No apology needed
This is going to be glib, belittling of suffering and bleeding-heart liberal which is about as an appetising a recipe as a cauliflower-flavour pork pie, but here goes…
About the time when Harold Shipman’s reign of terror was finally brought to an end, I went to see my GP about some minor ailment. During our conversation, at no point did my doctor say: “From the outset, Mr McKeating, I have to say how sorry I am for the actions of my colleague Harold Shipman. He was a disgusting aberration amongst the medical profession. It is incumbent upon me and my colleagues to make sure it never happens again.”
Furthermore, when human skidmark, David Copeland (link via DK), was brought to justice for his nailbombing of London’s Brick Lane, Brixton and Old Compton Street, I must have missed the widespread outpouring of apologies from straight, white men. No doubt gay pubs and clubs across the country were inundated by those of us on the other bus, hugging our gay brothers and pleading for their forgiveness.
Today, Tony Blair described the terrorists who bombed London last week as representing a “perverted and poisonous misinterpretation” of Islam and that the “moderate and true voice of Islam” must be heard.
I don’t remember similar clarion calls about the “perverted and poisonous misinterpretation” of the the Hippocratic Oath when Shipman was caught or demands to hear the “moderate and true voice” of straight white men during Copeland’s rampage. And yet Muslism leaders are to be summoned to Number 10, to discuss their “response” to the bombings.
I’m sure most of us would declare the same failure to understand the thinking of Shehzad Tanweer, Hasib Mir Hussain, Mohammed Sadique Khan and their as-yet-unnamed partner in terror as we did that of Harold Shipman and David Copeland. That’s because they’re freaks, cancerous cells in an otherwise healthy body.
So why the ostentatious condemnations from Muslim leaders across the country today for something that was nothing to do with them and over which they had no control? That’s an easier question to answer. Because they and their communities are terrified of the brick through the window or the petrol through the letterbox. Because of what people with psyches as freakishly distorted as the terrorists might do. Because certain scum-sodden newspapers have discovered that fear of “the other” sells. And sells. And sells.
Those brown people who live among us with their beards and their funny food - well, they’re not like us, are they? God knows what they plot with their foreign tongues. This mistrust, fostered in the name of profit and fertilised by wilful ignorance, has rotted and festered.
The Muslim community are now having to bow and scrape, apologising and reasoning for what four freaks, four statistical anomalies, four twisted and tortured minds have done. They must be seen to be bending over backwards. The fact that they have to do it, that fact that sections of the same British society that showed its “fuck you, terrorists” and Spirit-of-the-Blitz courage in all its wonderful, stirring beauty last week are forcing them to, makes me want to puke.
UPDATE: Jamie at Blood & Treasure says it much, much better than I did. Fantastic stuff.
Posted on July 13th, 2005 at 8:34 pm
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I never thought to look at it from that angle Justin.
But I am pretty sure the BMA would have released some comment about the matter, but point well made either way.
Move along now, nothing to see here:
Charles Clarke today denied that any of the four suspects in the terrorist bomb attacks on London last week had been previously arrested.
The four suspected bombers, all Britons from West Yorkshire, were described as “cleanskins” who were unknown to the police or security services, but Nicolas Sarkozy, the French interior minister, today claimed Mr Clarke had told him this was not the case.
He told reporters after a EU interior ministers meeting on counterterrorism that some of the team had been subject to “partial arrest” in spring 2004 but released in the hope of catching a wider network.
Article continues
The home secretary denied the allegation. “It is completely and utterly untrue. I am absolutely staggered he should make this assertion,” Mr Clarke told Sky News.
“I have not even talked to Mr Sarkozy about this … I don’t understand where he could have got this from.”
Big difference. In the Harold Shipman case, there was no possibility of ever saying that the Hippocratic Oath was somehow murderous. Dave Copeland was linked to a pretty straightforward ideology, but no one ever imagined we were going to get apologies from the fascist community, were we?
Not that I’m justifying the requests for apologies, but this impulse comes from a belief that Islam could somehow become more wayward if its “leaders” do not stand up for the wider society at large, that they ahve a responsbility that they have failed. It is a combination of Islamophobia and the errors of multiculturalism - whereby self-appointed community “leaders” are seen to be responsible for and govern those within their community.
