by ALEXANDER COCKBURN - Oct 28, 2007
In America awareness never sleeps and has been on particularly active duty this October, designated as Breast Cancer Awareness Month (proclamation of President George Bush); as Domestic Violence Awareness Month (proclamation of President George Bush); as Energy Awareness Month (proclamation of President George Bush and the Environmental Protection Agency); and--we speak here specifically of October 22-29 -- Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week (proclamation of David Horowitz, a fat and hairy ex-Trot living in Los Angeles).
Cautionary interpolation: Horowitz was certainly fat last time I clapped eyes on him and he sports a beard which waxes and wanes in outreach depending on which Google image you look at. And yes, Christopher Hitchens is also a fat and hairy ex-Trot, is also a known associate of the man Horowitz, and also thunders against Islamo-Fascism. Nonetheless we speak here of Horowitz.
When I first saw Horowitz he was neither fat nor hairy nor apparently aware of Islamo-Fascism. This was in the late 1960s in London and he was working for the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation, studying at the feet of Isaac Deutscher and Ralph Miliband. About a decade later I saw him again, this time in Washington DC presiding over a well-publicized "Second Thoughts" conference, announcing his departure from the Left. He spoke harshly of his parents' decision to make him watch uplifting features about the Soviet Union and forbade any Doris Day movies, a common blunder in child-brain-washing techniques among the comrades at that time.
Since then, like other Trotskyist vets, such as the above-mentioned Hitchens, Horowitz has thrown his energies into crusading on behalf of the American right, fuelled in his efforts by copious annual disbursements from the richer denizens of that well populated sector. Richard Mellon Scaife--apex demon in the "vast right-wing conspiracy" identified by Hillary Clinton amid the Lewinsky scandal--has poured millions into Horowitz's organizations, as have other well-heeled conservative foundations. Every now and again Horowitz will raise some spectacularly nutty alarum, like the Los Angeles Times being taken over by pinkoes, and I always assume that Horowitz must be filling out his annual grant applications, and reminding Scaife that others may snooze and idle, but he, Horowitz, is unceasing in his vigilance against sedition.
In Horowitz's bestiary, sedition comes in all the traditional forms, from commies on campus to commies in the press and he's churned out endless bulletins charting their insidious reach. Some of his specific accusations have no doubt been useful to fearful school administrations eager to harry and expel the few radical teachers able to find employment in these bleak times.
But the problem for Horowitz is one of supply. The left in America is really in very poor shape: near zero Commies, and really only a sprinkling of radical black profs, militant Lesbians and kindred antinomians to beat up on. The notion of pinkoes in the media is laughable to all except the fearful imaginations of millionaires like Scaife. Hence the spotlight on Islamo-Fascism, a gloriously vague term whose origin is the topic of a tussle between Malise Ruthven, who used the term in 1980 to describe all authoritarian Islamic governments, and Stephen Schwartz, yet another fat, bearded former Trotskyist who says he was the first to use it in its specific application in 2000, eventually receiving a tap on the shoulder for so doing from Christopher Hitchens and John Sullivan. Arise, Sir Stephen!
Islamo-Fascism Awareness week has been featuring Horowitz and big-name ranters of the right like Anne Coulter and Fox's Sean Hannity, plus former US Senator Rick Santorum, and noted Islamophobe Daniel Pipes. They descended on various college campuses to be received by Christian-Fascists and the curious while they hurled imprecations at the left for being soft on sons of the Prophet stoning women to death for adultery.
The reaction of the left has been mixed. In some ways it always takes Horowitz's antics far too seriously, though the latter's effect on timid college administrations cannot be entirely gainsaid. On the other hand, Awareness week is having a galvanizing effect. Coalitions have formed to combat Horowitz's version of Awareness with superior Progressive Awareness about what is good or not so good about Islam. Since Santorum and others have ripe records of intolerance for women, the air is usefully thick with shouts of "hypocrite". Horowitz is probably the best organizer the left has these days. He's an Energizer, apt to the beseechings of Energy Awareness Week, though the target in that instance was probably that other insidious element in the American way of life, the incandescent light bulb.
