Talmudic Tidbits

Pirkei Avot is the section of the Mishnah that deals primarily with Jewish philosophy and ethical living. Here is the first part, with my literal translation from the Hebrew to accompany my following commentary.

Moses received Torah* from Sinai** and handed down*** to Joshua; Joshua to the Elders [of the tribes of Israel]; the Elders to the Prophets; the Prophets handed down to the men of the Great Assembly. They**** said three things: Be cautious in judgement***, raise up many disciples, and make a fence around Torah.** (Chapter 1, Mishnah 1)

* Many English translations incorrectly translate this as “the Torah.” The Hebrew word תורה (Torah) does not have the ה in front that would make it “the Torah.” But why did the original author not write “the Torah”? The inclusion of the definite article would make it sound like the Law has a finite existence, a beginning and an end. Torah is infinite. Like God, Torah itself is אין סוף (without end).

** Why does the Mishnah not say “from God” or “at Sinai” rather than “from Sinai“? This is to remind Jews that the giving of Torah occurred at a specific place and a specific time in history. It was a REAL event. It is not an oral tradition or a myth — it was an actual event at an actual place. All Jews, present and future, were there.

*** The Hebrew neither repeats the word “Torah” nor uses the pronoun את זה (it) when referring to the handing down of Torah through the ages. The use of the pronoun would give a sense of limit to Torah just like the article ה (the) would have done. See my first footnote.

**** The pronoun “they” refers specifically to the men of the Great Assembly and not collectively to Moses, Joshua, the Elders, and the Prophets as well. The Great Assembly was the first to make rulings and issue precepts based on Torah since knowledge had become diffused by that time.

*** Courts of law are to resemble God. Courts should be neither too strict nor too lenient; they should be fair. This resembles two aspects of God as described in the mystical tradition — דין (Judgement) and חסד (Mercy) — that are balanced by תפארת (Compassion).

** Jews are supposed to guard against even approaching the breaking of Torah. For example, it is forbidden in the Bible Talmud to eat beef and dairy products in the same meal. The Oral Law — the Talmudic tradition that accompanies the Written Law in the Bible — also expanded this prohibition to include chicken so Jews are one step removed from even coming close to violating the precept. (Fish is allowed.)

Note: Most of the commentary comes from tradition sources, but a few ideas are mine. Then again, there is nothing new under the sun.

Personal News

I recently started working as Marketing and Communications Manager for Speech Modules, a company that is a pioneer in the speech-recognition industry. Check it out.

Journalism Versus Marketing

SEOmoz offers some humorous jokes through which people can know whether their writings are influenced by the Internet. The comments are amusing, but I wanted to address one related conflict that I have found between my prior career as a journalist and my current one as an Internet marketer.

I have written this blog since 2006, when I was a newspaper editor and publisher in Boston. By using various Internet utilities, I have always known the common search terms, links, and keywords through which people have found this blog. But, after I know this information, I have a conflict over whether to use it.

For example, here are the top-three search terms through which people have found my blog since I started writing three years ago:

holocaust — 53,261 visitors

universe — 22,187 visitors

dollar — 20,108 visitors

If I merely wanted to increase my traffic (in pursuit of advertising or fame), then I would write more posts about the relevance of the Holocaust to today, the science the Big Bang versus the creation of the universe in the Bible, and the future of the dollar in relation to today’s financial crisis. But the journalist in me, of course, might rather want to write about other subjects that are timely or about which I am passionate. The subjects that are popular are not always the ones that are desirable.

Traditional media outlets have always faced a similar dilemma. I cannot remember any specific data or a source because it was years ago, but I heard this story from a journalism professor back in college at Boston University: Whenever the Boston Herald, the major tabloid in the city, would publish a picture of Ted Williams on its front page, the newspaper would sell something like tens of thousands of more copies. So the editor, of course, would face a dilemma: publish a picture of Williams even if it was not timely (and please his boss, the publisher, by selling more papers) or put something else on the front page the was more relevant and timely to the news of the day even though fewer copies would be sold.

SEOmoz was making a joke in its post, but the issue raised by the writer is actually quite serious. When bloggers and other Web 2.0 writers decide what content to publish and what headlines to put on their posts, they must choose whether to discuss interesting topics and use “punny” headlines (as newspapers have always done) or publish content that draws as many readers as possible and use simple headlines consisting solely of popular keywords that attract search engines.

