If your sister had been among the nearly 3,000 people murdered in the World Trade Center on 9-11, how would you react to Osama bin Laden’s death? More specifically, if you were to write an opinion piece on the subject for a major newspaper, what would you most want to communicate?
One would think that anyone who had lost a loved one on 9-11 would write about bin Laden’s guilt, about evil, and about experiencing some degree of moral and emotional satisfaction that the loved one’s murderer had been killed by American forces.
But not Robert Klitzman, a professor of psychiatry at Columbia University. He had other, more pressing, things to say.
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Two days after Bin Laden was killed, Professor Klitzman wrote an opinion piece for the New York Times reflecting on his sister Karen’s death on 9-11. While acknowledging that Bin Laden “more than anyone else had caused my sister’s death,” and noting that he is “glad” that bin Laden “was now at the bottom of the sea,” Professor Klitzman directed his rage and blame elsewhere.
The main focus of his passion was to blame the United States for arousing the hatred of Muslims (including those who murdered his sister) and for arousing the hatred of “the rest of the world” as well.
Professor Klitzman writes:
When the members of Al Qaeda attacked on 9/11, Americans wondered, “Why do they hate us so much?” Many here believe they dislike us for our “freedom,” but I think otherwise.
There are lessons we have not yet learned. I feel Karen would share my concerns that underlying forces of greed and hate persevere. American imperialism, corporate avarice, abuses of our power abroad and our historical support of corrupt dictators like Hosni Mubarak have created an abhorrence of us that, unfortunately, persists. We need to recognize how the rest of the world sees us, and figure out how to change that. Until we do that, more Osama bin Ladens will arise, and more innocent people like my sister will die.
In the course of my lifetime, I have surely read many thousands of columns. And since I read those with which I differ as often as I do those with which I agree, many have annoyed, some even angered, me.
But I do not recall reading a column that I considered as reprehensible as Professor Klitzman’s. What other word can describe a brother using the killing of his sister’s murderer to badmouth America and hold it ultimately responsible for her death?
Asking what America did to elicit the hatred of Muslim terrorists is morally equivalent to asking what Jews did to arouse Nazi hatred, what blacks did to cause whites to lynch them, what Ukrainians did to arouse Stalin’s hatred, or what Tibetans did to incite China’s harshly repressive treatment of them.
We would dismiss such questions out of hand. Why, then, do we not similarly regard “What did America do to arouse Islamist mass-murdering hatred leading to 9-11?”
Comparing what Klitzman said to what the Nazis did is so wrong on an unmeasurable level. Had the Jews ever waged war (for "national interest" or otherwise) on the Nazis, before or since? Didn't think so.
Frankly, Klitzman's assessment is quite sober. Prager seems to have an irrational hatred of the Left, or maybe anyone who takes the time to "question". Maybe Prager should postulate what Iraqi civilians are trying to undestand about why the US invaded their country, leading to so many deaths? I assume, in that case, he feels they should blame themselves.
This has to be the most bizarre column I have EVER read on the National Review website.
I'm curious: why are various religious groups and leftists deemed to "see the world through their eyes", but Conservatives like Dennis Prager see it clearly and unobstructed. Just asking, like.
It's not just the Left that believes that America is the cause of its own problems. Talk to any libertarian and you will surely find that he believes the same.
There is nothing sober in Klitzman’s assessment. I’ll give him credit though; he does competently summarize the progressive world view that America is the root of all evil.
“We need to recognize how the rest of the world sees us, and figure out how to change that.”
This drivel permeates every aspect of society and must be called out instantaneously and vigorously if we are to defend our way of life.
Perhaps the perfect solution for these ninnies is to create a time machine and we go back and lose WW2 or the Cold War...absolutely the world would be a better place without a vibrant and strong Untied States (dripping sarcasm).
What the people in Iraq should be contemplating is why the arab muslim culture is so fond of death.
