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A Further Perspective
Seeing Is Relieving
Why is it that liberals are always getting mugged by reality?
The story of Lara Logan is first and foremost a personal tragedy. A decent woman, a South African by birth, an American by adoption, trying to do her job as a television journalist, is cheering for the street rebels in Egypt to unseat the old order. Suddenly the disorder becomes the occasion for her sexual victimization at the hands of the wanton mob.
It is terribly sad that this happened and terribly fortunate that she survived with her health and most of her dignity. Still, in a way the more profound tragedy is the naïveté she brought to that scene. Here is Logan’s assessment, in her own words, of what she knew about Egyptian society before her ordeal and what she discovered afterward, as rendered by the New York Times:
Before the assault, Ms. Logan said, she did not know about the levels of harassment and abuse that women in Egypt and other countries regularly experienced. “I would have paid more attention to it if I had had any sense of it,” she said. “When women are harassed and subjected to this in society, they’re denied an equal place in that society. Public spaces don’t belong to them. Men control it. It reaffirms the oppressive role of men in the society.”
This is worth pondering for a long moment. We are not talking about a blithe tourist who was gulled by the shiny brochure, surprised at the brackish water coming from the hotel faucet. This is a woman whose job is world news, working at a major national network which spans the globe with its coverage. There is no source of information on the planet to which Lara does not have easy access.
And with all this, she tells us in a heartfelt plaint - in the kind of monologue where a person may be trusted to bare her innermost truth - she had no sense of the fact that women in Arabic cultures are harassed and subjected to abuse. She did not notice that public spaces in those countries do not belong to women. She failed to observe that men control those spaces, exercising an oppressive role in society.
Respectfully, and with sensitivity to her pain, I must express my astonishment. I knew all those things she just described, and I knew them long ago. So did every single one of my colleagues at this magazine and at every similar publication. I would venture to say that the vast majority of our readership knew all this as well. Not because we entertain prejudices about members of other races, but because we are trained observers of reality.
The question is as obvious as it is painful: inasmuch as Lara Logan is every bit as well-trained and as knowledgeable about the world as the journalists at The American Spectator et al., how could she profess ignorance of such a blatant, patent, palpable, flagrant phenomenon?
The answer is not an original thought of mine. It was expressed in the popular culture by the story of The Emperor’s New Clothes. People can be maneuvered into missing obvious truths by peer pressure, conventional wisdom and wishful thinking. When personal experience intrudes jarringly, eyes dulled by a film of willful ignorance are opened wide. Then the proverbial liberal who gets mugged starts thinking conservatively. The mark who gets taken takes a second look at his givens.
Logan’s new awareness is echoed immediately by the celebration of Bin Laden being summarily executed in his courtyard and bedroom rather than being brought to the courtroom. Suddenly everyone in Manhattan and Hollywood and Burlington and Berkeley knows what we know everyday. At least, they know it for today. That is good news, as far as it goes, a great relief to those who feared we would walk blindly into oblivion.
Still, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that we would be better served by the governance of those who can tell the Emperor’s fur from his chest hair.
About the Author
Jay D. Homnick, commentator and humorist, is a frequent contributor to The American Spectator. He also writes for Human Events. Here he speaks at the Rally for Religious Freedom in Miami on June 8, 2012.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (62) | Leave a comment
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JimP| 5.3.11 @ 7:14AM
I think Mr. Homnick is being too kind to Ms. Logan when he describes her as "a decent woman" and "naive". Perhaps he is unaware of Ms. Logan's personal conduct and ethics. As for her naivete he addresses it but I think again is being too kind. What I have observed of her, and I am no follower of her career, is the kind of hubris and arrogance that virtually all 'journalists' display. They think they are citizens of the world, above everyone and everything else and expect the same elevated status and treatment everyplace that they receive in too many Western countries. Naive? No, IMHO. An arrogant fool? Yes!
Sheila| 5.3.11 @ 10:59AM
JimP - well said.
