Cultural Studies
Pete Bayle
to each other. Look at this.
http://www.andrewsullivan.com/
"Mr Shweiri said that while jailed by Saddam's regime he was
electrocuted, beaten and suspended from the ceiling with his hands
tied behind his back. "But that's better than the humiliation of being
stripped naked," he said. "Shoot me here," he added, pointing between
his eyes, "but don't do this to us... They made us stand in a way that
I am ashamed to describe. They came to look at us as we stood there.
They knew this would humiliate us. We are men. It's OK if they beat
me. Beating don't hurt us, it's just a blow. But no one would want
their manhood to be shattered. They wanted us to feel as though we
were women, the way women feel, and this is the worst insult, to feel
like a woman."
***
Nice view of women.
Notice too all the horror of homosexualtiy in the Arab world. For
years the Islamic and Persian worlds were the place gay men went to
have fun. (And wasn't TE Lawrence buggered in a Turkish prison.
Ironically, last night I saw a professor from NYU claiming that the
techinques were learned from the Arabs themselves.) I also thought (I
may be wrong) that homsexuality was more accepted in the Arab cultures
becuase of the role of women. Or maybe it's more prevalent but not
accepted.
And lest you think this is ancient history. There is a book (reviewed
by Edmund White in the LA Times, last Fall IIRC), written by a gay guy
who goes to Syria searching for adventure, where he hangs out with
terrorists who murder Israelis and screw him daily. Edmund White waxed
lyrical on his terrorist lovers.
This is the kind of hypocrisy you find in the left. Why is it so hard
for them to take a stand on this kind of hate speech? Why is it so
hard for them to say that killing Daniel Pearl, a cold blooded murder,
more than balances every naked Arab in the history of the world.
Yesterday I heard that moral paragon Seymour Hersch justifiy the Iraqi
shelling of the prison, because the Arabs thought the women were being
raped and tortured and that death was preferable. Of course he didn't
say, nor did anyone else, of the way they murder their own wives and
sisters and daughters when they think they have shamed the family.
Again this is the real humiliation.
Did you hear the story of the husband and lover who forced a Palestian
mother who comitted adultery to become a suicide bomber. Can you look
yourself in the mirror and say this isn't sick and disgusting, coming
from a culture of moral evil.
When you allow a homophobic women hating culture like this to define
your moraltity you are in deep trouble.