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Look Forward to AngerIt's impossible to satisfy "Rage Boy" and his ilk. It's stupid to try.

By Christopher Hitchens
Posted Monday, June 25, 2007, at 1:46 PM ET
Rage Boy. Click image to expand.

If you follow the link, you will be treated to some scenes from the strenuous life of a professional Muslim protester in the Kashmiri city of Srinagar. Over the last few years, there have been innumerable opportunities for him to demonstrate his piety and his pissed-offness. And the cameras have been there for him every time. Is it a fatwah? Is it a copy of the Quran allegedly down the gurgler at Guantanamo? Is it some cartoon in Denmark? Time for Rage Boy to step in and for his visage to impress the rest of the world with the depth and strength of Islamist emotion.

Last week, there was another go-round of this now-formulaic story, when Salman Rushdie accepted a knighthood from her majesty the queen, and the whole cycle of hysteria started up again. Effigies and flags burned (is there some special factory in Karachi that churns out the flags of democratic countries for occasions like this?), wounded screams from religious nut bags, bounties raised to suborn murder, and solemn resolutions passed by notional bodies such as the Pakistani "parliament." A few months ago, it was the pope who was being threatened, and Christians in the Middle East and Muslim Asia who were actually being killed. Indeed, Rage Boy had a few yells and gibberings to offer on that occasion, too.

I have actually seen some of these demonstrations, most recently in Islamabad, and all I would do if I were a news editor is ask my camera team to take several steps back from the shot. We could then see a few dozen gesticulating men (very few women for some reason), their mustaches writhing as they scatter lighter fluid on a book or a flag or a hastily made effigy. Around them, a two-deep encirclement of camera crews. When the lights are turned off, the little gang disperses. And you may have noticed that the camera is always steady and in close-up on the flames, which it wouldn't be if there was a big, surging mob involved.

Of course, this is not to say that there isn't a lot of generalized self-pity and self-righteousness (as well as a lot of self-hatred) in the Muslim world. A minister in Pakistan's government—the son of revolting late dictator Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, as it happens—appeared to say that Rushdie's knighthood would justify suicide bombing. But our media regularly make the assumption that the book burners and fanatics really do represent the majority, and that assumption has by no means been tested. (If it is ever tested, and it turns out to be true, then can we hear a bit less about how one of the world's largest religions mustn't be confused with its lunatic fringe?)

The acceptance of an honor by a distinguished ex-Muslim writer, who exercised his freedom to abandon his faith and thus courts a death sentence for apostasy in any case, came shortly after the remaining minarets of the Askariya shrine in Samarra were brought down in shards. You will recall that the dome itself was devastated by an explosion more than a year ago—an outrage described in one leading newspaper as the work of "Sunni insurgents," the soft name for al-Qaida. But what does "Rage Boy" have to say about this appalling desecration of a Muslim holy place? What resolutions were introduced into the "parliament" of Pakistan, denouncing such shameful profanity? You already know the answer to those questions. The lives of Shiite Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Christians—to say nothing of atheists or secularists—are considered by Sunni militants to be of little or no account. And yet they accuse those who criticize them of bigotry! And many people are so anxious to pre-empt this accusation that they ventriloquize the reactions of Sunni mobs as if they were the vox populi, all the while muttering that we must take care not to offend such supersensitive people.

This mental and moral capitulation has a bearing on the argument about Iraq, as well. We are incessantly told that the removal of the Saddam Hussein despotism has inflamed the world's Muslims against us and made Iraq hospitable to terrorism, for all the world as if Baathism had not been pumping out jihadist rhetoric for the past decade (as it still does from Damascus, allied to Tehran). But how are we to know what will incite such rage? A caricature published in Copenhagen appears to do it. A crass remark from Josef Ratzinger (leader of an anti-war church) seems to have the same effect. A rumor from Guantanamo will convulse Peshawar, the Muslim press preaches that the Jews brought down the Twin Towers, and a single citation in a British honors list will cause the Iranian state-run press to repeat its claim that the British government—along with the Israelis, of course—paid Salman Rushdie to write The Satanic Verses to begin with. Exactly how is such a mentality to be placated?

We may have to put up with the Rage Boys of the world, but we ought not to do their work for them, and we must not cry before we have been hurt. In front of me is a copy of this week's Economist, which states that Rushdie's 1989 death warrant was "punishment for the book's unflattering depiction of the Prophet Muhammad." There is no direct depiction of the prophet in this work of fiction, and the reverie about his many wives occurs in the dream of a madman. Nobody in Ayatollah Khomeini's circle could possibly have read the book for him before he issued a fatwah, which made it dangerous to possess. Yet on that occasion, the bookstore chains of America pulled The Satanic Verses from their shelves, just as Borders shamefully pulled Free Inquiry (a magazine for which I write) after it reproduced the Danish cartoons. Rage Boy keenly looks forward to anger, while we worriedly anticipate trouble, and fret about etiquette, and prepare the next retreat. If taken to its logical conclusion, this would mean living at the pleasure of Rage Boy, and that I am not prepared to do.

