Post by yahadj on Oct 10, 2007 6:25:54 GMT -5
Author in row over call for Muslims to 'suffer'
14 minutes ago
Top author Martin Amis is embroiled in a growing literary row after calling for Muslims to "suffer" to make them steer their children away from Islamist militancy.
The comments -- including a suggestion that people who "look like they're from the Middle East" should be strip-searched -- have drawn fire from renowned Marxist literary critic Terry Eagleton.
"The idea was that by hounding and humiliating them as a whole, they would return home and teach their children to be obedient to the White Man's law," Eagleton wrote in The Guardian Wednesday.
"There seems something mildly defective about this logic," he added ironically, calling Amis' view "vile" and obnoxious.
The disputed remarks were made last September, on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, when Amis argued in an essay that extremists had won the battle between Islam and Islamism.
"The Muslim community will have to suffer until it gets its house in order," he wrote.
He called notably for "strip-searching people who look like they're from the Middle East or from Pakistan.... Discriminatory stuff, until it hurts the whole community and they start getting tough with their children."
Fierce debate only erupted this month after Eagleton, a Marxist critic and veteran figure on Britain's literary scene, attacked the comments in an introduction to a new edition of his book "Ideology: An Introduction."
Specifically he accused Amis of taking after his father Kingsley Amis, also a famous writer, whom he accused of being "a racist, anti-Semitic boor, a drink-sodden, self-hating reviler of women, gays and liberals".
"Amis fils has clearly learnt more from him than how to turn a shapely phrase," he wrote.
In Wednesday's Guardian Eagleton voiced concern that the dispute is being seen merely as a "literary spat" between him and Amis, who coincidentally has recently got a job at Manchester University where Eagleton is a professor.
"The question of whether or not to insult a whole sector of the population was instantly reduced to a departmental spat," he wrote, noting that when he first criticised comments he did not know Amis was coming to Manchester.
"The views he expressed are vile, and saying so was my only point," he wrote.
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From his face expression I can see that he seems to be a type that likes to suffer and make people suffer. Poor guy. I hope he gets some life and chill out....
14 minutes ago
Top author Martin Amis is embroiled in a growing literary row after calling for Muslims to "suffer" to make them steer their children away from Islamist militancy.
The comments -- including a suggestion that people who "look like they're from the Middle East" should be strip-searched -- have drawn fire from renowned Marxist literary critic Terry Eagleton.
"The idea was that by hounding and humiliating them as a whole, they would return home and teach their children to be obedient to the White Man's law," Eagleton wrote in The Guardian Wednesday.
"There seems something mildly defective about this logic," he added ironically, calling Amis' view "vile" and obnoxious.
The disputed remarks were made last September, on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, when Amis argued in an essay that extremists had won the battle between Islam and Islamism.
"The Muslim community will have to suffer until it gets its house in order," he wrote.
He called notably for "strip-searching people who look like they're from the Middle East or from Pakistan.... Discriminatory stuff, until it hurts the whole community and they start getting tough with their children."
Fierce debate only erupted this month after Eagleton, a Marxist critic and veteran figure on Britain's literary scene, attacked the comments in an introduction to a new edition of his book "Ideology: An Introduction."
Specifically he accused Amis of taking after his father Kingsley Amis, also a famous writer, whom he accused of being "a racist, anti-Semitic boor, a drink-sodden, self-hating reviler of women, gays and liberals".
"Amis fils has clearly learnt more from him than how to turn a shapely phrase," he wrote.
In Wednesday's Guardian Eagleton voiced concern that the dispute is being seen merely as a "literary spat" between him and Amis, who coincidentally has recently got a job at Manchester University where Eagleton is a professor.
"The question of whether or not to insult a whole sector of the population was instantly reduced to a departmental spat," he wrote, noting that when he first criticised comments he did not know Amis was coming to Manchester.
"The views he expressed are vile, and saying so was my only point," he wrote.
=======================================
From his face expression I can see that he seems to be a type that likes to suffer and make people suffer. Poor guy. I hope he gets some life and chill out....