In more ways than one, new media providers are facing the same delimmas faced by traditional outlets. It is a choice between authenticity or popularity, between journalism and marketing. It will be interesting to see which route the Web 2.0 world takes.

Know How I Know You’re Gay?

RISHON LEZION, Israel — Judith Miller is uncomfortable with the increasing tendency of young males to call each other “gay” as an insult:

We should do something to get this insanity under control.

I’m not just talking about combating bullying, which has been a national obsession ever since Columbine, and yet seems to continue unabated. I’m only partly talking about homophobia, which, though virulent, cruel and occasionally fatal among teenagers, is not the whole story behind the fact that words like “fag” and “gay” are now among the most potent and feared weapons in the school bully’s arsenal.

Being called a “fag,” you see, actually has almost nothing to do with being gay.

It’s really about showing any perceived weakness or femininity – by being emotional, seeming incompetent, caring too much about clothing, liking to dance or even having an interest in literature. It’s similar to what being viewed as a “nerd” is, Bennington College psychology professor David Anderegg notes in his 2007 book, “Nerds: Who They Are and Why We Need More of Them”: “‘queer’ in the sense of being ‘odd’ or ‘unusual,’” but also, for middle schoolers in particular, doing “anything that was too much like what a goody-goody would do.”

It’s what being called a “girl” used to be, a generation or two ago.

I have begun to feel the same way. I went to visit my family last year, and I heard my twelve-year-old brother and his friends making these jokes. I was shocked. When I hang out at my local pub here in Israel, I see my circle of friends and regulars frequently making the same jokes (in English). I could be wrong, but I think it started when the American comedy “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” came out (see here). On YouTube alone, there are at least 120 parodies of the now-famous “Know-How-I-Know-You’re-Gay?” scene.

For the best explanation on this behavior, I refer you to Brett and Kate McKay, the authors of the Art of Manliness blog:

I think for the last few decades we’ve tried the genderless society thing, and it hasn’t worked. And I think today’s generation understands that. They’ve been told their whole life that there aren’t any differences between men and women besides our genitalia, but everything in their own experience, in their day to day interactions with the opposite sex tells them this isn’t true…

[Females] appreciate the advances women have made in the past fifty years, but they lament the loss of men and women embracing their complimentary gender differences. They want women to be women and men to be men. But they’re afraid that if they admit this, they’re being a traitor to women and the advances they’ve made.

And the men I meet want to embrace masculinity and man up, but like women, they’re afraid to. They’re afraid if they do, they’ll be labeled a patriarchal chauvinist…

What we have going on is that young people today have the same sense of things that I just described, but they don’t have any idea what to do about it. There’s nothing out there that helps them understand their feelings and gives them direction on how to channel those feelings in productive, satisfying ways. They don’t have role models to emulate and people to teach them what manhood and womanhood is really about. The problem is not, as Ms. Warner believes, the persistence of gender roles themselves. The problem is that young people want to embrace gender roles but don’t know how to go about it. So you have boys trying to be cartoonishly tough and macho and girls becoming over-sexualized. All they have to go on is caricatures of manhood and womanhood.

Spot on. When children who are my brother’s age make this joke, there is indeed an underlying element of homophobia. After all, they have not grown up enough to recognize any alleged conflict involving society and gender roles. Besides, they merely want to repeat funny lines from a movie.

But when men in their teens, twenties, and even thirties (most of whom, we can assume, are generally liberal like others their age and not actually homophobic) make these comments, that is an indication of something else entirely. As the Art of Manliness noted, men no longer know what it means to be, well, men. Young males cannot accurately define what manliness is; they can only clearly define what it is not. And it is being “not-feminine” in any way whatsoever. Moreover, in a hyper-masculine society like Israel (and the rest of the Middle East), men are under even greater pressure not to appear feminine in the slightest. And that explains why I have heard these jokes much more often here than I ever did in the United States.

