Universal smugness

June 20 - Ouch. Hartley Steward doesn't pull his punches in 'Nice' people finish last:

So, have you dropped the idea of sewing a cute little Canadian flag onto your backpack to endear yourself to strangers when you holiday this year? There goes another precious Canadian conceit.

It seems that even the unbearable niceness of being Canadian won't keep you safe in this dreadful new world of ours. The smug Canuck smile has surely been wiped off your face by the gory details of the alleged Muslim terrorists' plans uncovered in Toronto.

But there's no reason for Americans - or Europeans, Australians, Indonesians, or anybody - to grin at Canadian discomfort because we've all been guilty of thinking our essential niceness and decency immunized us from hatred. Americans failed to learn after the first attack on the World Trade Center to take bin Laden's declaration of war seriously and we paid a terrible price for our stupidity in 2001.

Canadians, or more specifically Torontonians, ducked the bullet this time and only time will tell if enough took the lesson to heart, but people up here do have the regrettable advantage of having witnessed terror attacks where other "nice" people live such as New York, Bali, Madrid, and London.

Our paradox

We've all been raised to believed that people will respond to kindness with kindness and, by application, to tolerance with tolerance. Those notions remain valid and not ones we should discard, yet it's the exceptions to those rules that will kill us.

Canadians, as do most Westerners, need to figure out how to be both tolerant and vigilant. It is extremely difficult because it is a paradox, requiring simultaneous trust and distrust, and all the harder because experiences in both London and southern Ontario indicate that new converts were used, indicating (again) that those wishing us harm are not easily identified.

All in all, itÂ’s kind of depressing that weÂ’ve gotten to this point. Like everybody, I made some vows to myself in those early days after September 11. Most of them were echoed by millions of Americans, but there was one in particular that I knew might be the hardest to keep: to keep my anger focused on the actual evil-doers, not to lump all the members of that culture with said evil-doers, and to persevere in winning Muslim support against evildoers.

We all know that Japanese-Americans were placed in detention camps during World War II. We know that it was rationalized as being to protect Japanese-Americans when Japan invaded as U.S. soldiers would fire upon anyone who looked Japanese while repelling the expected invasion.

So, did anyone else fear that Muslim-Americans with roots in the Mid-east might be rounded up? CÂ’mon, you know you did. Anyone who knows American history would have had the thought flash across his or her mind even if it were immediately rejected.

But, and itÂ’s a big but, I think most of us would have hit the streets and protested against such a draconic move. ThatÂ’s something the left doesnÂ’t seem to understand about those of us who are determined to protect and defend our country, and thatÂ’s why so many of us were won over when President Bush early on made it clear that he regarded Muslims as allies, not enemies, and declared this war as one against the evil practice of terrorism.

We know that we committed a sin during World War II. And I know that, although my rage some days challenges my early vow, that same vow has provided ballast and returned me to my earlier conviction: that we — Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, Hindu, Christian – are in this together.

You're either with us or against us

Stewart lays it out:

The time has come for the international Muslim community to take some responsibility. It's time to squeal their heads off to security forces everywhere when they know something. Time to drop the dime on friends, neighbours, associates -- to show some courage and old-fashioned fortitude. Time to stop whining about a possible backlash against ordinary, law-abiding Muslims and begin to participate in the solution.

We don't need another lecture on our insensitivity to the Muslim world. We need help.

Note that he addresses this to the international Muslim community.

A more than substantial number of terror attacks have been carried out by Muslims, and those in Western cities were carried out by Muslims who had been living in or raised in Western countries. Those attacks were proclaimed to be in the name of Islam. Like it no, Muslims have been put on the proverbial spot and each thwarted and successful attack lessens the patience Westerners have for the counter-accusations of racism, victimhood and the outright denial uttered by far too many international Muslim leaders.

It really is a pity more liberals seemed incapable of of respecting the sincerity of Bush's call for tolerance after Sept. 11, but it would have been a far bigger pity if many Muslims hadnÂ’t paid attention and, by choosing their allegiance and trusting their governments, helped expose cells like the one in Lackawanna and perhaps even this most recent Toronto cell.

The extent to which tips led to the takedown of international terror cells is impossible to ascertain and it might even be reckless to overly speculate on the subject, but logic tells us that some degree of inside information had to come into play.

That realization should counter outrage or any kind of opportunist backlash because, just as we do not always recognize the foe, we also do not always recognize the ally.

We were all forcibly enrolled in an intense training course on Sept. 11 and it is right that we hated being forced to take it, but don't forget that Muslims were also enrolled in that course and that Muslims were not only among the victims of Sept. 11 but have comprised the majority of casualties since.

In the end, Muslims have as large a stake in this war as do we, and we should never stop reaching out to those communities.

14:43 - I can't believe I failed to include the fact that success in fighting the terrorists in Iraq and Afganistan is largely due to the massive number of tips received by the police and armies as well as coalition forces in those countries. The grim degree to which Iraqis and Afghans have a stake in destroying terror networks there is beyond any dangers we've yet faced in North America.

[This was written Sunday but I've only now been able to publish. Sorry it's so stale.]

Posted by: Debbye at 12:45 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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