On Monday 2005-05-02 17:39, d.brin wrote: > Any of you who haven't joined our regular Thursday pm gathering > online, using my Holocene Chat interface, are welcome to let me know. > Several brinellers participate. Each Thursday 4pm Pacific. > > --- > > This from my blog.... > > > Still too swamped to continue the formal essay. But let me call to > your attention a TV show that has run in some markets, covering > elements in our world that I have called anti-modernist. The > following (italicized) is from the web site. > > <i><b> The Power of Nightmares</b> explores how the idea that we are > threatened by a hidden and organized terrorist network is an > illusion. Director Adam Curtis theorizes that it's a myth that has > spread unquestioned through politics, the security services and the > international media. > > At the heart of his story are two groups: the American > neo-conservatives and the radical Islamists. > > <b>Sayyed Qutb: Father of Radical Islam </b> > In the 1950s Sayyed Qutb, an Egyptian civil servant was sent to the > U.S. to learn about its public education system. As he traveled > around the county, Qutb became increasingly disgusted by what he felt > was the selfish and materialistic nature of American life. > > When he returned to Egypt, Qutb turned into a revolutionary.
I have read and forgotten Qutb's biography and some of his work. At this point he is an activist and budding revolutionary. So Brin's narrative is slightly misleading. > Determined to find some way to control the forces of selfish > individualism that he saw in America, he envisioned an Arab society > where Islam would play a more central role. He became an influential > spokesperson in the Muslim Brotherhood but was jailed after some of > its members attempted to assassinate Egyptian President Nasser. > > In prison a more radical Qutb Again this is misleading. It is important to make clear that imprisonment and government torture of Qutb and his bretheren radicalized Qutb. Eg. "His experience in prison radicalized Qutb, and his revolutionary ideology reached full bloom..." > wrote several books which argued that > extreme measures, including deception and even violence, could be > justified in an effort to restore shared moral values to society. He > was executed in 1966 for treason in Egypt. Something about the execution making him a martyr. > But his ideas lived on and > formed the basis of the radical Islamist movement. Break for new subject. > Leo Strauss Leo Strauss was a professor of political philosophy at > the University of Chicago. > > <b>Leo Strauss: A Neo-Conservative </b> > At the same time Leo Strauss, an American professor of political > philosophy, also came to see western liberalism as corrosive to > morality and to society. Like Qutb, Strauss believed that individual > freedoms threatened to tear apart the values which held society > together. He taught his students that politicians should assert > powerful and inspiring myths - like religion or the myth of the > nation - that everyone could believe in. Glosses over Strauss' (Strauss or Stauss?) glorification of Western Civilization and values in contrast to Qutb's complete condemnation of the same greco-pagan and Judeo-Christian values. I have not read Strauss, but my impression is that it started as a movement WITHIN the liberal or leftist wing of the struggle for Western Culture arguing for the absolute and universal imperative toward Western Civilizational Values and explicitly against liberal and radical relativism. Indeed, the Kennedy administration was Neo-Conservative in contemporary terms. Through the 1960's and 1970's, however, ethical relativism (once the darling of the extreme fascist right) moved to the very center of liberal-leftist-radical thought. Ironically, relativism gives no ideological or political traction to the left. Faith is of no utility and fundamentalism impossible when leftism is hybridized with relativism. Without fundamentalism there is no fanaticism and with no fanaticism, activism dies. Relativism realized leftism thereby rendering leftism impotent. The leftist sea-change in favor of relativism left the Straussian liberals with no one to ally with but the right. It is only in the 1970's than one can properly begin to talk about "Neo-Conservatives". Well at any rate you need to mention Alan Bloom since he connects the young turks to Strauss. > A group of young students, including Paul Wolfowitz, Francis Fukuyama > and William Kristol studied Strauss' ideas and formed a loose group > in Washington which became known as the neo-conservatives. They set > out to create a myth of America as a unique nation whose destiny was > to battle against evil in the world. > > Both Qutb and Strauss were idealists whose ideas were born out of the > failure of the liberal dream to build a better world. Perceived failure, mind you. One could argue that the liberal/communist era DID build a better world. Brin should, it is easy to argue that even communism was an advance over Tsarist monarchy and Bautista's quisling kleptocracy. (Ardent [American conservative] anti-communists do not buy it but the argument is MORE than merely plausible.) > The two > movements they inspired set out, in their different ways, to rescue > their societies from this decay.</i> > > For more of this writeup, see: > http://www.cbc.ca/passionateeye/powerofnightmares/one.html > _______________________________________________ > http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