Related: The Battle of the Sexes

Propaganda

I laughed and then cried when I saw this headline and article:

Surviving economic meltdown in the age of Obama
How to thrive by following top book on wealth, debt, investing – the Bible

Whenever I am bored, I read WorldNetDaily. It’s an extremely conservative website that does not even try to remain impartial or objective. Apart from Aaron Klein (who is a good Middle East reporter when his bias does not get in the way), Dennis Prager (whose columns frequently explain Judaism well to a Christian audience), and Vox Day (an intellectual heavyweight whose columns on gender relations and feminism are always insightful), there is nothing on the website that is worth taking seriously.

The headline in the quoted article is a perfect example. Barack Obama had nothing to do with the financial crisis that is unfolding. (If John McCain had won the election, I would have said the same thing.) Yet, to a website like WND, Obama is the enemy, and every negative news event must be connected to him somehow. The article then chiefly blames the “Democrat Party” — that inaccurate phrase itself is political — for the economic turmoil. It is silly, and anyone with any ability to think critically should be able to see through this propaganda.

The financial mess is not a result of Democratic policies; it is not a result of Republican policies. The dire predicament in which the United States finds itself is a result, in macroeconomic terms, of the entire country living beyond its means since the 1980s. The federal government, state governments, local municipalities, and individual Americans have all been living on, to borrow a phrase from Thomas Friedman, borrowed dimes and borrowed time. The issue is larger than any one political party or public policy.

But you will never see such a sober, honest analysis from WND. I always wonder why the site is popular.

The Politics of Language

Thomas Friedman once wrote that he never listened to what Yasir Arafat said in English at press conferences. To determine what the late Palestinian leader really believed, Friedman only paid attention to what he said in Arabic to his own people. Here is why.

Hebrew

RISHON LEZION, Israel — No matter how one feels about Israel and Middle Eastern politics, anyone one with an interest in language can appreciate the rebirth of Hebrew after few people spoke it for nearly 2,000 years. (And probably even longer: In ancient Judea, people spoke Aramaic.) See here.

Business Buzzword Bingo

Whether or not you’ve been to business school, you’ll get a kick out of this.

Good Night, Funnyman

George Carlin was a master at observing human nature, noticing the subtleties of language, and criticizing innane actions of governments and religions as he saw fit. While I disagreed with some of his points, his death is a great loss for comedy, as well as American society in general. Here are some of his most famous routines. HBO is also showing every one of Carlin’s specials over the next two days.

Religion is Bullshit

The Seven Dirty Words

Baseball and Football

On Soft Language

This Country is Finished

Letter from Israel: What is Israel, Anyway?

Second in an ongoing series

JERUSALEM — There’s an old joke among Israeli Jews: it’s easier to pray for the ingathering of the exiles than to live with them.

Israel, like the United States, is a nation of immigrants. If an Israeli is not an immigrant himself, then most likely his parents or grandparents came from places as varied as Germany, Russia, Morocco, Iran, and New York. Modern Hebrew is known as the only language that children teach to their parents – children born here are naturally fluent, but their parents usually know it as a second or third language.

But there is a crucial difference between Israel and the United States. Neighborhoods, cities, and regions in America are usually comprised of one or two ethnic groups. The southwest is increasingly a Hispanic area. Boston has historically been Irish and Italian. Many people in my hometown in southern Illinois are German.

However, Israel is an extremely small country compared to America; it is roughly the size of New Jersey. As a result, every city, neighborhood, and apartment building is a mix of people from all over the world. Everyone must try to live together in a tight environment, but they do not always succeed. Each ethnic group has its own worldview, culture and religion, and these mentalities often conflict. If you ask five Israelis for their opinions, you will get six answers.

But before I explain the conflicts in Israeli society, I need to set the stage by drawing a picture of the different ethnic groups in Israel and how they came here.

—
Israeli Jews

After Judea was destroyed by the ancient Roman Empire in 70 C.E., the surviving Jews were forced into exile. Some went to Europe. Some went to Spain, northern Africa, and neighboring Arab countries. Some stayed in the Middle East. Over the subsequent centuries, each Jewish community developed its own cultural, ethnic, and religious flavor.

