Another Day in Paradise

ANOTHER DAY IN PARADISE

Maryam Sakeenah

Just another day with its crippling sameness

That makes criminals of you and me_

Harmless; You can let us walk about on the loose.

It serves- that iron bitt in the mouth-

That keeps the unspoken, the unheard Word

Stuck in the throat.

We the lost herd: Lost-

But without a Loss

To wound the heart, to bloody it, to ennoble;

A losing without the Loss, the Pain…

Or with one too great to make itself felt

In the empty spaces that make us.

We are free, you know.

What though the wings that make us soar be clipped?

We are the Earthbound. And earth does not grow wings,

No, not the stony rubbish of the Wasteland.

There are gods on high-

Feeling forever the tail between the legs,

The feet of clay.

‘Dust to dust…’ 

Little gods, creepy-crawly

But gods all right:

For ‘they shall inherit the earth.’

Per force.

Their decree makes us free- 

Democracy, human rights, ‘laissez faire’

‘Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.’

All that jazz.

‘Man is condemned to be free.’-

To feel the tail between the legs,

The feet of clay.

……………………………………………………………

The tin rooftop comes sloping down like a vault,

And over it, from afar, a cry is heard-

Muffled, quivering, broken-

Like from another world

Somewhere in the world-

But not in here…

In here

We are free!

Like birds in gilded cages

In here it is warm with the gas-fire

And the central electric heating-

The trappings of civilization

That subsume our reality.

If you shut the window, the cold draught with its steely stab

Won’t come in.

Shut the window.

Don’t let the gale in,

For it might bring bits and pieces of the world-

The glass and stone, wood and plastic in burnt fragments

And maybe,

A spattering of reddened dust- Blood Red-

To hurt the eyes

And shatter the little fiction

That keeps us comfy

Near the warm hearth (well-insulated),

With news alerts flashing on the telly

So rhythmically.

And a coffee-table copy of the Washington Post

Telling of far-off places, distant lands-

‘People we do not know.’

But they look so much like me!

My eyes, my body, my throbbing heart, my battered soul…

Why, oh why?

Not my race, nor colour, skin nor country.

Faraway tales of the faraway folk.

Phew!

The woman there, mirrors a pain I have felt, known too well!

The dark lonely child has the stars in his eyes…

Not yet dimmed by Death’s fell sweep..

Why, oh why?

I am In Here.

Listening to the comforting drone of the air conditioner

Here and Now. All I will ever need, ever want.

A square yard of the earth to bury myself in

And bide my time.

In Here I am safe,

I am the free citizen

Like the bird in the richly gilded cage

The song of the soul

Stuck in the throat.

The Failure of Public Opinion

THE FAILURE OF PUBLIC OPINION

Maryam Sakeenah

The paradox in today's world is that alongside the loudly professed commitment to democracy, public opinion still does not 'have a say', especially in the domain of international affairs. American diplomat John Bolton said in a recent interview:

Interviewer: You do not seem to doubt the 'go-it-alone' approach of the United States although anti-Americanism is rising across the world. Doesn't such a negative view of America in world public opinion weaken US power?

John Bolton: I do not think so. I have looked at public opinion polls in France in the late 1940s and early 1950s during the height of the Marshall Plan aid. They had a very negative attitude towards the United States then. But did it make a difference? There were also negative attitudes about the United States because of Vietnam. There were negative attitudes about the US when Reagan wanted to deploy intermediate range ballistic missiles. I do not think the president should base his foreign policy on American public opinion polls, let alone foreign opinion polls. (Der Spiegel)

'DEVIOUS MEANS'

A frequently used ploy to control public opinion is through manipulation and state control of media as well as using propaganda mechanisms. A pertinent case in point is the manipulation of the Weapons of Mass Destruction spectre. The propaganda and the outrage against the 'axis of evil' it kicked up helped create a justification to launch the War in Iraq. The media played ally and tool, creating terror of the heinous weapons hidden somewhere in the dark corners of Saddam's backyard. Most people accepted the Bush administration's depiction of the War on Terror as a campaign against Weapons of Mass Destruction. Too little critical examination of the way events, issues, threats and policies were framed was done, and no alternative perspectives were given to the people apart from the official line. Hence public opinion in the US and elsewhere was effectively kept tame and any possibility of expression of outrage over the attack on Baghdad was successfully diminished. Public opinion, in such cases, shows itself to be extremely malleable, mould-able, manipulate-able.

