From Malcolm X to Barack Obama

Many of us expected some kind of statement or action by Al Qaeda after the election of Barack Obama. But I don't know whether anyone expected anything quite like the statement that appeared yesterday [Al-Qaeda vows to hurt Obama's US, BBC News 19 November 2008].

Malcolm X contrasted "field negroes" who hated their white masters with "house negroes" who, he said, were loyal to them [Message to the grassroots]. Referring explicitly to this speech, Ayman al-Zawahri described President-elect Obama as a "house negro". (Mr al-Zawahri actually used the arabic expression "abeed al-beit, which means "house slave", but this was rendered as "house negro" in the message's English subtitles.) What possible effect is this message supposed to have, in America or in the rest of the world? Or has AlQaeda lost the plot?

• Al-Qaeda plays the race card against Barack Obama … no, seriously (TrainWreckPolitics)
• Al-Qaeda's most epic fail ever (The American Prospect)
  

What effects is it likely to have? Firstly, it has prompted several bloggers to refer sarcastically to the crazy rightwing myth that Obama is actually Malcolm X's love-child. Sounds like Star Wars to me - Obama as a Jedi knight, overcoming the black ideology of his symbolic father. I guess AlQaeda would read the symbolism the other way around - Amerika as Sith. In any case, AlQaeda and the American Right are both attached to the kind of simplistic mythological worldview promoted in films like Star Wars, and perhaps Mr al-Zawahri will be happy to see anything that reinforces this worldview.

The second potential effect is reflexive. People often inadvertently reveal their own weaknesses and shame when criticizing others. Perhaps this is because they focus on those characteristics they are most uncomfortable or ashamed about in themselves. As a result of contrasting President-elect Obama with "honourable Black Americans", Mr al-Zawahri is inevitably going to find himself and his terrorist pals contrasted with "honourable Arab Moslems". And perhaps at some level he thinks this too.

Poetic Justice 2

In my previous post Poetic Justice I commented on the ironic downfall of Eliot Spitzer, and quoted Laura Trevelyan who compared it to Greek tragedy. In a post called Banks, Privacy and Revenge, Adam Shostack writes:

"Eliot Spitzer made a name for himself attacking banks. Setting aside the legitimacy of those attacks, I find it shocking that he didn't realize how much banks know about each one of us. It's doubly shocking that he didn't expect revenge."

For my part, I am always astounded by the things people expect to get away with. Is it sheer arrogance, or an unconscious desire to be found out? There are undoubtedly some people who unconsciously engineer their own downfall. Sigmund Freud (who certainly knew something about Greek tragedy) called this the death drive. Sometimes there is no other obvious explanation for people's self-destructive behaviour.

By chance, I've just been reading a beautiful short book by David Grossman called Lion's Honey, The Myth of Samson. Grossman carefully analyses the biblical story of Samson, who is secretive and yet confides in women, who is betrayed over and over again by these women, who destroys thousands of Philistines and destroys himself in the process.

"He goes through life like a walking enigma, marvelling over his secret, his riddle. He enjoys approaching the dangerous brink of being found out by others. Yet, on second thoughts, the word 'enjoys' is inaccurate: more likely he is driven to this, compelled to confront this feeling, this bitter-tasting knowledge that he is impenetrable, that he cannot be released from his strangeness, nor from the mystery within."

Update

And here's a great summary by Jessica Hagy from "Indexed".


Image copyright (c) 2008 Jessica Hagy

Redemptive Violence

What is the purpose of violence?

Theologian Walter Wink has identified what he calls the Myth of Redemptive Violence - the belief that violence can heal and is indeed the natural way to solve problems.

Ekklesia ("a think tank that promotes transformative theological ideas in public life") reprints a recent article by Wink, Facing the Myth of Redemptive Violence. The Myth is evidently one of the "transformative theological ideas" that Ekklesia is promoting - it is used to comment on various things including the UK Remembrance Day (BBC News, Ekklesia) and the 2005 New Year Peace Message from Pope John Paul II (Vatican, Ekklesia). The Ekklesia commentary seems to imply that the late Pope uses the term redemptive violence, although I couldn't find the term in his text.

Redemption implies some kind of temporal ordering - after the violence comes something good (peace, the Second Coming). The violence is finite, but what comes after the violence might be infinite. The UK Remembrance Day celebrates the Armistice at the end of the First World War, a war that was once designated "the war to end all wars".

The trouble with the myth is not only that it seems to be untrue (violence doesn't seem to have the promised long-term effects) but that it is popular and persuasive (the myth seems to justify and even encourage violence). 

See earlier post: Glory Glory Knockdown Argument

Wikipedia: The Myth of Redemptive Violence, Armistice, War To End All Wars.