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Hitchens has stated many things in which he is right and he gets crucified for his few mistakes, which is always easy for people that do not like Hitchens and his kind. One thing he never was is conservative anybody calling him that should pick up a few books written by him.
The attack on CH was a religious act of terrorism [remember the ALLAH AHKBAR when they killed the cartoonists] which does not make the average Muslim guilty of anything awefull and they should not publicly distance themselves. Most Muslims I work with call them nutters that misuse a religion for their own purposes. And I agree with that assesment.
Churchill would have gone down in history as a footnote if not for one key decision - to continue the war against Hitler. Many of his other views and actions are things I don't agree with, but for me and most other people, his (crazy in many ways) determination to stand up and continue the fight makes him a true great. Whatever his other mistakes were (and he made many), that is insigniciant compared to the one really big thing he got right.
Blair, who I think actually did a lot of good in many ways, will always be overshadowed by his catastrophic decision on Iraq.
Hitchens may not have actually made the decision but he was an influential and vocal cheerleader for war.
Harold Wilson is an interesting case. Not considered particularly significant in world historical terms, but he did make a crucial decision (for the UK) that Britain would not join the Vietnam War. Lyndon Johnson went ballistic on him for that decision. But it was the correct one. If he'd decided to join the war his legacy would have been that of the idiot who took us into Vietnam. He deserves some credit IMO for that decision at least.
Blair did do a lot of good, but his mistake is deservedly something that tarnishes his legacy, because it was apparent to many of us at the time that he was wrong - and even the way he explained/sold it at the time ("it's the right thing to do") showed wrong headed, almost possessed thinking at the time.
People like Hitchens are held to a higher standard by commoners like myself. If a memeber of the intelligensia like himself can't properly articulate a cohesive, balanced view that doesn't involve obvious forseeable collateral damage to thousands and possible reprisals and animosity for years to come, then he is a bigger idiot than the politicians imo. Their excuse is that they need to win elections and therefore can be beholden to fear mongery & the military/corporate doners. People like Hitchens should not be beholden to anyone but their intelligence/curiosity.
It's a bit of a tragedy what's happened to Blair. He was a force for good in many respects. He gave Britain a sense of optimism and positivity that it's lost since. But yes, his one big catastrophic error will always overshadow the success.
In my parallel universe histroy of the world, Blair would have persuaded Bush not to invade Iraq and instead waged an intensive diplomatic and espionage assualt on Al Queda and its network of financial backers around the world. There wouln't have been any big 'wars' - just perhaps the occassional special forces operation - mainly below the radar and not even in the media. Slowly but surely (a la Mosad's response to the Munich Olympics attack) the key players would have been taken out. Secret service agents would have infiltrated and destroyed these organisations from within.
Without the oxygen of war and the recruiting sergeant that was the illegal invasion of Iraq, the jihadis would have largely withered and died by now.
Now ironically politicians will be wary of being compared to Blair.
And yet I find Tony Blair far closer to Chamberlain than Churchill. He sure was an appeaser in the episode of the Danish cartoons. He may have been gung ho in Iraq, he was never keen on defending the faithless and the blasphemers. Not sure what his response to the terrorist attacks in Paris were, but ten years ago he was nothing short of pathetic.
That may be because he is a deeply religious man. I read that somewhere (not sure where), and certainly in his arguments for the Iraq war ("It's the right thing to do....the just thing to do" etc.) there was an element of almost possessed righteousness.
It could also be that he was concerned about what hornet's nest he had wrought in Iraq and was trying to prevent further upsetting Muslims - this Danish incident was after the 7/7 attacks in London I think.
Blair also said in an interview (with Parkinson I believe) that he spoke to God and took his decision accordingly. hearing him saying something so abysmally stupid, my first thought was that he needed a straightjacket and lithium.
As for his reaction to the Danish cartoons, I doubt anything could have been as bad as the Iraq war, which he started, to provoke Muslim's anger. The Danish cartoons happened before 7/7, and even if they had happened afterwards, his cowardice was no excuse. Feeding the crocodile hoping he'd eat him last was what Blair did.
Scary stuff.
Agreed. That is the argument he brought forward in this debate that matters. Dismissing it because of his stand on Iraq is ad hominem.
There may be a lot wrong with the West, but freedom of conscience and freedom of speech are not among them. As for Hitchens attitude towards islam, it is no different than his attitude towards Christianity. And at the core, the problem reside in the believer: his belief can be criticized, questioned and mocked. And if he claims to revealed truth and universal truth, the burden of proof resides on his side. I'm not Muslim, Mohammed is not my prophet, I don't have to abide by Islamic rules or obey their taboos.
Well yes, as the person making the positive claim has the burden of proof. If any person of faith claims revealed truth AND that we should accommodate this belief, then he has to show evidence for his claims. And if he can't, well that's not our problem.
Amazing isn't it.
The one thing that probably more people in the world (billions+) believe other than death (which is quite verifiable) and taxes (also proveable) is something for which there is absolutely no hard evidence except the collective belief of these said individuals.
Part of the problem with Hitch is that he attacks 'Muslims' and 'Islam'. That's a very big, diverse group of people. For many Muslims around the world, their religion is a cultural thing - not a big deal, just something they 'are', because their parents were. They probably don't even go to the mosque. They might even drink. They perhaps observe Ramadan half heartedly, and celebrate Eid with a blow-out feast. In other words, most Muslims are probably like most Christians, Hindus, Jews etc. Their religion is not something they spend a lot of time thinking about - it is just there, part of their identity. In fact it's not really an issue at all until it's actively threatened or attacked by others.
