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You employ an interesting debating technique...
...You present as my argument one that I haven't made, and then you shoot it down. This is right out of the old Marxist training manuals from the 1960s that were used to train campus agitators on American campuses. For the unsophisticated listener (reader) you score points, but you cannot ultimately change minds this way, because your arguments never really address the core arguments of the other side. And you alienate sophisticated listeners.
I did not intend to assign a simplistic view to you. From my perspective, I was addressing views that you seem to have presented. I am trying to say that I have not, nor will I in the future deliberately put a spin on your arguments. This only complicates things, because when either of us does this, the other must stop and untangle things--as I am doing now.
I don't believe I was dismissive of similarities. I simply didn't address them, because similarities don't divide us; differences do. As you well know, successful diplomats used similarities to construct the bridges that eventually (hopefully) allow civil discourse between widely disparate peoples. Incidentally, I, too, am fascinated by how difficult it sometimes is in our own culture to communicate on a really basic level. Semantics often completely clouds the communication so that real exchange of ideas does not happen.
I genuinely wish you would stop spinning my own statements, so that they mean something different from what you and I both know I was really saying. The "He's different - oh, well, let's bomb him and be done with it" statement is genuinely unfair, and a perfect example of the "straw man concept" I discussed in the first paragraph of this comment.
Furthermore, when I said that when faced with understanding or survival, I genuinely believed you would understand the concept: if we are faced with only two alternatives, one of which leads to our destruction and the other to our survival, then the choice is obvious. I should not have to explain that I didn't mean that to understand the other side is less important; but only that if it is understanding or survival, where destruction accompanies "understanding," then understanding simply will not happen.
This spin on my words is similar to the spin on Arnold Schwarzeneger's statement regarding Hitler, wherein he actually said that he was impressed by the ability of an uneducated paperhanger to rise to where he nearly accomplished world domination. He never said or implied that he admired Hitler, BUT the left-wing opponents twisted his words so that he found himself on the defense.
Obviously, if we can gain understanding without becoming obliterated, then that is how we deal with the situation. 9/11, however, gave us no chance for diplomacy. Furthermore, my relatively in-depth understanding of Islam, and in particular Wahhabi Islam, leads me to believe that diplomacy will never work until the other side opens itself up to genuine negotiations. What will work, because it is the one language the other side unequivocally understands, is force. This is why I am such a strong advocate for applying force as early as possible in this equation. Properly applied, force will lead to fruitful negotiations down stream.
Remember, when you are dealing with an opponent who uses diplomatic intervals to ready his offense (as did the Japanese before WW II), you are worse than stupid to grant him such an opportunity. Diplomacy works ONLY when both parties are willing to put force on hold for an interval. Chamberlain nearly lost England to the Nazis because he trusted the diplomacy of the Nazis, while they used the interval thus obtained to strengthen their position, and to ready for attack.
posted by
arGee
on October 6, 2003 at 7:58 PM
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The Assumptions...
...you believe you see in my post are entirely yours, not mine.
Having lived in Asia for three years, in France for two, and in other parts of the world (including two Muslim countries) for several months at a time, I can assure you that my view on differences and similarities is quite a lot more developed than the one you assign to me. And I know very well how cultural filters work.
You are also overly dismissive of similarities. We are all sophisticated animals. At the sophisticated level, the differences can be huge. Our animal needs, on the other hand, for water, food, shelter, sex and companionship, are damn-near universal.
But non of this changes the basic premise. What you have done is to underline how difficult it can be to bridge the gaps, and that you can never truly understand another. (And I think that's true within cultures, at a very deep level, as well as between cultures). But being difficult doesn't mean it's impossible, and certainly doesn't mean we shouldn't try.
In fact, your line of reasoning is exactly the one that stops people from trying. He's different - oh, well, let's bomb him and be done with it.
You finish by saying - When faced with the alternatives of understanding the other guy or simple survival, the choice is obvious. I agree - the obvious choice is understanding. That's partly what our sophisticated layer is there for, to rise above the animal instincts of survival (of the fittest?) to a place of mutual understanding and co-operation.
Think of it as evolution. And we can start whenever we like.
D
posted by
DamonLeigh
on October 6, 2003 at 4:55 PM
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