Taking cultural editing notes from terrorists

August 17, 2007

The New York City Police Department issued a disconcerting report this week called, “Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat.” In a nutshell, investigators and researchers concluded that the most serious threat the nation faces come from small groups of disaffected men who become radicalized.

The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan noted the report in her latest column, and seems to blame our culture and American values for inviting attacks.

[A]ll modern young people come from two environments. The first is the immediate family, which is human and therefore by definition imperfect, sometimes to a serious and destructive degree. The other is the broader culture in which we all live, and which includes everything from schools to the neighborhood to the media. It’s not a new thing to say but it’s still true that the latter, which is more powerful than ever, is wholly devoted to the material. People are money winners or luxury item enjoyers. They just want stuff. It is soulless.

The view we show of life to ourselves, and to whatever lost young men are watching, is not broad and inspiriting. It is limited and dispiriting. It is every man for himself.

We make it too easy for those who want to hate us to hate us. We make ourselves look bad in our media, which helps future jihadists think that they must, by hating us, be good.

This seems to be an old-standby for Noonan. After the Columbine shootings, she blamed Americans for creating a depraved culture.

But when it comes to counter-terrorism, I’m afraid Noonan’s argument is bewildering. As she sees it, Americans are to blame for wallowing in capitalist decadence, which in turn inspires terrorists to do us harm. By Noonan’s logic, we should take cultural-editing notes from jihadists.

For that matter, her perspective is increasingly common among conservatives.

Conservative activist/writer Dinesh D’Souza, of course, wrote an entire book devoted to arguing that terrorists are right about the problems with the culture in the United States. Osama bin Laden and other dangerous Islamic radicals believe the U.S. is too secular, too permissive, too diverse, too free, and too tolerant … and D’Souza believes they’re absolutely correct. (Indeed, D’Souza goes so far as to argue that liberal Americans are to blame for 9/11 — the left invited the attacks by reinforcing the beliefs al Qaeda had about the United States.)

CNN blowhard Glenn Beck recently came to the same conclusion.

“More and more Muslims now hate us all across the world, and it really has not a lot to do with anything other than our morals.

“The things that they were saying about us were true. Our morals are just out the window. We’re a society on the verge of moral collapse. And our promiscuity is off the charts.

“Now I don’t think that we should fly airplanes into buildings or behead people because of it, but that’s the prevailing feeling of Muslims in the Middle East. And you know what? They’re right.”

And now, apparently, Peggy Noonan is on board with this ideology, too: “We make it too easy for those who want to hate us to hate us.” If we nasty Americans would only stop being so wicked, we might be safer. We’re reviled and we deserve it. Or so the argument goes.

As you might expect, I think Noonan, D’Souza, and Beck couldn’t be more wrong. First, I’m not at all sure what they’d suggest we do, exactly. We’re supposed to stop making it easy for our enemies to hate us, but what might that include? How do Noonan, D’Souza, and Beck want us to behave?

And second, I’m afraid the entire argument is a cop-out. Under the Noonan-D’Souza-Beck school of thinking, the decisions made by the U.S. government are irrelevant. Americans’ actions on the global stage aren’t responsible for fueling animosity; our culture is. We shouldn’t blame the war in Iraq for enraging the Middle East; we should blame divorce rates, R-rated movies, and a general sense of tolerance for homosexuality.

By their logic, we shouldn’t change government policy; we should change citizens’ tastes. It’s not our conduct; it’s our lifestyles.

It’s the height of foolishness.

from Noonan “It is every man for himself”

Hasn’t this been the core message of the conservative movement all along? That we should have an “ownership society” where every man tries to get ahead at the expense of everyone else?

  • As she sees it, Americans are to blame for wallowing in capitalist decadence, which in turn inspires terrorists to do us harm.

    And Noonan writes about this in the Wall Street Journal, which succors capitalists with their thirst for wealth in the extreme. Am I missing something here? Oh, I must remember to take my vitamins and build up my sense of irony. Reading about such conservative claptrap so often is exhausting.