The Jews of Europe became known as Ashkenazi Jews, they developed the Yiddish language, and they tended to resemble other Europeans in appearance over the centuries as a result of intermarriage and conversion. They know European (and later American) history and culture, and they have Western mentalities. Ashkenazi Jews developed many diverse types of Judaism: Haredi Judaism (the ultra-Orthodox Judaism described in my last letter), mystical Hasidic Judaism, and non-Orthodox types of Judaism like Conservative Judaism and Reform Judaism. In the nineteenth century, Ashkenazi Jews founded the secular, Zionist movement that aimed to re-establish the State of Israel someday. Of course, the most significant event in European Jewish history was the Holocaust: Roughly one-third of the Jews in Europe died.

The Jews who fled to Spain following the destruction of Judea became known as Sephardi Jews. For centuries, Spain was divided between Islam and Christianity, and Jews were usually caught in the middle. In the late 1400s, the Christian king of Spain finally defeated the Muslims and united the country. However, there was a side effect. In 1492, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella gave all Jews and Muslims a choice between three options: leave the country, convert to Christianity, or die. (Columbus was not the only person to leave that year.) A sizable number of Jews did convert, but most left Spain to settle in Jewish communities in various places throughout the Arab world. A few resettled in the South America and other countries as well.

The Jews who moved to neighboring Arab countries after the destruction of Judea became known as Mizrahi Jews. For centuries they lived among Muslims in relative peace. A little-known fact: Jews, in general, were historically treated better in Arab countries than in Christian Europe until the twentieth century. (Spain was not the only country in Europe by far to expel Jews.) Mizrahi Jews are Arabs in culture but Jews in religion: their food, their mentalities, their dress, and their physical appearances can be virtually indistinguishable from those of Arabs. Their first language became Arabic. Most Sephardi Jews eventually moved to Arab countries, so the terms “Sephardi” and “Mizrahi” are now interchangeable in Israel.

There are two other Jewish communities that have moved to Israel in the past several years: black Jews from Ethiopia and Indian Jews from India. The communities had claimed that they were descendents from the ancient lost tribes of Israel, and DNA testing confirmed that they are descended from Jews in the Middle East. Most of these communities have decided to move to Israel.

—
Other Israelis

Roughly twenty-five to thirty percent of Israel’s population is not Jewish: primarily, they are Muslim and Christian Arabs, as well as non-Jews from Russia. Each of these groups has a story to tell.

The largest minority group in Israel is the Arabs. When Israel was founded in 1948, some of the Arabs in the region known as Palestine fled to neighboring countries (and, in some instances, the Israeli army forced them to leave at gunpoint). Others stayed in their towns, which were eventually located inside Israel once the borders were drawn. Israeli Arabs are full citizens under the law – Arabic is the second official language of Israel, and an Arab political party sits in the legislature. Arabs, however, do face constant discrimination and suspicion from other Israelis who consider them to be a fifth column. (One exception: Arab residents of East Jerusalem, which Israel annexed from Jordan after the war in 1967, are permanent residents, but they are not citizens. They are free to travel and work inside Israel, but they cannot vote.) Some Israeli Arabs have committed terrorist acts over the years, but the vast majority of them just want to live their lives peacefully.

When the State of Israel was re-founded in 1948, the country’s founders wanted to encourage Jews from all over the world to move here. Under the law, any Jew who requests Israeli citizenship can receive it. However, the law also permits anyone who is at least one-quarter Jewish to receive automatic citizenship as well – even if he is not Jewish himself. (In other words, anyone with just one Jewish grandparent can become an Israeli citizen.) The reason: Adolf Hitler aimed to kill anyone who had at least one Jewish grandparent – even if he was not Jewish himself.

However, this part of the law drastically changed Israeli culture after the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Once people were allowed to leave Russia, many non-Jewish Russians immigrated to Israel simply because they happened to have a Jewish grandparent and a desire for a better life. Now, as a result, Israel is partially comprised of a large number of Russians who are not Jews, who do not care about Judaism, and who barely speak Hebrew. In fact, at least one Russian-Israeli teenager even founded a neo-Nazi group in Israel recently and assaulted a few religious Jews in an Israeli city. (He was quickly arrested.) As a result, the government may change the law and close the loophole that allows non-Jews to become citizens, and Israel’s leaders are also facing calls to deport the teenager and strip him of his citizenship.

