Beating them at their own game
Local elections gone, I turn back to the press to get my share of awakening events in the morning. I mean, it feels fine to read newspapers again, without the guilty feeling that I should be talking to somebody thatis about to vote for me, or giving some flyers away. Now, I almost forgot that such an strategy is two edged. In between today and yesterday, the press keeps me between the revulsion and the amusement, actually. Welcome back, Inti.
I mean, why do I have to stomach early in the morning Hirsi Ali hyping herself as the coming Voltaire that the muslim world needs? Now, not that I love Voltaire, with his gardens-for-retired-people ideology. But there are limits. As a matter of fact, that image is just balanced out by Condi , trying to get a grip in the guitar that Evo just gave her, conveniently made out of coca leaves. Or, I suppose, the roles of revulsive and montypitonish can be reversed. As a matter of fact it is just wonderful to portrait the shouting Hirsi Ali, a politician that has no qualms to puke on half of the world, as Candide. Or even better, to be writing Candide. How absurd can we get? And actually, the bloody nerve of Condi, present in the Michelle Bachelet assumption as president, when not only her government, but her ideas, put Pinochet in power, and also send the father of the new chilean president to torture and death. Doesn't these people has any shame left?
Well, actually they don't. And that is probably why I remain trying to figure out what to do. Shall I puke? Shall I laugh? puke-laugh, laugh-puke. In between the shout and the style, as usual.
The sad part of this ongoing comedy is that these two brilliant women, actually, are the forerunners of one of the oldest strategies in the world: Go out, and beat them at their own game. Not terrible ethic kind of game, but who cares?
Let's start with Hirsi. For many of my foreigner-huging friends of the netherlands, she is the archetypical well integrated allochtoon. The mythology runs like that: political refugee arrives to the country, teach herself the beauty of dutch, goes into university, raises due to her intellectual calliber, takes up the cause of those opressed muslim women, and ends up as star parliamentair. Of course, the world, and most of all, those scary evil muslims, take it up against her. What I believe of the intellectual calliber of Hirsi, actually, is that is best proven
in her adaptability. Lets pass over the details that do not work well in the narrative, such as the fact that she is no political refugee, but she run out on a marriage, or that she is no newcomer to politics, but is the scion of a family with a long tradition of politics in her own country. Her insight shines on when you realize that she has been doing for years what the traditionally tolerant dutchies love best: shout louder than they.
And there we have Condi. As distinguished member of a government that has just shown how much it cares for the dispossesed back in New Orleans, she does market herself as the incarnation of the compassionate-conservative-american-dream. Brilliant academic, gifted musician, able political operator. And coming from a humble origin.Lets, again, pay no attention whatsoever to the irritant details. Lets don't worry about that oil tanker that goes around the world with her name, recognition of her history as leader of the big oil companies, another blatant proof of the (not really compassionate) interwining power lines in between politics and big money. All this is food for the rabid left wing press. What actually matter is that Condi is irresistible. Just look at her looks in the UN, short of matrix-inspired dominatrix, leather clad and briskly walking. I mean, what marketting image is better than the accomplished piano player of Bush family meetings gripping the charango from Evo, a coca-charango, for god sake! The ultimate music instrument of every single southamerican lefty that wanted to reconnect with her roots, with the millenia of south american indian traditions, and the centuries of opression in the hand of white colonizers.
In any case. The cliche that women are smarter than men is totally true here. In a shouting society, why should you botter with trying to be nuanced? What's the need of going for the soft sides of multiculturalism? none. You'll get yourself a better and faster ticket to fame if, foreigner yourself, go on beating the foreigner bashers at their own game. Shout higher! beat the crap out of muslims! Invoque Voltaire, because anyway, nobody read his work today.
There is catch, though. Supppose that you actually suceed. Suppose that you are actually the foreigner that comes along, and win at the race of beating the others that like you years ago, are trying to get away from arranged marriages. Or warfare, or murderous regimes supported with the oil that the USA needs so much. If you suceed in the game of beating the beaters, you are a beater yourself. And that success-history-to-be, that child of war or that clitoris-less woman, will be refused at the doors of your new country. No more place in The Netherlands for refugees, or no more affirmative action in the states. But who cares? not you,
surely. You are safe now, in the limelight of the media, or learning to play the charango.
