Justin Webb writes in the Times:
Amazing what these Americans can do just by thinking about it. Webb, or whatever sub-editor wrote that headline, has finally acknowledged the truth first revealed in dramatic form sixty years ago:
Commander John J. Adams: In return, that ultimate machine would instantaneously project solid matter to any point on the planet, In any shape or color they might imagine. For *any* purpose, Morbius! Creation by mere thought.
Dr. Edward Morbius: Why haven’t I seen this all along?
Commander John J. Adams: But like you, the Americans forgot one deadly danger – their own subconscious hate and lust for destruction.
Dr. Edward Morbius: The beast. The mindless primitive! Even the Americans must have evolved from that beginning.
Donald Trump must have an especially American id. He is always calling violence upon himself by the sinister power of his subconscious.
By the way, monsters from the Dallas branch of the id also killed Kennedy: “The city of hate had, in fact, killed the President.”
Update: Evidently Dallas is a sort of wi-fi hotspot of the id. The fabric of reality wears thin in Texas. (Oklahoma isn’t so bad, being protected by Rodgers & Hammerstein. And New Mexico votes Democrat.) Getting back to Dallas, no individual can be blamed for the recent murders of policemen there. In Texas such things are inevitable.
The left is incredible, isn’t it? Talk about blaming the victim.
And Forbidden Planet is a very underrated science fiction film.
All these journalistic effusions are fine examples of Nozick’s “normative sociology, the study of what the causes of problems ought to be”.
Agreed, it is a classic in oh so many ways.
Just don’t think of Bomb Alaska! Don’t!!
A bomb went off in Chelsea NYC. A slew of other as of yet unexploded pipebombs were discovered in other places, including New Jersey.
What’s interesting is that the Left are more “alarmed” and concerned about Trump calling it right, and doing so immediately, than the fact that apparently some caluding group of asshats are BOMBING and ATTEMPTING TO BOMB innocent people train tracks, etc.
Because, of course, this has “nothing to do with Islam”, right?
I didn’t read the Times article, because I’m not going to agree to cookies conditions that aren’t explained before I “agree” to them. I default to my usual beer toast under such conditions…”fuck’em”.
But I get the gist that Mr. Webb thinks that “Islamophobia” is an egregore. That’s magical occult-speak for Thoughtform Monster, in case you were wondering. That’s something akin to a monster made real simply by people thinking it. No, I don’t mean understood to be real within the domain of our minds. That would make sense. I mean actually and objectively real. Just think about the song Synchronicity II by The Police. (The line about grandmother screaming at the wall always makes me laugh).
Rather the truth is a bit less funny. The truth is that being concerned about terrorist attack after terrorist attack by people screaming you know what is not any form of phobia at all.
A phobia, in the context of mental health, is an IRRATIONAL fear. (Wheras in Greek, it’s just any old fear). There’s nothing irrational about, you know, actually ACKNOWLEDGING that Islamic asshat are murdering innocent people every time the moon changes shape, which is kinda all the time.
Maybe we should be like Obama and Hillary and, well, CNN, the Huffy-puffy post and the rest of the usual suspects and just pretend that the most likely outcome is the least likely outcome and presume the most unlikey outcome first and foremost. Yes, this latest slew of murders and attempted murders, all by people screaming you know what probably have nothing to do with one another, as, you know, Islam has nothing to do with….Islam, and all that. After all, our fearless leader has informed us, in case we didn’t know, that ISIS, that is the Islamic State, has nothing to do with Islam. Makes sense donesn’t it.
No?
Too bad. You must be racist.
Maybe if you get a blood clot in your brain and have nonexistent seizures like “stiff as a board, light as a feather” Hillary, it’ll start to make more sense, or perhaps the usual suspects can intimidate you into understanding. Or at least you can lie to yourself and others. ‘Done wonders for Hill. I mean, just look at her, almost president after almost accomplishing something after being appointed to a position not earned and all that, after being married to someone else who did something else. Brings an almost tear to your eye, doesn’t it?
No?
Well maybe you’re racist after all. Perhaps one of the Deplorables. What song were they famous for again?
To be fair to Justin Webb, the theory can be usefully turned around. No more blaming America for Vietnam and Iraq – that was the hatred in Vietnamese and Iraqi hearts. No more blaming the Israelis for casualties in the West Bank and Gaza, that’s the hatred in Palestinian hearts. Not to mention all that Polish and Jewish hate in WW2.
The important thing to remember about Justin Webb is that amongst BBC reporters on America, he was always the sane one. Which tells you something about the rest of em.
It’s hardly a new riff though. If you see FRENCH MAN ARRESTED AFTER BOMB ATROCITY as a BBC website headline, you know that there might have been a bomb, there might have been an atrocity, and the person arrested was probably a man. But you can be quite sure he wasn’t French.