  • Cognitive dissonance of the highest order. Conservatives have been saying for years that terrorists can’t be reasoned with, that they are simply evil, and attempts to do so amount to appeasement. For conservatives to now claim that not only are “Islamists” reasonable but further that their critiques have merit is a dramatic turnaround.

    It’s nice to see conservatives embracing reality, and let’s cheer this development as we should the president’s long overdue admission that there were “…conditions that lured 19 kids to get onto airplanes…” However, while we should welcome conservatives to the realization that terrorists are made, not born, we should continue to beat them senseless verbally for having taken so long to come around.

  • Gee, I thought they hated us for our freedoms. Oh well:

    Dear Ms. Nooner. One of the things jihadist hate are outspoken women. Please put on this burqua and go home, lest you drive them into a car bombing frenzy.

    You wouldn’t want that on your tiny little conscience would you?

    ___

    But of course, the whole point of such written wank sessions isn’t to suggest what we should do to appease the justly outraged masses who WANT TO KILL US! That would go too far. Nooner et al would risk offending their audience if they said that our need to drive tank like cars and eat more food in one sitting than most people eat in a couple of days and invade countries for no damn reason is what drives people crazy.

    They might make some comments about issues on which Das Base all agree: Gay rights, abortion, pre-marital sex, but they have walk a fine line between saying: “The reason people hate us (and WANT TO KILL US) is the fault of THOSE people,” and sounding like we ought to set up the dreaded Caliphate to keep more attacks from occuring.

    Notice it is the “amoral people” who create danger by arousing the ire of the guys with exploding belts.

    Nor does Noonan make any constructive comments about how to stop radicalization (because people who feel hopeless tend to be drawn to such things and giving them hope might require money).

    No, as with the other cretins who go on about morals, be it a Talevangical reverend or an over-paid hack like Noonan, the whole point of the exercise is to do a little light hand wringing over morals so that if something bad happens they can “savour” the feeling of being right.

  • In much of the Muslim world the practice of charging interest on borrowed money is VERBOTEN! No virgins, no glory, just dispair. Perhaps the first thing this trifecta of mental midgets should propose is the elimination of interest. After all we will then operate within the moral boundries of the people who hate us and thus remove the urge to kill.

    For some reason I bet this set is inclined to point more toward things like homosexuality, abortion, dicorce, and unmarried co-habitation as the “real” problems. Unfortunately these items are personal choices and should not be imposed upon free people.

    What are the odds these people will just go away?

  • So to put it another way, if more Americans were better hippies, we wouldn’t be having a lot of these problems we have today. That’s probably right.

  • This is just too ridiculous. Extreme conservatives commit terrorist attacks in the US and supposedly “mainstream” conservatives leap to their defense and we’re supposed to take their word for it because….?

    This is just sick. They say that Islamic radicals are part of a sick ideology of hate and violence, but that Oklahoma City attack, well we really had that coming. How the hell is that ok?

    I try and try to be a good liberal but these guys make me crazy sometimes.

  • If it really was a secular liberal society that they hated, then wouldn’t they have flown their planes into the CN tower here in Canada? Or maybe into downtown Amsterdam? Lets face it, the US is at the bottom of a long list as far as secularism and liberalism go.

  • I’m afraid Noonan’s argument is bewildering…

    I’m afraid that sentence is a tautology….

  • So, in order to beat the terrorists we need to join them, is that what she is saying?

    Or is she saying we need to eliminate capitalism?

    And as noted by comments above, every policy conservatives push today is ‘every man for himself, and eliminate safety nets and any social programs designed to try and help out those who lose and/or may become lost and dispirited in the system we have in the US.

    The mind truly does reel.

  • Sounds to me like these morons hate America as much as they hate brown people. In my perfect world, we’d all pitch in some $$$, buy some island somewhere, gather all of these conservative, authoritarian, right wing nut job types, and ship them off, allowing them to create their own little Christian Taliban type kingdom, where they can run the show. Let the rest of the country get on with tackling the challeges of the 21st century. I beg your pardon, but to use an oft quoted right wing talking point: IF YOU DON’T LIKE AMERICA THEN GET THE FUCK OUT!

  • A right-winger is a right-winger is a right-winger.

