-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
The Right is on a crusade to show that Islam is evil. The use of the attack on Lara Logan to further that agenda is despicable. The assault was almost certainly perpetrated by pro-Mubarak thugs who were sent out to rough up journalists and protestors. Now the Mubarak supporters here in the U.S. are using the attack on Lara Logan to further their own political agenda.
Right wing blogger Debbie Schlussel is one of the Mubarak apologists using the assault on Lara Logan to push her hatred of Muslims.
Her claim that Muslims are evil, when it was Egyptian soldiers, almost surely Muslim, that rescued Lara Logan, is a prima facie absurdity.
I am under no illusions about this leg of the Abrahamic Triad. There is no such thing as a “Religion of Peace.” When someone believes that Jehovah/Allah/Yahweh is giving the orders, any atrocity is justifiable.
Religions are engaged in a continuous struggle for survival. The priests/mullahs/rabbis are not about to give up their power without a fight. A common defensive tactic is for one religion to show how bad the other religions are, a form of “comparative exceptionalism.” Of course, each religion gets to define what constitutes good and bad, so the reasoning is strictly circular, that is, strictly fallacious.
Separation of church/mosque/temple and state is essential to check the power of religion.
michellefrommadison 1, February 19, 2011 at 1:11 pm
you are fucking sick
michelleofmadison,
It’s a sign of the times. There’s a state representative in Georgia who’s proposing legislation that would require proof that a woman’s miscarriage is the result of natural causes. There’s the possibilty that a woman could be charged with a felony if she can’t provide such proof during an investigation if the legislation passes. And don’t forget that some members of our House of Representatives in Washington were proposing legislation that would “redefine” rape.
Thus far demonstrations have been peaceful with no arrests … we’ll see what the Republican Teabagger thugs bring to the table.
This move by the Republicans was completely expected (remember the lawyer thugs that went down from D.C. to disrupt the count in Florida back in 2000). The Unions have purposely practiced a strict discipline of protest behavior in anticipation of the teabagging thugs arrival. The same is being anticipated in Ohio.
Lara Logan has been accused of being naively provocative, a very attractive young woman in Western dress in a country where such open displays of pulchritude are considered immoral. It’s clear that Lara Logan needs some time in prison for prostituting herself like that in the streets. And, for her to not be charged yet for her crimes is an insult to the adult-industry.
Bdaman,
I have a very liberal male friend who said pretty much the same thing to me the other day.
She should have never been placed in that position by CBS. CBS then refused to report an account on one of their own correspondents. How could anyone put a woman in a position where there are thousands and thousands of male revelers and inadequate security. The adrenaline had already been raging for days.
It’s a sick story and my heart goes out to Ms. Logan.
Stamford Liberal,
I do hope those groups support their fellow union members.
“We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.” ~Benjamin Franklin
I was positively giddy while watching it! Don’t forget the state troopers union is exempt as well.
I’m curious to see if both police unions will join the protests on behalf of their fellow union members.
Great video Stamford! Firefighters and police were exempted because those organizations supported Walker durng the campaign. I hope they have seen the light now.
SM:
Thursday, Feb 17, 2011 14:18 ET
How 480 characters unraveled my career
My tweets about Lara Logan cost me my job and humiliated my family. Here’s what I meant to say By Nir Rosen
After early reports of CBS chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan’s attack in Egypt, a number of writers and pundits came under fire for inappropriate comments. Journalist Nir Rosen was among them. A short burst of Twitter responses from Rosen earned him the ire of many, and caused him to resign his fellowship at New York University’s Center on Law and Security. Salon asked Rosen to explain what happened.
With 480 characters I undid a long career defending the weak and victims of injustice. There is no excuse for what I wrote. At the time, I did not know that the attack against Lara Logan was so severe, or included apparent sexual violence. Even so, any violence against anyone is wrong. I’ve apologized, lost my job, and humiliated myself and my family. But I, at least, don’t want to go down looking like a sexist pig. I am not. I am a staunch supporter of women’s rights, gay rights and the rights of the weak anywhere in the world.
