The horror of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai is still not over. There has been a lot of excellent reporting, both professional and amateur, about the situation on the ground as well as the people and issues driving the attacks. But there are a couple of threads of reductionist reporting that disappoint me:
- The filtering of these attacks through the prism of Islam vs The West. I have already said more about this at TBBWP.
- The tendency to focus on reporting about how many of “our people” are affected. It is terrible that Australians have been killed and wounded, and I am sorry for the loss their friends and families have suffered. But many others have been killed – and the emphasis on Australian or Western casualties feeds into my previous concern. Yes, there is reason to think that the terrorists targeted Westerners. But current reports suggest that of the more than 150 confirmed dead, a little over 20 are foreigners; many Indians have been killed.
And while our attention is focused on these awful attacks, I would also note that these deaths are tragic, as are these ones.
I must say I was a little disappointed that today’s Geelong Advertiser didn’t have a lead story about someone in Geelong who knows someone who knows someone who was in Bombay, as they have done in similar circumstances in the past. Still, it’s early days yet…
The poor regional papers don’t seem to have moved on from the way they did things a century ago – someone sent a letter home from wherever they had traveled to, and the paper printed it as the “news from abroad”.
What you ignore is the simple fact that we are all to some extent more interested in the fate of people that we may know and when it comes to atrocities like this it is far more natural to feel empathy for people like ourselves. So naturally the press reflects this fact. frankly I don’t think that it is anything to be denounced at all.
Secondly when it comes to this example of terrorist violence only an idiot would deliberately try to pretend that Islam is not a big precipitating factor, as it is in your second example of tragic death.
If I can just add to Iain’s comment: the media is an expedient organisation. They are catering for an audience desperate for sensationalised news and so talks of ‘patriotism’ and ‘us and them’ are only fitting in accordance with this marketing strategy. However, I think it’s stupid. There should be at least one news station out there challenging ideas of patriotism and ‘Australianism’; we shouldn’t be catering to a mindset based largely on emotive rhetoric.
Also, I have a problem with Iain’s suggestion that Islam is a “big precipitating factor”. Iain, I attended the Melbourne University Islamic Conference held early in November; there is a strong undercurrent of secularism that is expanding. Don’t associate terrorists with Islam unequivocally. Most Muslims are not fundamentalists – not any more than other religions anyway. But as an atheist, I disparage religion anyway, so perhaps I’m a bit biased.
Really Ruben you are a rather silly chap who has a very limited understanding of the media or what people want to get from it.
And what does your attendance to that conference prove apart from your ability to be swayed by the “hail fellow well met” rhetoric that is bound to be the pubic face of Islam here in this country (and i even accept that for most of the participants such feelings are probably sincere) It has nothing to do with the way that Islam is used to justify acts of violence in places like Mumbai. Because when suicide bombers cry out Allah Ackbah! as the detonate their explosives you can be pretty sure that they are expecting the rewards in heaven that are promised in the Koran (virgins ect) With out Islam promising a reward in the next world and it telling them that the ends justify the means there would never have been a 911 the bombings in London or this attack in Mumbai. I say that Islam is a precipitating factor quite simply because that is precisely what the scumbag terrorists claim and I see no reason not to take them at their word on this.
Iain,
Your original comment has been deleted, as you requested.
I can understand Australian media noting that Australians were killed and in harm’s way, but often find that there is a disproportionate focus on our people that understates the impact on the people where the tragedy is unfolding. And I wouldn’t agree with the implication that we empathise more with “people like ourselves” – I feel for the people in a place like Mumbai when this is happening – not only for the loss of life, but for the fear that it must provoke to think that maybe it will happen again, and maybe you’ll be there when it happens.
I also disagree with your characterisation of Islam as a “precipitating factor” – a distorted, radical and fundamentalist mentality in these terrorists is the precipitating factor, which shapes how these extremists interpret and act upon Islamic theology. The same thing can happen, does happen and has happened with Christianity.
