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Thursday, January 27 2005Deep thoughts on Islamist murderIn The Guardian, cultural theorist Terry Eagleton pontificates on the meaning of the Islamist act of suicide bombing. His first maneuver is to simply deny the death cult, and blame the victims' society instead: Like hunger strikers, suicide bombers are not necessarily in love with death. They kill themselves because they can see no other way of attaining justice; and the fact that they have to do so is part of the injustice. Hmm.. did Eagleton miss the videotaped statement of the 'vanguard' Reem Reyashi, just before she killed four Israelis and herself in Gaza last year? Said Reem: I always wanted to be the first woman who sacrifices her life for Allah. My joy will be complete when my body parts fly in all directions. Eagleton then likens suicide terrorists to their actual victims: It is possible to act in a way that makes your death inevitable without actually desiring it. Those who leapt from the World Trade Centre to avoid being incinerated were not seeking death, even though there was no way they could have avoided it. He goes on to analyze the phenomenon as the supreme act of human rebellion, on par with the great heroic figures from western literature: Like the traditional tragic hero, the suicide bomber rises above his own destruction by the very resolution with which he embraces it. Muhammad Atta was the modern-day Romeo, you see. Eagleton never bothers addressing the fact that the Islamist suicide bomber murders others along the way, other than reflecting that commuter bus terrorism has 'a smack of avant garde theatre' to it. How ironic that Eagleton, one of the foremost practitioners of postmodern theory, is unable to allow the cultural 'other' to define his reality for himself, but rather feels compelled to project his own, western humanist personality upon the death-happy Islamist. Comments to the Guardian: letters@guardian.co.uk
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» Not desperate from Israpundit CommentsHas this sick person ever saw the results of such bombing ? Has he ever talked to any would be bomber ? So how the fuck he claim to know anything about what is going on ? I just had to read the whole piece in The Guardian to make sure you weren't quoting Eagleton out of context. Aside from infantile logic and the pseudophilosophical jargon one fatally finds in such articles, what really blows my mind is that he elevates suicide bombers to the status of hunger strikers (!!!). (I shudder at the thought of Gandhi and Yassin sharing the same spot in Paradise - or anywhere else) Has Jim ever learned not to be a facetious moron? Eagleton, like his chum Tom Paulin, sits in his Oxford University ivory tower, viewing far-off events with the perfect toxic mix of arrogance and ignorance. Alberto, don't shudder too much on behalf of Gandhi, who infamously said the Jews of Nazi Europe should have committed mass-suicide as their *only* response to genocide. And Gandhi fils was not long ago in Israel/"Palestine" ranting about the evil, oppressive Israelis. He may even, like so many these days, have likened Israel to the Nazis. "what really blows my mind is that he elevates suicide bombers to the status of hunger strikers (!!!). (I shudder at the thought of Gandhi and Yassin sharing the same spot in Paradise - or anywhere else)" For any British or Irish reader, the reference to hunger strikers is a unmistakable allusion to Bobby Sands and the other IRA hunger strikers - rather than Ghandi. Eagleton is, I think, a British Catholic of Northern Irish descent. This is a small quibble, but Eagleton is, if anything, one of the more prominent critics of post-modern theory. Eagleton isn't defending suicide bombers; he is making a cold, objective analysis of the reasons someone would do it. You are implying things from his piece that just aren't there. he doesn't compare the morality of committing an act like a suicide bombing with going on a hunger strike; he justifiably compares their willingness to die. I think all of you are reading into this piece too much. If he is guilty of anything, it's that his detachment is easily mistaken for support. Dave, I disagree especially in one respect. He compares suicide bombers with people who jumped out of the WTC on 9/11: "Those who leapt from the World Trade Centre to avoid being incinerated were not seeking death, even though there was no way they could have avoided it." The difference should be obvious - suicide bombers HAVE A CHOICE! The difference is that they CAN avoid it. All they have to do is choose not to put on the vest. He also says it's "their only way of achieving justice" - he himself is claiming that blowing up innocent civilians is somehow "justice" The suicide bombers do want death. They chose it. The claim that this is just showing that they no longer fear death is silly. I believe many soldiers don't fear death - but that doesn't mean they actively seek it like suicide bombers do. The difference between hunger strikers and suicide bombers is that hunger strikers are willing to put on the line the only lives they have a right to give up - their own. The suicide bomber is only willing to give up their own as long as they get to take away others as