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Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair.
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Remarks from the Fray:

I would suggest that "rage boys" have existed in one form or another for ages. They are not usually "representatives" of their societies, but rather bellwethers. They are the violent/activist tip of larger, but more mundane, bodies of political thought and action. As an example, I would suggest looking at the "Busing riots" that convulsed many U.S. cities in the 1970s. The men with pipes and stones were a violent vanguard of a more-widely felt viewpoint that nonetheless didn't engage in rioting. Politicians had to be very careful about how they talked about this violent minority, however, because they understood that there was a much larger minority (or even majority) who might not be rioting, but who nonetheless sympathized with the ostensible goals of those who so publicly displayed their rage.

This is not new. For every abortion protestor who was arrested for chaining him/herself to a clinic door, there were oodles more who were content to write modest checks from the safety of their homes. "Hippy" anti-nuclear chanting is a fringe activity, to be certain, but the NIMBY effect that swells beneath it is a force well understood by politicians. One might be tempted to simply ignore the "sturm und drang" of the 'rage boys', but after them, the deluge.

--fozzy

(To reply, click here.)

The Sunni insurgents are claiming bigotry? Really? Is Al Sharpton involved? He wants to know what 'Rage Boy' thinks of Rushdie's work? He wants a reaction from Rage Boy on destruction on the holy shrine in Samarra? Once you've dismissed Rage Boy and his ilk as show-boaters, do you really want them to speak further on any other subject?

He makes an interesting point that the same extremists show up at all these protests. It's like someone followed, I don't know, extreme pro-choice activists around and broadcast every protest during the debates on Roe v. Wade. So it's wrong to characterize the majority of the population as protesters? Probably true, but I can't say it's a shock to find out.

I wish he'd focused on the irresponsibility of the media in broadcasting these protests as though they were the only events of note in Iraq at this time. (Good television, they say. Always fun to watch a good flag-burning.) Once you start asking Rage Boy questions, though, you're going to have to find out what his name is.

--Creirwy

(To reply, click here.)

I had some Saudi boys in my cab the other night, they were amazed that I knew as much about Islam and the war as I did. I live in Detroit but work in Borders' home town of Ann Arbor. I asked if they were hajis and they thought I was making a slur but realized I was serious when I mentioned the kaaba. When asked how I knew I replied that I was a spy which I thought was a joke. When I looked at their faces and saw how it was taken I got a pit in my stomach and apologized for my bad taste.

These people don't know anything else. When given the chance to change and grow they run into liberal enablers of the secret police that haunt them and the worst of our culture that spews from nyc/london/hollywood. They are born scared and when they see the last vestiges of their identity shat upon by some book club they freak out.

--playertwo

(To reply, click here.)

The true "nugget" in this piece is the passing reference to the overthrow of Hussein and the Iraq war and occupation. Hitchens is correct that "Rage Boy"'s reaction to the Iraq affair is largely irrelevant, and that we shouldn't base our policies and actions around his reaction. However, it certainly does not follow that "Rage Boy" is the only Muslim who opposes our actions and policy in Iraq and the greater Middle East, or that his are the only complaints.

Nor does it follow that we shouldn't do roughly what "Rage Boy" wants us to do in some cases (e.g. redeploy out of Iraq). Just as a stopped clock is right twice a day, an extremist such as "Rage Boy" might irrationally express a desire that corresponds to a rationally considered desirable course of action.

My point, then, is to drop "Rage Boy" and all other fringe outliers, including Hitchens' typical strawman caricatures, from the discussion. By continuing to trot out grossly irrational strawmen, Hitchens seems to be endorsing a sort of reverse-infallibility; whatever "Rage Boy" says must be false and whatever "Rage Boy" wants, we should do the opposite. It's a weird form of argument by authority, and belief in a perfect anti-logic.

I generally agree with Hitchens that the capitulation of booksellers to the threats against Rushdie and "The Satanic Verses" was unfortunate, unprincipled and unjustified. However, I believe that a thoughtful argument for or against should focus more on the dynamics of the larger Muslim and Western worlds. And unlike his defense of the Iraq fiasco, I believe Hitchens could make a reasonable, thoughtful and persuasive argument supporting Salmon Rushdie without leaning entirely on the idea of "Rage Boy"'s perfect fallibility.

--LastManOnEarth

(To reply, click here.)

The overall effect of these polemics is more likely to induce anger at Muslims in general (as if we need more of that!) than to lead to an intelligent discussion between people of good faith trying to find their way to the truth. That's the trouble with polemics - the inherent underlying assumption must be that the polemicist has a monopoly on wisdom and the other pole has a monopoly on stupidity. As difficult and messy as the truth is, there's one thing we can be almost certain of - it's difficult and messy, and therefore impossible to render in the black and white palette of the polemicist. Still, I'm sure Hitchens is remunerated (and sometimes venerated) for his "mal mots", so even if they haven't led us closer to the truth, and in fact may have even led us away from it, at least one person is richer for the experience.

--Colonel Truth

(To reply, click here.)

(6/26)

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