A Great, Intimidating Voice

I am, and have been for some time, and admirer of Christopher Hitchens.

I was directed to this article by a friend through the week and it reminded me of the fact that his autobiography, Hitch 22, was being released this week. I picked up a copy and am almost done devouring it. If ever there was a man who can put your intellect in its place with a limit of 200 words, it is Hitch. The pages of his memoir are so cram-packed with significant historical figures and events, all of which he was either present for or shared a drink with, that one can't help but be immediately intimidated by him. I catch myself feeling remarkably inadequate when I consider his intricate understanding of marxism and the delicate, yet dichotomously volatile, power shifts and balances of the sixties. I find myself jealous of the sheer number of causes that were begging to be fought for in the time of young Hitchens.

A bit of perspective brings me right back to present-day Earth, of course (there are ample causes waiting to be crusaded for right here and now - more on that in the next couple of posts). A little while ago I was overcome with an almost crushing sense of ignorance of the world around me. There was a month where I'd restricted my sleeping to a couple of hours each night - the rest of my time dedicated to learning as much as I could about anything that would interest me. I resented all the time I had wasted at learning institutions over the years. I hated the fact that I'd allowed myself to become complacent in my own headspace, committing the dreadful sin of believing my learning to be done and all that was left was application. The results of this feverish catchup on lost time were predictable enough - I burned out, forgot most of the detailed information I'd gleaned (if not it's general content) and made a compromise to continue learning as much as I could, from as many different sources, as long as I was waking up to a new day. For the most part this has worked out for me.

But every so often, one gets a whiff of inspiration to go that little bit harder.

'If you have never experienced the feeling that you are chained to the steam engine of history, let me assure you that it is a very intoxicating one.'

So goes one of the more memorable quotes from Hitch 22.

Someday, I'd love to know if he's right.

More Of A Dilemma Than We Might Want To Admit

Christopher Hitchens has done what he likes to do best - speak his mind.

This time, he's talking about Nicolas Sarkozy's pipe dream of banning the Burqa.

This is an issue that divides just about anyone - it divides feminists, it divides atheists, it divides muslims, it divides christians. It seems you can pick any group, usually cohesive, and find the very well-defined split running through it. People tend to know instantly which side of the debate they are on, too. I imagine anyone reading this has already made up their mind as to whether the idea of a burqa ban is a good or a bad thing.

It seems to me we need to ask a pivotal question: is banning a tool of oppression itself an act of oppression?

It is not as cut and dry as saying that banning the burqa infringes personal choice. Some women, it is true, don the veil as a matter of free will.  These are the privelleged few, however, and have never faced an altenative of disfigurement and violence should they refuse. Wearing the burqa is never a feminist decision - it is always, in all cases, a patriarchal one. To deny that is to do all those women who have no choice a very, very grave injustice.

Now, consider the other, very practical arguments against the burqa ban.

'It will create a great deal of animosity between the west and Islam'
'Women who cannot wear the veil in public will be kept indoors by their Islamic husbands'
'You risk violence against those women who choose to cast off their veil against their family wishes'

And note that every single one of these boils down to one central theme:

'If you ban the burqa, someone's gonna get hurt.'

It's my opinion that the French government, and the rest of us, ought to be railing against that kind of bullying than bowing down to it.