When four readers (and also Richard himself) send me a link to a new Dawkins essay, I will certainly pay attention. And you should, too, for Richard has written a nice new piece for his own website, “‘It’s part of their culture’: reading Nick Cohen in the light of the Jaipur affair.”
The “Jaipur affair,” of course, is the Jaipur Literature Festival, held annually in the state of Rajasthan in India—this year between January 20 and 24. Salman Rushdie’s scheduled appearance there was cancelled after there were death threats made on the basis of his 1988 book, The Satanic Verses, which of course incited rancor throughout the Muslim world, led to a fatwa against Rushdie, and forced him to go into hiding. Many who criticized the book, and still do, have never read it. And Satanic Verses is still banned in India, which is supposedly a secular democracy. (You can sign a petititon to rescind the ban here.)
“Reading Nick Cohen” refers to Cohen’s new book, You Can’t Read This Book, which decries censorship in the modern world. Richard refers to it throughout his piece.
Indian officials behaved execrably about Rusdhie’s participation. Indeed, the Rajasthani police may have been complicit in publicizing threats so that he wouldn’t appear. Festival organizers even prohibited a video link that would allow Rushdie to speak at the Festival. And, according to Wikipedia,
Meanwhile, police seek Ruchir Joshi, Jeet Thayil, Hari Kunzru and Amitava Kumar who have fled Jaipur on the advice of officials at the Jaipur Literature Festival after reading excerpts from The Satanic Verses, which is banned in India. Kunzru later wrote, “Our intention was not to offend anyone’s religious sensibilities, but to give a voice to a writer who had been silenced by a death threat”.
Yes, the lawbreakers aren’t those who made the death threats, or the police who were complicit in the publicity, but the people who read from Rushdie’s book.
The Chairman of the Press Council of India and former judge of the Supreme Court Markandey Katju said that although he was “not in favour of religious obscurantism“, he found Rushdie a “poor” and “substandard writer” and the focus on him detracting from more fundamental issues of “colonial inferiority complex” among educated Indians and what a literary mission could be about.
The government of India, of course, wants those Muslim votes: there are 150 million adherents to that faith in India, making the country second only to Indonesia in number of Muslim inhabitants.
At any rate, read Richard’s piece and watch at least the first video below. It includes a statement that Richard reprises in the essay:
Our whole society is soft on religion. The assumption is remarkably widespread that religious sensitivities are somehow especially deserving of consideration – a consideration not accorded to ordinary prejudice. . . I admit to being offended by Father Christmas, ‘Baby Jesus’, and Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer, but if I tried to act on these prejudices I’d quite rightly be held accountable. I’d be challenged to justify myself. But let somebody’s *religion* be offended and it’s another matter entirely. Not only do the affronted themselves kick up an almighty fuss; they are abetted and encouraged by influential figures from other religions and the liberal establishment. Far from being challenged to justify their beliefs like anybody else, the religious are granted sanctuary in a sort of intellectual no go area.
He makes explicit some of the motivations behind Rushdie’s ban, concluding that much of that sentiment derived from thought like this:
I shall give in to you because I know that freedom of speech is not part of your culture. Who am I to impose Western, colonialist, paternalistic ideas like freedom of speech on your very different and equally valuable culture? Of course your ‘hurt’ and ‘offence’ should take precedence over our purely Western preoccupation with freedom of speech, and of course we’ll cancel the video link.
And Dawkins quotes Richard Hughes (in Cohen’s book): “Oppression is what we do in the West. What they do in the Middle East is ‘their culture’.” Dawkins’s essay is short but trenchant, and will infurate you about the double standard of Western “liberals” when it comes to free expression in places like India.
Free speech cannot be subject to cultural relativism. It may be illegal or dangerous to voice unpopular sentiments in places like India (or Austria, France and Germany—among the 16 Western nations where Holocaust denial is banned), but it is wicked to defend the suppression of speech anywhere.