—
Forming a Country

Following the destruction of Judea in 70 C.E., a few Jews had always lived in the region known as Palestine. Many Arabs lived here as well. Ashkenazi Jews began moving from Europe to Palestine in the nineteenth century, and many Holocaust survivors later moved to Israel in the 1940s and 1950s. Shortly after Israel was founded in 1948, many neighboring Arab countries expelled the Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews who had been living in their countries, and they eventually moved to the Jewish State. Israel also had to use military operations to airlift several Jewish communities out of some hostile, Arab countries. Eventually, Jews from Ethiopia and India moved to Israel. After the victorious Six-Day War in 1967, many affluent American and European Jews moved to Israel. Tens of thousands of non-Jewish Russians arrived in the 1990s.

Take all of these communities, place them in an extremely small pot, and stir quickly. That’s the recipe for Israel. But how can one create a functioning country – not to mention a civil society – out of such diversity?

This is another difference between Israel and the United States. America has largely been successful in assimilating its immigrants over the years because the United States is a country that was founded not on religion or ethnicity, but on ideas – specifically, the ideas that are described in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. A person’s ethnicity and religion do not matter – a person can believe in these ideas regardless of whether he is white or Hispanic, Christian or Muslim.

But modern Israel was founded on Judaism, an idea that is an ethnicity and a religion. What this mean for citizens who are not Jews? What does a Russian Christian, a Muslim Arab, and a European Jew all have in common besides the fact that they hold an Israeli passport? What is the status of non-Jews in a Jewish state? What unites all Israelis regardless of ethnicity and culture? These are questions that have yet to be answered.

Still, Jews in Israel are extremely divided even among themselves. Ashkenazi Jews from Europe are generally wealthier and better educated than Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews, and this difference resembles the racial divide in America because Ashkenzi Jews have lighter skin tones than other Jews here. Ashkenazi Jews frequently work white-collar jobs at Israel’s top high-tech firms; Arabs and Sephardi Jews tend to work blue-collar jobs in food service and as day laborers.

The divide between Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews presents itself most significantly in a metaphorical question: Is Israel a European or Middle Eastern country? Is it East or West?

The Zionist founders of Israel were European Jews, and the country has developed a parliamentary democracy that resembles those in most European countries. Israel has friendlier relations with Europe than with other countries in the Middle East. The country’s soccer team plays in the European league (and not the Asian one). Israel’s high-tech companies frequently work with Silicon Valley in America.

However, a majority of Israeli Jews are now Sephardi Jews because that community tends to have more children. More people now eat various Middle Eastern foods including falafel, shawarma, and couscous rather than the foods favored by Ashkenazi Jews like latkes (potato pancakes) and matzah ball soup. At the risk of sounding stereotypical, most Israeli Jews culturally act more like Middle Easterners than Europeans: they yell, haggle, debate, and banter all of the time. Israelis are a very emotive people: to paraphrase New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, a calm discussion between two Israelis sounds like four Americans having a livid argument. It’s hard to put into words, but my readers who have traveled to the Middle East should know what I mean.

Still, the ethnic and cultural divide between Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews is nothing compared to the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. But that’s the complex topic for my next letter.

Prior letter: The Ultra-Orthodox; Next letter: The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Proper Punctuation

To the Editor:

I think we all ought to take time to commemorate the subtleties of punctuation. Internet correspondence has cavalierly reduced it to an adopted linguistic device, a mere signification of speech.

Yet punctuation has the possibility to be so much more; to appropriate T. S. Eliot’s description of the end of the world, it can conclude one’s thoughts “not with a bang but a whimper.”

It is the remnant of a gentler world, and its revival and its celebration can only be enriching for modern society.

Alexandra Buder Shapiro
Philadelphia

Note: This letter was published here, and it is in response to this article.

Sensational Headlines

Here’s a current headline on the Drudge Report:

World should brace for possible war over Iran: France…

More television and online news outlets are adopting this style in headlines and news tickers. It’s personally aggravating because the colon is being used improperly. First of all, it’s grammatically incorrect. Secondly, this use does not even follow the one exception to grammar that standard journalism allows: When a colon follows a subject in a headline, it means that the subject is saying the statement that follows the colon.

Under the standard practice in journalism, here is what Drudge’s headline should be:

France: World should brace for possible war over Iran…

I’m not only being a journalism purist. This change in style implies two negative things. In journalism, the most important thing comes first. (Usually.) The first paragraph of a straight news story, as well as the headline, should summarize the event or at least state the most important fact. It is highly important to state a fact, not an interpretation.