This is not the first time my words have landed me in trouble. I have been challenged many times on my support of resistance movements and my support of engaging with America’s enemies, and I have never and will never apologize for those stances. I continue to apologize for this comment because it in no way reflects the way I feel about women or violence. Sexual assault is never funny, and it is a terrible crime. I have apologized to Ms. Logan and her family, and to victims of sexual violence everywhere.
So why did I write it? It was a disgusting comment born from dark humor I have developed working in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen and Lebanon — and a need to provoke people. I have a few think tank friends on Twitter, and we often banter about the morality of WikiLeaks, counterinsurgency and other issues. When I first heard the news about Logan, I assumed she was roughed up like every other journalist — which is still bad — but I was jokingly trying to provoke one of my think tank friends on Twitter, thoughtlessly, of course, and terribly insensitively. Stupidly, I didn’t think the banter between myself and a couple of other guys would amount to anything.
Now, Twitter is no place for nuance, which is why I should have stuck to long-form journalism. And I have been frustrated by the ideological opportunists who have used this ordeal for their personal gain. People whose words have helped create and justify war and genocide are now jumping onto this issue to attack me for my previous journalism (which, naturally, I stand by). People like Jeffrey Goldberg, who has blood on his hands, and now acts like he’s never heard of me, jump in and use the disgusting situation of Logan’s assault as a lever against a longtime rival. Others include Michael Totten, Lee Smith and Jim Geraghty of the National Review, who led the crusade against me. I used a horrible situation as a way to provoke some friends. They are using it to further their careers.
So, given the opportunity here for some nuance, I feel I should explain the point I really was trying to make. Had Logan been a non-white, non-famous journalist, this story would have never made it to the news. Ahmed Mahmoud, an Egyptian journalist, was killed in cold blood and nobody ever heard of him. Dozens of other women were harassed and nobody will ever know their names. Credible accounts indicate that the assaults on women took place largely on the Friday of the victory celebration, when millions of non-demonstrators joined the party. Countless women (Egyptian and foreign, journalists and others) have reported being harassed and assaulted in Tahrir Square that Friday, mostly, it seems, by non-revolutionaries. (This harassment was a preexisting problem that Egyptian women have been increasingly complaining about.)
So why all the focus on Logan? The U.S. media did not care when Egyptian journalists (or any other Egyptian) were being jailed. Only when pretty white people showed up did Egypt really start to matter, and then, they were preoccupied with the scary Muslim Brotherhood possibly taking over, or what would happen to poor Israel now that there was a “threat” of democracy in Egypt.
This is why I wrote in a Twitter that I was already rolling my eyes. Even before we knew what happened to her, I knew how to anticipate the media response in the United States. So Logan and Anderson Cooper have become the story, instead of the thousands of Egyptians who have far more compelling stories.
Meanwhile, I have not seen any condemnation of the pure hatred, racism and vitriol that I’ve seen spewed all over the Internet in response to the Logan story. I’ve seen Arabs, Muslims and Egyptians called animals and pigs in tens of websites and, right under the Logan stories, read vile rhetoric about them that would never be acceptable if used against any other group.
I really have been outraged by Logan’s stories in the past, which I feel have defended American imperial adventures that cost the lives of many thousands of people in the Middle East, glorified American special forces even while they were killing innocent Afghans, and praised Gen. Stanley McChrystal, while condemning her own colleague, Michael Hastings, of Rolling Stone (because he hadn’t served his country, she said). My resentment of Logan was because I felt she was a terrible journalist who supported wars that I had covered.
But joking about her assault betrayed the very principles that led me to condemn her in the first place. And her destructive reporting has nothing to do with the crime she suffered, nothing at all. I point it out now only to explain my thinking, not to justify or defend the hurt I caused.