***
Here’s a five-minute video of Richard’s statement of support of Rushdie at the Festival:
And here’s a video of a Q&A session with Dawkins at the festival (16 minutes):
Really looking forward to getting Cohen’s book. It’s astonishing (including comments in the Guardian) how much of the Rushdie criticism STILL comes down to bluster about being ‘a bad writer’ or ‘foolish’ – as if, even if true, this escuses the threats he has faced and faces
Off to read. (subscribing)
I just finished Satanic Verses.
I wasn’t aware that it was a comedy until I started it.
I thought it was quite excellent overall — though I think you’d “get it” a little better it you were more well-versed in Indian culture.
I admit to being a literary cretin: I’ve never been able to get “into” Rushdie’s writing, though I support him whole-heartedly.
I got three-fourths of the way through Midnight’s Children before tossing it aside. It did nothing for me. I kept reading expecting it to come around in a way that justified all the profuse praise it has received. Didn’t happen. There must be too much “inside baseball” in it for me to “get it.”
I’ve readly very widely. I loved Freedom at Midnight about the partition and many other books about India, and I’ve been to India, Nepal, and spent a lot of time in the UK.
But again, I freely admit to cretinous taste in literature. I read >90% non-fiction.
I will have to try The Satanic Verses, if for no other reason, to be in solidarity with Rushdie.
Taste skewed toward non-fiction is not cretinous.
I read hardly any fiction at all and my undergrad and grad degrees are in the humanities!
The real world is at least as interesting as any imagined one.
“Taste skewed toward non-fiction is not cretinous.”
Seconded. Now, having tastes skewed toward, say, Jessie Ventura, that would be cretinous.
I’m glad you started this side discussion. I’d wanted to read SV out of solidarity, if nothing else, and at the same time thought it somewhat odd that I’d never happened onto (= I never went hunting for it) any discussion of the book itself, and finally got hold of a copy. I quit after 100pgs, feeling a) that there were just too many Indian cultural references that I didn’t get, and b) that his writing is, well, difficult. I can’t think of a good way to put it. Like JB, what I read is ~90% nonfiction. The only part that I really connected with was about 4pgs ~pg 89, where the creationist is slammed in the jaw by the rifle-butt of one of the hijackers, severing his tongue, which lands on Chamcha’s lap. Those pages could have been written by my favorite fiction author, Carl Hiaasen, and I was excited that perhaps the writing had turned the corner. But it didn’t. Most of the negative reviews on Amazon are along the lines of a) and b), as well as c), that if the Ayatollah had just kept his mouth shut, the book would have disappeared in obscurity.
Of course, we will never know about that, but what I wonder is how many there are out there who have it on their shelves out of solidarity but have either never read it or are reluctant to say that they put it down for any of the above reasons.
Nothing wrong with being outside a Westerner’s grasp, of course, but for those positive Amazon reviews gushing about the wonderful lyrical qualities – I wondered if I’d been reading the same book.
I guess I’m not alone! I, too, have a solidarity-copy on the shelf that I couldn’t plough through. I always figured that it was my mostly-nonfiction tendencies at fault, since others like Hitch spoke so highly of it.
I read the Satanic Verses when the scandal broke. I loved it. It is lyrical; it is a masterpiece, and a triumph of magical realism. It is also richly allusive. It is a “writerly” book. Rushdie is a writer’s writer, in the tradition of Thomas Pynchon, Tom Stoppard, Beckett, Joyce, and so on. Rushdie is one of the masters of the English language; I hope that some of you that found it a slog will try it again. To me, the book was a delight. (I also loved Midnight’s Children and The Ground Beneath Her Feet.)
All Hail Hiaasen! Also one of my favorite fiction writers! I’ve never run into another author who can write an entertaining, funny, semi-serious romp like Hiaasen can! With one exception: Edward Abbey, in The Monkey Wrench Gang which everyone should read!
Wow, way too many: !!!
I also bought a solidarity copy of the Satanic Verses and made it about 100 pages before giving up, but I was pretty young, so it may not have been the fairest test.
However, I started on The Enchantress of Florence a while back and made it through the first part and then lost interest. I think part of the problem might have been the setting. After the fall of the Roman Empire, I mostly lose interest in Europe until relatively modern times because it feels like they’re playing catch up in a lot of ways. I know there’s a lot of actual innovation, but there’s a lot of reinventing the wheel as well. That and the casual brutality of the past is off putting as well, and somehow less forgivable 500 years ago than 2,000 years ago.