Bob K.| 5.3.11 @ 12:10PM
Mr. Homnick is also a journalist. He is constrained to be circumspect in these criticisms of his colleagues and his profession.
JimP| 5.3.11 @ 12:42PM
Thanks for the info. Mr. Homnick is a journalist. Lara Logan is a 'journalist', IMO. Infer any and all negative interpretations you like regarding 'journalists.'
Craig K | 5.3.11 @ 7:20AM
I thought I was the only one who had your observation on the Lara Logan incident. I,m not sure that as a man I would have felt safe entering that crowd. I believe it shows an incredible level of naivete to assume a woman would be safe there.
Pecos Pete| 5.3.11 @ 8:50AM
Craig: you correctly state the situation. No sane (intelligent?) person would have walked into that mob.
Mari| 5.3.11 @ 10:13AM
Craig is right. No westerner, especially a woman, would be safe in that mob.
And it is astonishing that she didn't think women in the Middle East are abused. Burkas, beheadings, stoning, honor killing.
Deaf, dumb and blinded by political correctness, I guess.
Stephen| 5.3.11 @ 8:16AM
Thank you JimP for touching on reality. In the video, this attractive blonde appears to have on makeup, a semi-revealing black blouse and wearing a pearl necklace! Did she think she was going to a party? Middle eastern men, many, not all, use women for procreation and young boys for sex. Men cry and smash rocks and dirt in their own face when their leaders die. When women are stoned to death, even the most westernized of them first ask "what did she do?" They are basically haters that live by century old demented rules. What happened to Logan happens every summer in NYC pools. Yes, an arrogant fool or an incredibly stupid woman.
JimP| 5.3.11 @ 12:47PM
Belated reply: Yes. How could she have worked in the Middle East and NOT be aware that dressing the way she did would likely incite Arab Muslim men to rape her? Particularly in a semi-lawless atmosphere. She was dressed like a "Western whore" -from the Arab male perspective. It strains credulity that she did not know this, except that being a 'journalist' she thought she was above it all and that protected her from harm. Duh.
Redstateboy| 5.3.11 @ 8:31AM
What's sad? (and this is extremely well written in my opinion) is if any Liber-ul read this?? There Only conclusion would be Jay Homnick is one of (those) insensitive, cold-hearted "Conservatives" and think nothing further of it.
Hamilton Lucas| 5.3.11 @ 10:21AM
OR they might think the lady is a dumbass.
j| 5.3.11 @ 8:35AM
you must be kidding? In what world do you live where you know something before you read it or are exposed to it? I must say, you are the one who lives in an ivory tower.
Drunken Sailor| 5.3.11 @ 11:52AM
That would be in the world where you research a country you are going to like any sane individual. Or are you one of those arrogant, ignorant Americans that automatically assume every country is like ours? I met many like you when I lived overseas that showed me why so many abroad believe that stereotypical American myth.
Occam's Tool| 5.3.11 @ 2:00PM
Let's see:
"We're not at war with Islam."
"Islam is a Religion of Peace."
"If we abandon Israel, those terrorists will leave us alone."
"I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help you."
Indeed. Excellent point by Drunken Sailor. When I moved to New Zealand, I had already visited the country and I knew a good deal about day to day life. I did NOT realize that the cost of living was going to be so high, and that the best drying machine was going to be made by SMEG (yes, as good as its name). But I knew about Maori, and indigeneous peoples.
JimP| 5.3.11 @ 12:48PM
Plus she had been working the Middle East for a number of years.
Hal G. P. Colebatch| 5.3.11 @ 8:44AM
About Christmas 1983 I was in Cairo with a party. One, a small Jewish girl, asked me, late at night, to walk her back to her hotel - for obvious reasons she did not want to go alone. I did so, and I can only say that, while it was obviously not a journey for a woman to undertake alone, probably in any city, we did not have the smallest feeling of threat. I don't know what this means, except perhaps that times have changed.
