Discussion of Fitna continues
Scott B. writes:
I’m amazed by the tepid responses of some of your commenters about Fitna, which I saw for the first time today. I was hugely impressed—it’s a brilliant distillation of Islamic supremacism, and the elegiac melancholic classical Western music backdrop creates a superbly subtle emphasis on the civilized values that mass immigration from barbaric cultures is destroying. Barbara V. writes:
What got me was the ironic use of that beautiful Arabian music, from Tschaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite, to accompany the visual horror. Geert Wilders also used a lovely, tranquil piece of Grieg. Did you notice?LA replies:
I didn’t notice the music specifically, except that it was very good and produced a mood and worked. I need to see it again.Ed L. writes:
LiveLeak, which used to be ogrish.com, has always been controversial, like the ACLU. You’d think that people who stake their employment at such an organization would have a deep personal commitment to free speech as an absolute uncompromisable ideal. If “Give me liberty of give me death” really means anything to such people, to the point where they’re willing to defend Nazis marching through Skokie, defend flag-burning, or countenance the display of the crucified Jesus in a vat of urine, I think that they ought to be willing to put their own physical safety on the line against threats from Muslims.Bill Carpenter writes:
Geert Wilders certainly deserves the high praise given him by Scott B. and others. If the response from conservatives has been tepid, I think it is for the following reasons. First, the film provides no new information to people who are familiar with the issues. The praise for effectively packaging old information for the general public, a valuable and essential task, is inevitably going to be less enthusiastic than praise for providing profound insight. Second, the film appears to present the liberal version of universal human rights as the essence and highest achievement of our civilization. While in ordinary people’s minds, freedom may well mean the ability for peoples to continue in their established, even traditional ways, it can also stand for a leftist-utopian freedom from any inequality imposed by the distribution of rights and goods in any real society. By making the rights of children, women, and homosexuals exemplary, Wilders tacitly appears to accept the liberal proposition that peoples as such have no right to preserve their cultures and traditions (including religions) unless such cultures and traditions embody liberal universalism. Thus some conservatives may feel that the film is at bottom liberal in the same way that the conservatism of many conservatives is liberal. Wilders’ presentation may be justified on the ground that he is attempting to create, as quickly as possible, the broadest possible alliance against the Islamization of the West, which is arguably even more urgent than proselytizing for traditionalist (or realist) conservatism. However, admiration for political effectiveness is of a different quality than admiration for presenting the unvarnished truth. Conservatives should congratulate Wilders for what he has accomplished, thank him for his sacrifices, and accept his challenge to us to join him in defending our peoples and ways.LA replies:
“Wilders tacitly appears to accept the liberal proposition that peoples as such have no right to preserve their cultures and traditions (including religions) unless such cultures and traditions embody liberal universalism.” Posted by Lawrence Auster at April 02, 2008 07:28 PM | Send Email entry |