One strategy of controlling and weakening public opinion is creating and nurturing misperceptions and building on them. Stephen Kull has gathered interesting information to illustrate this. A convenient and oft-used misperception is to justify foreign policy by proving it to be in the 'supreme national interest'. Stephen Kull writes, "The public must be able to see the link of foreign policy with national interest. If Americans are told and explained to by their president that a certain policy is in the vital interest of the government and give a compelling argument, the people will withstand all the casualties in the process. Military losses should not be publicized."

THE ROLE OF THE MASS MEDIA

In order to promote propaganda, the State needs to use the mass media, which is easy in totalitarian states. However, in democratic societies, a conflict between the free media and the government may result as the media tries to bring to light what the government prefers to conceal. This clash has heightened due to the advent of new technologies, especially the internet where free information inflow and exchange is available.

However, the media is dependent on the government also for information. The government is more empowered and resourceful to be able to control information inflow, to manipulate journalists by feeding them information and 'shaping' the news. This can lead to curbs on the media and strict censorship to control public opinion, such as in the case of emergency in Pakistan. Media coverage of the military operations is usually prohibited or strictly censored, for example the ongoing war in Pakistan's restive tribal belt receives little attention, owing to a hostile environment for the media in the heavily militarized region. Similarly, during the Red Mosque Operation in Islamabad, the media was safely kept out, given little to cover and let in only much later for a cosmetic 'display' of the huge 'arsenal' recovered from the debris of the dilapidated masjid. By 'not showing the dead bodies,' as the government had demanded from the media before the crackdown began, public sympathies were kept in check and a popular backlash averted.

THE PARADOX OF AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY TRADITION

According to 'worldpublicopinion.org', 73% of Americans reject American policy in Iraq. 70% agree that Guantanamo prison camps are illegal, 77% want USA to renounce its nuclear weaponry and 76% want the United Nations, not United States to have the pre-eminent role in world politics.

Human Rights abuses in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have been highlighted and widely condemned. Peace movements like Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and Citizens for Peace etc. turned vociferous and organised themselves for a forefront role. The effort to show the world a forgotten human cost of war which is expediently cast aside as 'collateral damage', was commendable indeed and was helped greatly by a free media.

The tragedy that sets one thinking, though, is that the US still carries on with Afghanistan and Iraq; that Guantanamo still harbours prisoners clandestinely where torture goes unabated and scores go missing at the hands of state agencies on the hunt for the 'elusive terrorist.' The fact that stares one in the face is that Liberalism spearheaded by Western societies and their values of freedom and individual liberty ring hollow in the face of the appalling apathy towards the overwhelming public opinion against the unjust crusade shown by those at the helm of affairs.

The quality of thought in democracies has reached the lowest ebb of impoverishment with a mass naivete or even apathy running wild, leaving public opinion quite inconsequential and easy to dismiss by the foreign policy makers.

An interesting case in point is that of Cindy Sheehan, the American peace activist who was stirred into action following the death of her son serving the US army in Iraq. The sense of futility in the life lost for a vainglorious end made her organize a campaign to pressurize the government to stop the War. Despite a swift gathering of support, Sheehan suffered hostile, sneering and apathetic responses, leaving her frustrated and disappointed. Announcing officially that she was calling it quits, Sheehan presented a vociferous, unplugged critique of the American attitude:

"Hundreds of thousands of people are dying for a war based on lies, that is supported by Republicans and Democrats alike. People of the world look on us Americans as jokes because we allow our political leaders so much murderous latitude. We are rapidly descending into a fascist corporate wasteland… My son was killed by his own country which is run by a war machine and even controls the way we think. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed as we play politics with human lives. It is so painful. We are worried more about elections than about human beings."

STEREOTYPES

The Communist stereotype was swiftly replaced by the Muslim stereotype after the Cold War. To create a subdued, unquestioning and unprotesting mindset that accepts the logic and 'nobility' of a 'crusade' to wipe out the evil 'terrorist' and teach some civilization to the barbarians in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Muslim stereotype proved useful. The media helped create the stereotype, to the extent that today 3 in 4 Americans say they would prefer not living in a neighbourhood where a Muslim family lives. To neutralize opposition to the ongoing war, hatred and fear of the enemy is created.