Patrick| 5.3.11 @ 2:19PM
1. You were there, apparently her husband, and therefore she wasn't "free game", and therefore business as usual.
2. Times have changed, for the worse, and then some.
John Navratil| 5.3.11 @ 8:47AM
Lara Logan did not, as no one should, deserve the treatment she received at the hands of the mob. Having lived in the region (30 years ago), that behaviour was no surprise to me, even though it remains shocking.
Is it arrogance, bravery or stupidity that she entered the crowd? She knew to have guards. Did she not, in a small corner of her brain suspect trouble?
If there is any good to come of this, perhaps it is the make plain to the "folks back home" that not everyone lives in the same culture and that some are more solicitous of human decency than others.
Dan Hirsch| 5.3.11 @ 9:00AM
In Mz. Logan's quote, I find the most telling word to be the "the" in the last sentence. "...It reaffirms the oppressive role of men in the society.” Ms Logan draws no distinction between the societies of the West, the East, and the Mideast.
Yet to maintain the liberal's view of the emperor's attire, she must be seriously, continuously, and completely oblivious to the rest of the world and how it treats women.
However, I would think that any woman who was intellectually serious about the rights of women in the world would be a strong supporter of our Western, Judeo-Christian society. The West offers women the best of treatment, opportunity, and respect.
Not sure, honey? Count Chinese baby girls (those who managed to dodge the government abortionists), take a good look at sharia law and think about it for ten, uninterrupted seconds. It is so obvious, it is painful.
Where the heck is NOW now?
Eric Cartman| 5.3.11 @ 9:50AM
Wait, wait, wait. Since when is it that I have to respect woman? So she got roughed up a bit and the guys got in a few squeezes. I mean, aren't we all equal now? That's what I hear all the Feminazis say: A woman, a dog, a fish, a sex toy - its all the same. No big deal. Women in combat, women as cops, women as prison guards, women as in-locker room reporters. Its all a big, fluffy huggy-bear world out there and women have the right to do anything they want an be anywhere they want. Right? And I'm sure that's why there is complete silence by the Feminazi crowd on how the Arab world treats women - because the gals have to suck it up and take it if they want to break that glass ceiling. It's old fashion to treat a women with respect. So grope away, Mohammad! The NOW crowd wont say a peep.
Melvin| 5.3.11 @ 10:08AM
If a Christian man does these things, he is a criminal, when a Middle Eastern Muslim man does this, he's practicing his religion, and it is accepted.
Hamilton Lucas| 5.3.11 @ 10:22AM
When any person does this, despite which fairy tale book they choose to represent, it is wrong.
Occam's Tool| 5.3.11 @ 2:02PM
Dear Hamilton:
It tends to be a problem with ONE fairy tale book, though. Not all that many Evangelicals or Orthodox Jews, sorry. Lots of guys named after the 3 stooges character, though.
Peter McGrath| 5.3.11 @ 10:51AM
What irks me - more than anything else - is CBS News' dogged refusal to follow up and seek - or at least report on - the pursuit and punishment of the perpetrators of this appalling assault.
What about inquiring of the women and soldiers who broke up the melee? Are there any descriptions of the persons involved? Is Ms. Logan capable of and, if so, is she assisting Egyptian authorities in their investigation of who was responsible?
Is there, or will there even be, an investigation?
Is CBS going to report on any of the above, obvious inquiries? Certainly, I and many others are keenly interested in whether the "Green Revolution" in Egypt will produce an authority which cracks down on such brutish, misogynistic violence.
One would assume that CBS News desperately wants to see justice done to the brutish thugs who molested their Chief Foreign Correspondent and would do everything in its power to defend the honor of one of their very own best and brightest.
The sad answer is that CBS News does not want to know, let alone report on, the truth. If, as I fear, the Egyptian authorities won't bother to investigate and punish the persons involved because the victim was "only" a woman, that speaks volumes of the sorts of regimes one can expect from such "Green" revolutions. To report on such uncomfortable truths would contradict the liberal narrative that what happened in Egypt was a good thing - a peaceful transition to a "democratic" society.
Sad to watch such a wretched spectacle: a once proud news organization reduced to a pack of mewling cowards, parroting political correctness rather than defend the honor of one of their own.