Lee Moore,
While you were writing your comment I was adding an update explaining how no human being could be blamed for the shooting of policemen in Dallas.
Another traditional technique from the BBC, now slightly reduced as a result of mockery, is to say that a crime was committed by someone “from Manchester”. If this was inserted in circumstances where the criminal’s most recent place of residence would not normally be specified, it was to be translated as “from Somalia”.
Why the BBC ever thought this did anything to combat racism I cannot say. It had and still has the opposite effect.
To not suffer from bizarre delusions like the one Webb labours under now identifies you as an extremist.
Rob,
To be fair to Webb, he probably did not write that headline. As Lee Moore said the experience of living in America has taught him something. His Times articles on the US are better informed than many.
I notice he picked probably the numerically worst for fatalities American race riot as his “random example”.
Sort of like picking the Jallianwallah Bagh as a random exemplar of British psychology.
Lee Moore, September 20, 2016 at 9:04 am: “The important thing to remember about Justin Webb is that amongst BBC reporters on America, he was always the sane one. Which tells you something about the rest of em.”
True enough: the egregious Matt Frei sometimes found the basic manners of election-result reporting beyond him. 🙂
I go past the site of the bombing on a regular basis. It’s on the way to my dentist and its near a fabulous place for Italian food called Eataly. These days Chelsea is not especially bohemian or fashionable. By Manhattan standards its a lower middle class area.
Under the circumstances the American reaction to this bombing and to all the other Islamic terror has been remarkably peaceful, at least at home. No lynchings no mass anti Muslim riots, a relatively little amount of retaliatory arson (if proved). In Europe I note that anti Muslim violence is, so far at least, more notable by its absence than anything else.
This is supposed to be a sign that were civilized. I hope so. But it could equally be interpreted as a sign of weakness. I wonder what the Islamic terrorists think ?
But she does have some interesting buck teeth.
(Sorry, couldn’t resist).
They think Islamic Jesus is going to fight and die after they take over the entire planet by force, and force people to convert or die. This is their eschatology. ‘Rather depressing thought isn’t it?
Oh wait, I almost forgot Islam has nothing to do with Islamists, so all is well, right?
New Mexico is reliably Democrat because it’s mostly Indian reservations, those shining examples of Socialism.
All the other mammals treat not fighting back as a sign of submission, both when they threaten and when they roll over.
Human beings must be entirely different from other mammals.
Erm, aren’t the US already fighting back – they seem to be hitting (amongst other things) Islamic State with quite a lot of munition.
If anyone is suggesting fighting back against people who happen to be Muslim but aren’t threats to you, why aren’t you also suggesting fighting back against teenagers (you know, the ones who do most school shootings) or black people (you know, the ones who murder cops in the name of Black Lives Matters). Is it because you’re ignorant bigots who fixate on the label rather than the individual? I think so. Most Muslims do not want to kill you, and even if they do support extreme Islam have that right because they are humans (stupid and detestable humans, but humans). To fight back against them is not exactly going to help anyone other than those who want to limit our freedoms one way or the other.
And humans are clearly different from other mammals. I worked that out when I got out of bed (moving my bed clothes made out of cunningly refashioned natural fibres) and went in the lovely warm shower, having put on the electrical light (with low-energy LED bulb) and cleared away my ablutions using a flush system this morning. Like every morning. Because unlike other mammals we developed a complex society, which allowed specialisation, which allowed innovation, which allowed our technological world. If you want to throw all that away in favour of attacking other people because of their beliefs, then I can happily say you are probably more like other mammals than me.
Well, according to the original quote, we are not even merely fighting back in our hearts, we are in fact the original aggressors in our hearts – the bomb is a “sign of hatred in the hatred in American hearts” (presumably Justin Webb thinks that as a Brit he’s exempt, but I prefer not to avail myself of that get-out). So there’s no good objecting, Watchman (September 20, 2016 at 4:43 pm). As far as Justin Webb is concerned, you’re already doing all this stuff you advise against doing – that is, you are doing it in your heart. Not doing it in the secondary realm of reality hardly matters. 🙂
As for Justin Webb, presumably he feels the line of a certain Tennessee Williams character applies: “Ah never lahd in ma haht” excuses him from any slight departures from strict veracity in the real world.
Of course, I agree that “fighting back” against anyone who was not in fact part of the original attack would be a misnomer. I suspect it is rather the absence of any talking back that concerns this thread – all the “motive a mystery” stuff and etc.
“even if they do support extreme Islam have that right because they are humans”
So naturally you have no objection to them moving in with you. After all, they are humans.
