Humiliating" the Arabs? And if so... so what?

[Oerdin]

Every time some despot falls in the middle east--an all-too-infrequent occurence, unfortunately--we hear from the left that this is wrong, because it "humiliates the Arabs" (or the Muslims), with their presumably ultra-sensitive national pride. (Of course, the same sort of pride--in a much milder form--is considered intolerably "racist xenophobia" when displayed by Americans, but I digress.) As proof, we get video clips of the latest mob-for-hire shouting "Death to America!" out of their own free will with no coersion whatsoever--in Teheran or Islamabad or Cairo or Tripoli, those bastions of free expression of public opinion.

Well, Saddam fell. The supposedly "humiliated" Iraqis were SO humiliated this time, they danced in the streets for joy, openly claiming this is the happiest day of their lives. And on the same day the pride of the Arab world, the great and brave Hussein, was captured by evil imperialist forces, too!

What's wrong with this picture?

What's wrong with it is that the USA is NOT "humiliating the Arabs". It is merely humiliating the despots who rule the Arab world and the terrorists who would like all of the world to be (their kind of) Muslim. Most Arabs--and most Muslims--fervently wish for their "dear leaders" to be humiliated in this way, and the sooner, the better. If I were living in Libya, I'd be praying to Allah every day that the Americans will decide to humiliate Quaddafi next--and most of them no doubt are doing just that, if they can get a glimpse of the truth from their state-controlled press.

(By the way, one unintentional side effect of state-controlled press is that the public learns to read between the lines. "GREAT DEFENSIVE VICTORY" = retreat and/or defeat, "THE MOTHER OF ALL WARS HAS STARTED" = Saddam failed to stop American invasion, "ARAB PRIDE WILL AVENGE THIS IMPERIALIST AGRESSION" = Saddam finally captured, etc. Those Libyans who learned this art are probably quite happy right now. But I digress...)

In addition, even if it WERE true that "humiliating the Arabs" was a result of toppling Saddam, just like Quaddafi and Hamas fervently claim, SO WHAT?

When you fight a war, you have three options. 1). To lose; 2). To eliminate the enemy to the last man; 3). To defeat the enemy and NOT take revenge upon him, leaving him "humiliated" at having lost a war.

LOSING A WAR MEANS BEING HUMILIATED. DUH! But this is precisely what the USA did to Germany and Japan in WWII, to England in the Revolutionary war, to the south in the civil war, and to the USSR in the end of the cold war, etc., etc. A humiliated enemy come part and parcel with winning war. When the left says "don't humiliate the Arabs", what it really means is "don't you dare win the war, your enemy might not like it!".

But surely, "humiliating" the enemy--as opposed to losing the war or eradicting the enemy--is the least of the three evils, and it usually QUICKLY PASSES, especially since the US was always willing to show good will to a defeated enemy. When your "humiliating" victor comes back the next day and says, "OK, we won the war, now here's this money to reconstruct the damage you suffered and to build a democracy", it's hard to keep a grudge for long. Do we see many German or Japanese suicide bombers angry about their country's humiliation in WWII (and they were FAR more humiliated than the Iraqis ever were)? Where are the Russian jihadist out to avenge the fall of the Berlin wall?

So, first of all, I think that the Arabs, far from being "humiliated", are--unlike their despotic governments--hoping and praying for a lot more "humiliation" of this sort, and the sooner the better. In addition, even if they ARE humiliated, this is by far the least of a few possible evils, and certainly no reason for the USA to stop.

[Theben]

to summarize...

[Sandman]

Humiliating the Arabs is not a very common argument used by the left. Could you please point to some instances of it being used?

Otherwise, it's a strawman.

[Az]

Actually, I've heard it quite often, Sandman.

[GePap]

I wonder why Oerdin has such an Arab hangup?

As for humiliation: sadly, Arabs are too proudful, and thus take offenses "against honor" as a motivation for all sorts of stupidity. It is not the biggest motivator, but it does exist, and while one should not base actions on it, one needs to understand that reactions will stem from it.

[Bereta_Eder]

Germany wasn't attacked for oil.


(I rock)

[Oerdin]

Originally posted by Sandman
Humiliating the Arabs is not a very common argument used by the left. Could you please point to some instances of it being used?

Otherwise, it's a strawman.

How about HERE, HERE,
HERE, Here, and HERE for starters.

Also Palistinian Editor on CNN yesterday said that the pictures of US treatment of Saddam were humiliating to Arabs and would, in the end, cause great resentment against the US.

It is an interesting spin. Arabs who want the pretext, will of course, be humiliated. They didn't need US treatment of Saddam for that, in any event.