Fredrick Ward| 5.3.11 @ 3:22PM
"What irks me - more than anything else - is CBS News' dogged refusal to follow up and seek - or at least report on - the pursuit and punishment of the perpetrators of this appalling assault."
Are you serious? Come on, man. Wake up, and smell the bullshit. There will never be an investigation into that event from anyone. This is the Middle East we're talking about, and a bunch of stone aged Muslim wack jobs run the country. Sure... hold your breath.
Peter McGrath| 5.3.11 @ 5:13PM
You've got to be kidding. The "stone aged Muslim wack jobs" you describe receive billions in foreign aid, every year, from the United States.
I suppose you figure that CBS News gets a pass. It'd just be way, waaaay too hard to even try to get to the bottom of who's responsible, or even report that there will no effort, by anyone, to find out who's responsible, for Ms. Logan's mauling.
That's simply unacceptable, to me at least. If the "wack jobs" won't track down the perps, then we should cut off all foreign aid.
Where's Hillary on this? She's a wonderfully capable person. She could wade into a meeting of Egyptian government ministers and demand - I mean demand - that the perpretators be punished, or else.
Occam's Tool| 5.4.11 @ 2:01AM
"Wonderfully capable?" Of what besides backstabbing?
Peter McGrath| 5.4.11 @ 9:42AM
A bit of sarcasm was thought to be implied with the comment. No Secretary of State has ever been more over his (or her) head than the execrable Ms. Clinton.
RJ| 5.3.11 @ 10:53AM
This story of Lara Logan is an illustration why I don't waste my time listening to the main-stream media. So many of them are ignorant, clueless fools. They are not to be taken seriously. Their "news" is leftist propaganda from a fantasy world. It is not informative. It is not even entertaining. I want objective presentation of factual information provided with insight. We will never get it from the likes of Lara Logan and her friends.
Anthony| 5.3.11 @ 11:15AM
The story of the "Emperor's New Clothes" has become a worn out tale with the LSM over the past decades, no more so than with the cult of Obozo.
With all due respect Mr. Homnick, you tread more carefully on Ms. Logan's plight than she deserves. Ms. Logan is a product of the Upper West Side myopia that lives in the cliched and hide bound world of the American leftist elite.
In Logan's world, deliberate blindness to the misogynistic world of the Middle East runs parallel to the heightened sensitivities to Western society. Moral relativism is the cant of the left.
Mugged by reality, isn't that the old joke about the neocon f/k/a a liberal?
I have no doubt however, that despite her ordeal, Ms. Logan will learn not a iota; she will not reflect on her trite world, nor going forward, question her leftist proclivities and world view.
Ms. Logan will undoubtably remain a member in good standing of the Order of Lewinsky, a sobriquet I've given to the LSM, who have earned their presidential knee pads with the worship of the ONE, The OBOZO.
Claudia Monteverdi| 5.3.11 @ 11:16AM
I am quite impressed not only by the Nobel Prize for Literature artical of Jay's but also by the generally suberb quality of your letters.
Apparently I am the only female thrust into this casbah so perhaps I have one advantage amongst my oh so many disadvantages (I cant lift a 100 pound barbell, have trouble on a boy's bike and I don't DARE stroll about areas of ANY city of the world without suitable escort. Stephen my lad, your awfully fine observations and well intentioned remarks on this matter are thoroughly overwhelmed by your premise "she deserved it, she wore a black blouse and pearls" YUKHHHH. By the way am I properly dressed whilst I pen this thing? Nope Steve, that was a bridge too far....and the final EXCLAMATION POINT in the following literally makes me choke!!!!!! ........In the video, this attractive blonde appears to have on makeup, a semi-revealing black blouse and wearing a pearl necklace! ....WHEW so what Steve? You singled out the only thing which has no bearing upon the truth..Dammit, she had no right to be there, safer taming Bengal tigers or skinny dipping with piranha...that's the end all of it..Get it? Now Mr. Erich Cartman said it best..re-read his bitter letter..guess what? Every ugly word is true ! (my exclamation poits are OK)..He says it all and quite succinctly..dammit, she just wasn't fit for the job and CBS should be blamed for so stupidly and recklessly appointing her for that position...she was thrilled and jumped at the opportunity, obviously trusting her employer to provide the necessary security for her. She was wrong, her bosses were so busy beating up Israel and prising Hamas and Hezbollah that they had no time to consider the perils of what Mr Joker Friedman calls "the Arab Street"...not a nice neighborhood Miss Logan..but dammit guys, all of you make her the focus of her folly. Surely you must comprehend that she is an EMPLOYEE, a minion of the mighty CBS, fior whow none of the above fine letters indicate any displeasure..