I love Richard’s response to the last question (more or less): “I don’t know India well (though I’ve enjoyed my three visits to this great country) and so I would not presume to have plans for educating India in science. I defer to the people in this room, who can educate me.”
What a grand answer!
Oh, no — much, much too strident!
😉
/@
Shrill, even
Shrill, strident, and offensive!
Don’t forget that all-important and!
you’ve made my day!
I think those double standards exist because those so-called liberals and not so liberal at all. Liberalism has been hijacked by authoritarians of both the left and the right. I would love to believe that new atheism is the authentic voice of liberalism, and its passion and rational argument certainly suggest that it very much is, but we must not allow those authoritarian forces to hijack the new atheist movement either.
WSJ: It’s now possible to read excerpts of the book online, and its unclear whether this is prohibited.
Or just download and read or listen to the entire book from any one of scores of encrypted p2p torrents, whether in MOBI for Kindle, PDF, audio book, …
Violating copyright like this unethical under ordinary circumstances, but bans like this just encourage more people to host the forbidden ideas. Banning books has always been self-defeating, an reality now amplified by the internet.
Who are these “so-called liberals”?
Presumably these nefarious no-goodniks have names, no? Who are the individuals who speak loudly to silence others, with geographic hypocrisy?
Simply stating “liberal establishment” seems like mindless us-vs-them complaining. I’m not saying such attitudes don’t exist, but I’d like some more specificity in such charges.
Here’s a name for you: Chris Mooney. Here’s another: Chris Hedges.
That’s off the top of my head. Are you new to this subject?
Here’s yet another example of religious folks asking for special respect in public for their imaginary gods.
http://www.smdailyjournal.com/article_preview.php?id=227659&title=Hindu gods on thongs draw religious protest&eddate=01/31/2012
It’s from Tuesdays edition of San Mateo County’s “The Daily Journal”. Apparently a representative of Hinduism is upset that CafePress allows disrepectful images of Hindu gods on T-shirts and coffee mugs, as in Vishnu, Kali, and Shiva wearing bikinis and driving moter scooters.
“Hinduism has a billion followers and is rich in philosophical thought and should not be taken lightly,” said Rajan Zed, the president of the Universal Society of Hinduism. “Symbols of any faith, larger or smaller, should not be mishandled, he continued.”
One does have to wonder why the gods, who are uniquely capable of defending themselves against such personal offenses, do not choose to do so.
oops.. motor scooters.
Why are not these powerful beings able to take care of such concerns on their own… without human intervention?
I find Rajan Zed’s efforts especially laughable. If he applied his yardsticks to some of the world heritage monuments in India (many of whom were initially built for religious purposes) he will probably conclude we need to tear them all down, since, you know, “symbols of any faith, larger or smaller, should not be mishandled”. Also, he would probably recommend the expurgation of all ancient Buddhist and Jain literature (many of who are very critical of Brahmanical Hinduism), as well insist that about half of our mythology be simply erased and forgotten, since it takes the gods of Hinduism “lightly”.
Subscribing.
I venture the preponderance of the cultural relativists traveled by airplane to the Jaipur Literature Festival. “What’s that smell in this room? Didn’t you notice it, Brick? Didn’t you notice a powerful and obnoxious odor of mendacity in this room?” As Dawkins stated, “Show me a relativist at 30,000 feet and I will show you a hypocrite.”
I really don’t remember a “liberal” consensus that failed to support Rushdie – quite the opposite. This stinks of revisionism to me. I also don’t think cultural relativism in general is “liberal establishment” (remember, in the US that means the Democratic party, not Judith Butler) – it is an intellectual stance in a few academic enclaves.
Liberal xians bend over backward to ignore the unsavory sides of cultures and faiths that are not home-grown. And even some that are. (I speak as a citizen of the USA, and an organist at one of those liberal xian churches.)
