> Aspects of the debate on retaliation remind me very much of the
> discussions on "cultural relativism" - the precursor as I take it of
> "multiculturalism" - that took place when I was a student at Chicago.
There
> was much ethical questioning as to whether any culture could judge other
> cultures: whether any culture could say that one culture was "better" than
> another. Or that any set of cultural traits could be judged as "good" or
> "bad." We are still at that debate. In its extreme forms, it goes like
with
> McCain: "They bad, we good."
> Some have the nous to perceive that this is a cultural war, that the
> Islamic fundamentalists are fighting to preserve a way of life which we
may
> not approve of but they continue to find valuable. Sooner or later this
war
> can transform itself into a war, not only of Islam against the rest, but
one
> of all "primitive and archaic"people against the rest. I would be
interested
> in knowing how much Islamic fundamentalism's conversion departments are
> working on this notion.
> A nasty kink in the situation is that, since the U.S. prides itself on
> being "multicultural," it can go on claiming that we are "good" and they
are
> "bad" by pointing out that we do not differentiate ethnically/culturally
but
> only along the line democratic/non-democratic. This continues to blur the
> vital distinctuion between rich powers with big hammers and poor
non-powers
> with few or no hammers, even small ones.
> It goes without saying that any violence against places such as
> Afghanistan, or Pakistan or Iraq will only make this matter infinitely
> worse. It is also clear that American troops will be decimated in such
> places and unable to continue living, and fighting, in the style to which
> they are accustomed.
>
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