Pride, Honor, Culture and War

[Universe Prince]

Excerpts from "Pride Goeth Before A Brawl: The terror war is an honor war" by Jonathan Rauch

Boiling Bowman's richly nuanced 327 pages down to four paragraphs does the book a cruel disservice, but this is journalism, so here goes. Honor, for Bowman's purposes, means "the good opinion of people who matter to us." The basic honor code requires men to maintain a reputation for bravery, women a reputation for chastity. If a man is insulted, injured, or disrespected, he must avenge the offense and prove that anyone who messes with him (or "his" women) will be sorry. The West's history is rich with traditions of honor, and equally rich with examples of its dangers and follies, among them the duel that killed the most brilliant of America's Founders. Singularly, however, the West has backed away from honor. Under admonitions from Christianity to turn the other cheek and from the Enlightenment to favor reason over emotion, the West first channeled honor into the arcane rituals of chivalry, then folded it into a code of manly but magnanimous Victorian gentlemanliness—and then, in the 20th century, drove it into disrepute. World War I and the Vietnam War were seen as needless butcheries brought on by archaic obsessions with national honor; feminism and the therapeutic culture taught that a higher manly strength acknowledges weakness. [...] Thus, Bowman writes, "America and its allies are engaged in a battle against an Islamist enemy that is the product of one of the world's great unreconstructed and unreformed honor cultures." Jihadism wages not only a religious war but a cultural one, aiming to redeem, through deeds of bravery and defiance, the honor of an Islam whose glory has shamefully faded. It aims, further, to uphold a masculine honor code that the West's decadent, feminizing influence threatens to undermine. Whether or not Bowman has the whole story right, the prism of honor brings puzzling elements of the current conflict into sharper focus. Americans are baffled that Western appeals to freedom and prosperity get so little traction in the Arab and Muslim worlds. America's example as the "shining city on a hill" inspired liberalizing movements from Eastern Europe to Tiananmen Square; why should the Middle East be different? One answer is that traditional honor cultures value vindication over freedom and wealth. Militant Islamism and Baathist-style national socialism offer narratives of restored greatness and heroic resistance. Ballot boxes and shopping malls offer neither. If freedom brings humiliation, what good is it? [...] In the modern West, interest trumps honor (or subsumes it). We don't shoot ourselves in the foot to prove we're tough and fierce. Or, if we do, we expect to be ridiculed, not admired. If interest trumps honor, a country will swallow its pride in the face of a defeat or setback and make the best of its lot. For Germany after World War II (and for Japan, which was quick to adopt Western ways), getting rich was the best revenge. In a traditional honor culture, that sort of pride-swallowing compromise may not be possible. Honor trumps interest (or subsumes it). The well-educated and talented Arabs of the Levant might today be enjoying the same prosperity and security as Spain or South Korea if years ago they had accepted Israel as a fact of life, made peace, and moved on. To Hamas and Hezbollah militants and their supporters, however, Israel's continued existence is a standing humiliation, and the debt to honor must be paid, never mind the cost. Nor can militant Islamists settle with the West. When the post-honor West says, "Come, now, give up this foolishness, join our club, be free and rich," they hear something more like, "Be our poodle, sit at our feet, enjoy the fruits of capitulation." Admonitions that bellicosity accomplishes nothing miss the point, which is that the very act of fighting ("resistance") redeems honor and therefore accomplishes what matters most.

Whole article at Reason Online

[domer]

This is a jumbled analysis, Prince, but I thank you for sharing it because it is provocaive. First, I reject the very categories the author constructs. "Interest" and "honor" are not incompatible; indeed, their coalescence depends upon how broadly, yet cohesively, we can define the terms, indeed, identify the intellectual and kinetic fields in which they play out. The very narrowness -- blindness -- of the jihadists' conception of their motivation is precisely one prong of their arsenal we should attack vigorously. A closed-system falls most surely to an exposure to openness, an exposure that not only ameliorates the harsher elements of the radicals but subsumes their worldview in a larger, TRUER (and demonstrably so) reality.