Also - and this is a phenomenon in itself - a few Muslims including those amongst my friends are shocked and stunned and want to reassure people, in the context of a wide ignorance of what Islam is and who Muslims are (cheers, Mr Kilroy-Silk, Mr Griffin, The Sun and the Express). They shouldn’t have to apologise for the actions of other idiots, but the fact that these events have been blamed on a form of Islam, and that the bombers now look like they were British Pakistani, has had a deep and upsetting affect on some poeple.
_Because they and their communities are terrified of the brick through the window or the petrol through the letterbox._
Yes, but that brick could come from the BNP or local radical Islamists. (Though from the second it’s more likely to be a metaphorical brick, if such a thing exists…) That’s the problem. Muslims have nothng to apologise for  you’re right, why should they? But they can lance a boil that nobody else can reach. I’d tend to look at it more positively: for ‘Muslim community leaders’ (patronizing terminology in itself) this is their moment in British history.
Simple. To have a perpetual war, you require an enemy.Exuent IRA..bear approaches from the left.
Well, as you note, it’s a pragmatic request - Tony is recognising the (probably remote, but who knows?) possibility that race riots will kick off somewhere. Getting the ‘Muslim community’ to bow and scrape probably mitigates against that somewhat. Don’t have to agree with it on principle, having said that.
By the by, though, your analogies only really hold if this is true:
‘four freaks, four statistical anomalies, four twisted and tortured minds’
which it might not be. There could be many more disaffected potential suicide bombers out there, particularly if a stronger personality is controlling them. The same clearly wasn’t true of Shipman (a rogue cult of GPs murdering throughout the land…) or Copeland (a small, elite group of renegage straight men on a mission to purge the world of homosexuals…). The difference is in whether these four were a one-off, or a symptom of a wider problem. The fear, of course, is that the latter could be true. Whether it is or not, only time will tell.
Postman: I don’t understand your point. We didn’t create the enemy. They chose us. And to clarify myself: I like the idea of Muslim ‘leaders’ being pushed a little. Not because they owe us an apology, but because they are uniquely placed to get to the core of an issue I don’t think the (white, Christian) establishment can reach. And I suspect there is a problem there, however small.
Very interesting angle. Up until now I’d subconsciously thought of my British friends who were also muslim as somehow different from other British Muslims. Note to self: read the Mail less often
I’ve tried (unsuccessfully I might add) to describe how this is our big chance - to chnage from the idea of ethnic communities to the idea of a larger British identity. If we play this right, we might be able to get people who previously felt alienated to report those two or three dubious characters down at t’Mosque to the police. On the other hand we could mess it up, and alienate the segment of society that can, to quote jarndyce, lance this particular boil, even further.
I expect young men of Pakistani heritage carrying backpacks to be given a lot more attention by the police in the near future. I think I’m being hopelessly naive to ask “Muslim community leaders” to say “expect this to happen and co-operate”, just as much as I am to expect the police to do it sensitively. But one can hope.
No apology required, but public condemnation from as many prominent Muslims as possible has got to be sensible, puke-making though this fact may be.
The political reality is that even before the bombings, racial tension in parts of the country was already high. This is hardly going to have helped.
Obvious though it may be to you and me, the message that “the vast majority of Muslims abhor these vile actions” is one which needs to be hammered home well and truly - because there’s no shortage of anti-Muslim suspicion out there.
I should know - I’ve just come from the hell-hole which is USSNeverdock.blogspot.com, and the neanderthals there have no doubts that it was “The Muslims” who did the bombings. I fear that they might just be the tip of an iceberg…
This looks like a very worrying development. If a meeting helps to forestall backlash, in the short term that is entirely beneficial. But if there are further attacks, the people who attended this meeting could easily find themselves cast will ye nil ye as the public face of men of violence; the men of violence themselves can only see this as an opportunity. Undertakings made at this point would make a downward spiral very hard to avoid. No public statements after this meeting, please. We are all feeling quite all right, thank you, no need for extra reassurances.
Shipman had a beard. Muslims have beards. There’s your connection.