Yet it is also the media which has the power to undo stereotypes through objectivity, information, awareness, understanding and sympathy. For example, the stereotype of the 'black' in the West was undone largely by the media and a number of works of art and literature as well as movies came onto the scene humanizing the 'black' and creating sympathy for his predicament_ for instance, 'Roots' by Alex Haley, the works of Toni Morrison and Maya Angelou, and more recently 'Blood Diamonds.'

INEFFECTIVE PUBLIC OPINION

The modern man is dependent on others to formulate his own opinion, and is conformist in behaviour, avoiding risk and playing safe to go on comfortably. This makes him a cog in the machine of the system, an agent of continuing the status quo, a strength for the establishment's policies_ without perhaps being aware of it.

The ignorant mass-man is instrumental to policy making_ the more of such men, the better. Like the Pakistani President Musharraf who, in his bold defection from democratic, traditional norms and values, sought strength (in his own words), from 'the support of the silent majority.'

THE CULTURE OF CONSUMERISM

This process is aggravated by the commercial consumerist culture. Erich Fromm has mentioned the emergence of the 'marketing personality' in the modern age, incapable of genuine opinion-making and effectively expressing it. The 'marketing personality' grows out of "the experience of oneself a commodity and of one's value as exchange value. To be a social success as a 'commodity' one has to be an empty vessel into which one can pour in the right trait at the right time." The consumerist, brand-conscious, brand-suffocated culture creates passive recipients of information. It makes people with limited self-awareness as the fast-paced life pattern leaves little time to reflect and introspect. Life is too full of luxuries and comfort to desire a change in the status quo. The consumerist individual gets his Mac Donald's hamburgers everyday, has a two-room apartment, a girlfriend and Levi's jeans, and is likely to continue like this… so Iraq does not count, nor does the noise Ms. Sheehan makes.

The consumerist culture goes on producing 'mass man' by the dozen. The mass men help perpetuate the order, maintain the status quo, sterilize and deaden public opinion and make the world full of George Orwell's 'sheep' of 'Animal Farm', chanting the State's slogan 'Four legs good, two legs bad,' but switching over to 'Four legs good, two legs better' when expedient propaganda woos their simple, comfort-choked intellects. Winston White sums up this psychological phenomenon thus: "Every individual wants to fit in and be accepted. He strives for this by being like what most of the members of this reference group consider standards of behaviour (other direction) and acts accordingly; he conforms. Since in conformity, he is careful not to do or say something that will rub the others the wrong way, the idiosyncratic rough edges of his personality are rubbed away; in consequence, he becomes scarcely distinguishable from those whose approbation he seeks." It is this conformism that renders public opinion impotent and sterile.

It has been argued and proven by Mc Clelland that Americans, much more than others, want to associate themselves with majority opinion (and are hence more 'other-directed') because it bears the stamp of 'being right.' An American voter said, "Just before the election it looked like Bush would win, so I went with the crowd. It didn't make any difference to me who won, but I just wanted to vote for the winner." Despite the quagmire in Iraq, President Bush won a second term because the war statistics were perhaps still not enough to radically change the public opinion of a people who are increasingly conformist.

Foreign policy, in particular, is one aspect which carries little importance to the average voter in stating his choice. According to a survey, only 19% Americans consider foreign policy perspective of the presidential candidate when making their choice… and this about a country whose foreign policy embraces the entire globe!

THE 'DUMBING DOWN'OF AMERICA

As a result, the average American is both ignorant of and insensitive to America's manoeuvring of global politics and its adventures abroad. A progressive economy, individual liberty and personal comfort are all that matter. He cannot see beyond his two-room luxury apartment. Christopher Lasch calls this a malaise of 'narcissism' gripping the West. 'Narcissism' is an obsession with the self. The narcissist believes that his personal comfort guaranteed by brand labels makes him satisfied with the system as a whole, and so his country's unjust foreign policy elsewhere does not bother the individual. Literary critic Harold Bloom has called it a 'dumbing down' of the American public, for which he blames the media and the education system. Public opinion in the US, the world's greatest democracy, is impotent. This is the paradox of liberal democracy. Ironically, however, it is also this nation which, by virtue of an adventurous, domineering and interventionist foreign policy, influences global politics profoundly. It has managed to insulate its foreign policy making process from public opinion, safely and exclusively reserving it for lobbyists, interests-groups, inner-circle diplomats, the CIA and FBI to carry on clandestinely, without the burden of the public sanction. The 'dumbing down' is complete. The information level of the American public is rather low_ a lot less adequate to its grand agenda.

