In Egypt, the short version of the Arab Spring is that after 60 years the Nasser/Mubarak military has decided to throw its lot in with the Muslim Brotherhood. Given that for three decades the army was largely funded and its senior officers trained by the United States, at least we won’t have to waste a lot of time on “Who lost Egypt?” analyses.
The consequences for Copts, women, Israeli Embassy staff, etc, have been clear for some time. But just as important over the long run may be the loss of historical memory. A few days ago, during the recent military crackdown, the Institut d’Egypte was burned to the ground — mainly because young soldiers either joined in the gleeful savagery or declined to prevent it. Millions of manuscripts were lost.
This blogger (politically correct enough to use the terms “BCE” and “CE” rather than “BC and “AD”) compares it to the destruction of the Library of Alexandria. But I’d put it in the context of the Muslim world’s more recent retreat into ignorance represented by the Brotherhood, the Wahhabists, the Ayatollahs et al. The famous statistic from a 2002 UN report — that more books are translated into Spanish in a single year than have been translated into Arabic in the last thousand — suggests at the very minimum an extraordinarily closed society. Such openness to the world as exists was (as at the Institut d’Egypt) facilitated by the West. The journey from, say, Lawrence Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet, set in the ramshackle but pluralistic Egypt of Farouk’s day, to the city in recent years is a descent into ever more malign parochialism.
If you’re going to turn your country into a squat of theocratic totalitarianism, a stupid population is indispensable. Washington’s most basic problem in Afghanistan, for example, is that most of its upcountry villagers are too ill educated even to be aware of the existence of countries such as the United States. When, after 9/11, a bunch of guys in the full Robocop showed up and started blowing stuff up, your average rural Pushtun simply had no more idea who they were or where they came from than the Americans vis a vis the space aliens in Independence Day.
Egypt is now falling into the hands of men who revel in Taliban-scale parochial stupidity and are bent on imposing it. From 1922 to 2011, the country got worse. It’s now getting worser.
Ahh, Steyn. "a bunch of guys in the full Robocop" That was a delicious string of the English language, containing the full effect of the notion.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseC'mon Mark, the question isn't: Is Egypt falling into the hands of men who revel in Taliban-scale parochial stupidity and are bent on imposing it?
The question is: How have Facebook, Twitter, Skype, etc. brought about this trans-formative moment?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAnd your question, Mr. Lawdawg, of course brings to mind the saying current right after 9/11 about the Moslem terrorists: They took airplanes their society could not hope to invent or produce and flew them into buildings they similarly could not have built and planned and communicated with each other using technology which they also could not build or maintain.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseCareful there, Mark. It's dangerous to complain too much about OTHER countries' education systems. Most Americans don't know what/where Afghanistan is.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBut I can think where I'd like to cram it right now.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMod up.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAfghanistan?
It's the place you hang the knit yarn blanket that grandma made, right?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWow, we have several; thrown over the back of the couch, the foot of the bed, etc. I didn't know they made stands for them! I'll have to check Ebay / Amazon - might make a great last minute Winter Solstice School Break I Get an Extra Day Off Holiday gift.
Also, knew a girl who owned one, dumbest dog I ever knew.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMOST Americans? Source please. Not sure I agree with your point at all. Maybe it's your use of hyperbole. Mr. Steyn's reference is clearly to the significance of illiteracy and lack of technology in Afghanistan prior to 9/11/01. Surely not comparable to the US's rate by any thinking human.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMs. Eanb, The President of the United States doesn't know their (his states') number. Nor does he know his birth state's continent.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHyperbole? I'm honestly not sure.
I am sure that at least 50% of US public (and maybe private) high school graduates, given a world globe with no labels, couldn't find Afghanistan's location within, oh, 5,000 miles. And the percentage of the US population would be worse. That's "most," isn't it?
Worse than Afghanistan's citizenry? No, but not enough better to justify the difference in education expenditures.
Godspeed to Israel - war cannot be far behind.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIs it any wonder why gun sales are sharply higher this year? External Link
With the full backing of Marxist/Anarchist movements in the US by Barack Obama and the Democratic Party writ large, and the violence in Greece and other parts of Europe as World Socialism continues its slow motion collapse, it is not hard to look at Egypt and consider stocking up on ammunition.
And it seems to be having a healthy consequence: External Link
Now if we can just get Conservatives loke the author to stop slashing each other's throats, and focus on Obama, maybe we can save these poor dumb bas***ds in Egypt from themselves.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'm really not interested in saving the Egyptians from themselves. I subscribe to the theory that people generally get the government they deserve.
I think our foreign policy should be ruthlessly self-interested, unapologetically punitive when necessary, and brief in implementation. For example, in Iran, now that 30 years of spineless diplomacy has failed, we simply issue ultimatums and militarily punish disobedience with quick low-risk strikes. Iran has many targets vulnerable to high altitude bombing and missiles. No more Mr. Nice Superpower.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMark,
Small comment. Not everyone uses BCE and CE to be politically correct. Some do so out of actual religious conviction. The use of AD would indicate an acceptance as fact of a religious doctrine that is incompatible with that person's own theology that is as dear to them as yours. So please do not be so doctrinaire when trying to dismiss someone who does not conform.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe use of AD would indicate an acceptance as fact of a religious doctrine that is incompatible with that person's own theology that is as dear to them as yours. So please do not be so doctrinaire when trying to dismiss someone who does not conform.
This deserves a callout for the unintended asshattery.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOr even arsehattery
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI had a Buddhist professor in college who was fairly insistent that we use BC and AD instead of BCE and CE. He thought it offensive to both Christians and non-Christians to do otherwise: to Christians because we're trying to pretend that the event we're so obviously referring to with our current calender didn't happen, and to non-Christians because we're trying to pretend that this is the "common" way of marking time rather than acknowledging that other cultures have their own calenders. He felt that talking around the fact that our calender began roughly with the birth of Jesus doesn't change the fact that it did, and we should acknowledge this fact.
Food for thought.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI don't deny that Jesus's birth occurred, but I don't use the term AD, because as a Jew, I don't revere him as my "Lord."
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThen aren't you a precious prat?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNot that there's anything wrong with that.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse