Refreshing opinion from Kuwaiti Intellectual

[Aristophanes]

Dr. Ahmad Al-Baghdadi, a political science lecturer at Kuwait University, says Muslims themselves are to blame for the West’s distrust. It’s an amazingly clear-sighted piece—but also amazingly rare, because expressing opinions like this can be hazardous in the Islamic world.

“Osama bin Laden didn’t force anyone to go to Iraq, murder its people and destroy its institutions. He didn’t force anyone to murder innocent people in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, America and Europe. Bin-Laden did not tell the Muslims in the West: ‘Hate the country that gave you shelter when you fled [from your homelands], made you rich when you were poor, fed you when you were hungry, gave you freedom after the bondage you suffered in your Muslim countries, and educated you when you were ignorant.’

“You caused all these catastrophes out of your own choice and your own free will... and failed to repay the kindness [shown to you]. So what do you expect the West [to do] when it sees its citizens being murdered in the name of religion, when it [experiences] hatred in the name of religion and suffers the damages of terrorism [perpetrated] in the name of religion? It is only natural that the West should hate you and tighten the rope around your necks, so you do not ‘invade it from within’ as you declare in your announcements and sermons...

“The truth that we must deal with today is that people in the West no longer trust Muslims in general. The Muslims in the West must therefore sever their ties with the Muslims in the east, and repair their relations with the Western societies by announcing that they accept the humane values on the basis of which they were received in the West. They must also sever their ties with the religious clerics and their fatwas...

“If they fail to do this, they must bear the consequences and the difficulties that will ensue. They must not blame bin Laden and Al-Zarqawi, but [only] themselves for being driven, in ignorance, by the views of the clerics...”

True, so very true. Maybe all of us in the West should take his words to heart too, and stop apologizing for living in the best nations in the world. Yeah, I SAID it. BEST. Just watch the directional flows of immigration and tell me I'm wrong. Nah, you aren't going to. Man up.

[Caelius]

Do you have a link for that? I'd like to read the rest.

[Beetlecat]

Here's the full translation:

http://www.watchingamerica.com/alseyassah000001.shtml -- An interesting site.

Dr. Al-Baghdadi (ironic name) seems to come one step short of saying that muslims brought the US Invasion of Iraq upon themselves.

It reminds me a bit of how certain 'leaders' of ours claimed that the 9/11 attacks happened because of our 'moral decay' (and the ACLU, etc, etc).

A reverse apologist, in my opinion.

[Tiwaz]

I find it amusing when anyone tries to completely whitewash one side of this incident and pretend it is all good and actually clean victim of evil opposers.

Reminds me why I fear propaganda so much, it tends to go straight to the heart of people who forget to put it through their head first to see if it IS so correct.

[Aristophanes]

I find it amusing when anyone tries to completely whitewash one side of this incident and pretend it is all good and actually clean victim of evil opposers.

Reminds me why I fear propaganda so much, it tends to go straight to the heart of people who forget to put it through their head first to see if it IS so correct.

You can't change people by equivocating: it won't stir anyone to do anything, so, a little demagoguery may be in order.

[Beetlecat]

You can't change people by equivocating: it won't stir anyone to do anything, so, a little demagoguery may be in order.

But that's just it!

Who gets to make the decision that we need to be stirred up. And to do what?

[RZZZA]

Is it safe to say though, that Kuwait is a small rich, very westernized country that owes its prosperity to the wests insatiable thirst for oil? So doesnt that mean that Kuwaiti's generally are more sympathetic to westerners, since their prosperity more or less revolves around us?

edit-plus The U.S. already saved Kuwaits ass once.

[danzig]

Is it safe to say though, that Kuwait is a small rich, very westernized country that owes its prosperity to the wests insatiable thirst for oil? So doesnt that mean that Kuwaiti's generally are more sympathetic to westerners, since their prosperity more or less revolves around us?

Kuwait is not that 'westernized' besides countries like Iran & Venezuela all throw a hiccup into your theory since neither are sympathetic to west.

[Aristophanes]

Is it safe to say though, that Kuwait is a small rich, very westernized country that owes its prosperity to the wests insatiable thirst for oil? So doesnt that mean that Kuwaiti's generally are more sympathetic to westerners, since their prosperity more or less revolves around us?

edit-plus The U.S. already saved Kuwaits ass once.