Showing posts with label David Horowitz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label David Horowitz. Show all posts
Monday, October 29, 2007
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Welcome to 'Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week'
The ugly face of Race and Religious Hatred in all it's twisted glory. Two terms come to mind: Jew Klux Klan and Zio-Nazi
by Khody Akhavi & Ali Gharib - Oct 27, 2007
Right-wing pundit David Horowitz was in rare form during a tightly controlled "public speech" at the George Washington University on Thursday night, decrying the US academic Left as a hateful "lynch mob" who act as apologists for the impending threat of the "Islamo-fascist" jihad.
As bodyguards and police loomed on stage and in the aisles, Horowitz launched into an unscripted two-hour tirade that meandered between selective (and dubious) readings of Middle East history and pointed attacks against those who criticized his efforts.
It was the latest permutation of Horowitz's long march as the harbinger of revolutionary knowledge in the face of public opprobrium. And as usual, he offered up a sensational and bizarre spectacle that appeared better suited for the US tabloid talk show circuit than a forum of legitimate public debate.
During his speech, sponsored by the conservative student group Young America Foundation, Horowitz condemned the "oppression of women in Islam," and what he perceived as the endemic "genocidal Jew hatred" throughout the Middle East. He took aim at the "juvenile delinquents" – GW university students – who had satirized his efforts, said that Palestinians, through their actions, showed that they did not want a state of their own. Horowitz also alleged that the Muslim Students Association, which has chapters at universities across the nation, is a creation of the "Islamo-fascist jihad."
He called Lebanese Hezbollah a "Nazi party," and warned that Turkey was teetering on the edge of becoming an Islamo-fascist state. And he described Iran as the archetype of this phenomenon.
"There is an intellectual terror in this country, which you have all seen. The president [George W. Bush] is intimidated from using the term Islamo-fascism because it is supposed to be racist," he told an audience of students, a majority of whom applauded his words.
"Why the term fascism? The analytical reason is simple," he said. "Probably Islamo-Nazism is a more appropriate term."
Horowitz's conservative Freedom Center (DHFC) designated last week as the first annual "Islamo-fascism Awareness Week" – a time to refute "the two big lies of the political Left: that George Bush created the war on terror and that global warming is a greater danger to Americans than the terrorist threat."
The program consisted of more than 30 events at 26 universities across the nation. Conservative pundits, politicians, and academic and think-tank experts, including former Senator Rick Santorum, conservative icon Ann Coulter, and historian Daniel Pipes, delivered speeches and spoke on panels.
Pipes is among a small group of neoconservatives who advise Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani on Middle East affairs.
College students were urged to stage sit-ins outside women's studies departments, and to distribute pamphlets, including titles such as "Jimmy Carter's War Against the Jews." Films screened included "Islam: What the West Needs to Know." According to its description, the film "reveals the violent, expansionary ideology of the so called 'religion of peace' that seeks the destruction or subjugation of other faiths, cultures, and systems of government."
But Horowitz's speech Thursday did not reflect a coherent policy towards the perceived threat. Instead, it overflowed with insults, sweeping generalizations and hyperbole that were aimed at smearing his political enemies – mostly liberals, whom he described as "leftists" – giving him ammunition for his fundraising drives.
Horowitz focused much of his speech on the personal attacks he had received, repeatedly alluding to violent threats, and describing the fiasco as a "national hate campaign" against him, as if a "target had been placed on" his back.
The day earlier, he said, he was shouted down and was unable to finish a planned speech at Emory University in Georgia. Horowitz's website, Frontpagemag.com, called the students "brownshirts," an allusion to a Nazi paramilitary group in fascist Germany.
Horowitz sent a solicitation email to DHFC supporters in anticipation of the week asking for additional contributions "toward the expenses of providing security" for speakers. Donors of 50 dollars or more receive two booklets – "What Americans Need to Know About Jihad," by Robert Spencer, and "The Violent Oppression of Women in Islam," by Robert Spencer and Phyllis Chesler.
On Thursday, he appeared on stage with a large bodyguard constantly scanning the crowd. Journalists were barred from asking any questions.