Pearl neclace or not (hey gents, pear necklaces are quite sedate..ya want provocative? take a look at the total inventory of the local Tiffany inventory festooned upon so many Arab women I bumpinto in the street..And what the hell is evil abot a black blouse? Don't you see that arguments such as these give fine fodder to the band of harpies who are termed "feminazis" by Mr Cartman?
OK, I'll just call my security force now and go for a stroll in town--see y--BRAVO JAY!!!!
JimP| 5.3.11 @ 11:33AM
I think you misunderstood what Steve was saying. I didn't get your impression from it.
Claudia Monteverdi| 5.3.11 @ 1:24PM
Hi Jim,
You are undoubtedly right.I loved his letter but that one passage hit a raw nerve--HJim, Steve, Fellers, My Grandma wesrs a black blouse and pearls when she goes to the super-market..I further theorised correctly that those words create a loud AHA! from the same nutty broads we both detest..why give them ammo
Hey Steve, I hope no offense and I do apologise if I misunderstood (but I didnt)--what matters of course is your intent which is impeccable
Claudia
Drunken Sailor| 5.3.11 @ 2:29PM
After reading your reply to Jim I have concluded your a class act. Your point is well made.
JimP| 5.3.11 @ 2:41PM
Me too. You are a classy lady and a person of integrity and character. All the best.
Drunken Sailor| 5.3.11 @ 11:58AM
I think the point he was trying to make is she was not dressed like the locals and stood out, thus making herself a underserved target. He was not stating it was her fault and she deserved what she got. Only that she went in to a dangerous situation, totally unprepared for reality and did not attempt to at least dress conservativly to avoid attracting unwanted attention to herself. There is no excuse for how she was treated.
Al Adab| 5.3.11 @ 11:17AM
Terrible event, totally predictable. Why is The Left always mugged by reality? Because in the wolkenkuckkucksheim that is their world view we should all share latte and live in harmony. The human condition betrays them every time. It is not, as Reagan said, that they are ignorant, simply that they know so much that isn't true.
Claudia Monteverdi| 5.3.11 @ 11:18AM
yeah, yeah I know, my English spelling stinks..grammar gangrenish and vocabulary strained....D-minus
Occam's Tool| 5.3.11 @ 2:17PM
Actually, you're kinda sweet, Claudia.
I have an eight year old daughter, who I worship (properly discipline, though---in public, you would say that she is a wonderful child if you saw her)---which she knows, discipline and love in equal measure. Before I let her go under the burqa, much that would be painful to Middle Easterners would happen. There is a simple refusal to face facts here, as well as to realize WHAT must be done. Logan is a clod. What happened to her is terrible; she is still an incompetent journalist.
miami harold| 5.3.11 @ 11:23AM
I also think there is something else at work here. Journalists, male as well as female, seem to think they are a "protected species" able to go anywhere with impunity. They go into dangerous situations and then are suprised when the mob fails to treat them as such. That they have gotten away with it in the past is usually in direct proportion to their willingness to breathlessly parrot the views from whatever dictator, terror chief, or general scumbag they land an "exclusive interview" with.
tonypal| 5.3.11 @ 4:30PM
Very interesting point. Listen to how any so-called journalist describes their profession, as if it's some higher calling. But angry mobs of radicals in Egypt don't give a shit about the sanctity of journalism.
cicero| 5.3.11 @ 11:54AM
As I always taught my daughters, the mob, any mob, is never to be trusted. For a woman, any woman, to fail to notice that she is the only woman in a crowd of yelling, shouting, out of control young men, places her in the same position of the loan sheep at the wolves' convention.