Have you ever seen downtown Riyadh[Saudi Arabia] it's no different from the photos you're showing, but you wouldn't call them 'westernized' now would you? There's a profound difference between assuming some of the superficial trappings of a culture, as Kuwait has done, and being Westernized in the ideological or more broadly cultural sense, as Kuwait is clearly not. You can find tall buildings, nice cars and cellphones in pretty much any country in the world, what you cannot find is the system of ideas and protections which created the capacity to produce those goods: while Kuwaitis, Iranians, and even the Chinese may consume these commercial goods with as much gusto as 'Westerners', there is a profound difference in that the technologies and know-how are generally not their own.

Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, they're all virtual mirror images of Kuwait on the two superficial criteria you chose to try to discredit my point. I'm sorry, but that is a very, very poor argument.

The United States saved Saudi Arabia's ass too.

[Ummon]

In Gulf War 1, Saddam was about to invade the Saudis as well, if he hadn't been stopped.

Westernized, besides, is more than big buildings and shiny cars.

[RZZZA]

Westernized, to me, means a strong economy, wealth, success, industry, all of which Kuwait has. I may be using a wrong deifinition of the word, but Kuwait is at least semi-westernized. At least we dont seem to have as much trouble out of them as we do some of their neighbors in the region. Why do you think that is? I just happen to think its because they want to stay on U.S.'s (and the wests) good side, since we make them rich, and they want to stay prosperous. I may be oversimplyfying things a bit but thats the gist of why I think Kuwait is less dangerous to us than some of its neighbors.

[Ummon]

We disagree on the meaning of westernized. Furthermore: Kuwait doesn't have a strong economy, nor does it have industry, nor does it have success. It has oil. Point. :wink:

[RZZZA]

Heh, touche. But as long as they have oil, and as long as they sell it to us, I think we'll be seeing a stable, prosperous and appeased Kuwait. Barring one or two nuts of course...do you disagree? You think Kuwait could have been a staging ground for a 9/11 type attack? I dont think so, I always thought poverty breeds radicalism, and Kuwait doesnt seem to be like a place ripe for islamic fundamentalism to me. But then theres the fact that I know nothing so, yeah.

[Ummon]

Not being a staging point for terrorist attack is not the same as being westernised. Yet again, maybe not Kuwait, they were saved by international forces too recently, but Saudi Arabia is a staging point for terrorism.

[Aristophanes]

If you consider the family, occupations and education of many of the Arab terrorists, you will note that it certainly isn't personal poverty which is 'breeding radicalism'. When you compare Islamofacist terrorism to some European variants such as the Commiefascist terrorism of the Baader Meinhof Gang and the Red Brigade you quickly come to the conclusion that any link between poverty and radicalism is shaky at best. One would think, if poverty really were a leading cause, that Ethiopia, Sierra Leone, Haiti, Benin, Togo or Chad would be producing terrorists left and right.

No, I think the defining characteristic of most terrorists is that they had enough free time to mull over their murderous ideologies, and that's generally not the case with people scraping for a living.

[RZZZA]

If you consider the family, occupations and education of many of the Arab terrorists, you will note that it certainly isn't personal poverty which is 'breeding radicalism'. When you compare Islamofacist terrorism to some European variants such as the Commiefascist terrorism of the Baader Meinhof Gang and the Red Brigade you quickly come to the conclusion that any link between poverty and radicalism is shaky at best. One would think, if poverty really were a leading cause, that Ethiopia, Sierra Leone, Haiti, Benin, Togo or Chad would be producing terrorists left and right.

No, I think the defining characteristic of most terrorists is that they had enough free time to mull over their murderous ideologies, and that's generally not the case with people scraping for a living.

I want to simplify and you want to complicate, you are not meshing well with me, good sir! I say poverty, and disenfranchisement, and religious fanatacism causes islamic violence ot be exacted against the west. But you say its too much free time for too many bad people? Both answers could be right, honestly. I accept both theories.

when you look at riots in the western world, it seems to usually have something to do with poverty and inequality. but in the muslim world, riots can happen with many things that I've never even considered before...such as religious reasons, which seems like a weird thing to riot about to someone like me. But the fact is, I would feel safer, as an American, in Kuwait than I would in Iran. Am I foolish for thinking that?

[Aristophanes]

I want to simplify and you want to complicate, you are not meshing well with me, good sir! I say poverty, and disenfranchisement, and religious fanatacism causes islamic violence ot be exacted against the west. But you say its too much free time for too many bad people? Both answers could be right, honestly. I accept both theories.

when you look at riots in the western world, it seems to usually have something to do with poverty and inequality. but in the muslim world, riots can happen with many things that I've never even considered before...such as religious reasons, which seems like a weird thing to riot about to someone like me. But the fact is, I would feel safer, as an American, in Kuwait than I would in Iran. Am I foolish for thinking that?