One protester who had snuck a banner into the theater was removed quickly by security as soon as he stood up and unfurled it. Several heated discussions occurred in the lobby and outside the building shortly after the event ended.
The publicity provided by the extreme rhetoric and protest incidents gets the attention of a cabal of wealthy and powerful conservatives who in turn fund Horowitz's activities through foundations.
The Freedom Center has received more than 15 million dollars in grants from conservative donors, according to a report from Media Transparency, an organization that monitors contributions to conservative media. Major contributors include the John M. Olin Foundation, a New York based think-tank that closed its doors in 2005, and which funded major right-wing think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute, Heritage Foundation and the Hoover Institute.
Prominent conservative billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife has poured 4.2 million dollars into Horowitz's activities, through the Sarah Scaife Foundation, the Carthage Foundation, and the Allegheny Foundation.
Horowitz also received 6.1 million dollars from the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, considered the country's largest and most influential right-wing foundation.
By the end of the week, "Islamo-fascism Awareness" had descended into a publicity circus.
According to independent journalist Max Blumenthal, who was in attendance at the IFAW Horowitz talk on Friday at Columbia University, Horowitz was surrounded by a group of bodyguards that almost outnumbered the amount of people there to protest his speech. Columbia security subsequently removed the protesters from the campus.
Horowitz went on a bizarre rant – claiming that there "will never be social justice" – and launched into a tirade about the threats from the guests on the Jerry Springer Show, a US television tabloid talk show. He also compared his own father, a communist Queens schoolteacher, to Mohammad Atta, the operational leader of the 9/11 attacks.
"It was like listening to the ravings of a lunatic on a subway car," said Blumenthal. "The only difference was that on the subway the police are there to remove the lunatic and here they were there to protect the lunatic."
by Khody Akhavi & Ali Gharib - Oct 27, 2007
Right-wing pundit David Horowitz was in rare form during a tightly controlled "public speech" at the George Washington University on Thursday night, decrying the US academic Left as a hateful "lynch mob" who act as apologists for the impending threat of the "Islamo-fascist" jihad.
As bodyguards and police loomed on stage and in the aisles, Horowitz launched into an unscripted two-hour tirade that meandered between selective (and dubious) readings of Middle East history and pointed attacks against those who criticized his efforts.
It was the latest permutation of Horowitz's long march as the harbinger of revolutionary knowledge in the face of public opprobrium. And as usual, he offered up a sensational and bizarre spectacle that appeared better suited for the US tabloid talk show circuit than a forum of legitimate public debate.
During his speech, sponsored by the conservative student group Young America Foundation, Horowitz condemned the "oppression of women in Islam," and what he perceived as the endemic "genocidal Jew hatred" throughout the Middle East. He took aim at the "juvenile delinquents" – GW university students – who had satirized his efforts, said that Palestinians, through their actions, showed that they did not want a state of their own. Horowitz also alleged that the Muslim Students Association, which has chapters at universities across the nation, is a creation of the "Islamo-fascist jihad."
He called Lebanese Hezbollah a "Nazi party," and warned that Turkey was teetering on the edge of becoming an Islamo-fascist state. And he described Iran as the archetype of this phenomenon.
"There is an intellectual terror in this country, which you have all seen. The president [George W. Bush] is intimidated from using the term Islamo-fascism because it is supposed to be racist," he told an audience of students, a majority of whom applauded his words.
"Why the term fascism? The analytical reason is simple," he said. "Probably Islamo-Nazism is a more appropriate term."
Horowitz's conservative Freedom Center (DHFC) designated last week as the first annual "Islamo-fascism Awareness Week" – a time to refute "the two big lies of the political Left: that George Bush created the war on terror and that global warming is a greater danger to Americans than the terrorist threat."
The program consisted of more than 30 events at 26 universities across the nation. Conservative pundits, politicians, and academic and think-tank experts, including former Senator Rick Santorum, conservative icon Ann Coulter, and historian Daniel Pipes, delivered speeches and spoke on panels.
Pipes is among a small group of neoconservatives who advise Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani on Middle East affairs.
