Reading Michel Bauwen’s ‘censorial’ criticism of my views on the Israel/Hezbollah conflict gives me further reason to make the following comments.
There has been much said about the ‘Jewish lobby’, particularly its influence on US policy. There is a Jewish lobby, but there is nothing sinister about this. There are all sorts of lobby groups. What we have to be careful of is ’subtle’ anti-Semitism. Jews, like anyone else, have a right to lobby. There is also an Arab lobby that works closely with the Oil lobby. The Bin Laden family has links to the Carlysle group. Why is the Jewish lobby so successful? Perhaps because they have presented a compelling argument?
Julie Szego, a columnist with the Melbourne Age wrote a piece yesterday on how the pro-Palestinian pressure groups have convinced Europeans to ban Israeli films in protest at Israeli policy toward Palestine. A justified cultural embargo or just plain old censorship? The crazy thing is that these bans exclude all Israeli films but strangely do not ban Iranian films. Are all Israeli films right wing and anti-Palestinian? No, not at all. Israel actually has a very open and critical film culture and Israelis do make films that support the Palestinian cause. But these are banned too. But it gets even messier. Hany Abu-Assad, who directed the much praised Palestinian film ‘Paradise Now’, about two suicide bombers, supports the boycott. But guess what? His film was an Israeli co-production and had an Israeli producer – and guess what else? It was partly funded by the Israeli government. Now that’s an inconvenient truth don’t ya think? Under the proposed boycott Abu-Assad would not be able to show his own film!
Under the current climate in Europe Yoav Shamir, a ‘trenchant’ critic of his own government, was advised not to attend the Edinburgh film festival “for his own sake”. His previous film ‘Checkpoint’ was decidedly ‘pro’ Palestinian. So, he cannot attend why? Simply because he is a Jew?
What has all this got to do with integral theory? Do I need to explain this? We cannot afford to ‘exclude’ any view. We are meant to include ‘all’ views. PC censorship has NO place on this blog.
If you disagree with my analysis then please explain why it fails the integral test.
This is just to rectify Ray’s comment on criticism. Every blog has a purpose, and has boundaries. It is not a matter of censorship, as there are many places where Ray can post his justifications for the destruction of Lebanon, and his one-dimensional characterisations of the Arab and Palestinian people, and where they can be discussed for and against. But it is appropriate in the context of an open integral forum? I can only answer for myself, that the presence of pro-war writings create an identity for the integral blog that will act as an exclusionary filter for many to participate. I’m still asking myself in fact, whether I should or not caution the blog by my own participation.
Again, this is not to censor Ray, who can find many places to write about such issues.
What is the point of any integral approach, if it is used to justify unilateral war acts and the demeaning of whole peoples?
Michel,
How dare you! How dare you attack me for being “one-dimensional”. Outrageous. This is nothing other than the worst and most transparent use of rhetoric and polemic. “Pro-war” writings? Wrong. “One-dimensional chracterizations”? Nonsense. I think your view would be far more one-dimensional than mine. You seem to be uncritical and to have fallen for a romanticized image of the Palestinians and Arabs as ‘victims’.
An integral appraoch will best be served by you providing a solid argument and not cheap shots. I am quite happy to debate this at length and go into the issue in considerable depth and prove that I am coming from an integral perspective. Are you?
I categorically reject your characterization of my views as “pro-war”. You could not be more wrong. Talk about being “one-dimensional”. Sheesh.
I support Ray on this one. I don’t find his views pro-war and they are far from one-dimensional. I find his views in keeping with the purpose of this site, which is to explore a variety of complex perspectives within an integral meta-paradigm, the latter of which is also open to discussion and definition. If you have differences of opinion with Ray then may I suggest Michel that you do as he requests and discuss each point of difference with supporting argument. That is in keeping with the spirit and purpose of this site, in my opinion.
I generally agree with Ray and Edward here. However, I see a potential issue in the point Michel is raising. Where do we draw the line, or do we ever draw a line? There are views/ideas that all of us here I’m quite sure find disgusting, such as Nazism and child pornography, There are still other views which I’m quite sure all of us here very strongly oppose, such as fundamentalist religious ones that are clearly and unmistakably anti-scientific. Yet there are some very serious proponents of all these views out there, on the internet. What if someone tried to post an argument in support of one of these views on OpenIntegral? Would we delete it and tell him/her that this kind of discussion is not welcome? Or would we just post our opposing views, and hope it ended there? If we delete it, we are guilty of censorship, but if we accept it and oppose it, we are giving it credibility.
