A MENACE TO MULTICULTURALISM

Christopher Hitchens defend Aayan Hirsi Ali whose outspoken views have made her a pariah now in the Netherlands, even as her life remains in danger from the Islamists who want her dead:

Once again to mention her excellent new book The Caged Virgin, , this is an author and a politician who has made the transition from early Islamic fanaticism (she initially endorsed the fatwa against Salman Rushdie) to a full-out acceptance and advocacy of secularism and of Enlightenment ideals. Hirsi Ali calls for a pluralist democracy where all opinion is protected but where the law does not—in the name of some pseudo-tolerance—permit genital mutilation, "honor" killing, and forced marriage. One might have expected a more robust defense of this position from the Dutch, and indeed the international left, but instead there has been a response of extraordinary and sullen ungenerousness, as if a lone woman defying taboo and standing up to violence has in some way let down the side and become a menace to multiculturalism.

I would say the "extraordinary and sullen ungenerousness" hardly captures the indifference to Hirsi Ali's truly courageous stance against the Islamic fundamentalists by the feminist left (but the word "sullen" is certainly appropriate).

She is, as Hitchens notes a true menace to the cult of multiculturalism in the same way that Condi Rice is an apostate to the cult-- a female of color who dares to defy the rigid leftist rules regarding victimhood. Doesn't she know that she can't possibly be oppressed by Isalm, whose culture is superior by definition to western culture?

Once again she is defying those rules by refusing to be a victim of Islamic oppression and western dhimmitude; and choosing instead to be free and move to the U.S. As I commented in this post, The Dutch loss is America's gain.

Meanwhile, Dymphna notes that Hirsi Ali may be the beginning of a trend as many decide to abandon Europe's multicultural paradise:

Remember the 1930’s when so many of Europe’s intelligentsia came to America to escape Fascism? Albert Einstein was one; Karen Horney was another. Our intellectual ranks and our universities were enriched as Europe’s totalitarian rumblings caused the educated ranks to flee to safer shores.

It seems to be happening again. In addition to Hirsi Ali’s imminent departure from the Netherlands, there is a growing feeling that Europe is not safe for those who dissent even a little from the received wisdom of the bureaucratic state, or dare to confront the Muslim taqiyya so prevalent there

The reality is that multiculturalism is so intellectually vapid and morally reprehensible; it is a menace even to itself.