College students were urged to stage sit-ins outside women's studies departments, and to distribute pamphlets, including titles such as "Jimmy Carter's War Against the Jews." Films screened included "Islam: What the West Needs to Know." According to its description, the film "reveals the violent, expansionary ideology of the so called 'religion of peace' that seeks the destruction or subjugation of other faiths, cultures, and systems of government."
But Horowitz's speech Thursday did not reflect a coherent policy towards the perceived threat. Instead, it overflowed with insults, sweeping generalizations and hyperbole that were aimed at smearing his political enemies – mostly liberals, whom he described as "leftists" – giving him ammunition for his fundraising drives.
Horowitz focused much of his speech on the personal attacks he had received, repeatedly alluding to violent threats, and describing the fiasco as a "national hate campaign" against him, as if a "target had been placed on" his back.
The day earlier, he said, he was shouted down and was unable to finish a planned speech at Emory University in Georgia. Horowitz's website, Frontpagemag.com, called the students "brownshirts," an allusion to a Nazi paramilitary group in fascist Germany.
Horowitz sent a solicitation email to DHFC supporters in anticipation of the week asking for additional contributions "toward the expenses of providing security" for speakers. Donors of 50 dollars or more receive two booklets – "What Americans Need to Know About Jihad," by Robert Spencer, and "The Violent Oppression of Women in Islam," by Robert Spencer and Phyllis Chesler.
On Thursday, he appeared on stage with a large bodyguard constantly scanning the crowd. Journalists were barred from asking any questions.
One protester who had snuck a banner into the theater was removed quickly by security as soon as he stood up and unfurled it. Several heated discussions occurred in the lobby and outside the building shortly after the event ended.
The publicity provided by the extreme rhetoric and protest incidents gets the attention of a cabal of wealthy and powerful conservatives who in turn fund Horowitz's activities through foundations.
The Freedom Center has received more than 15 million dollars in grants from conservative donors, according to a report from Media Transparency, an organization that monitors contributions to conservative media. Major contributors include the John M. Olin Foundation, a New York based think-tank that closed its doors in 2005, and which funded major right-wing think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute, Heritage Foundation and the Hoover Institute.
Prominent conservative billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife has poured 4.2 million dollars into Horowitz's activities, through the Sarah Scaife Foundation, the Carthage Foundation, and the Allegheny Foundation.
Horowitz also received 6.1 million dollars from the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, considered the country's largest and most influential right-wing foundation.
By the end of the week, "Islamo-fascism Awareness" had descended into a publicity circus.
According to independent journalist Max Blumenthal, who was in attendance at the IFAW Horowitz talk on Friday at Columbia University, Horowitz was surrounded by a group of bodyguards that almost outnumbered the amount of people there to protest his speech. Columbia security subsequently removed the protesters from the campus.
Horowitz went on a bizarre rant – claiming that there "will never be social justice" – and launched into a tirade about the threats from the guests on the Jerry Springer Show, a US television tabloid talk show. He also compared his own father, a communist Queens schoolteacher, to Mohammad Atta, the operational leader of the 9/11 attacks.
"It was like listening to the ravings of a lunatic on a subway car," said Blumenthal. "The only difference was that on the subway the police are there to remove the lunatic and here they were there to protect the lunatic."
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
David Horowitz Bombs on Opening Night
Ultra-hawk blog Blackfive reports on David Horowitz’s dazzling opening of Islamofascism Awareness Week:
What a let down. My buddy Ebo and I attended Horowitz’ opening night of Islamo-Fascism Awareness week and if this is our answer to sharia, then I guess Dirka Dirka Mohammed Jihad it will be.
Both of us were predisposed to agree wth most of what Horowitz was saying, but as is my complaint fairly often, his tone and delivery ruined his chances of doing his cause much good. He spoke in front of what was potentially a very hostile crowd 3/4 or so antagonistic to his viewpoint. He was so uninspiring a speaker they didn’t even really heckle him. I will give credit to the Muslim Student Association and the other groups who were there in opposition, they maintained more decorum than Mr. Horowitz. By the end he was saying “Well I guess you just aren’t able to read” and “I don’t know what to do if you can’t add two and two and get four.” …
We held out ’til the end and the Q&A had Horowitz launching the testy ad hominems I noted and complaining that the questions were too long in comparison to his epic length musings on how dumb his audience was. I heard the College Republicans, who sponsored him, were wicked pissed.