POST-ELECTIONS PAKISTAN: 'THE GREAT BETRAYAL'

Any 'democracy' is meaningless and hollow if public opinion is not empowered. This is especially true in the case of Pakistan today. Following the elections, the public reposed great hope and trust in the elected representatives to a bring a change in the country's ill-thought role in the War on Terror which justifies the brutal onslaught on our own people by characterizing the victim as 'terrorist' and demonizing him sufficiently so that questions are not asked, sympathies not provoked. However, with a lack of will shown by the government to negotiate the problems instead of taking up the military alternative has dimmed hope. After a welcome lull, the spate of maniacal reactive suicide attacks engineered by shady characters seems to be in the offing. This time, however, it has been our own choice. We failed to commit to justice and peace and let go of the opportunity to make amends and stop the madness that has brought in its wake so much hurt. This time, again, we chose to betray the public trust, to sideline public opinion.

…………………………………………………………………………………..

Public opinion is the voice of the human sensibility and must not be perverted through manipulation. It is sacred and sovereign and carries within it the potential to rehumanize the morass we call 'international politics.'

It is only when lobbying, expediency, secrecy, manipulation and Machiavellian diplomacy is replaced with the basic democratic value of inclusion of the genuine 'vox populi' into foreign policy making will the cutthroat international order be replaced with a more humane and egalitarian order on the basis of the principles set by international law, and embodied in the universal human values that exist in little corners of men's hearts. It is about time we realize the potential and promise in the human voice that holds in it the amplitude capable of ushering in a newer, better world for all.

The Secular 'Ism'

THE SECULAR 'ISM'

Maryam Sakeenah

The façade of 'freedom of expression' does little to hide the real motives behind the republication of the Danish caricatures. It is a blatant provocation, a mischief_ and any fool can see that.

No sir, not the same bait each time. This time round, you only proved that with all your noise about freedom and liberal values, you're so badly and pathetically mired up in your self-created prejudices.

This time, it is you who took the bait_ and we're having our last laugh.

All the same, some important lessons emerge from it. For one, it helps one see deeper into the West's much-touted secular creed. Europe chose to wear proud the secular label for the tolerance, pluralism and freedom that being secular entails. And yet, it is ironic that so many years down the line, Western secular society continues to be trapped in fanatical prejudices and intolerance against an increasingly ghettoized Muslim community.

Prejudice and misinformed bigotry against Islam in the West's secular polity have reached manic proportions. Fear and hatred of the Muslim stereotype to an excessive and obsessive degree pumped up by the media is palpable in Western society. Michael Savage, a popular talk-show host in America remarked on his show: "When I see a woman walking around with a burqa, I see a Nazi. That's what I see. How do you like that? A hateful Nazi who would like to cut your throat and kill your children. When a woman wears a burqa, she's doing it to spit in your face. She's saying, 'you white moron, you, I'm gonna kill you if I can."

In France, the headscarf is banned; in UK teachers wearing the veil have to seek recourse to courts to win the right to dress like they want. All over Europe and America, Muslim populations face all kinds of discrimination and even victimization, which has put Muslims everywhere on the defensive, increasingly insecure in trying to practise their faith. Secular Western society grows more exclusivist and supremacist by the day.

The West's secular creed has assumed a totalitarian character. The values of freedom and tolerance it claims to champion are applied only selectively, as secular societies refuse to integrate or even accommodate religion. It has become an aggressively fanatical creed, wearing proud its irreligion with a militant religiosity. According to Phillip Bond and Adrian Pabst writing for the International Herald Tribune, "European societies enshrine the primacy of secular law over and against religious principles. Far from ensuring neutrality and tolerance, the secular European state arrogates to itself the right to control and legislate all spheres of life; state constraints apply especially to religion and its civic influence. Legally, secularism outlaws any rival source of sovereignty or legitimacy. Politically, secularism denies religion any import in public debate and decision-making. Culturally, secularism enforces its own norms and standards upon all other belief systems."