Drudge’s headline implies that the most important fact, since it comes first, is that the “world should brace for possible war over Iran.” This is not a fact. The fact is that France says the “world should brace for possible war over Iran.” Do you see the subtle difference? Drudge’s headline emphasizes the hysterical analysis, not the fact that it is a view of one country. By downplaying the attribution to the French government, Drudge is not only flouting the laws of grammar and conventional journalism, he is also emphasizing the sensational nature of the story to garner attention.

I’m saddened that more news outlets – even CNN’s news ticker on the bottom of the screen – are adopting this practice. I just have one question: Who was the first producer or editor to make this change, and why did he do so? This could not have been a mistake that merely caught on — such a significant change in journalism practice must have been intentional. But why?

I see one other reason for this change: Society’s declining attention span due to the Internet and the 24-hour news cycle. Life is moving so quickly nowadays that we cannot wait to read even one word and a colon before getting to the juicy part of the story. The factual basis and attribution, of course, can come later. After all, who needs those?

Both of the implications of this trend in journalism are very discouraging.

Internet Killed the Literary Star

Maryann Wolf asks whether the Internet is dumbing-down the young:

How many children today are becoming Socrates’ nightmare, decoders of information who have neither the time nor the motivation to think beneath or beyond their googled universes? Will they become so accustomed to immediate access to escalating on-screen information that they will fail to probe beyond the information given to the deeper layers of insight, imagination, and knowledge that have led us to this stage of human thought? Or, will the new demands of information technologies to multitask, integrate, and prioritize vast amounts of information help to develop equally, if not more valuable, skills that will increase human intellectual capacities, quality of life, and collective wisdom as a species?

One word: Yes. I’m guilty myself. As a journalist, I’ve been trained to examine and reflect on all sources of information: What are their biases? Could they be wrong? Why are they stating what they’re stating? Is there other information available elsewhere that is more accurate and up-to-date? Still, I sometimes find myself typing a phrase into Google or Wikipedia and running with the first information that I find. (I never do this professionally, of course. It’s only for personal things.) And that is the complete antithesis of what thinking people — of any age – should do. It’s a triumph of speed over accuracy, laziness over quality.

But the Internet also has other negative effects. As Andrew Keen notes in his new book, “The Cult of the Amateur,” the Internet has discouraged, if not eliminated, creativity. People use their blogs to link to things other people have written. Most news outlets provide their content for free, while online advertising still has not generated significant revenue for most websites. People download music and movies without paying for them. The question that Keen asks is very worrisome: What is the motivation for artists and writers — and perhaps even journalists — to work if they are not paid for it? In Keen’s view, people are stealing art rather than creating it, and amateurs are replacing professionals:

And, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere, we are grappling with the Internet in nearly ever facet of our lives:

• Attention spans are becoming shorter and shorter as media becomes faster and faster. We are forced to multitask and an ever-increasing level.
• We work twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and we take less time to rest and relax.
• Privacy is dead (see here, here and here).
• People spend more time alone than with other people (physically).
• Our ability to write properly is dying (see here and here).

I’m not a Luddite; I think the Internet will be a net benefit for humanity. Still, tools are tools, and they can have positive or negative uses. I can use a hammer, for example, either to build a house or to murder someone. People are going to need to recognize the Internet’s negative effects and adapt accordingly.

Banning Muslims and the Koran

Daniel Pipes looks at efforts in various parts of the world to ban Islam, the Koran, and even Muslims themselves out of a fear of Islamic extremism:

I understand the security-based urge to exclude the Koran, Islam, and Muslims, but these efforts are too broad, sweeping up inspirational passages with objectionable ones, reformers with extremists, friends with foes. Also, they ignore the possibility of positive change.

More practical and focused would be to reduce the threats of jihad and Shari’a by banning Islamist interpretations of the Koran, as well as Islamism and Islamists. Precedents exist…

Islam is not the enemy, but Islamism is. Tolerate moderate Islam, but eradicate its radical variants.

Pipes is close, but not completely correct.