It would have been a total bomb, but Ebo decided we needed a pitcher of Optimator in the Rathskeller and we spent about an hour talking with a couple of groups of folks who came in opposition to Horowitz. It was enagaging, entertaining and so completely superior to the waste of time that was the theater in the theater, that we resolved to attend the Muslim dialogue tomorrow night. I truly enjoyed the discussion with some folks who, although we disagreed on much, came with much more open minds and helpful attitudes than the headliner.
In related news, Horowitz is lying about the number of colleges participating in his Klan-rally-on-Quaaludes. Even Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University has had its name pulled from the list. That’s rock bottom, folks.
What a let down. My buddy Ebo and I attended Horowitz’ opening night of Islamo-Fascism Awareness week and if this is our answer to sharia, then I guess Dirka Dirka Mohammed Jihad it will be.
Both of us were predisposed to agree wth most of what Horowitz was saying, but as is my complaint fairly often, his tone and delivery ruined his chances of doing his cause much good. He spoke in front of what was potentially a very hostile crowd 3/4 or so antagonistic to his viewpoint. He was so uninspiring a speaker they didn’t even really heckle him. I will give credit to the Muslim Student Association and the other groups who were there in opposition, they maintained more decorum than Mr. Horowitz. By the end he was saying “Well I guess you just aren’t able to read” and “I don’t know what to do if you can’t add two and two and get four.” …
We held out ’til the end and the Q&A had Horowitz launching the testy ad hominems I noted and complaining that the questions were too long in comparison to his epic length musings on how dumb his audience was. I heard the College Republicans, who sponsored him, were wicked pissed.
It would have been a total bomb, but Ebo decided we needed a pitcher of Optimator in the Rathskeller and we spent about an hour talking with a couple of groups of folks who came in opposition to Horowitz. It was enagaging, entertaining and so completely superior to the waste of time that was the theater in the theater, that we resolved to attend the Muslim dialogue tomorrow night. I truly enjoyed the discussion with some folks who, although we disagreed on much, came with much more open minds and helpful attitudes than the headliner.
In related news, Horowitz is lying about the number of colleges participating in his Klan-rally-on-Quaaludes. Even Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University has had its name pulled from the list. That’s rock bottom, folks.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
David Horowitz Can't Handle the Truth
Exposing "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week"
by SUNSARA TAYLOR - Oct 22, 2007
David Horowitz has a long and scurrilous track record of blatant racism, politically driven witch-hunts in academia, and constantly spewing out bald-faced lies. All of this is being ratcheted up to new levels in his upcoming "Islamo-Fascism Awareness" (IFAW). To let the lies of "IFAW" stand unexposed and unopposed would be a grave mistake with lasting consequences.
"IFAW" is both a major heightening of an ongoing assault on critical thinking and dissent in academia - and a calculated move to disorient students and professors who would expose and act against a potential new war on Iran, to whip up anti-Muslim sentiment, and to isolate and chill women studies.
Nothing about Horowitz's "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" can stand up to critical interrogation. IFAW needs to be taken on with the truth - by opening up the debate, exposing the lies packed into the premises of IFAW, and revealing the underlying motives driving it.
Let's look at what Horowitz claims is his major objective of the week: to oppose the oppression of women under "Islamo-Fascism." In fact, everything Horowitz is doing will contribute to strengthening the oppression of women here and all over the world.
A look at the line up of speakers he is dispatching for his "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" is the first sign of the level of Horowitz's hypocrisy. Sorry, you don't get to put anti-women fanatics like Rick Santorum, who opposes birth control and believes "it is harmfulto have a society that says sex outside of marriage will be tolerated," and Ann Coulter, who says women shouldn't vote because "women have no capacity to understand how money is earned," on the road and claim to speak on behalf of women anywhere! Especially not while calling for sit-ins at women's studies centers, as Horowitz is!!