The major media, at least in America, generally deal with issues like these by defining a “mainstreamâ€Â, and arguing that such views are outside the mainstream. A problem with this approach, of course, is that the definition of mainstream is necessarily somewhat loose, arbitrary and subjective, and can be used to exclude minority views that some of us might find very valuable. There is certainly no hard-and-fast definition of mainstream that I know of. The media sometimes act as though the definition were in terms of the % of people adhering to a view. Thus political parties with less than 5% of the vote are considered minor, and are generally not invited to pre-election debates between the two major parties. But of course many of the most radical and innovative ideas are virtually by definition held initially only by very small numbers of people.
Another problem with the “mainstream†idea, from my point of view, is that sometimes views I very strongly oppose become shared widely enough to be considered part of the mainstream. In America, I say with some shame, this is now the case with fundamentalist religion. A very large number of people apparently believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible. They have become very much part of the political and social debate. I think the media do have some responsibility not to put their heads in the sand, to report on views that large numbers of people believe in. But do they also have a responsibility to report these views as in some sense equal with the scientific view?
In addition to the “mainstream†notion, there are also certain rules that almost all publishers follow, such as a refusal to publish ways of making bombs or other means of destruction. The media are generally very skittish about publishing calls to violence, also. I can’t recall a major newspaper ever publishing a letter to the editor advocating violence within a society.
But this is where Michel’s argument becomes relevant. When we discuss relationships between nations and societies, violence is inevitably part of the discussion. When we discuss wars, to take certain if not any positions is in effect to advocate some kind of violence. If one believes Israel has a right to defend itself and prevent attacks by Hezbollah and other groups, one is advocating some kind of violence. But if one believes Israel has no such right, one may be advocating or at least condoning what is certain to be continued violence against Israel. Of course, we all try to rationalize our positions by arguing that we are trying to end violence, or minimize it. But the brutal fact of the matter, at least as I see it, is that when one jumps into a debate like this, it is virtually impossible to take a position that is not in some way supportive of violence. I suppose the Gandhian view of non-violent civil disobedience is an exception to this, but I don’t see anyone here advocating that view in the middle East, and I can’t see that it would work.
So maybe this is a good time and place to discuss whether we have any rules or limits to the debate here, and if so, how we rationalize them.
I think that any post on this site should explain why it is integral, or relevant to integral theory. If someone wants to argue in favour of Nazism then let them justify it in integral terms. Similarly if someone argues that a view is not integral then let them explain why. So my limit would simply be relevance.
The thing that annoys me about Michel’s posts is not that he disagrees, but that he does not justify his ‘characterizations’ of my views from an integral perspective. I am disappointed because I expected more of him.
I can only conclude that the reason he does not want my views expressed here is because he disagrees with them on political grounds.
Ray: “I think that any post on this site should explain why it is integral, or relevant to integral theory. If someone wants to argue in favour of Nazism then let them justify it in integral terms. Similarly if someone argues that a view is not integral then let them explain why. So my limit would simply be relevance.”
The problem I see with that is that any subject can be part of an integral discussion. By definition, integral deals with everything. Certainly a discussion of Nazism, per se, could be made in integral terms. So the question is, could you support Nazism on these terms? I don’t see an easy way to say no to this, because integralism really doesn’t have a well-defined ethics associated with it. Whatever Ken’s political beliefs may be, one can’t say that being integral implies being Neo-Con or Left or supportive of Israel or whatever. There are no well-defined boundaries. And since there aren’t, there is no easy or certain way to rule out any position one wants to take.
If most people here are happy with this (clearly Michel isn’t), then I can certainly live with it. But it helps to be clear on this in advance of potentially controversial topics.
I understand your dilemma, but anything can be misunderstood. You could try and justify Nazism in integral terms but only if you misunderstood integral theory.
You make an interesting point about a well defined ethics. I support the idea of the Prime Directive and that is always my starting and end point. Is this sufficient? Interesting to consider – why not?