There’s a surprise
by Scoop Shachtman, 29 March 2008
I have no views on Wilders’ Fitna, having not seen it, but doubt it is the type of analysis that helps. However, this message, where once the film sat, is totally unsurprising. CNN cover the dropping of the film here; note the UN Secretary General’s comments.
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 10:55
The film comprises footage of terrorist attacks, statements by clerics, Jihadist videos and quotations from the Koran - up to the point where I had to stop watching (a jihadist video of a murder). The point seemed to be that there is a correlation between the terrorist violence, the inflamatory statements by clerics, and the passages in the Koran which call for violence. All of which seems remarkably uncontroversial. I find the reaction to the film quite surreal. It does have the turbomb cartoon in it so maybe the critics find that more offensive than the appalling acts carried out by the violent jihadists.
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 12:54
The film may be good, bad or indifferent. I haven’t seen it. I think that is beside the point. I hate the “Let’s not say anything in case we upset someone,” frame of mind. What is even worse is “Let’s not say anything in case we upset someone who might do something inconvenient to us,” argument. It’s not a moral or humane argument. It’s despicable, hypocritical expediency disguised as moral or humane argument. It stinks.
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 14:25
Geert Wilders is a piece of human excrement, and he gets no support from me. Reducing this to an issue of free speech is politically infantile and deeply reactionary.
Wilders is a politician is of the extreme right – nationalist, populist and demagogic. The man is a racist to the core of his being, and no defender of the rights of individuals, or of groups with whom he disagrees. Wilders is as much of a hypocrite as those who object to his film on the grounds that they do not want to offend Muslims.
Ban Ki-moon’s comments, and those of LiveLeak on pulling “Fitna” from its webservers, are in my view right on the ball.
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 15:14
What The Sedge said.
If you want to watch the stupid intertubes non-fillum, self-promoting propaganda excerise for a racist cunt you can get it all over the fucking place (like so much other fucking slime).
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 15:43
Second Will’s seconding of JW. And
Der ewige JudeFitna is freely available all over the place for those who really want to see it.Saturday 29 March 2008 at 17:32
“This is a sad day for freedom of speech on the net but we have to place the safety and well being of our staff above all else… Perhaps there is still hope that this situation may produce a discussion that could benefit and educate all of us as to how we can accept one anothers culture.”
A bit anodyne, perhaps, but I can understand LiveLeak’s position.
This may be a free speech issue, but only in part. It goes way beyond freedom of speech, and those who defend Wilders risk being co-opted to a dodgy political cause. Reducing this to an issue of free speech is politically infantile and deeply reactionary.”
Not sure how we get from “I can understand…” to “…deeply reactionary”. Has anyone here seen the video? ‘Der ewige Jude’ is based on lies. Is the fact that this is lies what makes it reactionary or that it is put together by a deeply reactionary infant who is also a piece of human excrement?
Is it, in other words, a matter of who says it rather than what it is? And is there a distinction between removing a bad thing because it is right to do so and removing it because of concerns for “the safety and well being of staff”?
I still think there’s a difference. And that is without any desire to watch the damn thing. If somebody was going to show it and then is not, then there should be a better reason than because “our staff’s safety is threatened.” It should be “because this guy’s a piece of human excrement and so is this film.“
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 18:00
George - I understand LiveLeak’s position as the company has a duty of care toward its staff. Individuals are free to go to the wall for their beliefs, but they have no right to demand that others go with them.
I have seen a few minutes of Fitna (as many as I could bear), and it is trash by any definition. To me it cannot be interpreted as anything other than hate speech. Both on its own, and also in the context of its maker’s political history and current practice.
To hell with the polarisation of political debate that on all sides of the spectrum says that my enemy’s enemy is my friend. What often happens there is that people forget what’s at stake, and over time the enemy becomes a friend.
I wouldn’t for a moment question Wilders’ right to make and distribute his shitty little film. But as far as I’m concerned he’s on his own, and he will never get any support from me. If Wilders ends up getting topped by some nutter chanting Allahu Akbar, I shall want to see the killer banged up for the rest of his life.
And then I’ll go piss on Wilders’ grave.
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 18:23
Quite, JR. I don’t think we differ there. It is not what it is, it is the reason given for the thing not being where it was going to be that annoys me. Because if that is the reason - the sole reason - then any threat of violence is going to work.
If the video is hate speech (not easy to define too precisely, since there is an awful lot that many of us hate, including Wilders) then it ought to be taken off the site for that reason. It’s why it should not be there in the first place. Punching Wilders (see Will in the later post) would mean punching LiveLeak too.
I understand perfectly clearly that on the issue of the wilder excesses of Islamism (and there seem to be quite a few of those excesses) one would not want to stand on the same side of the barricades as the far right. That becomes more difficult when the other side of the barricades is occupied by a right that is even further to the right. Excrement smells and you wouldn’t want to be living with it. It is not the best of all possible worlds to be living in a shithouse.
Nevertheless I worry about slipping from a point of expediency retrospectively to a point of principle without even a how d’ye do. I know we all do it - that is to say make decisions on points of principle - once we have established grounds for forming a firm opinion on something, but we should at least be aware what we are doing.
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 19:16
“Punching Wilders (see Will in the later post) would mean punching LiveLeak too.”
No it doesn’t.
Saturday 29 March 2008 at 19:51
I’ve read that the film represents the the muslim demographic in Holland and Europe as a threat. I’d stopped watching by that point, but I get the impression that it is racist in that it appears to associate the mass of muslims with the threat from violent Jihad.