Further, Horowitz's claim that U.S. aggression in the Middle East is good for women is a LIE. By attempting to force people to align with or at least be cowed into going along with the "War on Terror," Horowitz will not only be green-lighting further war crimes and crimes against humanity being commit in these wars, he will be strengthening the forces oppressing women in the Middle East. This has been well-documented in Iraq where the U.S.-installed puppet government wrote a Constitution that established Islam as the official religion, moved marriages and divorces from civil courts to the domain of the clerics, and removed women's right to child custody after divorces. The U.S. allied with Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Sistani who ordered women to cover themselves, an order that was enforced with beheadings and acid burns. And violence against women generally has skyrocketed under U.S. occupation, just this year, the UN has documented a stunning 250 "honor" killings in Northern Iraq alone.
Then there is Horowitz's LIE that the "left" has been silent about the abuses against women under fundamentalist Islamic movements and regimes.
In fact, many have spoken out the oppression of women in Islam, but since he specifies the Revolutionary Communist Party in this regard I have to say it again, David Horowitz is a fucking liar. (No, that is not a "personal attack"--it is a statement of fact which I am about to prove.)
For years RCP Chairman, Bob Avakian, has been an uncompromising voice against the oppression of women in all forms--including the ways in which fundamentalist Islam (as well as fundamentalist Christianity) has this oppression embedded in its core and can never lead to liberation. He has released volumes of writing and talks that get into this--with a new book out soon, Away With All Gods! Unchaining the Mind and Radically Changing the World--and these are widely available to anyone.
I myself have written for Revolution--the voice of the RCP--about the need to oppose both the U.S. wars of aggression and the Islamic fundamentalist response, polemicizing against the view that anyone opposing U.S. aggression should be supported and insisting that the liberation of women is a cornerstone of how any struggle for emancipation should be judged. A simple "google" will turn up excerpts, like this, where I describe the consolidation of power by the Islamic Republic of Iran: "women who refused to wear the hijab were whipped, beaten, and arrested and the legal system was changed so that the testimony of one man was equal to that of two women."
Beneath his LIES is Horowitz's real agenda. As a self-described "battering ram" of the right and for Bush's wars and fascistic repression, Horowitz wants to rule out of order--through whatever dishonestly and bullying is necessary--any discussion of the unjust role the U.S. plays in the world.
Horowitz wants to forbid any discussion that points out how, even with all this, the far greater force that is destroying the lives of people and worsening the conditions for women around the world is the U.S. empire--through its exploitation and subjugation of whole countries and their resources (including their people) for massive profit and accumulation. Horowitz wants to rule out any discussion of the role of unjust wars, torture, and crimes against humanity commit by the U.S. government as part of forcefully maintaining and reordering the U.S. empire in a world that is going through major transitions since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
For all his claims of concern for women in Islam, he cannot tolerate any examination of the major role played by the U.S. in creating conditions that have worsened the lives of millions and strengthened the oppression of women.
These conditions include millions and millions of people being uprooted from the countryside and their traditional ways of life by U.S. dominated imperialist globalization--leaving people every more brutally exploited, desperate, and longing for the sense of stability and order that fundamentalist religion often provides. These conditions include the complex pattern of cooperation and conflict between U.S. imperialism and the traditional, largely feudal based classes whose interests are represented in the political program of Islamic theocracy. These conditions include the history of the U.S. both "working through" and "propping up" these feudal strata to carry out imperialist penetration in the region while at the same time this imperialist penetration has disrupted the conditions of life and undermined the position of these outmoded and oppressive feudal and semi-feudal strata. And these conditions include a history of collaboration between the U.S. and fundamentalist Islamic forces in literally killing off secular, revolutionary and communist forces opposed to imperialism--largely burying a truly anti-imperialist political program that included equality between men and women and, instead, allowing fundamentalist theocrats to pose as the only viable "opposition" to imperialism.
There is more to be said--and learned--about all of this, but this is precisely what Horowitz wants to prevent.