Pakistan has slightly more Muslims than India according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Muslim_population
Yes, I thought that was the case, I was surprised by the statement in the post.
Till very recently, India did use to be the country with the highest number of Muslims in various estimates. This had often been a diplomatic talking point when the Pakistan government tried to imply that Muslims were “second-rate” citizens in India (which clearly they are not), with a famous incident where the Saudi crown prince refused to endorse that view on the grounds that India had more Muslims than either Pakistan or Saudi Arabia.
I think the decreasing population growth rates in India, without a similar decline in growth rates in Indonesia/Pakistan might have lead to a decline from the top.
Agree with everything in the article, but as people have hinted above I think Cohen, and to some extent RD, is conflating “liberal” and “looney left”.
This strange confusion seems especially common among USers nowadays. Is this a deliberate strategy by right-wingers to tar their sensible opponents with the same brush as their silly opponents? And if lefties are called liberals, what do actual liberals call themselves? And don’t you get really confused talking to Aussies, where the Liberal party are right wing?
In Australia, we talk about ‘small l liberals’ to differentiate them from the Liberal Party – all caps.
And yes, it all about having command of the bumper-sticker metaphors by which political conversation occurs.
US non-loony liberals have been trying to go with “progressive” for some time now. (A campaign I think about as stupid as the move in some sectors to find a “more acceptable” word for atheist. If they force you to change, they’ve won.)
Interesting. When I hear “progressive” I tend to decode it the other way round, i.e. as “loony left” rather than as “liberal in the usual sense”.
Are you American?
No – GB – so it sounds like yet another thing that loses something in the translation.
Indeed. I hope I can keep this in mind.
Yet again–“two countries divided by a common language…”
The mis-use of “liberal” (in many spheres) in the US is a symptom of the conservative resurgence in the US, which began in the 1970s (mainly; I know it go going in the 1960s) and really gained momentum after Reagan was elected in 1980.
It spawned (or arose in conjunction with) the resurgence of evangelical Christianity and mega-churches in the US.
Its goals are reversing all the social programs initiated as part of the New Deal* (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, AFDC, etc., etc.) and “returning the US to its Christian roots.”
“Liberal” has become a epithet in the US. Hence the move to “Progressive.” The Republicans can still get good, red-meat reactions out of their base by hurling the word “liberal” around.
To me, the most salient political event of the late 20th century in the US was the success the Republicans (and conservatives generally) had in getting white, lower income/class people to vote against theit own economic interests using: Guns, God, Gays, and blacks.
(* In one of the GOP debates earlier in the campaign, Ron Paul (libertarian) was asked, if a young man came to a hospital with a fatal disease and had neither health insurance nor money, what should be done, let him die? Paul hemmed and hawed and wouldn’t go there in the end; but several audience members shouted out, “let him die!” Tells you all you need to know about these people! That’s the Teabaggers. Works great until they need it, then exceptions must be made …)
Well said! I urge we reclaim “liberal.”
Chilling Ron Paul anecdote.
Does that audience count as a Death Panel?
This stuff always reminds me of a scene in the brilliant Radio 4 comedy series “Hordes of the Things”.
Prince Veganin (Simon Callow) is reading to King Yulfuric (Paul Eddington) his list of the world’s most evil people.
Veganin: The bishop of Zilbor!
Yulfuric: Shh! The ambassador of Zilbor is next door! If he should be in his front parlour, sacrificing somebody…
Veganin: Sacrificing??
Yulfuric: Its just his religion. We have to make allowances for other cultures.
That was first broadcast in 1981.
Thanks for this – it will travel!
I know this was posted here at WEIT not too long ago, but it’s so appropriate. And so good.
Perfect!
+1
This takes me back to the mid 1980’s when the anti-Rushie stuff kicked off in the UK.
One Saturday I had to take 10 Police officers across to Bradford to join about 200 other officers to supervise an anti
-Rushdie protest march, and also to prevent a mass incursion of Braford city centre.
About 30 of us were detailed to mingle with the gathering throng (a final total would be in the region of 500) and ‘be polite’ and advise those bearing banners, which had been handed to them on their arrival, with the legend ‘Death to Rushdie’ that they might be arrested for making ‘threats to kill’ – an offence that carries (or did carry) 2 years imprisonment in the UK if they did not remove them. Any other banner regarding offence to Islam or the Koran or Mohammed was permitted. We also explained that we would be escorting them in their sojourn around Bradford City centre. That did not go down too well. But, hey, that’s life!
Many of the participants had benn bussed in and most had no idea why. None of them had read the Satanic Verses and most had never heard of it. All they had been told was that were marching because of offence to Islam and the Prophet.
It was a nice day for a walk and the company was quite pleasant and interesting. There was plenty of stimulating conversation bewteen all parties and, thankfully, no rolling around on the floor.
We did have a secret weapon though. One of my officers was a Muslim who spoke several languages and so was able to speak with the marchers at their own level and therefore to tranmit a lot of intelligence. It did make it easier that the majority of the participants only spoke English.
The event passed off fairly quietly but there were initially many requests to be allowed to leave the procession to go to the toilet but they did get the message when they were told – ‘You’ve started so you’ll finish. Either tie a knot in it or piss yourself! You’re staying.’ We made a few friends that day. We also collected an increasing number of broom handles, formerly used for carrying banners and of late hidden down trouserlegs with intent to cause to cause later mayhem – which did not happen.
I eventually found out that an Iranian had been sent by the Iranian regime to start the protests because nothing was happenng in the UK, and it was his brief to start the ball rolling. I was also told that MI5 officers were present and they were ‘monitoring’ his contacts.
All in all, a fair day’s walk in the sun.
Much like the mullahs who scurried around working up the “offense” about the Jyllands Posten cartoons.
Certainly. An interesting follow-up to that was when I think it was the BBC who interviewed a senior cleric in Pakistan about the trouble over the cartoons and asked him if he would look at the cartoons. The repsonse was classic, the cleric said, about the ‘bomb in the turban’ cartoon – This is a Sikh and not a Muslim. He went on to say that if he had had knowledge of this before hand he would not have been so vociferous.
Yeah, great to just say “nevermind!” now! “The Cartoonist” Kurt Westergaard (of course there were sveral, 12 I think) is still in hiding in fear of his life.
These dummies can’t put the genie (or djinn, rather) back into the bottle.
…djinn…
Good one. 😀
And here, of course, is where so many cliche-ridden liberals (knee-jerk, bleeding-heart, etc.) earned their bad rep, by immediately siding with the ‘oppressed’ Muslims…without a clue as to the actual instigation and flame-fanning going on.
What a fascinating first-hand account! Thank you for that.
Thanks. Life is only boring if you walk around with your eyes closed.
There were in reality two aims for the march; certainly there was the march in itself but there were also a large group of Asian youths in the City centre waiting to join up with a group from the march itself. Fortunately we were aware of their plans and had about 50 officers in the city centre and the remainder acted as a rolling block as the march crossed all the roads giving access.
Simple plans work best. Of course, they had to be simple it was for MEN! Boom, Boom!
Incidentally the station where I worked was about 500 yards from Tempest Road, Leeds 11 where one of the 7/7 bombers lived and they carried out their planning. The bomb factory itself was about 3 miles away acroos the centre of Leeds. But that’s a different story and many years after I retired.
You put the lie to some of our police stereotypes (tho maybe those only exist in the US…). It would certainly be comforting to think that all law enforcement proceeded from such intelligent preparation, analysis and follow through.
I should think volatile crowds would be the absolute worst situation to deal with. Thank you for the further riveting details!
Thanks Diane, I wish that could be said to be the norm, but this was a more ‘gentle’ age. The UK Police do not generally carry firearms, neither were we wearing any form of riot protection equipment, which is often seen as agressive although it is only for self-protection.
However the teams of police officers who were providing the rolling ‘road block’ were carrying shields and wearing protective head gear. A sort of speak gently but make sure that others can see the bog stick – and hope that reason prevails and it isn’t necessary. Once the younger marches realised that there was no way they would be allowed to gain access to the city centre they quickly became bored, which is probably why we acquired so many broom handles :o)