    Whether he/she is in Pakistan or on the Wall Street Journal.

  • “We’re a society on the verge of moral collapse.”

    I don’t think our people are any different from what they have always been, are they? Has there been a significant shift in our genetic makeup? our Constitution and form of government? Has our geography changed? The only major difference of relevance is the Reagan-era shift toward increasingly concentrated corporate ownership of a monolithic means of national communication, principally TeeVee. It is amazing what happens to a once-idealistic nation when the only values given wide publicity are those of greedy, score-at-any-price, win-by-any-means corporate Republicans.

  • There are hundreds of homegrown groups that hate us for as many varying reasons. These bigots are trying to compare religions…Muslim vs Christian…and believe we should be more fundamentalist Christian …yeah, that would solve everything. When I read these opinions, I have to consider the source and these Noonan-D’Souza-Beck idiots speak for no one. Their theories miss the point entirely as they just ignore the actions of our own government and the corporate military imperialism that has been operating in secret to steal their resources and topple their goverments

    If we are hated for anything it is for the hypocrisy of professing one thing and doing another as a nation. Like saying we are for freedom and peace and democracy as we wage war and tell other nations how to govern, as we rob the resources of other nations or install dictators like the Shaw of Iran, or call ourselves a democracy when we are run by corporate military imperialists. Our nation has killed almost a million innocent Iraqis while bigots in our nation scream that Islam is the religion of the devil, that all Muslims are terrorists, that they are out to destroy “us” as we wage “preemptive” war on Iraq(and Iran if Bush can figure how to sell it).

    I ask these loud mouth bigots why they waste time trying to define the reasons they “hate” us when instead they should be asking if there are any reasons why they should like us. Let’s see them write or talk about that…why should they like us…after all we’ve done for or to them, why should they like us? We are not the America we profess to be, nor the America we want to be.
    The NYPD should keep their theoretical findings to themselves as it comes across as rabble rousing. They have no doubt come up with the same conclusions about “skinheads”, clansmen, and Christo-fascists and many other hate filled, who are disillusioned and in the process of gathering sympathizers. I would say it is the wrong time to be throwing their conclusions to the national press as it will surely bring suspicion on all Muslims causing them to be treated differently. Real brainstorming by the NYPD huh?

    Anything to sell papers or get ratings. These people assume Americans are stupid. I pray they are mistaken. That they will come to realize that if you slap us enough you’ll get our attention. This administration definitely has our attention, necessity has forced us to become wide awake and vigilant toward our own government more so than any “terrorists”

  • “We’re a society on the verge of moral collapse.”

    So how long has this country been on a “moral collapse”? Since the mid-1800s? Which tells me that either these kinds of people are full of shit, or the eventual bottom of the amoral abyss is reeeeeally deep.

    I’m hoping for the former.

  • “is wholly devoted to the material. People are money winners or luxury item enjoyers. They just want stuff. It is soulless. The view we show of life to ourselves, and to whatever lost young men are watching, is not broad and inspiriting. It is limited and dispiriting. It is every man for himself.”

    Cool. Having her write a supportive Op-Ed will really help when the Democrats try to remedy people wanting those soulless luxury items that show decadence and encourage terrorists by planting big ol excise taxes on furs, diamonds, boats, second (and third) homes, vehicles over $40,000, racehorses, and capital gains over 50% of earned salary or wages for non-disabled persons under 60. We can even invite her to speak at the “soak the rich” rally to repeal the tax cuts for the wealthiest 1%.

    Right Peggy? I mean, you do want to discourage people soullessly accumulating stuff, right? Otherwise the terra-ists win, right?

  • It goes to show that, at least as far as right-wingers are concerned, admitting one’s mistakes is indeed a fate far worse than death. They will say and do anything to preserve their pride and see their vision of society foisted upon us all.

    And this idea fails to consider that it is unbelief which is the worst offense in any religion or cult. As TAiO pointed out in #4, Noonan is too shortsighted to even realize that her rights would need to be put aside and her body covered from head to toe to satisfy the tenets of radical Islam; let alone that we would all eventually need to convert to exculpate ourselves from the sin of not believing.