Liberals whine about the deaths of Iraqis, but never seem to get around to mentioning the fact that the vast majority of said deaths were at the hands of their own co religionists. It wasn't the US military that handcuffed men to the steering wheel of a VBIED, it was the arab/muslim mad men. It wasn't the US military that relied on women with suicide vests to slaughter at random in the souk. It was the arab muslim mad men.
I've yet to meet a liberal who even remembers that was Abu Musab Al Zarqawhi who ordered the bombing of the Shia shrine of Samara that helped launch an intra faith civil war. Oh no. Why? Because that would spoil the narrative they believe, which is US bad, everyone else good.
The simple fact stares folks like James T in the face but they just can't accept it and retain their unshakable belief in the liberal dogma.
And the simple fact is that the Arab muslim culture kills. In massive quantities on a regular basis.
My prediction is that liberals here will respond to this post with their standard magical incantation: "Racist!" As Mark Steyn would say "Stick a baguette in it". It isn't racist to speak the truth. Look around you. The arabs are killing each other with reckless abandon even as I write this. They are killing christians in Egypt, budhists in Thailand and any other infidel they can get in their sights.
And somehow this idiot "Professor" is right to blame America?
James T doesn't deserve our derision. He deserves our pity.
God points in this article. Leftism is a faith, and a sickness. Yes, everyone does have a viewpoint colored by their own identity groups and experience; but to throw out all reason and any other kinships; (citizen, religion, family) to serve the Master of the repeated lie, makes little sense. How often have we heard the story now that the USA somehow provoked Al Qaeda to attack it on 9-11? Of course the US influence and policy are not perfect in the effects globally; but can we really take responsibility for every group that wants to wage war on us as a result? Should be stop all international relations and trade because it might offend someone? Only a Leftist disciple would blame 'US imperialism' for the Islamic hate unleashed on the world.
@RobL: a very good response, and one that at least tries to address the issue. "Defending our way of life" on our OWN shores is fine - no one should come here and dictate anything IMO. But what the professor is saying is that you can't go overseas and meddle for cheap oil, prop up and/or install dictators, look for "WMD's" and not expect some sort of blow-back. And that goes for ANY nation, not just the US.
North Korea, Iran and other pariah nations act like they do because they have no wish to be part of the world community. I'd be shocked if American conservatives feel the same way, or do they? Because like or not, the current approach to foreign policy (i.e. protect our own interests at the cost to others) just isn't working.
@Complete Curmudgeon - did your Mother not teach you two wrongs don't make a right? Sure, try telling ANYONE, "we killed lots, but you killed more". And Shock and Awe killed a lot more than 3000 - but I can't justify either.
"Asking what America did to elicit the hatred of Muslim terrorists is morally equivalent to asking what Jews did to arouse Nazi hatred, what blacks did to cause whites to lynch them, what Ukrainians did to arouse Stalin’s hatred, or what Tibetans did to incite China’s harshly repressive treatment of them."
Rubbish. And insulting rubbish at that.
I also believe the US has been a tremendous force for good in modern history, and its form of government and society broadly admirable, certainly more than most. But it is still a sovereign nation whose government pursues its interests in the world, as best it can, for the benefit of its own people rather than other people. This is as it should be, but it is bound to tick off other people who want their own interests served instead, especially people whose interests are not served because their government listens to the US first.
And the US certainly has supported corrupt regimes and dictators who proved to be disasters for their people, because they served US foreign policy.
All of which made perfect sense and I would suggest Washington keep it up as best it can. But it is not going to earn universal love and admiration.
So again, I think the US has done much good, and its honour is less tarnished than that of most other societies, but it is not untarnished. No nation's can be.
So Klitzman has some reasonable points, even if he has concocted a worldview around them that is at once naive, unrealistic, and even immoral.
But to compare his points to what Hitler said about Jews, or any of the other analogies quotes above, is absurd and offensive.
Those victim peoples had done NOTHING to those who sought to kill them. Jews had not paid off a German equivalent of Mubarak or Musharraf for many years. Tibetans had not propped up the decaying Manchu throne in an attempt to control Chinese resources. Etc. Nor did any of the peoples named have the military capability to either defend themselves or retaliate.
