The Silence of the Left
Long - but excellent article - by Nick Cohen in The Guardian which argues that Anti-Americanism has left the modern left blind to the evils of militant Islam.
Strangely enough - one of the turning points for Nick Cohen was the first Gulf war - as it was for me - and the growing realisation that the left were less concerned about human rights and much more concerned with despising America.
The second turning point for me was when I started the "New Cold War" project.
It began simply enough as an exercise in Herman/Chomsky style analysis - familiar from "Manufacturing Consent" - of the current "War on Terror".
But as I began to read I realised that something unexpected was happening - all of the "worthy victims" and "unworthy victims" seemed swapped around and I realised that the narrative I was using was wrong.
I have been in search of an alternative narrative ever since - if there is one ...
Why is it that apologies for a militant Islam which stands for everything the liberal left is against come from the liberal left? Why will students hear a leftish postmodern theorist defend the exploitation of women in traditional cultures but not a crusty conservative don? After the American and British wars in Bosnia and Kosovo against Slobodan Milosevic's ethnic cleansers, why were men and women of the left denying the existence of Serb concentration camps? As important, why did a European Union that daily announces its commitment to the liberal principles of human rights and international law do nothing as crimes against humanity took place just over its borders? Why is Palestine a cause for the liberal left, but not China, Sudan, Zimbabwe, the Congo or North Korea? Why, even in the case of Palestine, can't those who say they support the Palestinian cause tell you what type of Palestine they would like to see? After the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington why were you as likely to read that a sinister conspiracy of Jews controlled American or British foreign policy in a superior literary journal as in a neo-Nazi hate sheet? And why after the 7/7 attacks on London did leftish rather than right-wing newspapers run pieces excusing suicide bombers who were inspired by a psychopathic theology from the ultra-right?
Tags: nick cohen, radical islam, modern left, new cold war