  • What creates these soulless luxury-item enjoying consumers?

    My theory: The endless rat-a-tat-tat of corporate-sponsored advertising.

    Corporations exists to make money. Fine and dandy. But Americans used to value frugality, modesty, humility. Corporations cannot make money without creating demand for their (often frivolous) products.

    Hence, the minute-long “word from our sponsor” we remember from TV shows in earlier decades has become eight minutes of “Buy this! And this! And this! And this! And this!….” By the time commercials are done, you’ve forgotten the plot of whatever it is you were watching.

    Additionally, advertising appears EVERYWHERE your eye lands: the sides of buses, billboards, t-shirt fronts, email in-boxes, not to mention over your own private telephone line. Hell, even church bulletins sport advertising!

    Conservatives can bloviate until they are blue in the face, but they will not make any headway into this “moral collapse” of society because they will find scapegoats, like “Hollywood,” or “Liberal Social Policy,” and they will never be willing to point the finger at the true culprit: Corporate advertising.

    They are not willing, because they, too, are corporate shills.

  • “the most serious threat the nation faces come from small groups of disaffected men who become radicalized.” Which is exactly why the Young Republicans are such a dangerous and malevolent group.

    I believe there is kernel of truth to Noonan’s argument, though in typical right wing fashion she trots out her usual societal suspects to blame like sex, rap music, MTV and kids wearing their pants too low.

    Her quip, “The view we show of life to ourselves, and to whatever lost young men are watching, is not broad and inspiriting. It is limited and dispiriting. It is every man for himself,” I find essentially true. What is acting as the wedge to isolate groups of people in our culture is our social policy and not the music they hear, the video games they play or what’s on the TV: it’s the way we say a mine owner’s profits matter more than the lives of those that work for him. Or that soldiers volunteering their service to the country can be used and abused by the government to protect the egos of a small leadership group. Or that society’s safety nets such as Social Security, S-CHIP, education loans and other programs are aloowed to whither to lower the taxes of the very wealthy. Or when the government doesn’t think inspecting food for safety, enforcing work place safety or working to prevent permanent and catastrophic environmental damage is worth their while.

    As far as our culture helping spawn terrorism, the portion of our culture that is he culprit is our political culture. Our policies on the Middle East, our nationalizing of christianity as our political religion, or leaders demonizing a whole religion when a tiny sect attacked us, our waging wars of opportunity in their holy lands — these are the things that will set off disaffected young males to battle us.

    It’s this political culture that Noonan has championed and it’s her impact on our cuture that will lead to further jihadism, not Paris Hilton’s.

  • Free-market fundamentalism and enforced morality absolutely cannot co-exist. The cultural excesses and idiocies that Noonan et al condemn–with some justifcation, IMO; have you ever actually tried to watch MTV in the last, say, 15 years?–exist because they’re profitable, and those profits are going pretty much exclusively to those already rich beyond the comprehension of most of us.

    I’m not crazy about this, but I see it as an acceptable price to pay for society letting me live as I choose, with my own interests and by my own values (always assuming both are within the law). Until the would-be jeremiahs on the right even acknowledge that they’re essentially interested in killing, or at least maiming, their own golden goose, their rantings are no more relevant than those of the nut on the corner holding the “End is Nigh” sign.

  • By their logic, we shouldn’t change government policy; we should change citizens’ tastes. — CB

    But not too radically 🙂 From a NYT article about that report mentioned in the first para of your post:

    “The report also claims that signs of radicalization include positive changes in personal behavior such as giving up smoking, drinking and gambling”

    So, if you don’t give up those bad habits, the terror-fighters will come and get you but, if you do, the cops/FBI will. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. I was thinking something about quitting the evil weed and the products of the grape and the rye but, if it’s gonna get me in trouble, it’s not worth the effort.

  • “In much of the Muslim world the practice of charging interest on borrowed money is VERBOTEN!”

    I believe there are choice tidbits in the Bible as well on that dastardly practice of usury.

  • I see that blaming the victim has reached a whole new level. It’s not just rape victims that bring the violence on themselves anymore, eh?