Still, right-wing American pundits called for Julian Assange to be assassinated, and it’s perfectly acceptable to proudly support wars that kill thousands of innocent people. Racist right-wing pundits can say whatever they want on serious platforms, Ann Coulter can call for more journalists to be jailed in Egypt at CPAC (and be met with applause) but I made a callous joke on Twitter, a medium far less serious (I thought), and an entire mob turns on me. It’s hard not to be cynical about many of the sanctimonious responses I have received. Especially when they come from people who support every kind of American war (or Israeli war), tolerate racism against Arabs and Muslims, and — while focusing on the plight of celebrities — ignore outrages like our scorched-earth policies in Kandahar. The attacks have aimed at ending my career, but my career will endure because my work stands on its own.
I’m baffled by the fact that 1,000 new people started to follow me on Twitter. What do they expect to read? It’s a bizarre, voyeuristic Internet culture and everybody in the mob is looking to get in on the next fight first, to be at the center of the thing that’s happening, even if there’s nothing really there. Which might explain the thousands of stupid e-mails and tweets I have received from the mob wanting to get a punch in. But given that I have been condemned for seeming to condone sexual assault, it’s surprising how many hundreds (no exaggeration) of people have e-mailed me wishing that I or people close to me will be sexually assaulted.
I also don’t think this would have become such a story if I were not a leftist opponent of American wars (even the Washington Post stressed my “pro-Palestinian and pro-Arab political views”) and I have a hard time taking a lot of the sanctimonious condemnation from right-wingers very seriously, given what right-wing pundits say on a daily basis. But every creep I skewered or outraged in public now has the chance at a cheap revenge. Unfortunately, what I said in glib frustration didn’t really damage the culture I was targeting, it just damaged my allies, my friends and the causes I struggle for.
There’s probably some larger lesson about social media to be drawn here, and how its immediacy can be great in its power to connect us, but also a liability because something blurted out and not meant to be serious acquires a greater power. Then, an offensive joke can be seen as an ideological manifesto, gallows humor can be seen as a serious support for sexual assault. I only wish this had been apparent to me before I hit enter.
I hope that one day people will believe me when I say that I did not mean it and that it does not reflect who I am. I hope that people will take time to read my work and understand that I have spent my career taking a lot of heat for defending victims of all kinds, not just Arabs and Muslims. And I hope Ms. Logan and other victims of sexual violence will one day forgive me for my terrible mistake.
Nir Rosen is a freelance writer, photographer and filmmaker who has worked in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Somalia. He is the author of “In the Belly of the Green Bird: The Triumph of the Martyrs in Iraq.”
http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/02/17/nir_rosen_explains_twitter_controversy/index.html
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While I hope that Mr. Rosen has learned from this colossal mistake, it is highly doubtful others will learn from this.
rafflaw:
Wonder if this will add pressure to Walker –
Firefighters! Bagpipes! Unions!
Rapturous cheers greet a show of solidarity from Wisconsin firefighters at the state capitol Video
By Andrew Leonard It’s Glenn Beck’s worst nightmare — firefighters invading government buildings in a spine-tingling display of union solidarity. Don’t they know the Wisconsin protests are a Muslim Brotherhood plot to create a one-world Marxist government?
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nc4TXdPxUcE&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&version=3]
As the on-scene narrator notes — firefighters are exempt from Gov. Scott Walker’s attempt to strip collective bargaining rights from state employees, but that doesn’t seem to have split union ranks in Wisconsin.
Credit for the video goes to “jessarp24.”
Stamford,
The unions are in a fight for their lives in Wisconsin and Ohio and across the country. The Tea Party should be backing the unions if they are for the freedom to negotiate a fair wage. You are correct that the Right has demonized them and made false allegations about their pensions. The average teacher pension in Wisconsin is $24,000. In Illinois, the teachers do not pay into Social Security and their pensions are in lieu of Social Security. I know that there are other states who handle the teachers pensions the same way as Illinois. The unions must make a stand in Wisconsin now that the tide seems to be turning in terms of public sentiment. Maybe it is time to start a recall Walker drive.