Riots are generally fueled by extremely strong perceptions of injustice, and perceptions of injustice can have very strong foundations, or very weak foundations.[although the decision to riot is always based on rather weak logic] If you consider the case of the French university students rioting, we can hardly blame 'poverty' in the sense that they suffer any real deprivation, nor could we accuse the WTO protestors of being 'poor' in the sense that they are, in any way, denied opportunity. It is the very fact that those groups are so unused to real poverty [and real injustice] that they are acting the way they are, and showing a callous disregard for the properties and safety of others. Their sense of proportion is hopelessly deformed.

I'd feel safer as an American in Tokyo than I would as an American in Los Angeles, would I be foolish in thinking that? I wouldn't accuse Japan of sharing an even remotely similar culture to Americans or Europeans. Yes, they build big concrete, steel and glass towers, manufacture, wear business suits, maximize profits and have the rule of law, but their culture is very different from ours, isn't it?

[RZZZA]

Riots are generally fueled by extremely strong perceptions of injustice, and perceptions of injustice can have very strong foundations, or very weak foundations.[although the decision to riot is always based on rather weak logic] If you consider the case of the French university students rioting, we can hardly blame 'poverty' in the sense that they suffer any real deprivation, nor could we accuse the WTO protestors of being 'poor' in the sense that they are, in any way, denied opportunity. It is the very fact that those groups are so unused to real poverty [and real injustice] that they are acting the way they are, and showing a callous disregard for the properties and safety of others. Their sense of proportion is hopelessly deformed.

Well with the french youth you can blame disenfranchisement. Some poverty, some disenfranchisement, some misguided anger and you get a riot. 'Real injustice' seems like a subjective thing to me, A black man today has it a hell of a lot better than a black man 200 years ago, but you still see racial riots break out here, during the civil rights movement, and more recently the Watts riots are a good example. Proportion and injustice are all subjective, I think longtime constants like your race, your skin color, your class etc. has a tendency to blind people to the plights of others

I'd feel safer as an American in Tokyo than I would as an American in Los Angeles, would I be foolish in thinking that? I wouldn't accuse Japan of sharing an even remotely similar culture to Americans or Europeans. Yes, they build big concrete, steel and glass towers, manufacture, wear business suits, maximize profits and have the rule of law, but their culture is very different from ours, isn't it?

Youre blowing my mind here dude. Well first of all, I probably wouldnt feel so safe as an American in Tokyo, with no knowledge of the language? I'd probably get kidnapped by a Yakuza drug cartel and sold into slavery, I'd be forced to work in a meth lab at gunpoint. There you go with the complexities, I was comparing something easy like Kuwait and Iran, and here you are throwing Tokya and L.A. at me from out of nowhere. Lets just stick to one region though shall we? My point was that I'd feel safer in Kuwait than I would in Iran because I'm an American, Kuwaiti's probably have more tolerance for Americans, I'm saying this because I think the history between our two countries is more favorable, our countries do business together and we are both relatively industrialized and modern nations (even if some people wont accept me saying that they are also more westernized), I feel like my nation doing business with theirs has contributed greatly to their prosperity not to mention safety(since they'd be under Saddams boot right now if it werent for Americans). Of course I wouldnt actually say all that if I were to visit Kuwait.

[barbarion horde]

If you consider the family, occupations and education of many of the Arab terrorists, you will note that it certainly isn't personal poverty which is 'breeding radicalism'. When you compare Islamofacist terrorism to some European variants such as the Commiefascist terrorism of the Baader Meinhof Gang and the Red Brigade you quickly come to the conclusion that any link between poverty and radicalism is shaky at best. One would think, if poverty really were a leading cause, that Ethiopia, Sierra Leone, Haiti, Benin, Togo or Chad would be producing terrorists left and right.

No, I think the defining characteristic of most terrorists is that they had enough free time to mull over their murderous ideologies, and that's generally not the case with people scraping for a living.

I have a friend who's parents come from syria. According to him, most terrorists or fanatical muslim extremists come from reletivly properous, and middle class upbringings. He says, that poverty striken people in the Middle East like in any other place on Earth are too preoccupied thinking about day to day survival to have time to listening to extremist propaganda or "Hate" anyone in particular.(except maybe Israel)

I findit entirely possible that using the West as a scapegoat for there troubles, it could surely lead young desperate men into extremism.

just 2 cents.