Rather than really examining or disputing any of this, Horowitz is seizing on real outrages committed by fundamentalist Islamic forces against women, gays and others in order to lubricate public opinion for a potential war on Iran, intimidate and silence any who would challenge this by labeling them "terrorist-sympathizers," and take a leap in cohering and unleashing a movement of fascist foot-soldiers among a new generation to target Muslim students and women studies.
Through all this, Horowitz is playing off of and seeking to exacerbate a situation where increasingly, humanity is being confronted with two intolerable choices: Bush's crusade for empire or a reactionary Islamic fundamentalist response. The Bush regime has committed crimes on a far greater scale and is by far the greater danger to humanity, but both are complete nightmares. Both reinforce and feed off each other, and as they grow, they suck up the air to breathe for secular and progressive forces in this country and around the world.
If IFAW is ignored and unopposed, this bad polarization will be furthered.
If, on the other hand, Horowitz and his ilk are exposed, if their bullying and dishonest methods are revealed, if their underlying motives are challenged, and their political terms (with "us" or with the "terrorists") firmly rejected--then this fascistic assault on the campuses and on critical thought can be utilized to spring open discussion, debate, and political protest so desperately needed on campuses and throughout society.
Politically taking on David Horowitz and his "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" can--and must--be a part of bringing forward another way for humanity--an option that refuses to choose between crusading McWorld or reactionary Jihad--and of stopping the assault on critical thinking in academia.
by SUNSARA TAYLOR - Oct 22, 2007
David Horowitz has a long and scurrilous track record of blatant racism, politically driven witch-hunts in academia, and constantly spewing out bald-faced lies. All of this is being ratcheted up to new levels in his upcoming "Islamo-Fascism Awareness" (IFAW). To let the lies of "IFAW" stand unexposed and unopposed would be a grave mistake with lasting consequences.
"IFAW" is both a major heightening of an ongoing assault on critical thinking and dissent in academia - and a calculated move to disorient students and professors who would expose and act against a potential new war on Iran, to whip up anti-Muslim sentiment, and to isolate and chill women studies.
Nothing about Horowitz's "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" can stand up to critical interrogation. IFAW needs to be taken on with the truth - by opening up the debate, exposing the lies packed into the premises of IFAW, and revealing the underlying motives driving it.
Let's look at what Horowitz claims is his major objective of the week: to oppose the oppression of women under "Islamo-Fascism." In fact, everything Horowitz is doing will contribute to strengthening the oppression of women here and all over the world.
A look at the line up of speakers he is dispatching for his "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" is the first sign of the level of Horowitz's hypocrisy. Sorry, you don't get to put anti-women fanatics like Rick Santorum, who opposes birth control and believes "it is harmfulto have a society that says sex outside of marriage will be tolerated," and Ann Coulter, who says women shouldn't vote because "women have no capacity to understand how money is earned," on the road and claim to speak on behalf of women anywhere! Especially not while calling for sit-ins at women's studies centers, as Horowitz is!!
Further, Horowitz's claim that U.S. aggression in the Middle East is good for women is a LIE. By attempting to force people to align with or at least be cowed into going along with the "War on Terror," Horowitz will not only be green-lighting further war crimes and crimes against humanity being commit in these wars, he will be strengthening the forces oppressing women in the Middle East. This has been well-documented in Iraq where the U.S.-installed puppet government wrote a Constitution that established Islam as the official religion, moved marriages and divorces from civil courts to the domain of the clerics, and removed women's right to child custody after divorces. The U.S. allied with Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Sistani who ordered women to cover themselves, an order that was enforced with beheadings and acid burns. And violence against women generally has skyrocketed under U.S. occupation, just this year, the UN has documented a stunning 250 "honor" killings in Northern Iraq alone.
Then there is Horowitz's LIE that the "left" has been silent about the abuses against women under fundamentalist Islamic movements and regimes.
In fact, many have spoken out the oppression of women in Islam, but since he specifies the Revolutionary Communist Party in this regard I have to say it again, David Horowitz is a fucking liar. (No, that is not a "personal attack"--it is a statement of fact which I am about to prove.)
