting on acts of terrorism, to pin any label ascribing putative aims to the terrorists is bad, as it is awarding them "the oxygen of publicity". Acts of terror should be reported on like other disasters, but attributed to human malignity rather than human error or natural causes.
Similarly, in reporting on the apprehension, capture, trial and incarceration of any terrorists who survive their acts, such reporting should focus on the crimes themselves and the punishment for them, and not discuss the causes or motives of the terrorists.
In this way we can separate out such acts as kidnapping and mass murder and treat them simply as crimes, and their perpetrators as criminals.
Any discussion of the movements, political causes, disaffected elements of society, ethnic or political tensions - and of possible resolutions - can then take place separate from the acts themselves, and never in response to them.
The voices of those with any view could be heard (with the understanding that exhortations to violence are of themselves criminal acts), and any valid concerns addressed: but if no one ever hears of a "successful attack by Islamists" (to give just one example) but only of a mass murder, then not only will it allow those with the political aims of "Islamists" to pursue those aims by peaceful means - which they have a right to do, in the same way that we have a right to peacefully oppose them - it will prevent the negative labelling of whole segments of the population because of the acts of individuals.
Similarly, the ability of terrorists to publicise their aims via acts of terror - or even to invoke terror itself - would be curtailed by the absence of association between their movements and any successful acts.
Free the names of religions, ethnic and political groups from association with terrorism by not using these labels. Allow all these groups to engage in peacful dialogue and debate, and learn how to make accommodations with each other, without the overhanging baggage of past, or even present, atrocities committed in their name.
In the end, political groups can change even their core and founding beliefs if they are no longer relevant, and those who nominally desire that Islam should be universal may give up that aim. Look at the Labour party, and Clause IV - a lesser dogma, admittedly. Look at the IRA, now seeking at last to pursue its agenda by exclusively political means.
This is not censorship or restriction of free speech - it is simply refusing to acknowledge that an atrocity should be dignified by attributing it to a cause or motivation.
If all atrocities are reported solely as heinous crimes, and never progress the aims of an organisation, maybe more people will come to regard all atrocities as heinous crimes - and maybe fewer organisations will perpetrate such crimes if no-one outside the courtrooms and investigating agencies know, or care, that they were responsible for them.
Complain about this postIf Mike M is asking for more responsible journalism and reasoned political debate -then I can only agree. Unfortunately, in practice, it seems that even the standards of the ´óÏó´«Ã½ are rather questionable in this respect:
For example, a recent statement from the Philippine based Foundation for Media Alternatives describes the incident at the Manila Peninsular Hotel as follows ".... a naval lieutenant and elected senator of the Republic, a decorated Army general, and about thirty (30) of their military comrades, reiterated their withdrawal of support for the President and called for the creation of a new government. They walked out of a hearing of their pending case of rebellion, and holed up in a 5-star hotel to deliver their statement. Whether as an exercise of political self-sacrifice to rally the disenchanted, or as a signal for an attempted power grab by military adventurists?they again brought to the surface the simmering political crisis which has not seen any closure since 2004."
This report seems consistent with local live radio reports of the event.
However, the ´óÏó´«Ã½ report "Philippines siege: Dozens charged" says "The charges are in relation to last week's siege, in which 14 soldiers walked out of a trial for a previous mutiny and seized the Peninsula Hotel" this ´óÏó´«Ã½ report concludes with "The Peninsula Hotel has now formally re-opened, after repairs said to cost more than $100,000. It estimates it lost $1.2m through the alleged coup attempt".
While listening live to several local radio reports -there appeared no indication or suggestion that the soldiers "seized" the hotel as stated in the ´óÏó´«Ã½ report. The local reports suggested only that they were "present" in the hotel to make their statements. The "siege" (and the damage) seems to be the result of government action -and not the soldiers who stand accused of "rebellion". This is not made very clear in most reports. The ´óÏó´«Ã½ has even filed a witness report from the hotel balcony -so what did we miss in local reports that justified the claim by the ´óÏó´«Ã½ that the hotel was "seized"? What evidence does the ´óÏó´«Ã½ have that is not available to local listeners that there was a "coup attempt" and not simply (as stated by FMA) a reaffirmation of their (previously stated) withdrawal of support for the government? Earlier ´óÏó´«Ã½ reports unjustly claimed that the soldiers had "broken out" instead of simply "walking" out of the courtroom as was later stated in their own reports. It the ´óÏó´«Ã½ had a reporter witnessing the events -what evidence does the ´óÏó´«Ã½ have that justifies their tendentious and emotionally biased deviations from local (live) reports?
Other ´óÏó´«Ã½ reports of the incident either seem to support government claims of a dangerous coup attempt "Manila coup bid ends in surrender", "Arroyo vow after Manila coup bid" or to trivialize and ridicule the event "Watching the Manila siege unfold", "Idealism that drives Philippine plotters", "Philippine press weary at coup attempt".
Clearly ´óÏó´«Ã½ reporting does have global political and emotional implications: By implicitly and apparently unquestioningly supporting (any) government claims and/or affecting the mental state of local people (in any situation) it can, and presumably does, affect local politics and the way they are viewed by foreign visitors and investors. There are also global political implications regarding countries such as the Philippines concerning their role as US allies (with or without the consent of the local population) in the "war on terror". The ´óÏó´«Ã½ reports do make entertaining reading -but, in my view, they do not dig deep enough beneath the surface to reveal the nexus of tensions -including the actions of US and UK governments -which are creating extremely dangerous political instability in many countries around the world. Such complex events cannot be dealt with properly by reporters crisis-hopping from one exciting incident to another.
Decades ago, Aldus Huxley's historical novel "The Devils of Loudon" revealed how a complex nexus of individual, communal and institutionalized beliefs, interests and desires lead to mass hysteria and the death of innocent people.
In my view, during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, the ´óÏó´«Ã½ allowed itself to become a propaganda tool of those who were determined to go to war -as we now know, with disastrous results. At the time, it seemed that all dissent was ignored and misleading historical distortions presented by neo-con apologists were frequently allowed to pass as "facts" without comment or correction by the ´óÏó´«Ã½.
Unfortunately, it seems that these historical lessons still have not been learned -and we are still being subjected to dubious news and comment disguised as "facts". As long as this continues, we shall never understand why others should wish to kill us -whatever name we choose to give them.
Complain about this postEarlier ´óÏó´«Ã½ reports unjustly claimed that the soldiers had "broken out" instead of simply "walking" out of the courtroom as was later stated in their own reports.
Erm, ever tried just walking out of the court when you're on trial for a crime? The usual practice is that you're not allowed to. Hence they 'broke out'. The same goes for a hotel - unless you book a room, you can't just march in and call a press conference or whatever they did.
Unless the Guardian is also biased?:
Earlier commenter: I have only heard ´óÏó´«Ã½ use the term "terrorist" once without ascribing it to someone else such as "Mr. Bush's so called war on terror."
I noticed recently while watching ´óÏó´«Ã½ News 24 late at night, they have '´óÏó´«Ã½ News America', which is broadcast on the ´óÏó´«Ã½ America network but also shows up on News 24, and its presenter, Matt Frei, was sprinkling the term 'terrorist' around quite liberally to describe people like Hamas (if I recall correctly). I wondered if the ´óÏó´«Ã½ was tailoring its language to fit the American audience.
Complain about this post