Chomsky takes down Hitchens

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

>>But hatred of some of the most positive Western values (yes, there are some)
>>is not as inconsequential as some on this list would like to believe,
>>either.  The left is in for a rough ride until we're all willing to
>>acknowledge that.
>
>Leaving aside the question about whether it is ethnocentric to call 
>Western values "Western," something I have done in print (as you 
>know, Yoshie), you are in the wrong neighborhood, Luke, if youy 
>think this is the hidey-hole of the relativist pomo academic left 
>who is afraid to criticise female genital mutilation or whatever 
>because it done by Other Cultures. Anyway, I am a certain as I could 
>be that the bin Ladans of this world would regard the "Western" 
>habit of electing legislatures and enforcing due process in criminal 
>procedure, etc. as a  harmless if decadent heresy, not worth the 
>expenditure of a single car bomb or suicide hijacker, if the Western 
>democracies didn't keep invading and bombing the Mideast, supporting 
>Israel's occupation and military adventures, and generally acting as 
>if our superior values gave us the right to ignore them whenever it 
>conflicted with the naked self-interest of our rulibg classes.
>
>jks

In the main I concur with Justin, but I reiterate my point that it is 
inadvisable to proclaim values such as "Freedom, Equality, Property, 
and Bentham" & "religious toleration" are "Western."  That is exactly 
how Osama bin Laden & Co. think & tell their followers.  Why should 
we agree with them that such values are alien to nations outside the 
G8 circle?

Yoshie