So Hitch attacking 'Muslims' and 'Islam' and people publishing cartoons of Mohammad is all perceived by a lot of Muslims not as really having much to do with free speech, and having a lot more to do with a Western attack on a specific religion and culture. An attack that has historical echoes in the Crusades, the reconquest of Muslim Spain, and colonial wars of oppression and subjugation by western powers across the Muslim world.
After almost a millenia, during which Islam was at the forefront of world culutre, Muslim civilisation has endured centuries of decline and humiliation. There are complex reasons for that, but one of them has doubtless been the impact and legacy of Western colonialism. So when Hitchens mounts his verbal tirades at an entire world religion, he needs to take the history and context into account and realise that a white man sitting in Washington DC, and a firm supporter of George W, most Muslims won't be looking at him thinking 'defender of free speech', they'll be thinking 'oh , here they go again, those arrogant imperialist m*****f******'.
All I'm asking (as with the Mohammad cartoons) is what dialogue exactly did Hitchens think he was advancing? Where does his absolute belief in his own correctness take us? He accuses Muslims of being all to ready to take up violence in defence of their ideas, but the truth is, the violent extremists are a relatively small minority. And if you look at the history of the western world, right up to the present day, it's been us who have waged the endless wars, constantly invading other peoples' countries, murdering and exterminating each other and persecuting our minorities, like the Jews. However much the Arabs in the Middle East might hate Israel, they never managed a holocaust, yet we lecture the Muslim world about anti-semitism.
The thing that sticks in your throat is the hypocrisy of people like Hitchens, defending 'free speech' but ignoring almost everything else about the context and history of the relationship between Islam and the west. The biggest threat to free speech and our liberties is not frankly a few nutter Muslim fundamentalists, but governments that want to exert ever more control over their citizens and what they do and think.
Hitchens made it very clear over and over again that he respected the rights of any individual to "play with their own toys" but objected to religion telling other people what to do. Ever had an atheist knock on your door with a smile and a leaflet? Ever had an atheist school telling you your kids cant attend due to their beliefs? Ever had an athiest take a perfectly healthy baby under the knife? the list goes on. In general, atheists promote knowledge, facts, thought, debate, enlightenment etc as they tend to think that, once people have all of the facts in front of them and also have free will, then people can make up their own minds. When was the last time you heard a religious leader promoting the idea of going off and reading as many books as you can from all walks of life and then think really hard about the pros and cons and then think for yourself, really think and then make up your own mind. If they were that confident and secure that their beleif system was correct, they would want people to do this. But they dont.
That's the idiocy of Hitchens' argument - that it's only religious believers that forcibly impose their views on others. In terms of modern history, the aetheists have been much worse.
I just think Hitchens banging on about Muslims was barking up the wrong tree. Malligning an entire culture primarily because of the acts of a few nutters is unfair. Most Muslims also generally want free speech. In a Muslim country, there might be blasphemy laws (just as there were in the UK up until the late 20th century). That does not make Muslims fundamentally opposed to free speech. In France and the UK today there are limits on what you can do and say - racially offensive language for instance can lead to criminal convictions in the UK. That is what I mean about the danger of Hitchens' absolutism and fundamentalism - it creates artificial walls where there is no need for them and prevents discourse and the opening up of common ground when it's urgently needed. He was a dangerous fundamentalist - not a murderous one like the jihadis - but still dangerous. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and down Hitchen's path lies world-ending culture wars and the clash of civilisations - something that is completely avoidable if we accept that we don't need to impose our views on the rest of the world in order to live peacefully in our own countries.
well that is a very bold statement and I may not be alone in wanting some evidence to back the claim up.
Communism. And arguably fascism (depending on what form it took).
Read some history books if you need more info.
My history books record Nazism as starting WW II, which was not an atheist ideology. Leaders hell bent on domination use whatever ideology, religion, or no religion, is convenient to them and serves their needs to dominate.
Lets talk about the treats to the world today, not the last century. Atheists didn't fly those planes into the World Trade Center killing 3,000 people, atheists aren't killing off sects of Christians in the Middle East, beheading and murdering innocents who are attending schools or shopping in a mall in Africa, or shopping in a food market, or publishing cartoons in France, or whoever or whatever is offensive to their religion.
The majority of Muslims in this world are indeed peaceful and want to just get on with their lives, but there is a cancer of extremism in the religion that is exceedingly dangerous. The extremist interpretation of the religion has always been there, but foolish interventions by the US and particularly Britain who drew much of the insane map of the Middle East as a misbegotten by product of their now dead British Empire have all helped bring us to this mess today. Now we have oil, money, social media, and modern weaponry all greatly raising the stakes. When the extremist obtain small nuclear weapons, we are all truly at the gates of hell.
There are many Muslim leaders who know more than anyone how dangerous radical Islam is, and are struggling to contain it. Good luck to them. This is filled with irony as Saudi Arabia is now threatened by the very force they themselves helped fuel with their wealth thinking it would hep inoculate them. So talk about atheism, Hitchens, fundamentalism in the US, communism and fascism all you want, that is yesterday's news, it is radical Islamism that is putting the world on edge today and most definitely not a few nuts.
False. Mussolini was an atheist, but Franco and Hitler were Catholics. Franco was even a practicing one. And Stalin did not kill a single person in the name of atheism. And is North Korea atheistic? The last three leaders are godly and the regime pretty much theistic.