(Sorry, drunk…)
Right, I’m in the same state as Master Nosemokney, plus it’s getting on fot 48 hours since I slept: so, you lucky ladies, I shall make this sweet. Oh, yes, and short.
Muslims who read the Koran in a certain way, believe that they are going to go to heaven if they kill some infidels. I think that they are idiots because I think that anyone who delieves in an all-powerful entity–much as I might envy them (and I do)– is an idiot.
Islam, unlike Christianity, pushes idiots to kill not only themselves, but also infidels, i.e. us.
Practically, in terms of legislation I do not know–and actually would discourage–more illiberal crackdowns. however, this particular trait of Islamism much be recognised if we are to fight it, i.e. that, unlike Christianity (which regards, for instance, suicide as a crime), theIslamic religion regards suicide in the cause as a wonderful thing… I’m going to go to bed now. DAMN that grapefruit beer…
BTW, I really would appreciate some decent comment on this. WARNING” it clocks in at 2705 of my own words…
Mainline Christians call people like this heretics. Hmm. The problem could be solved by relabelling. Good point.
It now appears that Nicolas Sarkozy was …er … well…correct. Jumbo Clarke was being economical with the actualite as they say in la belle France.
2 of the putative mules had records and were known to the local gendarmerie, one for shoplifting and one for problems of disorder.(Not, I would suggest the hallmarks of devout Muslims)
BBC 24 hr news. 1.00 am
Apologies for confusing image of Shakesperian bear. Whether the bear was welcomed in or thrust on us is not the point, an endless cycle of enemies is required.
On 2nd thts perhaps Jumbo meant they had not been previously arrested for suicide bombing ?
The fact that a couple had been done for shoplifting, though, would make it less likely that they’d be identified as Islamists. It was the same problem in Madrid: one of the big guys in that plot was, or had recently been, a murdering drug dealer. Not exactly a stereotype salafist bomber.
Larry: what the hell were you doing at Neverdock? That bloke is the biggest wanker in the British Isles.
Glib comment in keeping with original intent:
Will this make it easier to get a reservation at Fairuz?
Given the area that the bombers came from, it’s probable that when growing up they were part of the many street gangs–mixed asian and white–that litter both Burly and Beeston. Which would mean, yes, petty crime and vandalism (and in some cases moving on to drug dealing and protection). I should think their parents were pleased if they started going to the mosque, or getting involved in religious readings, even getting interested in politics–probably even supported these interests.
If they’d stayed involved in petty street crime, they’d probably never have ended up as bombers. Maybe we should be encouraging more anti-social behaviour, not less.
DK,
“I really would appreciate some decent comment on this”.
Thanks very much. I would have appreciated a decent post to read, but we can’t all always have what we would appreciate.
Jarndyce,
what the hell were you doing at Neverdock? That bloke is the biggest wanker in the British Isles.
Yeah, I know, that’s the attraction. I guess I’ve just got a morbid fascination about such things.
What I’d like to know is how many of the Americans (especially the LGF crowd and all those other white, straight males) who’ll be cheering on any attacks on British Muslims will have apologised for the crimes of Timothy McVeigh?
I suppose this is what I get for being a blue-sky utopianist who wishes we could just love each other.
It’s the double standard that gets me riled. If everybody is adamant that these terrorists were on the outer rim of Islam then why should mainstream Islam be compelled to get involved - it’s the implication of guilt by association.
You’re defining a swathe of the population by one small facet of their characters to defuse the rantings of right-wing thungs who, if our criminal justice system, worked better, wouldn’t need pandering to.
Anyway. Here’s what I’d do if I had the influence:
A television advert. You round up 50-odd celebrities, sportsmen and women, the whole nine yards - a spread to appeal to the knuckle draggers on the Right and the wankers with their hard-ons for the virgins. Each celebrity says the name of one of those killed last week.
At the end of the advert, a simple caption, black on white.
If you think Muslims did this, you’re a prick.
You’re defining a swathe of the population by one small facet of their characters to defuse the rantings of right-wing thugs…
Yes. Defining people by one aspect of their characters is wrong, isn’t it? In what sense are these thugs ‘right-wing’?
I’m not sure what you mean. Should I have said far right?
Nick Griffin not being famous for his love of Marx, after all.