For the US to compare itself to these helpless victims is as insulting as if AQ were to compare itself to them.
@James T: No, we didn't kill a "lot more than 3,000." Because those 3,000 you mention were innocents. Those we have killed in Iraq were soldiers, insurgents and terrorists. (I am not equating soldiers and terrorists, btw, except to say that they were our enemies on the battlefield.) There is NO moral equivalence between 3,000 people blithely going about their daily business and being incinerated and crushed, and our taking of combatants' lives on the battlefield.
If you don't comprehend that the jihadis really don't give a flying fig about our foreign policy, then you need to simply return to your plow and leave the governing to those who do. They want to exterminate our way of life. They want to kill or enslave us. The only complaint they have about our foreign policy is that we're even worse than the other infidels in the world because we support the right of the jewish nation to exist.
@curmudgeon: Spot on. Though the religion goes hand-in-hand with the culture in celebrating death over life.
James T - I'm not sure what you're talking about. When the US invaded Iraq in 1991, it was to liberate Kuwait and to save Saudia Arabia from Saddam Hussein. Was that such a bad thing? Indeed, one of the country we were saving was bin-Laden's native country: why then his irrational hatred of the West under such circumstances?
As for killing Iraqis, the US doesn't hold a candle to Saddam Hussein. So, I don't think talking about our behavior can be done in a vacuum. The question that has to be asked: what would the alternative have looked like (after 2003)? I think it would have been worse for Iraqis. (I know, two wrongs don't make a right, but let's suppose that Saddam Hussein had stayed in power after 2003; no doubt he would have killed more Iraqis then died since our invasion in 2003: so the calculus is, more Iraqis dead under Saddam than under US auspices.)
At the end of the day,if Mr. Klitzman has such a visceral hatred of the US, I would suggest he take up residence elsewhere, say, Red China.
@Jack, we can agree to disagree (and I'm only talking about Iraq and 2003), but your points are well made.
@GWB, you are seriously deluded if you think their were no civilian casualties during Shock and Awe in 2003 (I don't account for jihadis and opposition soldiers, though one might argue that the soldiers were just defending their nation from an unjustified invasion).
Random Observer puts it best in a way that Prager doesn't get: the US will go about its Foreign Policy in a way that it sees fit, be it the defence of Israel or the pursuit of cheap oil. It has been that way for decades, and when it didn't involve Muslims, it was arming the Contras in Nicaragua, invading Viet Nam and installing Pinochet in Chile. My point, as articulated much better by Random Observer, is that by stating that these actions aren't exactly going to make you a lot of friends ANYWHERE doesn't make you a traitor, and certainly bears no comparison to the Jews and Nazi Germany. And calling out US Foreign Policy for what it is, is not the same as defending the barbarism of Islam. "You're with us, or against us" is just so 2002.
Respectfully, I must disagree. I think you are falling for the classic liberal meme, "America is to blame," here. I do not believe it is too much of a stretch to make the Nazi, black, Ukrainian (etc.) comparison.
Prager's greater point being, even if we had not propped up dictators, and never put our troops on the ground in Muslim lands, they would still desire our destruction. We are hated because of who we are; we are hated because of Israel. Don't delude yourself into thinking otherwise. Freedom is our failing to the Muslim world. They hate our freedom of religion, the rights of our women, our secular culture. Our intervention pales in comparison to our cultural influences on them.
While I disagree with our support of these tyrants in the Middle-East, admittedly, it was their very presence in the region that created stability. US interests were served by supporting stability, in a historically "volatile" region. This need to conquer and kill is engrained in the Muslim people- it is in their faith. While I have not personally studied the Koran, I have read, or watched, dozens of educated scholars (many of them Islamic) corroborate the truth of that statement. The truth is ugly. Islam is NOT a religion of peace, and even if it is, the contemporary version is not.
Look at the alternatives: Muslim on Muslim violence, chaos, Muslims murdering Jews and Christians, burning churches and homes.
Islamic hatred of the West goes much deeper than our liberation of Iraqis, or our war in Afghanistan. Americans are being spoon-fed a progressive lie.