Well I haven’t done a word count but i think that the coverage of the Australians caught up in this tragedy was not as disproportionate as you want to suggest perhaps the only way to be sure would be to do some good old empirical research (word counts ect.) But most of the reports that I saw or read focused mainly upon the total body counts and paid rather less heed to the ethnicity of the dead and wounded.
I think that you will find Tobias that to empathise with any people that we have to fell that we have something in common with them, Now on Planet Latte you may believe that their being human beings is all that is required and to some extent it is but the fact is that we identify more strongly with people the closer that we feel related to them , so we identify most strongly with those who are in our immediate family, then comes our extended family, then those we know from our own immediate community then from our own country, then from those with the same ethnicity, then those who speak the same language. That is just simple human nature and frankly I don’t know why you want to deny this simple fact.
That is the standard leftist line on the Jihadists and really it is a perfect example of your denial of the truth. There are a 164 instances in the Koran where the faithful are instructed to kill unbelievers in the name of Allah now I invite you to find similar instructions to Christians in the Bible to do likewise But I think you will be very hard pressed to find any. The fact that most Muslims do want to live in peace and ignore the exhortations to take up Jihad is something that pleases me greatly, but only the wilfully blind ignore the fact that the instruction to take up arms and spread the faith by the sword is at the very heart of the Koran.
Iain,
You might be as cogent and convincing as an antiseptic salesman, but I’m going to respond to you anyway.
“And what does your attendance to that conference prove apart from your ability to be swayed by the “hail fellow well met” rhetoric that is bound to be the pubic face of Islam here in this country (and i even accept that for most of the participants such feelings are probably sincere)”
Thanks for confirming my observation of that bloody big bee in your bonnet (possibly a wasp in your case) about Islam. You should have attended the conference. Islam is not a violent religion as you make it out to be; rather, it has been hijacked by the likes of Armedinajad (I can’t be bothered spelling his name right) who don’t represent everyone in Islam. In arguing your point, please don’t refer to Islam as if it’s one giant indistinguishable mass.
Because when suicide bombers cry out Allah Ackbah! as the detonate their explosives you can be pretty sure that they are expecting the rewards in heaven that are promised in the Koran (virgins ect)
…and therefore Islam = evil ? Well reasoned and cogent as always, Iain.
With out Islam promising a reward in the next world and it telling them that the ends justify the means there would never have been a 911 the bombings in London or this attack in Mumbai.
The same could be said of any religion, Iain, including the big one about the dead Jewish guy with the beard (I think it’s called Christianity) which I suspect you might somehow be connected to. But this does not justify your unqualified and pejorative attack on Islam.
Perhaps you’re suggesting that Islam is such a ‘convincing’ religion, that its intrinsic nature leads young men to blow themselves up. Perhaps…but that would be the same for the Christians who plant pipe bombs under abortion clinics in the US wouldn’t it?
Ruben
Is that meant to be a smart arse insult? Hmm
You know I would have though that a chap like your self who claims such great powers of comprehension would have noticed that in my comment I am freely acknowledge the following :
Islam is not a monolithic edifice
Islam’s faithful, on the whole, do not want to kill all unbelievers. Therefore i am making it clear that it is a minority of the followers of Mohammed who are the problem.
There are however a significant number of followers of that faith, as admitted by yourself, who DO want to Kill all of those who refuse to submit to Allah, and it is with those adherents to the faith that I focus my concern. That you can both acknowledge that there are murderous nutters in the faith and denounce me for saying so says heaps about the foolishness of your position.
No, I am not saying that “Islam = Evil” but I am saying that there is a particular interpretation of Islam which is supported by those 164 exhortations to Jihad in the Koran which is profoundly evil and profoundly contrary to the pluralist secular world that you personally claim to support. The difference is that I will not sugar coat my concerns, as you do, and pretend that the seeds of the crazy mind set of the Jihadists are not right here in the Koran.
Actually Ruben I have been an atheist for the entirety of my life and I have varying levels of contempt for all belief in the supernatural, an afterlife or any kind of magical thinking. But that does not mean that I am incapable of making a qualitative judgement of what the various religions suggest is the way to earn a place in heaven or how they suggest a member of the faith should spread the message of their religion, and there are significant differences between Islam and Christianity on that point.
