Our political leaders have rightly sent their condolences to the American people following the tragic loss of life of US personnel in Benghazi, the largest city in the still highly volatile eastern region of Libya. They also, again quite rightly, condemned the violence that has erupted all over the Islamic world in protest against a US-produced film intentionally mocking the figure of Mohammed, revered by Muslims as a prophet.
What up to just a few months ago was being referred to as The Arab Spring has suddenly undergone a traumatic seasonal shift into a sad autumn that now threatens an even sadder winter. When the western world, led by an elated US administration, happily chose to back the insurgents with funds, arms, and a collaborative international media, now also happening in Syria, it all seemed so perfectly arranged as the old dictators fell like pins in a keen game of bowling in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and elsewhere.
Of course the pro-West dictators of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE, Bahrain and Oman were left to keep on quietly warming their gilt-edged seats, and when people there even dared catch a whiff of freedom, they were not only sledge-hammered into submission but also simply ignored by western politicians and their satellite TV empires.
The extremely distressing events of the past two weeks have shown how misguided and misinformed we have all been. The old regimes have been replaced by a growing wave of Islamic fundamentalism that is now also worming itself into the innards of big European cities.
What had enthusiastically been taken to be a “democratic” rejuvenation is now a discomforting extreme reality. Friends of mine who have come back from Tunisia said that in all their previous visits to this neighbouring Arab country, they had never seen so many Tunisian women wearing their traditional black dress that covers them from head to toe. While traditional dress is certainly not to be seen as some display of a backward sense of fashion, in truth we had grown used to the western style adopted by most Tunisian women we met while on holiday or for work. What has brought about this transformation? Not Dolce & Gabbana.
That Libyans in US-enamoured Libya should attack the American Embassy and even kill the Ambassador and three members of his staff is, of course, far more shocking. And all because of a short, cheap, and very amateurish film production? That can hardly be the reason for this human tragedy, and even less so for the global backlash that followed after it was uploaded on YouTube.
The US film industry cannot totally wash its hands of this offensive film on its fringe. The Hollywood dimension has always been a subject of much international debate, for Americans and American filmmakers seem to need an enemy all the time. We all know how Hollywood and its stars were controversially thrust into the American WWII effort, as happened to the film industries of Britain and Germany at the time. Countless generations of Americans have since grown up hating other peoples and other nations even in times of peace.
American producers of such ideological-trash-filled films like the James Bond series, Rocky and Rambo, Chuck Norris et al, have made monsters of whole nations by depicting them collectively as Reds, Russians, Soviets and, after Gorbachev, Communist Chinese, North Koreans, Cubans, Arabs, Iranians and so on. The Afghan Mujahedeen were once seen as heroes but soon became enemies. The stereotyping and stereocasting were effectively put to good use, but no single film critic in the western world would have dared describe them as “propaganda”. No, that word is reserved for productions by the assumed enemies of the US.
The problem of course is that Hollywood not only desperately needs an enemy, but also that the average American, certainly not known for his/her IQ, actually believes them. Then we are surprised when there is someone crazy enough to try it in real life, as happened recently with the new Batman film.
In fairness, there have been scores of American films depicting fellow Americans as gangsters, fraudsters and what have you, but somehow they are quickly forgotten. Perhaps the only exception is the Vietnam War which the Hollywood script-writers and producers have exploited in full, so much in fact that they were strongly criticised by the conservative lobbies, especially when it was clear to everyone watching the film that the US had plainly lost the war. Americans don’t lose wars, but when they do you just don’t say it!
Michael Moore, one of the few genuine social commentators in the US film industry, has anti-hero status despite his having won a Palme d’Or and an Academy Award for his no-holds-barred documentaries.
But back to the anti-Mohammed film and the Obama Administration’s conundrum as it tries to grapple with the worldwide problem it has caused it during a tight election campaign. Just as there have been American religious fundamentalists willing to make public bonfires out of copies of the Koran, there will be more TV and film producers ready to interpret their “freedom of expression” as a “freedom of hatred”.
People’s religious beliefs are not to be dabbled with. No religion should be disparaged, just as a person or organisation that has no religion at all should not be shunned. In the case of Islam, however, one needs to bear in mind the realities of nations all over the Islamic world that have been bred on an anti-Americanism not unlike the anti-Communism/Socialism fed into the veins of American citizens immediately after the last war.
The American government, as well as several other western administrations, have not had any qualms ordering Facebook, YouTube and other Internet sources of communication to remove items such as videos, documents and pictures they considered “a threat to security”. The Wikileaks saga is yet another embarrassing example of how tough and uncompromising they can be. Why did they choose not to do the same in this case?
In contrast, the Catholic world has also had to contend with its fair share of films, books and documentaries which hardly painted a positive picture of the Church, popes and, at times, even the image of Jesus Christ, but other than some ill-advised, Opus Dei subscribed cardinal with a mediaeval mentality, no one really batted an eyelid and the whole affair was soon buried in the dust-covered archives of artistic creativity. Who still speaks of Dan Brown or the films based on his books?
Islam is still far from achieving this collective resilient state of mind. Until it does, it must continue to be treated with both respect and caution, certainly shielded from the religious and patriotic nuts stalking the West.