We have in our society today entire groups of people who have decided that they exist to take offence at things. Not only that, but they think they have some inherent right never to be offended. They think they are meant to go through life never being offended, and if they are, they think someone is going to have to pay.
A culture of offence has sprung up in which all sorts of folks are hyper-sensitive to seemingly everything. One has to walk on egg shells for fear of offending anyone. A wrong word, a wrong turn of phrase, a wrong look, and all hell can break loose. This of course fully ties in with Political Correctness and our culture of complaint.
We think we are owed everything, and we think life is about a never-ending stream of rights (but no responsibilities). Thus we somehow think we have a fundamental right never to be offended. As far as I am aware, there is no charter or declaration spelling out such rights, but it has become a major growth industry in the West nonetheless.
Thus if you dare to speak up in favour of heterosexual marriage, for example, every activist group on the planet goes into a spin, begins to foam at the mouth, and screams about how much they have been offended. They think it should be against the law to be subject to anything which might offend them.
Of course the most glaring example of all this is radical Islam, and their never ending offence-taking. Any and every excuse will do to take offence, and they effectively have much of the West in a condition of dhimmitude, with leaders, the MSM, and our cultural elites all fearful of saying anything or doing anything which might offend the religion of peace.
And one can almost forgive such fear and cowardice: dare to say anything which even remotely might be seen as an insult or a slight of Islam, and airplanes start flying, bombs go off, and the rioting begins. Whether it is Danish cartoons, or supposed disrespect for the Koran, or any film which might be made critical of this faith, and the explosive repercussions instantly occur.
The latest round of riots are supposed to be about some film recently made about Islam. I have not seen the film, and I don’t really wish to focus on it here. Even if it was so horrific, the question is: so what? Every day of the week offensive, derogatory and insulting remarks and more are made about Christianity and Christians.
The last time I checked they did not respond with a quick batch of flying lessons, or the blowing up of innocent men, women and children in crowded public spaces. Nor were fatwas issued, or protests held with banners proudly displaying the words, “Behead all those who insult Jesus” or “Death to all those who dare mock Christianity”.
The radicals are in a perpetual state of taking offence, and no amount of grovelling, apologising or appeasement will change things. Indeed, a steady stream of apologies and kowtowing to the radicals simply ups the ante, and causes them to make even more of a stink, and expect even more dhimmi responses from the West.
Commentator Bruce Thornton has recently written about this very issue: “Einstein’s definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results. By this standard, our foreign policy in the Middle East has been managed by crazy people since 1979. In fact, so consistent are the mistakes and delusions characterizing our responses to the jihadists that anything one can say has already been written.
“The riots and violence in Afghanistan over some accidentally burned Korans are following a script that by now is all too drearily familiar. As we have seen over the years with the riots over the Mohammed cartoons, Pope Benedict’s comments about violence in Islam, or false rumors of Korans flushed down toilets, violent Muslim overreactions to slights are immediately followed by anxious apologies from American leaders. Rather than defusing the anger, however, such groveling merely encourages more contempt and violence.
“I wrote that on FrontPage back in February, but change the first sentence and it applies perfectly to the murders of our ambassador and three other Americans in Libya and the continuing violent demonstrations against our embassies in Yemen and Egypt.”
He continues, “The futility of apology and the lack of reciprocity is as obvious today, when apologies have been followed by more violence, as it was in February: ‘Indeed, over the past few decades, no amount of apologies for alleged “insults” to Muslims has stopped Islamists from attacking us. Nor have the good deeds benefiting Muslims, from rescuing Bosnians from genocide to liberating Libyans from Gaddafi, stopped jihadists from wanting to kill Americans for an endless list of reasons. The past decades of such incidents have shown instead that apologies are useless, and merely confirm the impression among Muslims that we are spiritually inferior, and so endorse the perverse logic that accidentally burning a book is worse than murdering our soldiers and citizens. Why else would we publicly flagellate ourselves over such “insults” even as we say nothing about the Muslim murders of Christians in Egypt and Nigeria, or the Muslim laws prescribing capital punishment for converts to Christianity, or the Muslim vandalizing and destruction of 300 churches in Cyprus, or the Muslim slow-motion extermination of Christians in lands that worshipped Christ for 6 centuries before Islam even existed?’…
“This double standard today, as in previous such episodes, has the same source: a willful refusal to acknowledge the true nature of Islam: ‘What we refuse to accept is the intolerant chauvinism inherent in Islam, the belief that Muslims are the “best of nations” and destined to rule the world. Accepting the double standard merely confirms their superiority and our inferiority. After all, to let someone behave according to one set of principles or standards while demanding that you be subjected to others is to validate a claim of superiority that justifies the disproportionate and unjust behavior. It’s acting like a battered wife, who accepts a beat-down from her husband as justified punishment for burning his dinner. This double standard also reflects incoherent thinking, a failure to apply consistently a principle that presumably has universal validity. Hence we celebrate and practice “tolerance” at the same time we enable, ignore, excuse, and rationalize intolerance. In the West’s struggle with Islamic jihad, our doubts about the superiority of Western beliefs have coupled with this breakdown in ethical reasoning. The result is the appeasement of jihadist aggression and the confirmation of the jihadist estimation of the West’s weakness and corruption’.”
As Mark Steyn has said, “They can’t keep taking offense at everything”. But it seems that is just what they are seeking to do. The more they take offence, the more we apologise and grovel on our faces before the militants. And the more we do that, the more they take offence.
Well, here’s the scoop: I take offence at all these Muslims taking offence at everything. If they want to hate everything about the West while in their own homelands, I guess that is one thing. But when they hold up signs which read, “Behead all those who insult the prophet” – not in Tripoli or Cairo, but in Sydney – then it is time for the West to say, “enough is enough”. If you detest our values and our way of life, no one is forcing you to come here or stay here.
Indeed, I would have to concur with Pam Geller who said yesterday: “You cannot ask me to sacrifice my freedom so as not to offend savages.”
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/bruce-thornton/the-futility-of-apology/
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