Lets get one thing straight here and that is there is no scriptural basis at all for acts of violence to spread the Christian message But there are 164 instances in the Koran inciting Jihad or Holy war. Does this significant fact suggest to you the folly of your citing a very small number of psychos in the US in an attempt to down play the problem of Jihadi violence? Well it should.
“There are however a significant number of followers of that faith, as admitted by yourself, who DO want to Kill all of those who refuse to submit to Allah, and it is with those adherents to the faith that I focus my concern.”
But, again, the same can be said of any religion, Iain. Furthermore, the conference I mentioned previously (which you simplistically disparaged) had none of those fundamentalist elements in it.
The way you talk about Islam sounds like you’re attacking the entire religion; you might want to be clearer.
The difference is that I will not sugar coat my concerns, as you do, and pretend that the seeds of the crazy mind set of the Jihadists are not right here in the Koran.
Then why attack people? Talk about the Koran, not ‘Islam’ because ‘Islam’ implies you’re talking about the Koran’s adherents.
Lets get one thing straight here and that is there is no scriptural basis at all for acts of violence to spread the Christian message.
Possibly; but remember the ‘big three’ religions (Islam, Judaism and Christianity) all derive from largely the same material. I would argue that all books carry contradictions and calls for heretics death etc on account of this ‘common ancestor’. People kill people; religion doesn’t kill people, though there is enough material in most religious texts that give that authority.
Furthermore, just because one scripture bears out one interpretation, it doesn’t make actions in its name any less heinous. The pipe-bombs under abortion clinics analogy is sound.
Are you serious Ruben? please show me examples from scripture for any faith other than Islam that suggests (at least 164 times ) that followers should kill unbelievers or take up the dogs of war in the name of the deity? Your suggestion that Islam is no different to other faiths in its methodology of propagation betrays a very shallow understanding of history and religion on your part. But when it comes to discussing Islam I always make the distinction between the Jihadists and “ordinary” Muslims. as you can see if you check out my archive.
I will explain this in simple terms so that even you can understand it Ruben, the faith is called Islam, that scripture is recorded in the Koran, and its followers are called Muslims. So when I criticise “Islam” I AM criticising the the religion and not those who claim to follow that faith. Is that clear enough?
Ruben in your blog’s mast head you claim to support secularism yet all I see here is a desperate attempt to make excuses for the Jihadists. I think that you have no idea at all about the contents of any of the holy scriptures of any of the Abrahamic faiths because if you did you would not resort to such stupid and false generalities. Perhaps you need to do some more study before you comment further on this topic.
Utter bollocks! The Christian faith denounces all killing But the Jihadists can cite 164 instances in the Koran that support their actions or promise a heavenly reward when they kill in the name of Allah.
“I AM criticising the the religion and not those who claim to follow that faith. Is that clear enough?”
Be clearer next time; it didn’t sound like that initially.
Ruben (sic) in your blog’s mast head you claim to support secularism yet all I see here is a desperate attempt to make excuses for the Jihadists.
Funny you say that, considering you’re so eager to defend Christianity:
Utter bollocks! The Christian faith denounces all killing.
I would argue that the abrahamic religions are equally mean-spirited, and that no matter how detestable their followers can be, it still makes no sense to blame their scriptures. They all ‘evolved’ from the one origin.
I’ll be reading some religious books these holidays mind you. Then I’d be able to respond more cogently after I’ve formed my ideas…twas an interesting argument though.
Reuben*
I look forward to debating such things with you after you have done a little more research on the subject , maybe then you will realise that for a secular society to work that we unbelievers have to be equally sceptical about followers of faiths that constantly claim “victimhood” when they are legitimately questioned on their scripture and their dogma rather than accept those claims without question.
* apologies for misspelling your name BTW, my spelling is crap
We’ll agree to disagree for now Iain, but I’ll just end off with a casual reminder that I attended the Islamic conference and was duly informed of the nature of contemporary Islam. Have you attended any such conferences?
Thanks for spelling my name correctly.