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WORDS
HAVE POWER
Words have power. A power to which we have been
the witnesses since Jyllands-Posten published
its 12 controversial cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad. The
fierce debate the publication of these cartoons aroused,
which has now entered its fourth month, has to a large extent
centered around the usage of free speech in principle as
well as practice, with one often being confused with the
other.
Since the story broke, we have thus witnessed a veritable
phalanx of sticklers for principle, some of them otherwise
exceptionally intelligent people, whom The Cause has suddenly
transformed into absolutists. Because 'freedom of speech
is non-negotiable', they have entirely forgotten about the
healthy reality check one would otherwise assume to be found
amongst the political commentator's most treasured disciplines.
Since they equate principle and practice, we have had to
endure discourse that seems to take for granted that the
religious Muslim right wing is a clear and present danger
to our way of life. Established commentators have acted
as if Danish imam Abu Laban and the Danish Islamic Association
wield the real political clout necessary to effect government
censorship of the media, despite the fact that their irresponsible
but understandable reactions to Mohammad-Gate - most recently
their rather hysterical disinformation tour of several Muslim
countries - have been motivated by what they consider hardheaded
intransigence on the part of institutional Denmark.
Because practice to these commentators has been substituted
with principle, there for example been a tendency to equate
the virulently anti-Semitic statements of the Islamic group
Hizb-ut-Tahrir with the strongly xenophobic ones on Muslims
by members of the Danish People's Party, the latest example
being Jens-Martin Eriksen and Frederik Stjernfelt writing
in the weekly newspaper Weekendavisen 30 dec.-5
jan. This comparison makes perfect sense in principle, if
one just considers the statements themselves, but it takes
on an entirely different character when seen in relation
to practical reality. The aforementioned statements come
from an extremist group that represents no more than a negligible
number of right-wing Islamists, while the latter come from
members of parliament, representing the third-largest political
party in Denmark, which is a consistent supporter of the
government and has considerable influence on legislation
on immigration and integration. The sticklers have, generally,
had a very hard time recognizing the difference between
being part of what one could call 'the Danish establishment',
and belonging to a minority. They seem to overlook the fact
that it is in the nature of democracy, as well as basic
social dynamics, that the opinions, statements and actions
of the majority wield more clout than those of the minorities.
Most secularized Danes, be they of Germanic or Ottoman
descent, will unhesitatingly agree with the sticklers that
freedom of speech is of great importance and that cartoonists
should be allowed to draw any major religious figure they
should wish to, that death threats are a completely unacceptable
way of expressing one's disagreement with something, and
that it is absurd to expect the prime minister of a democratic
country to interfere in the affairs of the free press, which
at the end of the day was what the 11 Muslim ambassadors,
Abu Laban, and the Danish Islamic Association did. What
the sticklers seem to forget, however, is that this debate
is not exclusively about freedom of speech and other basic
rights that we happily enjoy in this part of the world.
It is about practical reality in Denmark as well as the
rest of Western Europe, about how to create as harmonic
a community as possible in an increasingly heterogenic society.
In other words, this is not just a matter of principle,
but one of practice.
As many critics of Jyllands-Posten 's obviously
ill-advised publicity stunt and the prime minister's handling
of the controversy have pointed out, it is quite natural
to see the matter-of-course attitude of the publication
of the cartoons on part of the editors as a symptom of the
increasingly shrill and aggressive discourse on Muslims
these last years. It is of course hard to say precisely
how many people in Denmark were offended by the cartoons,
but it does not, as some commentators with reference to
the silent "accept" of them by most Danish Muslims have
posited, seem logical to assume that it was exclusively
the Islamic right wing who felt insulted. Could it perhaps
be that the reason that so few "moderate" Muslims have reacted
is because insults of this type have become business as
usual to them, merely the latest of many indications of
the Danish establishment's lack of understanding and respect
for them? Could it be that the cartoons, rather than being
a fundamentally important manifestation of freedom of speech,
were merely a boorish and unnecessary expression of the
intolerance plaguing our country?
However one chooses to look at it, these questions have
led to a discussion of the general "tenor" of Danish discourse
on immigration and integration. The sticklers have dismissed
this issue with reference to the sanctity of free speech,
affixing "bleeding-hearts" and similar sobriquets to the
critics raising the question. They have almost exclusively
focused on the notion that yielding an inch on the issue
will invariably lead to a washout. Classic behaviour amongst
people who, in lieu of navigating the murky waters of practicality,
seek the hard, high and easily gained ground of principle.
