Hitchens is a well travelled and thoroughly educated writer. I do not agree with his views much of the time as he was so pro unions. When he says how dare the Canadian human rights commissions call themselves that, I want to know more. Why would he say that?
When I see that Christopher Hitchens is to appear on Fox News or CNN, I'll usually tune in. I appreciate that he wants to develop a conversation about a very expansive topic(s) that is not confined to five minutes, and more often than not, I enjoy watching his opponent squirm under Hitchens straightforward-no-bull-shit approach. However, the Htichens present in this interview comes across as a pompous wind-bag that is an expert on - well, not quite an expert, but certainly someone who is very well learned on ... everything.
I will readily admit that Hitchens is incredibly intelligent, but he lacks any sort of imagination. To say that "I see the ways of the world, and this is how it is and it is death" marks him has one of the holy prophets of doom that he rails against.
I have had "God is Not Great" on my bookshelf for awhile and after reading this interview that is where it will stay. It will be a prop to provoke some of my more religious minded house guests. Hopefully, we can have more positive discussion and reach a basis of compassionate understanding and recognize our shortcomings and steer clear of the "No I'm right" scenario. I suspect the book doesn't go far beyond this.
To Adam:
You say, "Hopefully, we can have more positive discussion and reach a basis of compassionate understanding and recognize our shortcomings and steer clear of the "No I'm right" scenario."
Why bother to debate, then?? The whole point is to try to reason the other guy into saying, "Oh yeah...I hadn't thought about it that way...". Steering clear of the "No, I'm right" scenarios would make for a boring conversation. People should stand for something and be honest enough to admit that they may be wrong or that they don't know what they're talking about. As wrong as he is about alot of things, Hitchens would probably admit it if someone made an irrefutable case that he's full of it.
On another note, I think Hitchens makes alot of good points but they are based on his analysis of human failings. God IS great. He is SO good. We are the ones who screw things up in the name of religion. Dad used to say, "La ou il y a de l'homme, il y a de l'hommerie". Where there are men, there is humanity. And that's not a good thing because humanity is inherently bad.
Hitchens has really turned into a hypocrite. You either have liberalism or you don't. You either believe in democracy or you don't. A state should be a state of its citizens whether in Canada, Israel, or France. No state should officially be a Jewish or Christian or Muslim state, but rather a state of its citizens.
One person, one vote, freedom to wear what you want or not wear what you want. Freedom of choice to wear a burqa or go topless or something in between. Otherwise, the state is a hypocrite on liberalism. And let the courts and not politicians interpret liberty.
In the U.K. and (the rest of Europe), a lot of poor and uneducated people were shipped in from Pakistan in the 50's and 60's (and Turkey or North Africa) as cheap labour for British & European factories. Most of those governments should now admit they're a bunch of hypocrites on democracy and liberty because they wanted those people as cheap labour but now they don't want to let those people live their lives as they chose to.
He doesn't even know Canada and the US obviously. Most immigrants here (from all over the world including Muslim-majority countries) are quite educated and moderate, more educated than Canadian-born citizens. And if you have less discrimination as you do in North America compared to Europe, then the vast vast majority of immigrants and their children become very loyal citizens.
As a child of immigrants, I think Canada, although not perfect, is one of the best and most just countries in the world, a credit to all Canadians of every background.
I tried to buy tickets to his talk at ROM, but it was sold out. I met him in Toronto around 2000 when he was touring his "The Trial of Henry Kissinger". I wanted to talk to him now to ask him what happened to his decency and tolerance since then. We had a great conversation in 2000 about justice and tolerance. I think he got messed up by 9/11 and lost his principles.
Hitchens should watch the movie "Doubt" - with Philip Seymour Hoffman and Maryl Streep. In the movie is a great talk by Hoffman's character about how doubt in and about religion and God is a good thing, and how doubt can be as strong a bond among people as certainty.
Hitchens comes across as arrogant, to put it mildly. The point of life perhaps is to have doubt and humility about God or anything else. We don't know for sure either way about God. Anyone who claims anything with certainty is a fool.
Where did this interview take place? Across the lake from Chicago? Hitchen's is in SW Michigan? Oh God!
ID writes: "Most of those governments should now admit they're a bunch of hypocrites on democracy and liberty because they wanted those people as cheap labour but now they don't want to let those people live their lives as they chose to."