That would have been better, yes. I’m a right winger. I resent being tarred by the same brush because of extremists within my community, Justin.
Not that I recognise them from being within my community. Wouldn’t ‘racist thugs’ have been a better term? Their behaviour is nothing to do with political affiliation - it’s to do with bigotry, plain and simple. Surely you recognise the irony of your position?
Andrew,
you and I have discussed this before, right?
next time you hear a lefty using the terms “right-wing” and “racist” in closer proximity than you’re comfortable with, instead of haranguing them about “irrational prejudice” and “phantom thought-crimes”, just explain why such sloppy language is “irritating for those of us on the right with sensible views”.
Glad to see, so far, you’re making good on our deal!
Andrew: Precision, precision. I think that choice of words is the expression you were searching for at the end of that last sentence.
Uhhr, the BNP ideology is heavily shot through with socialism. I think Mr. Griffin and Mr. Marx would be on pretty good terms actually…
Isn’t ‘the muslim community’ being used by the politicos as a shorthand for ’some tightly-knit second generation families possibly descended from common villages in Pakistan, the community of which it is very hard for the Police to get inside’? Only, of course, even that is questionable, given how fast the names have turned up (and now we’re close to knowing the identity of the ‘fifth man’ (Blunt or Cairncross?) who programmed them all…)
Larry: As you say, we’ve discussed this before. Everyone has one of those things that push their big-red-nuclear button. This is mine - putting right-wing before any opinion the (usually left-wing) writer finds distasteful. It’s inaccurate, and irritating for those of us on the Decent Right(tm).
Postman: I don’t understand your point. We didn’t create the enemy. They chose us.
I really think that after screwing around in the Middle East for a long long time, we have in fact created this enemy. For instance, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Iceland, Norway, Czech Republic, Greece, Ireland, Belgium, Austria, Finland etc aren’t on Al Qaeda’s (or various imitators) hitlist because they haven’t tried to dictate life and death in the Middle east for the last 100 years. If it was - as Tony Blair incredibly maintains - an attack on ‘our values and way of life’ then why not attack any of these countries, who could be said to hold similiar values?
Perhaps it might just be connected to the British imperialism that is still rampant today, and in particular our affiliation with the real rogue state: America. These enemies, these terrorists are a product of our foreign policy, whatever the small points of the doctrine or ideology they follow, they are attacking countries that can be clearly perceived to have attacked them - or their culture.
Andrew: You’re spot on. It was sloppy language not a position and I apologise.
No need Justin, I’m guilty of far worse myself. It’s just my nuclear issue - I tend to lose it over this one.
Uponnothing:
You really haven’t been watching, have you? For starters, the Secret Organization of al-Qaeda in Europe that claimed last week’s bombings does have Denmark on its shit-list. And, Sweden and Denmark aside, none of those countries you mention has a significant Muslim population, which provides the cover these nutters need to operate. But that’s really beside the point:| are you suggesting that we should be building our foreign policy goals around what a bunch of bloodthirsty murderers think? There are plenty of reasons for agreement and disagreement on British foreign policy, but that sure isn’t one of them.
And, you have a curious view of moral agency. (Try reading this.) We “created” this enemy, they are the “product” of our actions. So, what, these bombers had no choice but to blow themselves up in packed tube trains? We have a pretty poor history of foreign policy in Africa, but I haven’t noticed any Kenyan suicide bombers on the streets of London. Or how about Rwandans taking their revenge on the Belgians? And what’s this “their culture”? The people who bombed London last week are as British as me - born here, raised here, culturally British. I’m not sure what point you’re making.
And this:
_whatever the small points of the doctrine or ideology they follow_
just shows your utter ignorance of salafist Islam. It is precisely the small points of doctrine and ideology that are important. That’s where the justification for suicide and murder come from. Not mainstream Islam. Without those, our often indefensible actions in the Middle East would have such people protesting on the streets, or signing up to fight in Chechnya at worst, not committing mass murder. If you don’t understand that, you really have nothing to offer a discussion of the bigger picture.
“I really would appreciate some decent comment on this”.
Thanks very much. I would have appreciated a decent post to read, but we can’t all always have what we would appreciate.