This case is particularly important because it has laid
bare and opened up broad debate on essential discontents
of integration in Danish society in all their ambiguity
in a way that other comparable ones, such as the ferociously
racist statements that appeared on the webpage of member
of parliament and the Danish People's Party Louise Frevert
this summer, have not. Whether this debate will ultimately
have proved helpful or just polarized our society further
remains to be seen and will in any case probably be hard
to answer. One thing is certain, however, the answers will
not be found in seeking refuge in the realm of principle.
In the already mentioned article in Weekendavisen ,
Eriksen and Stjernfelt attempt a very commendable analysis
of the meta-debate on the "tenor" of this discourse, but
they undermine their own argument by resorting to a couple
of rather crude and problematic conclusions as to its importance
and the basic values of the Open, secularized society. They
lucidly describe the downwards spiral of radicalization
the tenor of discourse is suffering, but at the same time
assert that the meta-discussion of this selfsame tenor is
the cause of this downwards spiral, that its consequence
is "a surreal scenario where two opposing parties in
an offended tone of voice accuse each other of producing
insulting discourse" neglecting the pursuit of pragmatic
solutions to the actual problems discussed.
This last point is well taken, and one can only hope the
prime minister now that he in his New Years' speech, after
months of undiplomatic pussyfooting, has reached a finely
balanced position on the issue, will follow his words with
action in his policymaking on integration, although it would
be inadvisable to hold one's breath waiting for it. The
problem with Eriksen's and Stjernfelt's analysis is however
that it underestimates the fully integrated aspect of a
problem the way it is addressed and discussed is. Words
have power and they shape our perspective on the world.
When the tenor of a discussion is polarized it is thus not
merely a symptom that things are going awry, it is one of
the contributing factors. The cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad
can therefore just as soon be considered part of the problem,
as they can the solution to it. It is, as already, noted
hard to determine conclusively, but it remains an important
consequence of their publication that people have become
more aware how important the tenor of the discourse on integration
is.
A further problem of Eriksen's and Stjernfelt's essay is
their rather unhesitant embrace of Karl Popper's notion
of the paradoxical necessity that the Open society fights
intolerance with intolerance. Once again, this is an important
insight on Popper's part and history offers plenty of examples
of its relevance, but in this context the sticklers have
been rather quick to accept it as the appropriate strategy.
Their rhetoric has been characterized by a "when in Rome"-style
attitude which holds that intransigence be fought with intransigence.
They have even gone as far as to state that freedom of speech
holds no meaning if its boundaries are not constantly tested
in accordance with this principle, and they even temporarily
convinced our clueless prime minister of this.
The sticklers' main argument is that a society in which
people censor themselves and have to moderate their speech
on certain groups in society is unacceptable. Once again
an argument that makes sense in terms of principle, but
is fundamentally unworkable in practice. Any community is
based on mutual consideration. As social beings we constantly
consider our surroundings, we live and define ourselves
in terms of the considerations we take and that are taken
in relation to us. A favourite word of the sticklers' in
this debate has been "self-censorship" and it was, of course,
an alleged case of exactly that which prompted Jyllands-Posten
's commissioning the cartoons. But in the rhetoric
of the sticklers, "self-censorship" has suddenly become
applicable to any consideration we might make in relation
to our fellow man. This despite the fact that all of us,
every day of our lives, as a matter of course moderate our
speech and avoid insulting people around us. But apparently
it is unreasonable to expect that the editors at Jyllands-Posten
operate according to this logic.
Contesting the newspaper's right to publish the cartoons
is obviously unacceptable, and the fact that they have the
right to do so indicates a healthy society in which free
speech is treasured. But this does not mean that they absolutely
should publish them, that they should not think
before they act, just as we all do in so many situations
in life. Free speech is a right to be used responsibly,
not a carte blanche to act like a bully. And to
criticize people who use it as an excuse to do so is not
a symptom of a society in the process of compromising its
fundamental values, but rather of one in which we still
understand the mutual understanding and respect these values
are founded on.
Matthias Wivel 09/01/05
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