It’s All So Complicated

Films show terrorists as people
By Scott Bowles, USA TODAY Wed Dec 21, 6:45 AM ET

Clooney, who produced Syriana, says the trend stems largely from growing American displeasure with the Iraq war.

“I’ve been called a traitor for questioning the war,” he says. “But more people are beginning to look critically at what our government is doing, who we’re fighting. And that’s the most patriotic thing you can do.”

You’re not a traitor if you question the war, or look critically at your government. You cross the line of treason when your words or actions damage your country and countrymen. When your worldview is based on the premise that America has been wrong about most things, most of the time, and you see it as a perpetrator of evil rather than a proponent of good, and that this is the root cause of everything that is wrong in the world – then pardon me for pointing it out but you are a traitor. Not being a traitor doesn’t automatically make you a patriot. The next time you or your Hollywood jetsetting friends are traveling the world and you’re standing in front of a crowd of American-hating foreigners try telling them you love your country and explain why rather than joining in their bashing. That would be patriotic.

Syriana, for example, “simply doesn’t want to paint things in black and white, because the world isn’t that way,” Clooney says. “The world is complicated, and good movies try to show that.”

How about a good movie that explores the complicated roots of terror? Not more “religion of peace” apologia. Show them as people. What do they believe? What are their goals? A documentary or two about Islam would be nice. How it started, how it spread; a view backward that doesn’t stop at the Crusades, or colonialism. What are the core beliefs of the various Islamic sects? Why are there so many terror groups? It’s all so complicated, we need Hollywood to help us understand.

Don’t hold your breath.

Via LGF.

Pardon Me Mr. Anti-America

My country, always wrong

Pages could be filled with the caustic, contradictory, and almost schizophrenic accusations of the prophets of anti-Americanism. Don’t be fooled for a second that such criticisms are fueled by a genuine desire to build a better America. It’s pure bile that does not deserve to be taken seriously. So when you hear me calling anti-Americanism by its name, don’t assume I mean that every leftie is a traitor. I don’t take issue with reasoned dissent, I just have a problem with those on the Left who follow the motto, “my country, always wrong.” It just happens that this type of leftist represents about ninety-five percent of the Left.

Nice blog.

A Fellow Called Mohammed

Racism is bad – so is self-delusion
By Mark Steyn
(Filed: 20/12/2005

These days, whenever something goofy turns up on the news, chances are it involves a fellow called Mohammed. A plane flies into the World Trade Centre? Mohammed Atta. A gunman shoots up the El Al counter at Los Angeles airport? Hesham Mohamed Hedayet. A sniper starts killing petrol station customers around Washington, DC? John Allen Muhammed. A guy fatally stabs a Dutch movie director? Mohammed Bouyeri. A terrorist slaughters dozens in Bali? Noordin Mohamed. A gang-rapist in Sydney? Mohammed Skaf.

Maybe all these Mohammeds are victims of Australian white racists and American white racists and Dutch white racists and Balinese white racists and Beslan schoolgirl white racists.

Maybe saying something like this is enough to get you killed by a member of the Religion of Peace.

About the photo.

Smartypants Traitors

Treason of the Intellectuals, Volume 3

But a new magnet for intellectuals is emerging: radical Islam. It’s not that intellectuals are likely to embrace radical Islam themselves anytime soon – for one thing, the requirement of believing in God would deter many of them. But what they can do is obstruct efforts to combat radical Islam and terrorism, undermine support for Israel, stress the "legitimate grievances" of radical Islamists, and lend moral support to the "legitimacy" of radical Islamic movements.

This is a phenomenon at first glance so baffling it cries out for analysis. Both fascism and Marxism censored, harassed, and imprisoned intellectuals, but they also gave lip service to intellectualism. Russia and Germany both had great universities. Both fascism and Marxism appealed to their respective nations’ cultural heritage in support of their ideologies. Our mental picture of fascism is now mostly colored by images of Nazi book burnings and bad art, but before World War II fascism was quite successful at passing itself off as a blend of socialism and nationalism.

When we try to discover what fascism, Marxism, and radical Islam have in common, the field shrinks to a single common theme: hatred of democracy. Despite all the calls for "Power to the People" from radical intellectuals, the reality is that no societies have ever empowered so many people to such a degree as Western democracies.

The problem is that people in democratic societies usually end up using that empowerment to make choices that intellectuals hate. How can we reconcile the fact that the masses, whom intellectuals profess to support, keep making wrong choices? I’ve got it – they’ve been duped somehow. Those aren’t their real values; they’ve been brainwashed into a "false consciousness" by society. If they were completely free to choose, they’d make the "right" choices. But of course we have to eliminate all the distractions that interfere with the process: no moral or religious indoctrination, no advertising or superficial amusements, no status symbols, no politically incorrect humor. "False consciousness" is a perfect way of professing support for the masses while simultaneously depriving them of any power to choose; a device for being an elitist while pretending not to be.

Via no dhimmitude.

Islamophobia All Right

Hollywood’s PC perversion stifles storytelling
November 27, 2005
BY MARK STEYN SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

This year’s Sean Penn thriller, ”The Interpreter,” was originally about Muslim terrorists blowing up a bus in New York. So, naturally, Hollywood called rewrite. And instead the bus got blown up by African terrorists from the little-known republic of Matobo. ”We didn’t want to encumber the film in politics in any way,” said Kevin Misher, the producer.

But being so perversely ”non-political” is itself a political act. If there were a dozen movies in which Tom Cruise kicked al-Qaida butt across the Hindu Kush, it would be reasonable to say, ”Hey, we’d rather deal with Matoban terrorism for a change.” But, when every movie goes out of its way to avoid being ”encumbered,” it starts to look like a pathology.

There are at least two good reasons why Western filmmakers are reluctant to address, even obliquely, the Islamic threat to civilization. First, they will immediately be labelled racist bigot Islamophobes. Second, they will be brutally murdered. This is not supposition. They called Theo van Gogh a racist bigot Islamophobe, then they brutally murdered him.

Isn’t it strange when these liberal artist types, who ordinarily delight in testing limits and sticking their finger in whoever’s eye they like, suddenly turn obsequious when it comes to Islam. Oh no, "we didn’t want to encumber the film in politics". Riiiight. That and you’ve got a touch of Islamophobia. Remember: just because you’re afraid of Muslims doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.

Politics + Technology = Nonsense at the Speed of Light