The liberal supremacists

[T_i_B]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/apr/25/liberal-islam

If the test of liberalism is how it confronts its illiberal adversaries, some of the liberal intelligentsia seem to have fallen at the first hurdle. Writers such as Martin Amis and Hitchens do not just want to lock terrorists away. They also tout a brand of western cultural supremacism. Dawkins strongly opposed the invasion of Iraq, but preaches a self-satisfied, old-fashioned Whiggish rationalism that can be wielded against a benighted Islam. The philosopher AC Grayling has an equally starry-eyed view of the stately march of Western Progress. The novelist Ian McEwan is a freshly recruited champion of this militant rationalism. Both Hitchens and Salman Rushdie have defended Amis's slurs on Muslims. Whether they like it or not, Dawkins and his ilk have become weapons in the war on terror. Western supremacism has gravitated from the Bible to atheism.

The irony is clear. Some of our free literary spirits are defending liberal values in ways that threaten to undermine them. In this, they reflect the behaviour of western states. Liberals are supposed to value nuanced analysis and moral complexity, neither of which are apparent in the slanderous reduction of Islam to a barbarous blood cult. They are noted for their judicious discriminations, rather than the airy dismissal of all religion as so much garbage. There is also an honorable legacy of qualifying too-absolute judgments with an awareness of context: the genuine liberal is appalled by Islamist terrorism, but conscious of the national injury and humiliation that underlie it. None of the writers I have mentioned is remarkable for such balance. On the whole, they are more preoccupied with freedom of expression than freedom from imperial rule.

There is an irony or paradox built into liberal thought: you must be properly intolerant of assaults on tolerance. But this irony is in perpetual danger of getting out of hand. For the liberal state to accommodate a diversity of beliefs while having few positive convictions is one of the more admirable achievements of civilization. But such neutrality, once under pressure, can easily slide into superiority, as sitting loose to other people's faith comes to look like rising disdainfully above it. It is then only a short step from superiority to supremacism.

[angstlessk]

1. wow, that was certainly convoluted logic...tolerate the intolerable?

he uses the terms socialist, leftist and liberal in ways that totally confused me...maybe in Britain things are very different than here? I enjoy Dawkins..why preachers can preach fire and brimstone at the tops of their lungs - no problem, but a couple of atheists who become popular and give lectures to an extremely hungry audience for their voice - liberals are now intolerant? I don't really get his gist?

[provis99]

2. you've got to know the Guardian

That rag is basically anti-Western Enlightenment, pro-politically correct, post-modernist drivel. So ranting against rational thinkers in favor of religious nuts is basically par for the course at the Guardian.

[T_i_B]

8. Is this Richard Littlejohn posting?

[Democracyinkind]

3. Dawkins a liberal? Dawkins is a one man hit team.

" the genuine liberal is appalled by Islamist terrorism, but conscious of the national injury and humiliation that underlie it. "

The genuine liberal is appalled by terrorism, violence, no matter who's the perp.

A genuine liberal is appalled by all these in-your-face debates.

But then, the author of this piece seems to be a rather ignorant chap. seems really phony to me. Like a debate from the early 50's or so...

[Bluenorthwest]

4. Rushdie had a global hit called on him

and this guy exects him to be a defender of those who wanted him dead? I'm sorry, but that is irrational. Crazy talk. Expecting him of all people to go out on a limb. Just out of touch with human nature, among other things.

[alarimer]

5. Moral relativism is wrong.

When a religion (or, more accurately, some of its practitioners) utilizes terror, it is wrong, no matter how much we bend over backwards to "respect" religion. In my opinion, no religion or its practitioners is deserving of respect, because it adheres to superstitious nonsense. But human rights violations and treating half the population as second-class citizens or virtual slave is ALWAYS wrong.

[Dr.Phool]

6. Hitchens converted to Neoconism a long time ago.

[Seldona]

7. Give me a break.

Liberals don't want to lock terrorists away? I stopped reading this tripe right there. What a hack this author is.

[struggle4progress]

9. Attitudinal analysis like this seldom produces anything of value. The doctrine

of political tolerance has multiple objectives: it is better to let wackos speak out than to burn in quiet resentment until they explode, and it is potentially useful to know who they are; moreover, the practice of silencing wackos brings with it the threat that at some future day one might oneself be silenced as a wacko, so that tolerance as a political ideal involves a certain enlightened self-interest; beyond that, it is not unknown for a person who is wacko about one topic to have useful ideas about another topics, nor is it unknown that a very good idea may seem laughably strange on first hearing

The hope of an open society is that if enough information is exchanged and enough discussion permitted, ordinary people will eventually sort through the mess and reach some practical understanding: some such process, after all, is behind most human accomplishments, such as agriculture or domesticated animals or the fork. The dream of an open and tolerant society does not require any of us to have few or no convictions, nor does it require us to regard every opinion of equivalent worth, no matter how unsupported or ill-reasoned. The notion that one may not know better than others is a prerequisite for learning, but one may also have some obligation to be insistent about what one knows: if one knows, for example, that gunshot wounds are not best treated by pouring boiling oil into them, then one should probably insist on this insight, even if boiling oil is the local standard treatment

The universal difficulty, of course, is in the knowing what we know and what we do not know: we are all creatures of our own time and our own place, and it is difficult for any of us to believe we are blind to certain things -- because, of course, we do not see the things we do not see. But it is precisely that fact that underlies the success of open societies -- what I do not see, others will, if they are allowed to say what they see. So tolerance is not some abstract and innate and isolated moral virtue, nor is it simply a style of good etiquette, but it is rather an aspect of a larger practice of civic responsibility that we hope will help us transfer the treasures from our time to our successors

[Doctor_J]

10. Hitchens may be a socialist, but he's no liberal

he still thinks invading Iraq was the right thing to do