For years RCP Chairman, Bob Avakian, has been an uncompromising voice against the oppression of women in all forms--including the ways in which fundamentalist Islam (as well as fundamentalist Christianity) has this oppression embedded in its core and can never lead to liberation. He has released volumes of writing and talks that get into this--with a new book out soon, Away With All Gods! Unchaining the Mind and Radically Changing the World--and these are widely available to anyone.
I myself have written for Revolution--the voice of the RCP--about the need to oppose both the U.S. wars of aggression and the Islamic fundamentalist response, polemicizing against the view that anyone opposing U.S. aggression should be supported and insisting that the liberation of women is a cornerstone of how any struggle for emancipation should be judged. A simple "google" will turn up excerpts, like this, where I describe the consolidation of power by the Islamic Republic of Iran: "women who refused to wear the hijab were whipped, beaten, and arrested and the legal system was changed so that the testimony of one man was equal to that of two women."
Beneath his LIES is Horowitz's real agenda. As a self-described "battering ram" of the right and for Bush's wars and fascistic repression, Horowitz wants to rule out of order--through whatever dishonestly and bullying is necessary--any discussion of the unjust role the U.S. plays in the world.
Horowitz wants to forbid any discussion that points out how, even with all this, the far greater force that is destroying the lives of people and worsening the conditions for women around the world is the U.S. empire--through its exploitation and subjugation of whole countries and their resources (including their people) for massive profit and accumulation. Horowitz wants to rule out any discussion of the role of unjust wars, torture, and crimes against humanity commit by the U.S. government as part of forcefully maintaining and reordering the U.S. empire in a world that is going through major transitions since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
For all his claims of concern for women in Islam, he cannot tolerate any examination of the major role played by the U.S. in creating conditions that have worsened the lives of millions and strengthened the oppression of women.
These conditions include millions and millions of people being uprooted from the countryside and their traditional ways of life by U.S. dominated imperialist globalization--leaving people every more brutally exploited, desperate, and longing for the sense of stability and order that fundamentalist religion often provides. These conditions include the complex pattern of cooperation and conflict between U.S. imperialism and the traditional, largely feudal based classes whose interests are represented in the political program of Islamic theocracy. These conditions include the history of the U.S. both "working through" and "propping up" these feudal strata to carry out imperialist penetration in the region while at the same time this imperialist penetration has disrupted the conditions of life and undermined the position of these outmoded and oppressive feudal and semi-feudal strata. And these conditions include a history of collaboration between the U.S. and fundamentalist Islamic forces in literally killing off secular, revolutionary and communist forces opposed to imperialism--largely burying a truly anti-imperialist political program that included equality between men and women and, instead, allowing fundamentalist theocrats to pose as the only viable "opposition" to imperialism.
There is more to be said--and learned--about all of this, but this is precisely what Horowitz wants to prevent.
Rather than really examining or disputing any of this, Horowitz is seizing on real outrages committed by fundamentalist Islamic forces against women, gays and others in order to lubricate public opinion for a potential war on Iran, intimidate and silence any who would challenge this by labeling them "terrorist-sympathizers," and take a leap in cohering and unleashing a movement of fascist foot-soldiers among a new generation to target Muslim students and women studies.
Through all this, Horowitz is playing off of and seeking to exacerbate a situation where increasingly, humanity is being confronted with two intolerable choices: Bush's crusade for empire or a reactionary Islamic fundamentalist response. The Bush regime has committed crimes on a far greater scale and is by far the greater danger to humanity, but both are complete nightmares. Both reinforce and feed off each other, and as they grow, they suck up the air to breathe for secular and progressive forces in this country and around the world.
If IFAW is ignored and unopposed, this bad polarization will be furthered.
If, on the other hand, Horowitz and his ilk are exposed, if their bullying and dishonest methods are revealed, if their underlying motives are challenged, and their political terms (with "us" or with the "terrorists") firmly rejected--then this fascistic assault on the campuses and on critical thought can be utilized to spring open discussion, debate, and political protest so desperately needed on campuses and throughout society.
Politically taking on David Horowitz and his "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" can--and must--be a part of bringing forward another way for humanity--an option that refuses to choose between crusading McWorld or reactionary Jihad--and of stopping the assault on critical thinking in academia.
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