AUDIO: Amnesty Lecture 2005: Michael Ignatieff speaks at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

by Badman Mon Jan 17, 2005 21:08

To my mind he presonifies, more than anybody else, the craven and sycophantic attitude of US intelectuals to the wholescale terrorism of their political masters. He ignores the obvious motivations and naked imperialism of the US state and prefers to obscure all before him in such intellectually empty concepts as "exceptionalism". By enveloping reality in these, apparently subtle and sophisticated nuances, which are in reality just ignoring the obvious, he creates a space that allows the complicit to avoid facing their complicity in crimes.

For example, he appears to believe that the US has a genuine interest in their much promoted 'democratic' project in Iraq, contrary to all the historical and current evidence. He often pontificates on the nature of terrorism, but for some reason decides to define terrorism in such a way that the actions of states are not included. This allows him to generalise and philosophise about the official enemy, without the merest hint of context and renders his thoughts as worthless.

by fogy Tue Jan 18, 2005 19:52

“To my mind he presonifies, more than anybody else, the craven and sycophantic attitude of US intelectuals to the wholescale terrorism of their political masters.”



Ahem…..except he happens to be Canadian!!!!!

by Badman Tue Jan 18, 2005 20:05

Very clever. He also happens to be a professor in Harvard. Where he was born isn't really that important to his role in propagating ideas.

by ff Tue Jan 18, 2005 23:33

" Where he was born isn't really that important to his role in propagating idea"


or "expressing his views" as it's known to the civilised world

by Badman Tue Jan 18, 2005 23:43

"or "expressing his views" as it's known to the civilised world"

I was actually being quite precise in my language. Intellectual elites, such as Harvard professors, have a function in Western societies which means that when they express themselves in public, they are also actively propagating ideas within society. I was refering to his role in this process.

If somebody else wants to quibble with my contribution, how about actually disagreeing with the content rather than playing the pedantic smart alec.

by thinking Wed Jan 19, 2005 14:34

...but it did get me thinking in a lot of ways.

I know that the US has a history thats based on imperialism & capitalism, and that their previous invasions are based on greed, and Olivia O'Leary takes him up on this in the Q+A session - but crucially it got me asking: how can we stop dictators in remote places oppressing minorities?

Saddam Hussein's regime WAS involved in human rights abuses - how can we stop this happening, practically?

Do we encourage them to take up arms themselves?
Do we sit back and do nothing?
Do we slap economic sanctions on the country?
Do we adopt of a position of neutrality and not get involved?

If the Nazis were persecuting the Jews today, would the antiwar movement object to a US invasion?

I dont have any answers to these questions, just random thoughts.

by Joe Wed Jan 19, 2005 14:43

"how can we stop dictators"

The key question is who is the 'we' in the above question. You can hide a lot of wars behind that 'we' if by it you mean 'me and George Bush'.

In reality 'we' don't get to make such decisions, 'we' are simply given the choice of supporting or opposing those made by Bush, Blair etc.

by R. Isible Wed Jan 19, 2005 17:57

QOUTE: Saddam Hussein's regime WAS involved in human rights abuses - how can we stop this happening, practically?

Well, we could not be selling arms to countries like Indonesia that are human rights abusers. We could not trade with violators of international law that torture and murder civilians: like the USA.

That'd be a small start. It'd be much more practical than anything I've heard Ignatieff propose.

by Badman Thu Jan 20, 2005 02:59

QOUTE: Saddam Hussein's regime WAS involved in human rights abuses - how can we stop this happening, practically?

To add to what my esteemed co-commenteers Joe and R.Isible have said above. Firstly, this question is based on a false assumption, namely that the political power in the US has any interest in getting rid of dictators and stopping human rights abuses. Even the most casual look at the history of US foreign policy shows very clearly that this is not the case. In fact, there is remarkably clear evidence that in the poorer parts of the world they favour dictators who invariably carry out human rights abuses. Look at their actions in Chile, Panama, Iran, Liberia, Haiti, etc, etc....

For a man with the obvious intelligence of somebody like Ignatieff to somehow ignore this glaringly obvious fact is simply beneath contempt. Even in Iraq, all the evidence points towards the fact that they have consistently favoured dictators. They supported Saddam until 1990 and helped to arm him - the period during which he carried out his worst atrocities. In 1991, they neglected to depose him as they couldn't guarantee that whatever replaced him would be amenable to their control. They even expressly gave him permission to quash the two rebellions after the first gulf slaughter by relaxing the restrictions on the no fly zone. Between 1991 and 2002, they openly promoted the idea of a 'palace coup' whereby he would be replaced by a former henchman who would be obedient to them. Their policy was quite open about containing him and they were quite against any forces that might democratise Iraq.

In a hypothetic world where the US did want to institute some sort of genuine democracy in Iraq, one could speculate about many thousands of ways in which they might undermine his dictatorial rule. but that is a question for abstract dreamers.

by pc Thu Jan 20, 2005 03:28

...

by BP Fri Jan 21, 2005 21:28

Well, listening to this asshat was a nauseating trial (but thanks for posting it) - to critique this barrage of rubbish would be a long and dreary task; luckily it has already been comprehensively done by CounterPunch - check the link for an excellent article on this character -- http://www.counterpunch.org/neumann12082003.html

>>excerpt
"Ignatieff cooks up a testosterone-laced stew in which morsels of freedom and human rights are seasoned with crushing violence, enlightened greed, and calculated hypocrisy. His world contains three races: the ballsy Anglo-Saxons; the Western European surrender monkeys; and those hysterically dim-witted, childlike underachievers, the natives. He avoids explicit racism only through studied obtuseness."

This appearance does at least help show us the true colours of what Amnesty International has become; that such a crass purveyor of imperialist 'White Man's Burden' ideology all tarted-up in pitiful 'Humanitarian' garb is carted to Ireland to patronise, upbraid and instruct the Natives in the performance of their duties to the Imperial Master is a pretty effective indication of underlying AI policy/agenda. His basic message, not easy to decode, is really very simple - "On your knees, white Niggers!!"

All the labourious name-dropping and ass-kissing seems to indicate a champange-circuit social outing for the Irish 'great and good' to lap up; obfuscation and flattery combined with some serious stealth indoctrination. This is a dangerous man, but probably quite effective at what he does. The US ruling class is obviously very happy to sponsor such an obsurantist 'kept intellectual' as a spokesman for its interests.

Quo vadis Amnesty International?

by Austin O'Sullivan Mon Jan 24, 2005 13:47 austin at walk dot ie 1 Long Mile Road, Walkinstown, Dublin 12 4650388

America's claim that it's invasion of Iraq was equally based on the arms issue and Human Rights is hard to believe.

America selects the Human Rights issues that bring advantage to itself either politically or economically. What has America done for the 1.5 milion Tibetans murdered by the Chinese since 1959. Has America any plans to invade China and depose that regime?.

America picks its targets and uses Human Rights as its excuse to rape and pillage.

In its own land it murders more of its own citizens than any country in the world. It murders children and people with learning disabilities without discrimination.

by web'serf'er Sat Jan 29, 2005 20:18

Badman is bang-on.........Well done! You don't have to look very hard to see how complemantary a person like Ignatieff is to a Bush-Blair elitist view of the world. Enjoyed reading your comments, keep up the good work.
http://www.zmag.org/ZNET is a wealth of info.