In the end, it is Iraqis that matter. If (and it is a big if) Saddam's capture and facing a trial liberates the country...i.e. makes it possible for people to speak their minds, become more comfortable with participating in post-Saddam Iraq, and lessens fear ... than it is a good thing.

BTW, not that any arab nationalist who wants to feel humiliated would care, I actually thought that the US treatment of Saddam was appropriate and on the humaine side. They gave him a medical check...they didn't frog march him naked in front of cameras, they didn't call out his name in a mass assembly and have him taken out and summarilly shot. They didn't have him tortured or have the soles of his feet beaten. They didn't rape his daughters in front of him. THey didn't amputate any of his limbs. They didn't attach batteries to his private parts and turn on the juice. They didn't gas him. They didn cut him with knives. THey didn't turn him over to his son's weilding baseball bats...and on and on.

They gave him a physical, a shave and checked his DNA. Pretty bad and darn humiliating.

The difficulty, and the US will never be the right ones to make this argument, btw, is that the only humiliation that Arabs should feel about Saddam is the humiliation that he has brought on himself and them...he wasted the resources, both human and natural, of the Iraqi nation for years. He robbed them, he murdered them, he got them into pointless wars that killed millions of them (and Iranians). Arabs need to use this opportunity to "try" Saddam, and to establish a rule of law that holds leaders in their nations responsible.

Indeed, the trial of Saddam should make Saudis and Syrian Baathist think a little harder about the world they are building. The masses turn to fundumentalist Islam, because leaders like Saddam are theives and murderers and put themselves and families above the law and justice. Some in the Arab masses have grabbed on to this sort of fundumentalist Islam in an effort to find Justice.

Anyway, in the end, Saddam is his own humiliation. Redemption for Arab honor lies in trying him and convicting him for his perversion of their dignity and his usurpation of their honor.

I don't expect it to happen, but it could....

[Oerdin]

Originally posted by GePap
I wonder why Oerdin has such an Arab hangup?

I've been reading alot about Arab culture and Arab societies since I will be spending the next year in Iraq. I must admite that the more I look the more I find I dislike. There are many good things about Arab culture but they are being drowned out by a vast number of negatives.

BTW I wouldn't call two threads in one day a hangup.

[GePap]

Most of the threads you make are ME or Arab related.

[Whoha]

Whats humiliating are the something awful photoshops of the man.

[Az]

Poor Saddam.

[Tripledoc]

The strange thing is that there is no public wish for humiliating anyone. people are tired. And still the Media and Press agants still want to ram it down our throats. "A Pathetic Old Man". A Coward Hiding in a Cave". "The Death Penalty Would be too Kind".

I think they have it wrong. Journalists are a bunch of alcoholic bastards. They don't hold their jobs, because they are honest. maybe it some sort of exquisite satire. But like I said, people are tired. They can't stand it anymore.

[Oncle Boris]

LOSING A WAR MEANS BEING HUMILIATED. DUH! But this is precisely what the USA did to Germany and Japan in WWII, to England in the Revolutionary war, to the south in the civil war, and to the USSR in the end of the cold war, etc., etc.

Indeed, the US was particularly kind towards Nazis that could give them some help. Only the useless ones were hanged.

Now to your main argument: Whether or not the left use this as an argument is irrelevant. I am a leftist and I don't think it is a good one.

The fact that some Arabs claim they are humiliated is interesting, though. Not taking that into account in your strategy is dumb. Failure to convince them of the opposite through propaganda could be catastrophic. We're not talking about how they should feel; we're talking about how they feel and what should be done about this.

There is something most Americans don't seem to understand: colonialism is humiliating. Would you really expect a colonized country to feel gratitude towards its mother-Empire because it built railroads and a postal service? This has happened in the industrial era. I don't think Quebec or India is any thankful to England for this. They'd rather have done it themselves.

To summarize: American imperialism is threatening; economic vassalization is humiliating. Given America's foreign policy, both sentiments are not unjustified.

Guess what's going to happen in Iraq: the money of the reconstruction will go back to the US through profits. Iraqis will likely get the low-ranking jobs while foreign engineers direct the whole thing. Oil companies will import their own worker and have them live in rich and enclosed quarters to protect them against Iraqi resentment (which can only rise from such actions).

And another thing about humiliation: do you know what the US troops do when they suspect a house might contain partisans? They take all men of service age of the neighboring area, tie them with handcuffs and bring them away from the fight, to make sure they don't help the resisters. Now if you spent a few hours handcuffed on the public place, would you feel humiliated? Would you then feel like denouncing other resisters, or would you rather bring them food in their shelters?