This is but one aspect of comprehensive offensive against violent, radical Islamic extremism, but it is crucial. Turning the enemies' bloodthirsty hate and anger into a dysfunctional atavism is a core enterprise in the struggle. Yet, we fight on all fronts, including the military (et al.) battlefields where tthe "sense of honor" the author speaks of not only is a helpful store of information for our troops, but is indeed matched and surpassed by them. A battle rightly joined among "honorable" men has as one of its basic currencies the "honor" of which we speak. The winner will use it as a tool rather than let the concept run an unguided course, subsuming interest.

[Michael Tee]

Good article.  That is the essence of why the Palestinian refugee problem can't be resolved like the Jewish refugee problem was resolved after the war.  It's a cultural outlook.  The Jews basically had gotten used to getting their ass kicked and just moving on, and the Arabs never did.  Probably because the Arabs are still on their own land, so it grates all the more to be ripped off, insulted and murdered in your own home, so to speak.  The Jews lost their land a long time ago and took it for granted that a lot of shit was going to come their way wherever they located and all they could do about it was pack up and move out.  In a perverse way, that gave them a certain strength, or it freed them from a lot of baggage.  "When y'ain't got nuthin you got nuthin to lose."  But now that strength seems to have lighted upon the Palestinians.  They're the ones who ain't got nuthin and have nuthin to lose.  The suicide bombers are just an aspect of that.  Their honour means more than their lives to them.

[Michael Tee]

I think also it is impossible to talk credibly about the "violence" of an honour culture without taking an honest look at the violence in our own culture (including criminals and the penal system) and the violence perpetrated upon the so-called honour cultures by outside forces.  And I would hope that the threat of violence and the things done under threat of violence also count as violence in these considerations.

So much fucking bullshit from "Western" commentators.  So much finger-pointing.  So much self-righteousness.  Anything to justify the failure to see the humanity of the "other side" - - they are so bad, we are so good.

The violence is practically universal.  It's in all of us.

[domer]

As a Jew, Michael, how would you advise your Israeli co-religionists now to deal with their conflict with the Palestinians? Arguably, a benign Zionism aimed at scratching a 2000-year itch through peaceful means was transmuted into a torrent by GERMAN actions during World War II. Fleeing genocide, so many post-WWII Jews swarmed to Israel AS A MATTER OF SURVIVAL. Conflict resulted, the equities of which I am not qualified to comment upon. The end result, however, was that Jewish national yearnings were forever melded with the raw drive to survive. THAT context, I submit, even from my own perch as a "heritage-collaborator" in the Jews fate, makes sorting justice from this mess all the more excruciatingly difficult.

[Universe Prince]

First, I reject the very categories the author constructs. "Interest" and "honor" are not incompatible; indeed, their coalescence depends upon how broadly, yet cohesively, we can define the terms, indeed, identify the intellectual and kinetic fields in which they play out.

Then again, perhaps we don't need to see how broadly yet cohesively we can define the terms. How we define 'honor' may color how we discuss the way in which interest and honor relate to one another, but the important defintion of 'honor' in the context of this discussion is the definition given to it by the Muslims who live in the Middle East. If we ignore that so we can play semantic games, we might as well not bother because we've already missed the point.

The very narrowness -- blindness -- of the jihadists' conception of their motivation is precisely one prong of their arsenal we should attack vigorously. A closed-system falls most surely to an exposure to openness, an exposure that not only ameliorates the harsher elements of the radicals but subsumes their worldview in a larger, TRUER (and demonstrably so) reality.

That assumes they would listen to what we have to say. While we look at them and wonder why they are so harsh, they are are looking at us and wondering why we are so soft. From their point of view, as best I can tell, we hold the weaker position not in terms of physical strength, but in terms of righteous philosophy. You speak of a truer reality, but by their worldview we are the ones who need to be subjugated to what they consider a truer reality. And attacking that 'reality' vigorously could easily feed their view of us as attacking their religion and their honor. Yes, we should seek to undermine the narrow rigidness of their concept of honor, but they are not likely to listen to us if they think we're lacking in understanding of the nature of honor, no matter how vigorous we might be.

