The way to snark
This is the way to do political incorrectness, snark, kulturkrieg, counterintuitive journalism, out-of-the-box thinking, wading against the lefty tide - call it what you will. It’s well-researched and well-written, and specific in its targets. Greg Sheridan could never write an article like this if his life depended on it (nor could John Pilger). The link to al-Qaeda is measured and defined. The laziness of those who go after Israel is made clear, without the ideological blunderbuss hitting fair and foul alike (the very sort of intellectual imprecision that the targets of The Australian are often accused, but which its writers practice so often its credibility is almost exhausted). Well done on rescuing Anna Politkovskaya from a schlocky Diana-style martyrdom and putting her death in a squarely political and journalistic context.
Chechnya also shows the wisdom of what Americans call “the surge”, or (before he fell out of favour) “the Powell Doctrine”. I’d be fascinated to know if Australia has accepted any Chechnyan refugees. This does not make me any sort of expert on Chechnya but I am better informed that I was and challenged to consider issues I hadn’t considered much. I wish this article would be recognised by the various journalistic prizes at year’s end, but it probably won’t. This article is a real find in the lame junk shop of Australian media, and I was glad to have found it.
Pity the comments aren’t of similar quality (Moderates don’t take to the streets by definition, DH, they have work to do – and shame on you for not noticing people until they take to the streets and cause atrocities).
This doesn't take four months of undercover work to do - it's bloody marvellous and there should be more of it.
that article, from its initial argumentum ad google, debating society outrage quotient and teh left hates jews ending, is another example of how right wing snark is only ever unintentionally funny.
ReplyDeletethis 'article': x opposes y but x has not opposed a,b...g therefore x is clearly motivated by evil motive z' is standard fare on right-wing blogs. the fact that such a lazy, imbecilic argument can be published on the australian website as a meritorious argument from a right-wing point of view is another sign of how empty the right-wing cause has become of late. i'm amazed that you seem taken in by this. or are you engaging in subtle sarcasm and am i the one taken in?
alternatively this could just be a shitty article by a shitty writer. why not make an argument about the left being happy to invade and bomb eastern european statelets and iraq on spurious reasons only when a centre-right us president thinks it's a good idea? oh, because john pilger already did that, in fact brendan o'neill of sp!ked has pretty much made a career out of this massive blindspot some left-wingers have.
if this is it, it's going to be a long time in the wilderness waiting for rudd to slip on a banana skin, or for the american right to fix their fax machine.
I'm not "taken in", but nor did I see this as any sort of rightwing renaissance. The article I linked to was not flatulent armchair stuff like Greg Sheridan or Noam Chomsky, it was detailed and thought-provoking, and far better than anything the Oz has produced in a long time. Not perfect (see the post below from Richard Perle on Bush's impotence, which this piece should have explored), and a 600-word piece is not the place for any sort of comprehensive whip-around. Let's face it, it's a while since either of us have given Chechnya much thought.
ReplyDelete"why not make an argument about the left being happy to invade and bomb eastern european statelets and iraq on spurious reasons only when a centre-right us president thinks it's a good idea?" - because it's been done, Gam, intellectual exhaustion isn't just a rightwing phenomenon. John Pilger hasn't attacked a leftwing regime since Pol Pot.
"Statelets" is a curious description of sovereign nations, and a piss-poor attempt at delegitimisation. They're not in eastern Europe, but is East Timor a "statelet"? Is Fiji? What about Kurdistan? Is it acreage, population, what defines a "statelet"? Pilger lost interest in East Timor at about the same time Henry Kissinger did, and the other two seem to be infra his dig - careful, Gam, you might have to do some thinking for yourself.
Here's a test for you: Mugabe. There's more on this blog about Mugabe (against, you'll be surprised to learn) than in the entire Pilger oeuvre. When that bastard dies I shall cheer (Mugabe, not Pilger). Pilger will wring his hands and claim Mugabe as a "freedom fighter". While he'll dip a toe into the bottomless pit of blood and ordure that is Mugabe's record - but before wrestling the contradictions of the left, he'll latch onto some good-riddance speech and in one bound spring to the high ground, as though anyone who pisses off whitey can't be all bad. Then, he'll trot out some windy speech by Mugabe as though anyone capable of such words could be truly guilty, as though occasional speech absolves him of his foulest deeds.
What will you do in that event, Gam? Do some reading (don't be ashamed to Google but don't let it be all that you do), do some thinking, and let me know how you get on. The future of the left depends on it.
The Oz article in question is embarrassingly stupid, and nothing other than a conflation of the situations for Chechnya and Palestinians. These two scenarios have very little in common with each other, and you could just as easily point to the lack of coverage of the Western Sahara (for instance) and claim that the Left is full of Jew haters. It's about as valid as pointing to the lack of an invasion on Zimbabwe and suggesting that neo-cons are Arab-haters.