[Pekka]

If Saddam represents ME and people get humiliated because of his treatment, then I say get humiliated.

If Saddam represents the dictator human scum that he is and people get humiliated, then I say go see a shrink.

[Az]

I think they have it wrong. Journalists are a bunch of alcoholic bastards.

Yeah. They're probably gay, too.

[Tripledoc]

Originally posted by Azazel

Quote:

I think they have it wrong. Journalists are a bunch of alcoholic bastards.

Yeah. They're probably gay, too.

It is well known that journalists are heavy drinkers. They are not gay. Only rightwing politicians are.

Maybe Azazel is dissapointed that the Jewish killing machine did not get to Saddam first? Tough luck Azazel. No gloating for you this time.

[Kuciwalker]

I was wondering, do Muslims believe in the seven deadly sins? If so, humility is good for them

[Az]

Maybe Azazel is dissapointed that the Jewish killing machine did not get to Saddam first? Tough luck Azazel. No gloating for you this time.

But I am. I wish we'd get Saddam first.

You, on the other hand, seem to be sorry that they got Saddam.

[Tripledoc]

Originally posted by Azazel
You, on the other hand, seem to be sorry that they got Saddam.

Democracy does not mean that one has to share every single thought one has. You have a totalitarian concept of Democracy, but that is understandable.

[Az]

Democracy does not mean that one has to share every single thought one has. You have a totalitarian concept of Democracy, but that is understandable.

If you want to troll, please make it at least somehow connected to the issue that you're responding to.

[Datajack Franit]

LOL Azazel, you are the last person I expect to say sth like that

Poor Saddam..

[Bereta_Eder]

Originally posted by Oncle Boris

To summarize: American imperialism is threatening; economic vassalization is humiliating. Given America's foreign policy, both sentiments are not unjustified.

Exactly.

Guess what's going to happen in Iraq: the money of the reconstruction will go back to the US through profits.

Precicely.

Now if you spent a few hours handcuffed on the public place, would you feel humiliated? Would you then feel like denouncing other resisters, or would you rather bring them food in their shelters?

Not only that. They go to houses and drag men, women and children out, literally terrorizing them. Haven't you seen the video with little children crying in the embrace of their mothers?

This is invasion pure and simple. Hell even the Nazis justified the burning up of whole villages and the murder of whole male populations under the argument that it's "fighting against terrorism".

You can't liberate someone by blowing his 2 year old son's guts out and then say sorry, collateral damage, but hey you're free now! (we'll suck you for all you got).

of course there's going to be anger. Duh.

[Bereta_Eder]

And be seen as humiliation.

[Az]

Originally posted by Datajack Franit
LOL Azazel, you are the last person I expect to say sth like that

Poor Saddam..

I am joking.

[Patroklos]

Heh,

If you are actually insinuating that America is going to make money off this venture then I will just start ignoring you now, because you obviously have no idea what your talking about. However, I will tell you who will make money. All those European pacifists who didn't give a dam about libertaing Iraq but sure are whining about their contracts (which they will probobly eventually get). Good for them, no investment and good returns.

Yeah colonialism is a horrible thing, good thing nothing even resembleing it is going on. No population transfers, no social codes, no taxation, partial home rule, and the occupation force doing its damnedist (you can argue how good they are doing but not whether they are trying) to leave. Yep, direct correlation, great job. But your right, I bet our European critics know alot more about colonialism having been the imperialists for a few centuries and all, and we just having the experiance of a colony.

An invasion, you are correct. Though I don't think anyone has denied that, only debated on why. And of course I expect things to be destroyed and people to be killed and @Paikitis I suppose so that we don't have to make any woman and childeren cry we just won't search for the enemy, I bet that will end the war and the suffering of the Iraqis much sooner....

As has always been the case, you are trying to apply the modified civilized world that your societies have crafted for you to the raw real world that now exists in Iraq and in that world; people will die, infrastructure will be destroyed, wars are nessecary, no war is ever about truly unselfish causes (not that America ever claimed that), and the losers were humiliated though at least when America does it we rebuild the country so they don't experiance it for nothing. Of couerse we could use Fance and Britians WWI victory policy since you don't seem to like our way and that is the only other.

This whole equating America and conservatives to Nazis and Facists thing is interesting, Really, is admitting that you have no true arguement that can hold up to logic and reasoning so you arbitrarily associate us with a word that generates hate for anyone hearing it, and of course anyone bieng associated with it. A good tactic, though totally unfair and vile, like one that was used by, say.... Facists?