This is but one aspect of comprehensive offensive against violent, radical Islamic extremism, but it is crucial. Turning the enemies' bloodthirsty hate and anger into a dysfunctional atavism is a core enterprise in the struggle. Yet, we fight on all fronts, including the military (et al.) battlefields where tthe "sense of honor" the author speaks of not only is a helpful store of information for our troops, but is indeed matched and surpassed by them. A battle rightly joined among "honorable" men has as one of its basic currencies the "honor" of which we speak. The winner will use it as a tool rather than let the concept run an unguided course, subsuming interest.

You appear to be assuming the Islamic extremists' idea of honor and the American military idea of honor are somehow fundamentally similar. The point of the article, and I tend to agree, is that they are fundamentally different. We do not have a conflict between men with similar codes of honor. We have a conflict between men of radically different codes of honor. Indeed, it is perhaps those differences that lie at the heart of the conflict. A conflict between similar codes of honor would indicate a conflict merely of interest, which could perhaps be resolved with some sort of compromise or an evolution of ideas. A conflict of honor, on the other hand, means there is no compromise possible because to compromise is to capitulate. This is not a fight for honor but a fight of honor, which is to say the honor is in the fight, in the conflict, and so to give up the fight is to surrender the honor. And again, if we ignore this to play semantic games about what honor "really" means, then we will have missed the point.

[Michael Tee]

domer I'm not sure that there IS a way out for them anymore.  There has been so much hatred generated just since the start of the West Bank settlements and then another quantum leap by the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan . . .  there are still Arabs searching for a peaceful solution but so many of them are so far past that point . . .  where is the tipping point?  When does the hatred build up so pervasively that it's irremediable?

My advice for them would be that they have got to try to turn everything around.  Possible, not possible, WTF is the difference?  What is going on there is just plain wrong and until that's rectified any hope of peace or justice is really nugatory.  And they gotta start.  Even when that voice in the back of their head keeps telling them, they're too late, they're fucked, it's over.  Maybe so, but then they'd be fucked anyway.  Might as well be fucked trying to turn the tide around as fucked holed up in your burning condo with an Uzi.  I would tell them you start with one single act and you build one act on another.  A journey of a thousand miles . . . etc.

The other thing I would say is, try to see them as human beings.  I've had so many lectures from Israelis and Zionist Jews, how I "don't understand the Arabs," (notwithstanding that I work with Arabs, Pakistanis and Persians practically every day,) don't understand "the Arab mind," the same way people from the South used to tell me I didn't understand "their" niggers.  There's nothing much to understand - - these people are furious.  They're hurt, humiliated, threatened, insulted, ripped off, living under the threat of death, crippling injury and/or homelessness day in and day out, many of them have seen their women and elders humiliated and insulted, their families torn apart by tank fire or missiles - - OF COURSE they don't give a shit if some "terrorist" suicide bomber does the same thing to a bunch of Jews, to them it's just a payback too long delayed.  (This is the point where some moron usually suggests that my solution is to have everybody sit down together and sing "KoomBayYah") but I tell ya domer, they're either moving toward that direction or they're moving toward a catastrophic explosion.  And when people are dying every day, you really can't wait for the other guy to make the first move.  You gotta make the first, and maybe the second and the third and the tenth and the twentieth and every move in between.

I have no hope in the present Israeli leadership, Kadima, Labour or Likud - - they're too old, they're too "broken in."  I think in the absence of credible political leadership, they have no choice but to take personal responsibility.  They could start by resolving, in the army or not, they will not participate in any inhumane activity no matter how small and even if they have to disobey a direct order, and they will do whatever little they can to rebuild the lives of the Palestinians in any way they can.  And whether or not their efforts will ever be reciprocated.  And some Israelis are already on that track - - not very many, but hopefully a growing number.