This is precisely the kind of backward looking moralizing that paralyzes people when they reach the decision Hitchens is talking about: 'should we let people into our country knowing they won't share our values and that we don't have the will or ability to teach them different?' What does hypocrisy have to do with the future of a civilization? Naivete can go no farther than making hypocrisy the premise of an argument concerning how a civilization should conduct itself. Civilizations ARE hypocrisy. Grow up.
The ubiquity of Religion throughout human history suggests that it has some kind of function that seems to elude Mr Hitchens. This is not altogether surprising, since a man with his mouth open generally has his ears shut.
Any person who claims any kind of moral ground wants to be as careful in broadbrushing entire religions as he would probably be about broadbrushing entire races.
Hitchens is essentially an intemperate buffoon who sold his credibility to the Bush Administration. Not moral, and not even smart.
To call Hitchens a hypocrite is hilarious — he's probably the least hypocritical media figure around. As for his arguments about Islamic immigration, it's pretty basic: radical Islam has very openly declared war on western culture and Hitchens says 'BTW — radical Islam has declared war on western culture', and suddenly it's "Boo Hoo, how can he say that???" The best hope for Europe is that progressive breakaway elements within Islam itself get sick enough of their religious overlords to fight their way free of them and defeat them from within, because the Ayatollahs are safe from without. Apparrently, there's no fight left among the Sob Sisters of Western Culture — the only people they are willing to criticize are westerners willing to protest attack upon their cultures, lifestyles, freedoms and heritages (apparently, it's only OK for non-westerners to have pride in and wish to retain these sorts of things). I guess we're all lucky that this creepily backboneless form of liberalism didn't arise a couple generations sooner or we'd all (from Ireland to the Ukraine, anyway) be Heiling the swastika.
the real point here is that we in the west have spent a lot of time and spilled a lot of blood in creating a culture which recognises pluralism as a key element in sustaining a genuinely democratic culture - the notion is perhaps best put in that nostrum about not agreeing with a point of view but defending unto death its right to be heard. The issue is not so much with islamism but with fascism - the key element of which is the cynical posture which seeks to use that perversion of free speech which is populism only for as long as it takes to seize the levers of power and immediately use them to deny the very freedom that enabled this travesty in the first place. The islamists have that much in common with the nazis and the leninist/stalinist crew who did for nascent democracies in Germany and Russia - and just pause to examine the legacy of that if you will. Hitchens and Amis and their ilk defend the point that if western democracies are inane enough to misread this essential truth (about the reality of fascism as a very live philosophy in our societies right now) then the consequences could easily exceed anything we have seen thus far. The war in Afghanistan, the need to monitor and if necessary take out the possibility of nuclear weaponry falling into the hands of fascist zealots in Iran, Pakistan or Korea - all of these may be regrettable and even terrifying but make no mistake - whether you are coming from right or left of centre or just enjoying life in the fuzzy middle ground - this is the shape of things....sorry....
Hitchens is being an idiot, but not when it comes to religion. On that particular subject he is spot on much like Thomas Paine, Abraham Lincoln, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and many others.
However, his position on Iraq is utterly irrational. Apparently he thinks there's a difference between Iraq and Vietnam. (Instances where the governmtent repeatedly lied to get us into a war that was unnecessary unncessary and caused a great many casualties.) Or there's a difference between Sarah Palin and George W. Bush. Both are religious nutcases. How could he possibly still think Iraq was a good idea after reading The End of Iraq How American Incompetence Created a War Without End, by Peter Galbraith? People were murdered, tortured and oppressed by Hussein's regime which the Kennedy Administration helped come to power and now they're being murdered, tortured and oppressed by civil war. Only American troops are caught in the middle of it and it made us look bad for causing the catalyst to the civil war. Animosity towards the U.S is worse than ever and Iraq now has Al-qaida forces which were not there previously. Al-Zarqawi was in the Northern part of Iraq where Hussein had no rule, damnnit.
What is this talk of Pakistan not being taken into consideration? We're firing rockets at them constantly and it's hardly done any good. It's pretty much the bombing of Cambodia all over again, it's just pissing civilians off and making more Al-qaida recruits. The Taliban will probably take over more so and it will be another Khmer Rouge.
Hitchens should be writing The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld or something like that rather than trying to justify a war of aggression.