ReplyDeleteOh, and your attacks on Chomsky and Pilger do you no credit, particularly when fawningly citing the blustering of hacks from News Ltd.
No fawning, and I defy you to use the plural in searching this site for references on News Ltd. The whole point of my post was that the article was uncharacteristically intelligent considering its source.
ReplyDeleteChechnya and Palestine do have very little in common, but the latter receives far more attention than the former. I wish all articles on Palestine were as good as this one. You could, I suppose, do an article about Western Sahara but I haven't seen it yet, and I read pretty widely.
Expressing disdain is not an attack, THR, in the same way that your post is not an attack on me. I don't think it's possible to be leftist without wrestling with the contradictions of the left, and because Pilger refuses to do so makes him less important than he might like to be.
"Here's a test for you: Mugabe. There's more on this blog about Mugabe (against, you'll be surprised to learn) than in the entire Pilger oeuvre."
ReplyDeletewhy would i be surprised to see an australian against mugabe? have you forgotten it was the ostensibly left wing uk labour party that started the global crusade against this hitler of the week? what if i argued that mugabe has killed fewer people than the north korean government, who you haven't criticised, therefore your criticism of mugabe is based on racism. would that be a sensible argument?
also, why is this a test? just because i think you've been gulled by an appallingly bad article doesn't mean i agree with everyone you disagree with. what sense does that make? it doesn't even mean i necessarily disagree with you on everything.
"When that bastard dies I shall cheer (Mugabe, not Pilger). Pilger will wring his hands and claim Mugabe as a "freedom fighter". While he'll dip a toe into the bottomless pit of blood and ordure that is Mugabe's record - but before wrestling the contradictions of the left, he'll latch onto some good-riddance speech and in one bound spring to the high ground, as though anyone who pisses off whitey can't be all bad. Then, he'll trot out some windy speech by Mugabe as though anyone capable of such words could be truly guilty, as though occasional speech absolves him of his foulest deeds."
well when that day comes your hypothetical criticism of a transgression that hasn't occurred yet will come in handy. it might be difficult to accept, but here in the real world, people are not completely evil or completely good. this is why applying these litmus tests is really silly. implying that people of a particular ideological persuasion must accept the deeds of every person you allocate to that ideology is a illogical. it's as absurd as if i asked you to take ownership of every word and policy uttered by john howard, or, god preserve us, alexander downer. that would be stupid. i'm trying to point out to you that the article you're praising is in fact the very sort of intellectual laziness that you decry on your otherwise well written blog.
just because i point out that a lot of the best criticism of the left comes from other people who are left-aligned doesn't mean i have to accept or defend them. i'm simply pointing out that a lot of people who are left-aligned are happy to contradict themselves when a particular ideologue is doing something they would otherwise decry. i'm saying that this is a more valid criticism than 'teh left hates jews x1000'.
you've responded by assuming that i'm aligned with the left (whatever meaning that has) and going on a rhetorical bender.
also, i feel i should point out that i lived in a country that neighboured zimbabwe for 13 years and actually visited the place several times over several years. that means i know that mugabe was feted by people like margaret thatcher while he was busy orchestrating the massacre of hundreds of thousands of black zimbabweans. you'll forgive me if your rhetorical outrage fails to impress me. mugabe was just as bad in the 1980s as he is now, though apparently not so completely evil that the mdc can't form a government of national unity with him.
also:
ReplyDeletestate⋅let
/ˈsteɪtlɪt/ [steyt-lit]
–noun
a small state, esp. one resulting from the dissolution of a larger state.
Gam, your criticism above says that the only criticism you'll accept is a swingeing, tick-all-boxes rant covering all injustice anywhere. I'm not obliged to hold to standards I openly reject.
ReplyDelete"well when that day comes your hypothetical criticism of a transgression that hasn't occurred yet will come in handy." It is entirely valid to take Pilger's work and extrapolate it forward to future events. It is a form of intellectual weakness not to criticise your own side with a view to making things better. From 1996 I saw a vigorous political party become a passive happy-clappy club for a man without charisma, and otherwise sensible people become shills for silly corporate interests. I despise Pilger because he won't bring himself to do the same, so when he takes easy shots at, say, Margaret Thatcher I give him less due than someone who takes an obscure situation and presents it in a fresh and interesting way.
I thought the article did that, and still do. Until I read another on that subject which is so fresh, interesting and well-researched that it buries the article I linked to (to the extent that you're trying to do in your comments), I'll stand by my assessment of it.
I have no idea what you think about Pilger, if anything, or whom or what you're aligned to, if any. I was seeking to demonstrate my point in reference to someone who writes extensively on foreign policy issues but who wouldn't be published in a million years.
I'll still stack my "rhetorical outrage" and perception of the "real world" against yours any day. And, you can shove your dictionary - "statelet" is still a patronising term applicable only to those that are small and artificial (like, say, Bophuthatswana or Monaco) rather than merely small but otherwise due all the recognition due to sovereign nations (like, say, Armenia).