I mean, why do I have to stomach early in the morning Hirsi Ali hyping herself as the coming Voltaire that the muslim world needs? Now, not that I love Voltaire, with his gardens-for-retired-people ideology. But there are limits. As a matter of fact, that image is just balanced out by Condi , trying to get a grip in the guitar that Evo just gave her, conveniently made out of coca leaves. Or, I suppose, the roles of revulsive and montypitonish can be reversed. As a matter of fact it is just wonderful to portrait the shouting Hirsi Ali, a politician that has no qualms to puke on half of the world, as Candide. Or even better, to be writing Candide. How absurd can we get? And actually, the bloody nerve of Condi, present in the Michelle Bachelet assumption as president, when not only her government, but her ideas, put Pinochet in power, and also send the father of the new chilean president to torture and death. Doesn't these people has any shame left?
Well, actually they don't. And that is probably why I remain trying to figure out what to do. Shall I puke? Shall I laugh? puke-laugh, laugh-puke. In between the shout and the style, as usual.
The sad part of this ongoing comedy is that these two brilliant women, actually, are the forerunners of one of the oldest strategies in the world: Go out, and beat them at their own game. Not terrible ethic kind of game, but who cares?
Let's start with Hirsi. For many of my foreigner-huging friends of the netherlands, she is the archetypical well integrated allochtoon. The mythology runs like that: political refugee arrives to the country, teach herself the beauty of dutch, goes into university, raises due to her intellectual calliber, takes up the cause of those opressed muslim women, and ends up as star parliamentair. Of course, the world, and most of all, those scary evil muslims, take it up against her. What I believe of the intellectual calliber of Hirsi, actually, is that is best proven
in her adaptability. Lets pass over the details that do not work well in the narrative, such as the fact that she is no political refugee, but she run out on a marriage, or that she is no newcomer to politics, but is the scion of a family with a long tradition of politics in her own country. Her insight shines on when you realize that she has been doing for years what the traditionally tolerant dutchies love best: shout louder than they.
And there we have Condi. As distinguished member of a government that has just shown how much it cares for the dispossesed back in New Orleans, she does market herself as the incarnation of the compassionate-conservative-american-dream. Brilliant academic, gifted musician, able political operator. And coming from a humble origin.Lets, again, pay no attention whatsoever to the irritant details. Lets don't worry about that oil tanker that goes around the world with her name, recognition of her history as leader of the big oil companies, another blatant proof of the (not really compassionate) interwining power lines in between politics and big money. All this is food for the rabid left wing press. What actually matter is that Condi is irresistible. Just look at her looks in the UN, short of matrix-inspired dominatrix, leather clad and briskly walking. I mean, what marketting image is better than the accomplished piano player of Bush family meetings gripping the charango from Evo, a coca-charango, for god sake! The ultimate music instrument of every single southamerican lefty that wanted to reconnect with her roots, with the millenia of south american indian traditions, and the centuries of opression in the hand of white colonizers.
In any case. The cliche that women are smarter than men is totally true here. In a shouting society, why should you botter with trying to be nuanced? What's the need of going for the soft sides of multiculturalism? none. You'll get yourself a better and faster ticket to fame if, foreigner yourself, go on beating the foreigner bashers at their own game. Shout higher! beat the crap out of muslims! Invoque Voltaire, because anyway, nobody read his work today.
There is catch, though. Supppose that you actually suceed. Suppose that you are actually the foreigner that comes along, and win at the race of beating the others that like you years ago, are trying to get away from arranged marriages. Or warfare, or murderous regimes supported with the oil that the USA needs so much. If you suceed in the game of beating the beaters, you are a beater yourself. And that success-history-to-be, that child of war or that clitoris-less woman, will be refused at the doors of your new country. No more place in The Netherlands for refugees, or no more affirmative action in the states. But who cares? not you,
surely. You are safe now, in the limelight of the media, or learning to play the charango.
posted by Unknown at 1:43 PM
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