The only person that lost a job over this was someone on the left, Nir Rosen, who had been critical of Ms. Logan’s pro Aghan war sentiments.
You can fool some of the people some of the time,but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time:
Fox Reporter Greeted With ‘Fox Lies’ Chants In Madison
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/18/fox-reporter-greeted-with-fox-lies-chants_n_825393.html
eniobob:
“I’m taking that a step further,today they say that there are going to be **tea party** people coming from out of state to Wisconsin to demonstrate against the workers of Wisconsin.WHAT??”
I had to do a double-take when I heard this last night. The rabid and ridiculous Right has managed – once again – to distort the message of the demonstrations. With their millions of dollars spent in propoganda, the Koch Bros. et al have managed to drill into the teabaggers heads that state employees and union members earn far more than those doing the same work in the private sector. They have managed to portray state employees and union members as living lavishly on the taxpayers dime. I think it’s quite genius, actually. The millionaires and billionaires are sitting comfortably in their cushy surroundings while having the little people do their dirty work. They are using the same tactics the teabaggers falsely accuse Democrats and liberal of using, by taking disenfranchised people and telling them exactly what they want to hear, facts be damned, and demonize those who they falsely blame for the country’s woes – Josef Goebbels would be proud.
After hearing last night that the unions are willing to bargain and make concessions and Walker’s refusal of their offer to sit at the table, it just confirms for me what is already becoming well known. This has absolutely nothing to do with spending cuts and everything to do with ensuring the destruction of unions, the people that support them and the lower and middle classes – Democrats.
What is the argument OVER Lara Logan? Other than “Holy Hannah (or insert highest power plea of choice) I hope she is getting eveything she needs to heal from this and is alright”
That first. That + ensuring that her safety and needs are met FIRST. Any other use of this incident that is not preceded by that thought and ACTION is inappropriate, inhumane, incivil, exploitative, crude and will be teaching every other human being in this Countries and others that that is acceptable.
Religions, Profits, Governments, Corporations…are made up of people. What they learn is OK….will be OK.
I hope she was taking birth control…
“rcampbell 1, February 19, 2011 at 8:31 am
Throughout the events in Egypt I was struck by the absudity of Fox News and other right wingers, particularly on the radio, defending a brutal dictator over the people’s demand for democracy.”
I’m taking that a step further,today they say that there are going to be **tea party** people coming from out of state to Wisconsin to demonstrate against the workers of Wisconsin.WHAT???
Ms Logan is a courageous young lady/reporter.
A repost :
“At that very moment, as we now know, CBS News reporter Lara Logan was recovering from a brutal sexual assault that occurred the prior day when she was coering one of the demonstrations in Egypt. A mob separated her from her crew and she was assaulted by a group of men.
That’s what happens when you get out of the luxury hotel and actually do some work.”
http://blog.nj.com/njv_paul_mulshine/2011/02/post_72.html
I learned of the rabid and ridiculous Right’s attacks against Lara Logan while watching “The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell” the other night. To say I am still shocked over comments I’ve read from Schussel, et al is a mild understatement.
Is there really any wonder why moderate conservatives are alienating the GOP? I certainly wouldn’t want any part of a group that not only proudly displays its intolerance, pettiness, hatred, ignorance, and its utter disdain for anyone not of their ilk, but is a great recruiting tool for those fringe Muslims who are just as illogical as the “new” GOP.
The subhuman Schussel and her cohorts call Muslims “savages.” Kettle? Pot calling …
Throughout the events in Egypt I was struck by the absudity of Fox News and other right wingers, particularly on the radio, defending a brutal dictator over the people’s demand for democracy.
So they think it can be done that easily….