Add to that, she was in a rebelling, rioting Muslim country, whose religion and philosophy (if you can call it that) specifically considers women to be less than equal, and you wonder what she was doing there, or if she had to be there, why she didn't have a whole regiment of bodyguards. For the woman or CBS to claim surpriseis laughable.
Appleby| 5.3.11 @ 12:05PM
Unfortunately, this isn't isolated to mobs of men in the Middle East; this is the practice of mobs of men in virtualy every place. There used to be a "gathering" in Atlanta over Easter Break called "Freaknik" in which mobs of Black unversity students would flood into the city (as the residents were bolting, locking up, alarming and pulling down the metal shutters on the way out of town) for no apparent purpose except to gather. Surrounding a woman who looked out of place, or was perhaps drunk or stoned, and treating her in this fashion was considered "sport", and most other men and women observing same would have agreed that It's What They Do.
Putting it into an international context, the first time I was in Italy with World Campus Afloat, one of the periodic outbursts of Italian rage against the machine broke out, and there was some sort of demonstration with signs and shouting and chanting, all in Italian. In the middle of it waded oblivious American girls with cameras, one of whom said blithely, "They won't bother us! We're Americans!"
The professors, who could read and understand Italian, were able to extract these foolish virgins before somebody put out their lights. This was in 1969.
It seems that one particular class continues to wander the earth in search of a clue.
Al Adab| 5.3.11 @ 2:29PM
Appleby:
Congrats on the Canadian election. Hopefully our voters will understand reality and respond accordingly as well.
Bob K.| 5.3.11 @ 12:20PM
Does she think that mobs will behave differently in South Africa or America? Can one predict the actions of a mob based on it's culture? Can one predict the actions of a mob?
Occam's Tool| 5.3.11 @ 2:19PM
Yes they would behave differently, yes one can make general predictions based on culture. This would not be happening in a crowd of 30,000 at Wrigley Field. It could happen in a soccer game in Egypt.
Richard| 5.3.11 @ 12:37PM
Liberalism makes intelligent people stupid because they are 1. forced to ignore reality and 2. forced to believe the absurd. Thus poverty causes crime and (now) poverty. Christians murder more than Muslim Jihadists. Sexual differences are socially determined. Green energy will dominate if only the government spends enough money. AND ON AND ON. Children with breasts and beards and deluded ones at that.
EricTheRed | 5.3.11 @ 1:06PM
"Why is it that liberals are always getting mugged by reality?"
To follow up to what Richard (12:37PM) said, it's because to be a liberal is to IGNORE reality. To be a liberal is to create an fantasy world of illogic and un-reality around you. EVERYONE must believe in it too and anyone daring to hammer the smallest chink in the membrane of your precious PC world is to be vilified, demonized, smeared, libeled, and accused of bigotryracismsexismhomophobiaxenophobiaislamophobia, "hate speech" and "inciting violence."
It's unfortunate when a liberal living in a liberal fantasy world is injured or killed (I recall a climate alarmist recently killed by a polar bear after trying to pet it). But it's far more unfortunate when the liberal fantasy world results in OTHER people's injuries or death. Can you say CAFE standards? DDT ban? Gun control? The list goes on and on.
http://VocalMinority.typepad.com
The Jewish Republican's Web Sanctuary
Claudia Monteverdi| 5.3.11 @ 1:33PM
Eric you are 100% on taqrget..Now, the last several letters begin to make me more firm in my feeble earlier protestation--those college girls in Italy? Nothing but nothing was going to happen to them..maybe a tender pinch if they were cute--cmon, giv us all a break, we are speaking of Arab masses in the square whose behaviuor can be attested to by countless injured souls...The lady certainly knew that, but she had been taught to believe and the dummy drank it in, that these were wonderful guys, maltreated by those horrid Israelis, slaughtered by the French Foreign Legion, trampled upon by Italian colonists..to which I respond to the poor lady, you havent a brain in your head to have thrust yourself in their midst but it just AINT your fault and it AINT because you were wearing that so very provocative string of peaols!