The secular commitment to freedom of expression has become a justification for intellectual abuse, slander and propaganda directed against a community_ very frequently, 'immoderate' Muslims. A whole array of Western pseudo-intellectuals, journalists and leaders participate in the verbal onslaught, seeking cover under the shield of freedom of expression. According to Karen Armstrong, "With freedom of speech comes a lot of responsibility. Anything that tramples on sensitivities is not freedom of expression. And whatever comes from the heart can never offend like this." The secular intellectual reserve of the West has failed to define what freedom of expression really means; that it is not the right to hurt, abuse, blatantly malign and provoke in calculated moves.

Ironically, however, State legislation in many secular countries effectively checks what is defined as 'anti-Semitic' expression_which also includes the intellectual crime of doubting the statistics of the Jewish Holocaust. There goes freedom of expression.

Secularism comes packaged nice and appealing, wrapped in humane vocabulary. It is all about democracy, individual liberty, freedom, tolerance, pluralism and moderation. States in the West loyally commit themselves to it, living under a grandiose fantasy of superior humanity and a higher civilization. With this narcissistic perception comes the license to play the global Big Brother, dictating the order of things arbitrarily. Dennis Rahkonen writes in 'Ugly American needs a Makeover', "Our insufferable arrogance and foreign policy excesses are garnering us record levels of international opprobrium…Washington tries to thrust its wayward will on understandably resistant mankind." Secularism is nurturing an ultraconservatist extremism in Western state machinery, screeching madly onward towards what Huntington called the 'Clash of Civilizations.'

Ideology-lessness or poverty of vision are the gifts of secularism. Wrapped up in promises of liberation and democracy, the secular vision is depraved, devoid of an ethical orientation. As a result, we see secularism's 'missionary soldiers' committing heinous crimes against humanity while in a drunken stupor of arrogant self-righteousness. The West's apathetic insensitivity to Israel's blatant human rights violations of the hapless Palestinians reflects just that, as does their support and their sordid deals with the highly corrupt and unpopular Fatah.

Seven years on, the secular missionary zeal with which Afghanistan was 'liberated' has quite dissipated. The spokesperson of a women's NGO in Afghanistan lays bare the West's bid on her country: "The US militarily occupied Afghanistan to 'bring freedom and democracy' to the Afghan people… but it has empowered and equipped the criminal bands of the Northern Alliance, making a game of the values of human rights. The destitution and suffering of our people doubles every day. Our children fall victim to NATO's non-stop bombardments. The Northern Alliance bloodsuckers have key government posts… human rights violations, corruption, crime and violence have reached their peak, and women in prisons are raped as a common practice. If these foreign troops leave Afghanistan, we will feel no vacuum, but rather more free… Neither the US nor any other power wants to actually release the Afghan people from these fetters…"

The megalomania of the Secular 'ism' is not just wreaking havoc in the foreign policy misadventures of the Western world. Greater crises are brewing up in Western societies. This great demographic crisis has its seeds in Enlightenment Europe's celebrated dissociation from religion. It was a shortsighted triumph, ignoring the reality that human societies cannot survive in a secularized milieu. The natural corollary is the amoral relativized morass we observe at the heart of Western civilizaion.Today, religious morality and universal ethics are absent from the Western consciousness. And the absence makes its presence felt. According to Mitt Romney, "Europe is facing a demographic disaster. That is the inevitable product of weakened faith in the Creator, failed families, disrespect for the sanctity of human life and eroded morality..." On the social level, Secularism generates a culture of degeneracy, a society of minimal selves, ephemeral lives. Socially, secular societies have abandoned the cultural cohesion based on transcendental human values religion creates. This is what makes secular society fragmented, excluding those it defines as the 'other.'

Secularism is fundamentally flawed, as it overlooks the undeniable reality that man by nature cannot create a society with multilaterally co-existent beliefs and systems. By nature, man propagates his belief, fights for it and aspires for the pre-eminence of his own ideology. A state of absolute equality and pluralist co existence of multiple opposed beliefs is a Utopian dream. Secularism aspires to create this Utopian state, but fails to achieve it, given the inalterability of human nature. It eventually evolves into an authoritarian creed, weeding out remnants of archaic religious belief. Because of its inherent amorality and absence of a universal ethical idealism religion could give, Secularism eventually degenerates into a ruthless imposition of irreligion, often discriminatory, intensely intolerant, divisive and exclusivist. This is exactly what is plaguing Western societies today.