Watchman, I think that’s a gross overreaction to staghounds’ comment. “Fighting back” doesn’t necessarily mean lynch mobs. It can also mean acknowledging that Islam is a problem (even if some specific adherents to that faith aren’t), that we should be far more circumspect in admitting into this country members of that faith and persons from nations dominated by it, and that such persons who are already here (and especially the places where they congregate) deserve closer scrutiny than do non-Islamic persons and places. The fact that our “leaders” do none of those clearly common-sense things, in service to some perverted notion of “anti-discrimination” or “political correctness”, demonstrates both their utter unfitness to lead and the fact that their group lacks long-term survival prospects. If you are content to throw in your lot with them that’s your choice, but don’t climb up on some moral high horse about it. Personally, I don’t care to join you in committing cultural suicide and I don’t acknowledge any moral superiority in those who do.
You sneer about “fighting back against people who happen to be Muslim but aren’t threats to you”, but how do you know? The man who set bombs around NY and NJ last weekend wasn’t (apparently) a threat to anybody, until he was. The murderers in San Bernardino weren’t a threat to anybody, until they were. The same can be said about most of these “home-grown radicals.” There is a significant element within Islam which is a threat, and even if it’s a relatively small percentage it’s still a large number in absolute terms. And it grows all the time as people become “radicalized.”
So yes, I do think we should be “fighting back” beyond simply bombing ISIS camps. We should be massively limiting the number of immigrants (including purported “refugees”) accepted from Islamic states. We should stop issuing visas for travel to those states, and absolutely give very close scrutiny to anyone who has travelled there and returned here. We should be aggressive in deporting Imams and others who are radicalizing young Muslims, fomenting hatred and recruiting for ISIS. We should be closely monitoring what goes on inside Mosques. We should recognize CAIR and similar Muslim apologist groups for what they are: the “civilized” fronts for the terrorist organizations they support (overtly and covertly). And especially, we should stop being afraid to acknowledge what anyone paying attention already knows: that Islam has been engaged in a war against the West for a thousand years; that it isn’t going to stop any time soon; and that it poses an existential threat to our civilization.
If anyone is suggesting fighting back against people who happen to be Muslim but aren’t threats to you
For my part, I think we should stop the pandering and take it from there.
How does that sound?
We’re not really hitting ISIL with “a lot of munitions”. Face it cor the US to be launching less than a hundred sorties a day against an enemy whom our president says must be ‘destroyed’ is not exactly a sign of a serious war effort.
How many of those sorties are against innocent wedding parties?
Heteronormative wedding parties are hardly ‘innocent’. At least in the eyes of our current administration.
@Laird
“We should stop issuing visas for travel to [Islamic] states”
Confused here….Since when can one country issue a visa to another one? There are some things we just don’t control.
AFT, you are correct. I misspoke.
I don’t think there’s a lot of interest in opposing radical Islam at the moment because we Americans have largely decided that doing so with our current effete and incompetent leadership is a waste of time. We are now looking ahead to the Trump administration.
What a lot of the world doesn’t get about Americans is how patient we are; it is a capital error to mistake that patience for weakness.
In 1963 President Kennedy was murdered by a Communist (Mr Oswald) a Communist who also murdered a police officer (who no television show or film seems to care about) before he was captured. Dallas at the time has a Democrat Mayor who was a strong supporter of the President.
Yet the left managed to blame conservatives and a mythical “City of Hate” for the death of President Kennedy. This “stuck” because the left control the education system (the schools and universities), and the media (including the entertainment media). Ironically Jack Kennedy in life was not really a leftist – but in death they adopted him and made him a sacred sacrifice of the socialist (sorry “liberal”) cause.
Donald Trump?
If he is murdered the left will (somehow) manage to blame him, and his supporters, for his own murder.
I am no friend of Donald Trump – but this “he is calling violence on himself” stuff stinks.
As does the anti American “blow back” stuff that many people come out with to justify attacks on the United States – indeed many “libertarians” come out with this evil, and it is evil, stuff. By the way – the sort of libertarian who comes out with the “blow back” stuff is the sort that sometimes support Donald Trump.
Oh, by the way, Jutin Webb – by using the Islamic attack on the United States as an opportunity for a general attack upon the United States – has proved himself to be an evil man. Most “compassionate liberals” actually are evil – their “compassion” is fake, a cover for power-lust.
PFP: we are slow to anger. But righteous indignation unleashed with our protection of the concepts of natural rights and liberties has in the past destroyed Nazism, Fascism and Communism.Perhaps someday soon we will destroy Islamo-fascism too. A sleeping bear might awake upon enough prodding to devour its predators (bad metaphor, but pretty obvious. ..)