Ah, Stanley
February 14, 2006
Stanely Fish is coming around, or at least saying more openly what I have long suspected he must believe or admit–and in The New York Times to boot:
I would bet that the editors who have run the cartoons do not believe that Muslims are evil infidels who must either be converted or vanquished. They do not publish the offending cartoons in an effort to further some religious or political vision; they do it gratuitously, almost accidentally. Concerned only to stand up for an abstract principle — free speech — they seize on whatever content happens to come their way and use it as an example of what the principle should be protecting. The fact that for others the content may be life itself is beside their point.
This is itself a morality — the morality of a withdrawal from morality in any strong, insistent form. It is certainly different from the morality of those for whom the Danish cartoons are blasphemy and monstrously evil. And the difference, I think, is to the credit of the Muslim protesters and to the discredit of the liberal editors.
The argument from reciprocity — you do it to us, so how can you complain if we do it to you? — will have force only if the moral equivalence of “us” and “you” is presupposed. But the relativizing of ideologies and religions belongs to the liberal theology, and would hardly be persuasive to a Muslim.
This is why calls for “dialogue,” issued so frequently of late by the pundits with an unbearable smugness — you can just see them thinking, “What’s wrong with these people?” — are unlikely to fall on receptive ears. The belief in the therapeutic and redemptive force of dialogue depends on the assumption (central to liberalism’s theology) that, after all, no idea is worth fighting over to the death and that we can always reach a position of accommodation if only we will sit down and talk it out.
But a firm adherent of a comprehensive religion doesn’t want dialogue about his beliefs; he wants those beliefs to prevail. Dialogue is not a tenet in his creed, and invoking it is unlikely to do anything but further persuade him that you have missed the point — as, indeed, you are pledged to do, so long as liberalism is the name of your faith.
This comes by way of The Revealer, which identifies Fish as a “Florida attorney.” I understand that after a notorious but estimable academic career, Professor Fish is in his dotage teaching law at Florida International University. Ignorance is chronic at the Revealer, which adds the following bit of sarcasm as commentary on Fish’s remarks:
The obvious, implied solution is that they start taking the opposing belief system, say, Christianity, more seriously, and enlist in the new Crusades not as willy-nilly nationalists, but as stern true believers who realize now (and never) is no time to try to get along.
Unfortunately, Professor Fish implies no such thing.
This is Ah, Stanley in The Japery, a part of The New Pantagruel. Previously: Kuntsler in Fine Form | Next: A Nation of Tattooed, Overfed Clowns in Paramilitary Drag | TrackBack (1) | Comments (0)
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Tracked on February 15, 2006 11:46 PM