Apologies, Larry; I ignored Justin’s advice and got pissed and then posted. I don’t think that I’d actually read your comment by then: anyway, your post was exactly the kind of critique I was looking for. I then drunkenly answered and had to take it down upon reading it sober this morning…
DAMN that grapefruit beer…
I agree with you when you say that individuals of the community need not apologize for something that they did not do. But unfortunately the reality is there is a fair amount of extremist teaching going on in the mosques and Islamic schools. Being someone who has experienced this to an extent, I think I understood what Tony Blair was saying.
It is very easy to jump on the man and he has done some really silly things, but this time he got it right. I definitely believe Muslim leaders as well as heads of families should proactively discourage their youngseters from becoming disillusioned and turning to extremism. They have been doing nothing for long enough now.
I am not saying everyone should apologize, and I believe neither did Mr. Blair. What I am saying though is that the members of the community should increase the moderate voicings. Otherwise there will be no alternative discourse against fanaticism that is so openly being preached by the criminal elements within the society.
What I don’t think the moderate muslims are understanding is that for every fanatical act committed on behalf of Islam, it is the far-right elements of the British society that is going to gain upper hand with their views of “We said so”. At the end this is going to create a very dangerous situation for the Muslim community themselves. The BNP has already started with these activities. It is up to the Muslim communities to decide whether they want to make sure every member of their community is happy and willing to co-exist with the moderate mainstream masses of the country or have to live a life of daily struggle against the likes of BNP. Because BNP is well and truly a real threat now.
DK,
Apologies, Larry
Accepted, of course. Maybe I was being a little sensitive… It’s this damn thesis I’m trying to finish, it puts me on edge…
By the way, I did enjoy reading your post really. Not that I agreed with it, mind you.
Only just seen this, Justin, but I think you’re mixing categories here. You posit three cases, each with a reference class, and ask why only in the third case is the reference class expected to apologise. But the link between the individual and the group differs in each case. Consider:
David Copeland and Straight White Men: similarities are of race (white) and wanting to shag women. We know full well that race and sexuality has absolutely nothing to do with our view of right and wrong. In fact, some of the most vicious fighting in history has been between Straight White Men. The only similarities I have with David Copeland as a Straight White Man are biological characteristics, and no more.
Harold Shipman and Doctors: similarities here are of trade (practices and procedures) and an agreement to certain professional standards, under the Hippocratic Oath. Closer here, because that Oath is shot through with values to which all Doctors must subscribe. But again, no dice: Shipman wasn’t killing under some interpretation of the Oath, and never argued as such. So, his actions were a reminder of why the Oath is right, and Doctors are right to uphold it. If he had offered some not-unreasonable argument for why his actions were compatible with the Oath (as some euthanasia proponents do), then we would naturally expect other Doctors to point out why not. If they were silent, our confidence in medical practice would be diminished.
7/7 Terrorists and Muslims: here, the connection is a shared set of spiritual and temporal beliefs - they subscribe to doctrines following from the Koran, all of which are value statement. So, they share a common cause and identity. We assume that 7/7 terrorists adhere to a radical interpretaton of the Koran, but while that is radical, it isn’t on its face an absurd misreading. That’s why they aren’t so few in number as Shipman or Copeland and his immediate circle - yes, they are a tiny minority, but they’re big enough to have developed a significant network, and draw support from non-terrorist Islamic groups like al-Muhajiroun. In this case, clarifying how you interpret the Koran (i.e., what makes you the Muslim you are) differently to the 7/7 Terrorists is not as unreasonable as you suggest.
There is no ideology promoted by the BMA that could be judged to justify what Shipman did. Moreover never claimed to kill in the name of doctors.
Those is no ideology of “straight white men”. Copeland never claimed to kill in the name of this unknown ideology, he claimed to kill in the name of an extreme right wing group. Many straight white men (including me) supported actions that opposed the NF, the BNP et al. We never supported his objectives, let alone his means.
However, the 7/7 terrorists acted in the name of Islam. The difference is the ideology.
I don’t care nor want Moslems to apologise for the murders. In fact this is a pathetic straw man argument. However, I do expect Moslems to act the same as other groups are expected to act when they are used as cover by extremists - to clear they own house.
Jarndyce is right.