Why riots?

In my previous post on the Newsreek/Failure-to-Investi-Gate scandal, I referenced an observation that Christians did not riot when news accounts of the Palestinian takeover of the Church of the Nativity 2 1/2 years ago included descriptions of Palestinian militants ripping pages out of Bibles and using them as toilet paper.  In contrast, Newsreek's sloppy reporting of unconfirmed, second-hand allegations that Guantanamo interrogators flushed pages of the Koran down toilets incited a firestorm of protest and riots in Muslim nations.

It's one thing to make cheeky "they do it and we don't" observations about rioting.  It's yet another to attempt an understanding of why this is so.

The basic premise that I will explore involves how different cultures handle perceived insults and injustices.  I am convinced that deeply-rooted cultural factors determine whether or not riots are deemed to be an acceptable means of dealing with injustice.

It is difficult to separate culture and religious belief in most societies.  In fact, it is valid to argue that the two are integrated to such a degree that often it is impossible to judge where one ends and the other begins.  I believe that the ancient Middle and Near-east culture of male dominance and intimidation is a fundamental aspect of Islam that makes it difficult for Western or Christian cultures to deal effectively with large-scale cultural phenomena that are a part of Muslim nations.

It is our nature as human beings to seek revenge and 'justice' for perceived wrongs.  And it is also our nature to use intimidation and humiliation as a means of imposing societal discipline.  When these elements are left unchecked, violence is the end result.

That Islamic law greatly depends on intimidation is a fact that should not require proof.  Similarly, the fact that Islamic law prescribes violent punishment and revenge for infractions should also be assumed for the sake of this argument.  I believe that a society which thrives on abuse and intimidation naturally turns to violence as a means of expressing their anger. 

Intimidation and violent punishment are not completely foreign to the Judeo-Christian tradition.  The Mosaic law given to the Israelites over three thousand years ago is filled with harsh sentences that are to be imposed on citizens who break religious prohibitions.  According to Mosaic law, justice was to be dispensed by the Levite priests after hearing accusations of wrongdoing and the defense of the accused.  The word of God delivered through prophets was not required for the priests to impose punishment.  These punishments were given during a time when all known civilizations engaged in practices that were considered unholy by the mandates of Mosaic law.  The punishments outlined in Leviticus and Deuteronomy were harsh because God wanted His people to follow a different path than that of other nations.  And they were harsh because other nations would immediately perceive Israel to be 'soft' if the Israelites did not enforce their laws with the same extreme methods used by others.

But interestingly, the Mosaic law does not include provisions for priests to autonomously sanction acts of revenge or retribution against other peoples.  In the Old Testament, revenge is seen solely as an act of God; God is the only entity deemed worthy of dispensing justice.  The Old Testament includes numerous accounts of battles fought by the Israelites against other nations, but any offensive action was to be taken only after the word of God had been given personally to His people, either through priests, judges, kings, or prophets.  Vengeance and retribution initiated by man acting without a command from God was considered an act of blasphemy.

In contrast, the Islamic tradition (which post-dates Mosaic law by 2500 years) encourages its followers to wage holy war and exact revenge on behalf of the teachings of the prophet Mohammad and the holy word of Allah as outlined in the Koran.  Islam encourages evangelism primarily in the form of military warfare, whereas Christian scripture teaches that evangelism should occur primarily through preaching and prayer.  And Islam requires its adherents to follow a strict set of laws (sharia) - far more harsh than Mosaic Law - as the means of working out their salvation and entering Paradise upon death.

Christianity views itself as the herald of a new age, a fulfillment of the Mosaic law based on Christ's death on the cross.  Biblical Christianity no longer advocates complete obedience to the entire Mosaic law; rather it teaches that the ability to have a personal relationship with God through the in-filling of the Holy Spirit is a free gift to mankind through the grace of God, made possible by Christ's death on the cross.  By allowing the Holy Spirit to dwell within us and empty us of our carnal human nature, God provides a way to restore the personal relationship enjoyed by God and Adam in the Garden of Eden.  In this state, mankind no longer requires the law as a means of achieving holiness.

In allowing the Holy Spirit to perfect him, the Christian freely associates himself with the will of God and leaves behind desires of the flesh, including the desire for vengeance.  But at the same time, Christians are called to end social injustice and work to ensure that all people are treated justly and with respect.

Needless to say, mankind as a whole has not achieved anything even remotely resembling a renewed relationship with God.  Over the centuries, human nature and the desires of the flesh have misguided men into committing unspeakable acts of cruelty in the name of Christianity.  Yet Western Christian society has somehow managed, over the last two thousand years, to widely purge itself of the desire to commit vengeance or acts of violence as a means of rectifying injustice.

Above all else, this fact alone distinguishes Christian and Islamic culture.

Further, I believe that Christianity is the primary reason why this is so.  This idea is born witness by the fact that the most deadly societal systems devised by man, Naziism and Communism, both stemmed from a philosophy that assumed God to be 'dead' and mankind to be the ultimate moral authority on Earth.

Of course pockets of vengeance-seeking citizens still exist in Western culture.  The culture of poorly educated Europeans who migrated to America some 100 to 300 years has deeply entrenched itself in the American South.  Some time ago I referenced an article by Dr. Thomas Sowell which discussed this 'redneck culture' of the American South.  Redneck culture is largely patriarchal, with women playing a submissive role to males, and it is still largely consumed with revenge and payback.  It is also still found in the subculture of American Blacks, whose roots almost invariably extend back to the South.  But while redneck culture is derided and impugned in Whites, it has been turned into the culture du jour for Blacks.  Could the similarities between redneck and Islamic culture be a reason why Blacks seem to be more prone to riot in America, and why these riots take place in cities with governments that are perceived to be predominantly progressive or tolerant?  And could this be a reason why Islam appeals so strongly to Blacks incarcerated by the American justice system?

Unfortunately there are no easy answers to these questions, and I hope that my speculation has not offended any readers.  But in the final analysis it is worth contrasting the education of children in Islamic and Middle Eastern cultures with the education in Western Christian culture. 

In Islamic culture, children are routinely instilled with concepts that we as Westerners would consider to be racist and religiously intolerant, and they are taught from birth that violence and armed conflict is the primary method of addressing perceived grievance and injustice. 

In Western culture, children learn our concepts of tolerance and acceptance and equality (though sometimes to a fault) and are encouraged to solve problems through discussion and negotiation.

The danger that we face stems from the assumption that all cultures teach their children these Western ideals, and that all mankind strives for peace and understanding with one another.  In doing so, we often make the mistake of assuming that violent cultures can simply be swayed by persuasive arguments or massive amounts of cash.

While we should be careful not to engage in a wholesale write-off of cultures that are predisposed to violence, we do need to understand where to draw the line between acceptable and unacceptable behavior, and we must be careful that political disagreements with our own leadership do not place us in league with those who seek our destruction.

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UPDATED on May 20, with a few minor re-writes that hopefully made my points a little more clear.

Comments

[the crossfader]

what is curious is that the admnistration made the collosal fuck up of taking us to war also based on bad information resulting in tens of thousands of people dying and yet there is no push for the administration to retract their story of WMD. stones and glass houses come to mind.