A reactionary response to the secular onslaught has been the growing rise of Evangelicism. Evangelicism, however, is more of another fanatical creed than a comprehensive system built around universal religious morality. It is an imposition of the 'love of God', having done 'untold damage to non-Christian societies in the name of Jesus'(Z. Sardar, The New Statesman), including the printing and distribution of counterfeit 'Korans', propagation of anti-Islamic blasphemous literature and incitement of apostasies among despondent Muslim communities. Like Secularism, the Evangelist is deluded into believing that all is fair as a 'benevolent act in the name of Jesus.'

It is Islam alone, with its stringent moral basis, that stands as a veritable alternative and an effective bulwark. For, it knits into a comprehensive whole, both the secular and the religious aspects of life, and imbues them with a pristine, absolute morality that is all-embracing in its universality. Unlike Secularism and other fanatical creeds, Islam does not blindly cling to a hidden ideological agenda under cover of a civilizing mission. It energetically denounces the violation of human rights both in the name of religious fanaticism, and in the name of secular liberalism and democracy. It is not selective, and upholds what secular and narrow creeds cannot_ an objective universal Truth transcending the limits of human fallibility and endeavour. It towers above the morass of 'isms' the world is riddled with. The Prophet (SAW) said in his Last Sermon:
"O People, just as you regard this month, this day, this city as Sacred, so
regard the life and property of every Muslim as a sacred trust. Return the
goods entrusted to you to their rightful owners. Hurt no one so that no
one may hurt you. Remember that you will indeed meet your Lord, and that
He will indeed reckon your deeds.
O People, it is true that you have certain rights with regard to your
women, but they also have right over you. If they abide by your right then
to them belongs the right to be fed and clothed in kindness. Do treat your
women well and be kind to them for they are your partners and committed
helpers.
You know that every Muslim is the brother of another Muslim. You are all equal. You are all sons and daughters of Adam, and Adam was made from dust. There is no superiority of an Arab over a non Arab, or of a white over a black. Nobody has superiority over another except by piety and good action.
Be my witness, O Allah, that I have conveyed your message to your people".

Rights of non-Muslim subjects are clearly outlined in Islamic Law, and their honour, freedom and safety is guaranteed in the Islamic society. Muslim communities in history have maintained exemplary levels of tolerance towards minorities. The first Islamic community was essentially pluralist, deeply integrated and egalitarian_ in so much more meaningful ways than what any modern-day secular society can boast of.

Since the nature of human society is that a single belief or system is bound to gain ascendancy over others, it is important for the triumphant system to have a strong basis in absolute universal morality so as to include all in a single human bonding. A truly universal and inclusive system can only be one that upholds justice as its highest value, and guarantees the protection of basic human rights without discrimination and narrow delineations. Distinctions are unavoidable, as humanity is not a monolithic entity but a diverse, multi-layered multiplicity. However, distinctions based on ethnicity, race, social status and nationalism eventually dwindle into narrow fanatical creeds. A system that allows for no distinction but that of a humanizing faith offers a promising, egalitarian vision. The ideal human community is one held together by the bonding of ideas and faith. Not just because this faith is the highest human trait, but also because it is essentially liberating; its commitment to universal morality means it includes and respects all; its merit is that it does not divide humanity into those of a 'lesser' and those of a 'higher' God. It is a guarantee of true, veritable and meaningful human liberation. A system according supremacy to none but those of 'righteous conduct' (which is solely judged by God), is truly egalitarian, progressive, promising and visionary.

Thinking minds both in the West and non-Western societies are gradually feeling a disaffection with the avowed Secular worldview. Sped up by the ongoing War on Terror, the distinctions between fanaticism in the guise of religion and pristine Islam are becoming clearer to see. Muslims are feeling the urge to find out and inquire for themselves the Whole Truth_ and it is leading many Homewards. That explains the growing numbers of converts to Islam in the West and the ever-increasing numbers of young, educated 'born again' practising Muslims the world over. And that is why, what with all the hypocrisy and the insanity around, we have grounds for hope. That is why the puerile tricks by publishers of blasphemous caricatures and Dutch documentary-makers are merely a puny, ridiculous, self-defeating endeavour.