Al Adab| 5.3.11 @ 2:33PM
You and Eric have it on point. If only wishing made it so The Left would find the world more to their liking. Fortunately for the rest of us, that's not the case. We may not always like reality, but we must understand it in order to deal with it.
Mark Shepler| 5.3.11 @ 3:20PM
What I find very curious is how she's fallen back on the western feminist's trope that this is another example of job inequity that "female journalists" face. Not the oppression all women suffer within the grasp of the most ancient and fierce patriarchy in the world but, you know, like a particular career hazard western lady reporters have to deal with when amongst them. One almost expects her to announce some new non-profit to "raise consciousness" on the issue or lobbying for legislation or something. So much for the universal sisterhood they used to bleat about, eh?
Logan doesn't seem really to recognize the hard truth of who and what did such evil and that it covers great swaths of the earth and oppresses hundreds of millions of women in even worse ways than she suffered. But for them, it lasts all the days of their lives...
However, being a liberal, which is to say ever ready to be a victim and always preferring to hate their own more than any "other", she would much prefer it was the monsters of her college dorm nightmares that brutalized her as opposed to the very real, implacable patriarchy that makes those fairy tales of Friedan & Steinem seem so silly and childish....
islam up close proves a basic, primeval point nobody dares admit at this late date of our civilizational evolution. None dare think of the implications that grow ever clearer like a figure looming out of a fog- that women are free and "equal" because "we", meaning the males, allow them to be. At least in those parts of the world we call "the west" where we've adapted our laws and customs to accommodate the idea. But islam demonstrates that in huge territories of the earth physical might still makes right and there is no more basic inequality of might than between a man and a woman....
This linchpin of inequality and it's license to oppress the "weaker sex" in islam will make it more and more attractive to the pussified, nannified, feminized western males of our age. Any red-blooded male will admit, if only to himself, there are advantages to it and many will opt for it in the coming years and decades...
Sorry for the cheesy plug but you can read my full take at www.rightwingmuse.com | Lara Logan: The Feminist Delusion
Redstateboy| 5.3.11 @ 5:00PM
I think Claudia got real tight re: the "Pearl" thing but I think we can all agree - Logan was a Putz. As a White boy? I wouldn't have wondered through that crowd without a few brawny Mustafa's in tow, however; if I had - wouldn't that have made me a Putz too? We've ALL done brainless things and she did a brainless thing.
Claudia Monteverdi| 5.3.11 @ 8:23PM
Hey Red State Boy..you got the right stuff for sure and I am with you with two minor exceptions..
a) The pearl thing? Look guys, that's the old "she got it comin to her" canard--it just plain STINKS! Get it? No, I guess you don't but on to my second point:
b)Erich, don't you dre go wander around with them Mustafa chappies..they are the ones who would just love to skewer you, mess up my black blouse and steal my pearls
Love Claudia
CAPTAIN SHAWN HARRIS | 5.3.11 @ 9:00PM
What is the purpose of this article? Why do you insist on dragging every unfortunate incident into some misaligned discussion about liberals? How dare you insinuate a political agenda spin on an absolutely horrific and life threatening event personally happening to someone…I have been in the Marine Corps for 22+ years, have served in multiple wars and other nasty little places where tragedies like this are common place, and I can assure you none of those victims are considering their politics as they are being beaten and raped. You are an absolute piece of human crap for writing this garbage, putting the example together with whatever message you’re spinning, and shame on you Spectator for littering your publications with literary street trash…you are much better than this.
Occam's Tool| 5.4.11 @ 2:04AM
Dear Captain Harris:
Thank you for your service. The problem with the journalist is that she is protecting her rapists and exposing more women in Egypt to abuse, the abuse the Marine Corps exists, in part, to stop.
