'looking Islamism in the eye'

This neat phrase from Nick Cohen the Observer this sunday encapsulates a lot of recent comment in Britain. By 'neat' I imply well-chosen for purpose and also tidy, as in rug-sweeping occlusion. The connotation is that we, the rational scientifically-argued secular west/Observer readers [conflation], must confront 'Islamism', over its apparent unwillingness to accept responsibility for the actions of certain sections of the 'Islamic community'. This is not the time, runs the subtext of Cohen [overtly textual in The Sun, Daily Mail, etc,] to indulge in 'hand-wringing, sentimentalism, etc etc'. We live in a 'very real' climate of fear of people using 'modern technology' to fight a classically dirty terror war. [Has John Reid been reading John Gray?]

Cohen doesn't quite revisit the sentiment 'hang on, it's mostly young Muslims that are setting off all the bombs, isn't it? So don't look at us,' but it's implied. In his brief, loose and ill-considered diatribe he sets up the straw man of writer/former diplomat Craig Murray to further an implied argument that blanket dismisses and totally ignores dissenting positions, the idea that any collection of infomation which contradicts the centrally held line is a 'conspiracy theory', and the further idea that somehow there are no grounds on which Britain/the west can be seen to be at all culpable: it's 'the terrorists' and terrorists alone.

I join the dots in my own eye... Writing personally - and noting the position of relative freedom which allows it - I find it abhorrent that we [citizens of the UK] are dandering along in a society where it is acceptable to play a game of mirrors, endlessly shifting blame and responsibilities and denying that we may have done anything. As if people who engage or attempt to engage in 'terror' do not believe they have a justification for their actions as compelling as we might believe we do for ours. 'Well, we don't go blowing up innocent people.' Yes, yes we do, yes we fucking do. We also make and sell arms around the world and then complain it's a dangerous place. We belligerently and - laughably, crudely - attempt to engineer control of specific strategic energy resources, while cursing gridlock and pollution on a daily basis, and pretend it's about 'democracy'. And then we act surprised when a comparably bellicose response is enacted. This is not rational, this is stupid.

Humans can only take responsibility for their own actions. Anything else is oppression. This, by the by, is true of any religion or system of government, not just the ones that hang 16 year olds for 'crimes against chastity'. So when John Reid says 'people don't get it', that we're under threat, it's imperative to say, 'No, Dr Reid, thank you, I do in fact get it. 'Terrorism' is not the exclusive preserve of one religious or secular system. It stands on a simple and universal premise of brute subjugation of other people by people. Telling people what to think, using violence or the threat of violence. Chimp behaviour. Thank you.'

We're lucky people in the west. We've grown up largely not knowing what oppression really means, or what being hungry means. Well, I have, and I can only speak for me. My good fortune - thus far - is not a source of shame, neither does it absolve me of responsibility for actions taken in my [citizen of the UK] name. I can, however, let it be known that I am entirely unhappy about such actions, and intend not to stop carping until we start to be a little more linked in our thinking and acting. This may begin with the creation of media that informs us of the right to not feel afraid, of media that does not try to stifle debate outside certain rigidly defined parameters, and it may continue as we utilise whatever methods we can to display a little less self-loathing and get out among the universe and enjoy it. This is not a theory, it's a call to action.

GAH, it makes me cross!

This is from the film Waking Life:

'The truth is out there in front of you, but they lay out this buffet of lies. I’m sick of it, and I’m not going to take a bite out of it! Do you got me? Resistance is not futile. We’re gonna win this thing. Humankind is too good! We’re not a bunch of underachievers! We’re gonna stand up and we’re gonna be human beings! We’re gonna get fired up about the real things, the things that matter: creativity and the dynamic human spirit that refuses to submit! Well that’s it! That’s all I got to say! It’s in your court.'