well. Um, Eagleton is NOT a postmodernist -- he is a Marxist for crying out loud! Don't tell me you don't know the difference. It’s amazing to see that this article doesn’t grasp the basics of the suicide bomber: he aims to kill others, he is a murderer. That he dies in the act of killing is irrelevant to the victims, but the fact that the author focuses on this side exclusively shows with whose eyes he’s looking at the phenomenon. People commit suicide for different reasons, and we tend to view a suicide with sadness, not as an act of heroism. But if the author believes there is something heroic in suicide, why does he associate heroism only to the Islamic and murderous kind of suicide? And why does he say that “They kill themselves because they can see no other way of attaining justice; the fact that they have to do so is part of the injustice”? They don’t HAVE to do it, and fortunately most people don’t do it. It’s sad to watch the Guardian romanticize murderers in such a way. This article helps to clean the path for potential killers, making them know that the liberal minds in the UK will admire their quest for “justice” and equate them to the tragic heroes of the literature, thus providing them an epic dimension and inserting them into the thread of Western history /Western club: “You will be Achilles” and “I admire your courage” and “I suffer your pain for injustice”. It feels stupid to compile this list, but look at this depiction: They kill themselves… The point is not that they die. The point is that they KILL others, or as the article puts it: …they take others with them in the process. Don’t you get it? The process IS taking others with them. And of course he ignores one of the main issue with the practice of suicide bombing and that is the fact that it takes a large number of people to put together a suicide bomber. There are those who plan and finance the operation, who put together the vests and the bombs, who provide the support, the drugs and the brainwashing required to manipulate/encourage a poor soul to commit the act. Lots of accomplices, all with murderous agendas. The suicide bomber and his/her accomplices and supporters have the power and are the Nazis of the 21st Century. The Guardian has hit a new low with this article, specially given the fact that it was published on Holocaust memorial day. Dave 'he justifiably compares their willingness to die' You're a fool. Hunger strilkers are ready to die but they don't want to. They hope their point will be made before they die and change can happen but they would prefer to live and see their cause succeed. They are ready to die for this but they would prefer however to live. Suicide bombers aren't just willing to die, they WANT this and don't wish to see their cause succeed. For them, death is their cause - not their own, but as many as the enemy as possible. To not see the illogical comparison between the two clearly shows how much of a fool you are. The counterpoint of Reem Reyashi is interesting. She probably did kill others out of desperation, but not because of Israel. She was compromised by one of her husbands friends. Faced with the choice between the shame of an honor killing and Hell on one side and a "martyrdom operation" and Paradise on the other; she chose the latter. I don't think that she's quite the typical suicide terrorist. There's more on the Eagleton piece here. As most of you correctly pointed out, the issue of murdering innocent people was carefully avoided by Eagleton (and I really don't care whether he disregards morality out of ideological or philosophical concerns). It seems my irony on Gandhi was lost. My point is: regardless of any relativistic views, regardless of any armchair arrogance or postmodern aloofness, hunger strikers represent admirable sacrifice and suicide bombers the very soul of murder. Eagleton's skills notwithstanding, his article's only merit is to make us strengthen our own principles and to reveal the moral lameness of others. They are charging a man in Cal. with several, 10, 11 counts of murder for his attempt to commit suicide by parking on train tracks-it is somehow different when you use a bomb and go through with it? Gimme a BREAK!! It reminds me of the BBC. Always claiming it is wrong to say "terrorism". When the IRA (harmlessly, as I recall) blew up a car not far from a/the BBC building, the BBC suddenly re-discovered the T-word. It seems it IS evil and it IS terrorism - the moment it's close to you or touches people you actually care about. We still remember a case, was it the Guardian or the Independent? Where they discovered that the T-word is not so bad after all. That is to say, when the would-be perpetrators are Jewish/Israeli and the would-be victims are Palestinians, the attitude changes rather drastically and all the old excuses that were made to avoid 'moral-judgment' and 'subjective labels' just fly out the window. Did the Beeb call the Spanish train bombing a terrorist attack? Was it because they thought the ETA did it? I cannot remember, does anyone know, I am curious to see if Alvin is on to something. Alvin and Jane, For the BBC and the T-word, try http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3563713.stm It's a keeper. 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