Further, she is protecting them well after the rape is over, from the safety of America.
Occam's Tool| 5.4.11 @ 2:07AM
Further, she was a defender of Islam and a trasher of the West.
gazinya| 5.3.11 @ 9:25PM
This is one of those 'learning experiences'. The internet and 24/7 news has openned many eyes of the differences in cultures and worldviews. The Obama was raised with a worldview that did not include the American Culture. Liberals may know of the American Culture but reject the importance of individual responsibility and a Christian ethos. So when some liberal, whatever the make, goes into a world they think is better, they usually get mugged. 'Hey honey, lets go to Mexico. See some of the simple folk and buy a taco.'
carol| 5.3.11 @ 9:44PM
strangely waching her tell her tale I was pained by her experience yet thought the same thing... foolish girl not a place for you
Johnny| 5.4.11 @ 6:25AM
Years ago, as a young sailor, I was in Italy when the Italians were protesting in the streets. I was with several of my fellow sailors and was in a relatively safe area, yet I did feel a little fear and apprehension at the thought of a bottle being thrown from a balcony or such. Why would anyone not feel that same way in a much more volatile situation??? Blinders on to the reality that surrounds them perhaps?
CLAUDIA MONTEVERDI| 5.4.11 @ 9:55PM
OK, here goes..With the exception of the inanely vicious Captain Shawn (oh yeah--I am a navy brat, daughter of a GENUINE HERO..I know my sailors & marines and this guy is a copper plated phoney) ..OK that aside, nearly all of the letters were thoughtful and rather in coformity with Jay's thesis BRAVO! However I absolutely get the strong undercurrent of "the bitch got what she deserved" which is chokingly disgusting.. She is a brainwashed, leftest twirp in love with the muslims and hateful towards the west,,,,BUT so what? This was an extremely awful event and she is deserving of better from us, pearls, black bluse and all the rest. Actually she was dressed quite properly....so the bastards hate women? what else is new, they hate everybody..so we must "RESPECT THEIR PRIMITIVE CUSTOMS" and forbid females in their yukky streets? Gimeabreak, you guys are dangerously close to the very group you say you despise!
Love & Kisses,
Claudia
Ken Royall| 5.5.11 @ 12:48AM
She drank the Kool-Aid that the people in the streets were freedom loving moderates whose only problem was they had bad leaders. Sadly in most cases the leader of an totalitarian nation is merely a reflection of the populace. There are some reasonable people in Egypt of course but to a large extent they deserved the leaders they had. The Muslim Brotherhood is hardly going to be an improvement as their recent condemnation of the killing of Bin Laden indicates.
It is no coincidence that every nation on earth that is under Islamic rule is an oppressive hellhole where women are treated as mere property or worse. The fact that Logan failed to understand this in advance is quite disturbing. As the author of the article indicated, anyone with a cursory understanding of Islamic CULTure knows these things.
Logan was a victim of her indoctrination into a cult of another kind, which is liberalism. They may not be as extreme as Islamic radicals but their ignorance makes them quite dangerous just the same, even to themselves.
Claudia Monteverdi| 5.5.11 @ 10:15AM
Dear Mr. Royall,
Your words are precise and I thorughly agee with, say, 88% of it..I do take small exception to your last two paragraphs:
....The fact that Logan failed to understand this in advance is quite disturbing. As the author of the article indicated, anyone with a cursory understanding of Islamic CULTure knows these things.....Once again Mr Logan, all the blame for this ignorance is directed at this poor lady..It appears difficult for all of you to grasp that she was an employee of CBS and she was ordered to accept this horrible assignment...maybe it's too simple, too satisfying to Cherchez La Femme, but dammit she is an employee of a supposedly responsible major news organisation, and to date I see no criticim of THEM!
.....Logan was a victim of her indoctrination into a cult of another kind, which is liberalism. ......They may not be as extreme as Islamic radicals ...... OMG, "MAY NOT"?????
thanks,
Claudia