    Damn us victims for being imperfect and justifying everything criminals do to us.

  • I would ask Noonan, “Whose party is it that holds as a primary value, that ‘greed is good’? And whose party is it that, when this value is protested against, is sneered at as ‘elitis

  • To expand on this some, there is this posting at the Angry Bear reviewing an article:Cross-National Correlations of Quantifiable Societal Health with Popular Religiosity and Secularism in the Prosperous Democracies

    The conclusion: The non-religious, pro-evolution democracies contradict the dictum that a society cannot enjoy good conditions unless most citizens ardently believe in a moral creator. The widely held fear that a Godless citizenry must experience societal disaster is therefore refuted. Contradicting these conclusions requires demonstrating a positive link between theism and societal conditions in the first world with a similarly large body of data – a doubtful possibility in view of the observable trends.

    http://angrybear.blogspot.com/2007/08/correlations-between-religion-or.html

  • And I had thought that these alleged terror masterminds acted upon their hatred for our current administration and its political ideologies far more than from hatred of the American people. Now I realize everything is all our fault due to our silly Constitution permitting us to think freely. This must be what our fearless leader meant when he said “there ought to be limits to freedom”.

  • Both Dinesh and Noonan want to pin their terrorism woes on Liberals. The underlying message is the liberal culture is what is at the core of jihadist hatred, not Bush policies or Conservative stupidity in keeping these clowns in office.

  • Peggy Noonan has some highly instructive points if we step back long enough to listen rather than engage in partisan attack. Unfortunately, she does not realize that her own political philosophy is contributing significantly to the problem, partly because it is itself an instance and instigator of the social breakdown that she decries. Any philosophy that tells us that we are on our own (and at the mercy of impersonal forces) at the same time that it tells us that we are free to do our own thing with no obligation to our fellow citizens is a blunt instrument of social breakdown and further alienation. Her philosophy will assist greatly in generating more alienated and destructive “refuseniks” to our culture.

  • Fundies and Neocon Rape-Public-Can idealogues are overlapping since they are one in the same. Al-Qaida and Christian Taliban share very similar idealogy – Subjegate, coerce, control — if that fails kill them with the blessing of Allah / Jesus.

  • I haven’t read the NYPD report, but I understand its authors are talking about American Muslims. They are a different breed than the racailles plotting mayhem in Europe. American Muslims are better educated and more affluent than your average Joe Six Pack American, and they came here because of economic opportunity, which includes living in really big houses and driving excessively large cars. Why should Noonan be shocked that some American Muslims feel estranged and frustrated? Alienation has been a theme of American life for the last 100 years or more.

  • Why do we CARE what they think of us??They’re living in the dark ages. They’re jealous of this country! This is a WONDERFUL country with a reasonable amount of freedom. Would YOU give up your American passport for a Saudi one??What’s wrong with us. We have an inferiority complex and we aren’t inferior….certainly not to Muslims.Why can’t we say how we think of them? No one suggests it. Christopher Hitchens has said a lot of good stuff.

  • So, I’m a Norwegian by the way. I didn’t get the fact that this was a leftist blog before it was spelled out in some of the comments. I’m a socialist, which in europe is on the left side of the scales. That beeing sad I’m not saying what I’m saying because I hate you or are jealous of you, just take your critiques and shut up about it.

    “They dont like our culture, so they want to kill all of us”, no, they dont like you forcing your fucking culture on them and killing them if they resist. I don’t like free markets and capitalists, I’d like people to care and be taken care of. I don’t know if you are doing it consciously, but you are pushing your fastfood, capitalist, violence and god knows what cultures on pretty much everyone else, whether you want it or not! When reading right wing blogs i usually shake my head and swear a bit, but when reading your comments i see you are all alike. You dont care about right or wrong, you care mostly of yourself, and the bashing the other party. Period.

  • The one common theme between Noonan and Beck is that their statements are unfettered by weighty reasoning. Just blame the liberals for everything. Never mind that the liberals’ stand on Iraq, the “War on Muslims, Mexicans and the Constitution” – oops – “Terror” (we regret the error) and the Patriot Act have since been proven correct.

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