-Pat

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Every time some despot falls in the middle east--an all-too-infrequent occurence, unfortunately--we hear from the left that this is wrong, because it "humiliates the Arabs" (or the Muslims), with their presumably ultra-sensitive national pride. (Of course, the same sort of pride--in a much milder form--is considered intolerably "racist xenophobia" when displayed by Americans, but I digress.) As proof, we get video clips of the latest mob-for-hire shouting "Death to America!" out of their own free will with no coersion whatsoever--in Teheran or Islamabad or Cairo or Tripoli, those bastions of free expression of public opinion.

Those people who get those panties all bunched up by worrying about the "feelings" of the poor Arabs are just extremist idiots.

[dannubis]

No, the average american is not going to make money out of the iraqi adventure. The 'friends in high places' however ... and this is the sentiment living amongst those 'pacifist europeans'. So take your mindless accusations and stick them where the sun doesn't shine.

And as far as the facist thing goes, it is just an argument that can be followed. In none of your comments you have ever considered that the society model you charish might actually be morally equal to theirs. How unfacist of you indeed...

[Sandman]

How about HERE, HERE,
HERE, Here, and HERE for starters.

Two Aljazeera stories and three pages from the Randi Foundation Forums, two from the same thread?

The Aljazeera stories are about Arabs feeling humiliated, not left-wingers arguing that it's bad to humiliate the Arabs, as you claim in the first sentence of the first post in the thread:

Every time some despot falls in the middle east--an all-too-infrequent occurence, unfortunately--we hear from the left that this is wrong, because it "humiliates the Arabs" (or the Muslims), with their presumably ultra-sensitive national pride.

And no-one on those Randi Foundation threads, left-winger or otherwise, is arguing that winning the war was a bad thing because it humiliates the Arabs, a small handful either urge caution or don't care.

You seem to be confusing the capture of Saddam with winning the war, as well. Not showing those pictures of Saddam in order to avoid humiliating Arabs is quite different from not winning the war in order to avoid humiliating Arabs:

When the left says "don't humiliate the Arabs", what it really means is "don't you dare win the war, your enemy might not like it!".

[alva]

Oerdin, it's a relious thing, not much you can do about it.

[Bereta_Eder]

Originally posted by Patroklos
Heh,

If you are actually insinuating that America is going to make money off this venture then I will just start ignoring you now, because you obviously have no idea what your talking about. However, I will tell you who will make money. All those European pacifists who didn't give a dam about libertaing Iraq but sure are whining about their contracts (which they will probobly eventually get). Good for them, no investment and good returns.

Yeah colonialism is a horrible thing, good thing nothing even resembleing it is going on. No population transfers, no social codes, no taxation, partial home rule, and the occupation force doing its damnedist (you can argue how good they are doing but not whether they are trying) to leave. Yep, direct correlation, great job. But your right, I bet our European critics know alot more about colonialism having been the imperialists for a few centuries and all, and we just having the experiance of a colony.

An invasion, you are correct. Though I don't think anyone has denied that, only debated on why. And of course I expect things to be destroyed and people to be killed and @Paikitis I suppose so that we don't have to make any woman and childeren cry we just won't search for the enemy, I bet that will end the war and the suffering of the Iraqis much sooner....

As has always been the case, you are trying to apply the modified civilized world that your societies have crafted for you to the raw real world that now exists in Iraq and in that world; people will die, infrastructure will be destroyed, wars are nessecary, no war is ever about truly unselfish causes (not that America ever claimed that), and the losers were humiliated though at least when America does it we rebuild the country so they don't experiance it for nothing. Of couerse we could use Fance and Britians WWI victory policy since you don't seem to like our way and that is the only other.

This whole equating America and conservatives to Nazis and Facists thing is interesting, Really, is admitting that you have no true arguement that can hold up to logic and reasoning so you arbitrarily associate us with a word that generates hate for anyone hearing it, and of course anyone bieng associated with it. A good tactic, though totally unfair and vile, like one that was used by, say.... Facists?

-Pat

Patroklos, I don't disagree with anything you say - except that the US will not make money out of it. I think it could, but we can bypass that for the moment.

Oerdin is wondering why the Arabs are reacting the way they do. I simply try to convey the other side of the story without necessairily agreeing with it, or claiming it as my own.
But it IS the other side of the story. And perhaps it can help have a more well rounded perception of the whole image for those who can't - I'm not saying YOU can't.

I accept I trolled a bit when I talked about Nazis, but I think it's midly interesting that the word "terrorism" was used by them too.