Manifesto: Together facing the new totalitarianism

The Jyllands-Posten has made headlines again -- its own headlines, at least.

Twelve intellectuals have signed a manifesto supporting "freedom, equal opportunity and secular values" and published it in the February 28th edition of the Jyllands-Posten. The twelve are:

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Chahla Chafiq, Caroline Fourest, Bernard-Henri Lévy, Irshad Manji, Mehdi Mozaffari, Maryam Namazie, Taslima Nasreen, Salman Rushdie, Antoine Sfeir, Philippe Val, and Ibn Warraq.

Everyone knows Salman Rushdie (see photo above, from Jyllands-Posten), but if you don't recognize some of the others, then scroll down at the Jyllands-Posten article and find brief bios. Or Google them. (Or click the links above for six of them.)

Here's the manifesto:

After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism.

We, writers, journalists, intellectuals, call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all.

The recent events, which occurred after the publication of drawings of Muhammed in European newspapers, have revealed the necessity of the struggle for these universal values. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the ideological field. It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats.

Like all totalitarianisms, Islamism is nurtured by fears and frustrations. The hate preachers bet on these feelings in order to form battalions destined to impose a liberticidal and unegalitarian world. But we clearly and firmly state: nothing, not even despair, justifies the choice of obscurantism, totalitarianism and hatred. Islamism is a reactionary ideology which kills equality, freedom and secularism wherever it is present. Its success can only lead to a world of domination: man's domination of woman, the Islamists' domination of all the others. To counter this, we must assure universal rights to oppressed or discriminated people.

We reject "cultural relativism", which consists in accepting that men and women of Muslim culture should be deprived of the right to equality, freedom and secular values in the name of respect for cultures and traditions. We refuse to renounce our critical spirit out of fear of being accused of "Islamophobia", an unfortunate concept which confuses criticism of Islam as a religion with stigmatisation of its believers.

We plead for the universality of freedom of expression, so that a critical spirit may be exercised on all continents, against all abuses and all dogmas.

We appeal to democrats and free spirits of all countries that our century should be one of Enlightenment, not of obscurantism.

I don't know if these twelve are collecting signatures of other intellectuals, but I hope that others will sign on in spirit and echo this manifesto's call.

Eight of the twelve come from Muslim backgrounds -- though some, such as the pseudonymous Ibn Warraq, have renounced Islamic beliefs -- and their cultural links to Islam undercut any attempt to dismiss their manifesto as "Islamophobic."

At least two of these twelve, Salman Rushdie and Taslima Nasreen, have had fatwas leveled against them by Islamist clerics for their 'blasphemous' novels. They know well what free intellectuals confront in the rise of Islamism.

About seventeen years have passed since the Ayatollah Khomeini pronounced his fatwa on Rushdie, and despite the support that Rushdie has received, too few prominent intellectuals have spoken up for him. Some have even tended to blame him.

For example...

When I was studying in Tuebingen in the early 1990s, I attended Hans Küng's weekly ecumenical seminar for three years, a very interesting experience that was gratifying to the intellect and -- thanks to the excellent free wine at each meeting -- also to the senses.

In this seminar, we discussed relations among religions, which at one point touched on the fatwa against Rushdie. I expected Küng to criticize it, and -- to his credit -- he did. He also acknowledged that calls for Rushdie's death, or the death of anyone for expressing an opinion, were unacceptable.

But -- and I'm quoting from memory -- Küng then strongly implied that Rushdie was partly culpable:

"But Rushdie is an intelligent, informed man. He cannot have been ignorant of the predictable Muslim reaction to the portrayal of Muhammad in his novel."

I wasn't certain that Küng's premise was true. When the fatwa was issued by Khomeini, Rushdie seemed shocked, and even more shocked by the massive Muslim reaction. Regardless of what Rushdie could have anticipated, I thought that Küng should have spoken more strongly in favor of Rushdie's right to free speech and more vehemently against Islamist attacks on free expression.

But Küng's implication seemed to be that Rushdie should have censored himself to avoid Muslim outrage.

In my view, however, if we agree that we should curtail our free expression to avoid giving 'offense to Islam,' then we are rejecting one of our most important traditions and effectively submitting ourselves as dhimmis to Islamic sharia.

I consider that submission a grave error. I prefer to stand with Rushdie and the eleven others. I urge other individuals to do so as well.