Speaking of France, Muslims, tolerance, republican traditions, etc., here’s an update on the Houellebecq affair: http://in.news.yahoo.com/020822/137/1u48b.html .

I guess if the West still had a coherent civilization, it wouldn’t be in the mess it finds itself in today.
But why worry about the threat of global Wahhabism next door when I can play fields of videogames, practice crude vouyerism by watching innumerable “reality” (there’s a telling pun) shows, view virtually unlimited porn on the net, pursue thousands of pointless hobbies, and basically listen to the band play as the Titanic slowly sinks into the water.
Why concern myself with reality when everyone knows the best orgies happened when Rome was getting sacked.

As far as one can tell from the linked story at yahoo.com, what Houellebecq is actually on trial for, and for which he is facing a year in jail or a $51,000 fine, are two comments he made in a published interview: that reading the Koran is “so depressing,” and that Islam is “the stupidest religion.” That’s it. He also made further insulting comments in his novel “Plateforme,” in which the main character admits to a “quiver of glee” every a Palestinian terrorist is killed. However, his statements in “Plateforme” are not the subject of the trial, only the the things he said in the interview. So it appears that Houellebecq is facing the possibility of a year in jail or a $51,000 fine for saying that the Koran is “depressing” and that Islam is “the stupidest religion.”

In Judith Shulevitz’s review of Houellebecq’s novel in the June 2, 2002 New York Times, she concludes that he should not punished for his anti-Muslim statements when they are made in a novel. But (this is a bit off-topic) look at Shulevitz’s very New York Timesian idea of what the purpose of fiction is:

Must we demand from novelists the same standards we demand (or should demand) from politicians? Or should we cut Houellebecq slack because he has become, as The New Statesman recently put it, ”the great chronicler of the moral and cultural emptiness of modern France”? Obviously, when he makes a racist remark on television, we’re entitled to condemn it. We’d be foolish, though, to do the same to his novels. The last thing we want from a good novelist — and Houellebecq is one — is an ethic of sober responsibility. On the contrary…. We want [novelists] to plumb our depths, to dredge up our excesses, to startle us into recognizing ourselves for the confused and desperate characters we have become. There’s nothing worse than having a politician do that at the polls, but when it happens in literature, there’s cause for celebration.

It’s interesting that Houellebecq is under fire for expressing opinions that, had they been expressed about Christianity, would have made him a hero. But Islam and the ongoing Muslim incursion into Western homelands is a pet project of the global elites, who apparently do not countenance any criticism of it, however clumsily made.

Has anyone here actually read his books? I recommend Atomised and Whatever. Houellebecq is a remarkable novelist and his critique of the political and sexual excesses of the 60s generation is spot-on. He also has Americanism firmly in his sights, which should (and has) upset some American readers.