Every country determines its own sovereign legal system and the freedoms that citizens enjoy, so I hate to use the United States as the basis for comparison. But I do believe that the United States, out of all the countries in the world, is the most free on the planet (at least ideally). Freedom is central to American culture and historical memory, and this characteristic has motiviated the millions of immigrants who have aspired to come here. So, I apply the American model to most foreign matters involving freedom and civil liberties, and I believe other countries should be inspired by the American system.

In the United States, people are free to say whatever they think (except in specific contexts like shouting fire in a crowded theater and whenever a captive audience is present). Neo-Nazis, anarchists and even pedophiles are free to express their opinions as long as they do not put their thoughts into action. I can even say that I want to kill the president until I start to plan to do so. The difference arises when people move from speech to action. A person can say whatever he wants; he cannot do whatever he wants:

The right to swing my fist ends where the other man’s nose begins.                    — Oliver Wendell Holmes

So, where does this leave the discussion? Obviously, a ban on Islam, the Koran and Muslims is right out. (And so should it be.) Neither a religion nor a publication can be banned under the First Amendment, and a forced deportation of a specific segment of the population directly resembles Nazi Germany, the expulsions of Jews from many Western European countries (and, in Spain, of Muslims) during the Middle Ages, and the forced conversions by Muslims and Christians (depending on who was in power in a given place at a given time) of Christians, Muslims and Jews in southern Europe and the Middle East centuries ago. Do we really want to return to that mentality? (I already fear that an increasing nationalism in response to growing Islamism will set the stage for such a conflict.)

It would be legally and morally wrong (not to mention impossible) to ban Islam, the Koran and Muslims. Pipes is correct on this point. But he is wrong when he states that “Islamism” itself should be banned instead. A ban on an idea, of course, is already a violation of freedom of speech (not to mention unenforceable). However, it is also a slippery slope: Who determines what defines ”Islamism” and which ideas are “dangerous”? One year, it is al-Qaeda; the next year, it is Islam as a whole; the following year, it is Judaism (after all, they’re loyal to Israel!); the next year, it is Roman Catholicism (after all, they’re loyal to the Pope!). Who knows where the legal precedent would lead. Besides, a ban on ”Islamism” would only inspire extremists: it would “prove” that the West is, in fact, waging a war against Islam itself. Islamists have the right to say what they wish — no matter how horrible — but the moment that their words become actions, then they should be jailed and, if in a country illegally, deported.

So, Western countries cannot ban Islam, the Koran and Muslims. The West cannot expel all Muslims who already reside in Europe and the United States. Governments cannot ban Islamism. What, then, can Western countries do to combat homegrown Islamic extremism? The answer is fourfold:

1. Enforce existing laws without taking religion into account. Muslims need to feel that they are free and respected, not only tolerated — this is one reason why extremism is less prevelant among American Muslims than those in Europe. It is illegal for a person to murder someone, rob a bank, or blow up a building – and his religion is a moot point. The law should be truly blind.
2. Countries should restrict future immigration from countries that have large numbers of extremist Muslims, focus more on individual background checks, and reform their labor, economic and employment policies so large numbers of immigrants are no longer needed in the workforce. (It is one thing, as I mentioned earlier, to expel members of a population who are citizens. It is quite another to regulate and restrict future immigration. Each country has a sovereign right to determine who can and cannot enter – even if those determinations, unfortunately, are primarily motivated by race, religion or ethnicity. But such a law, of course, would be morally questionable. If a country wishes to restrict immigration, it should do so based on factors including country of origin and a personal background check on the person wishing to emigrate.)
3. Fight Islamic extremism, along with other fundamentalists who are part of what I call the True Clash of Civilizations, in the marketplace of ideas. There are reasons — and religion is only one of many – that the standards of living, for example, in fundamentalist Muslim countries is much lower than those in the West.
4. Moderate Muslims need to purge extremists from their midst or risk the wrath of the societies in which they live. This is obvious.

I have one other point: Pipes states that the West should “tolerate moderate Islam.” To tolerate something means that one puts up with it even though one thinks it is bad. I hope that was not Pipes’ intention. (The word “tolerance” is frequently misused today’s politically-correct climate.) The West should welcome moderate Muslims into an increasingly diverse, complex and globalized world. All people have something to contribute.

Elsewhere: Paul Sims, writing in The New Humanist, discusses this issue as well.

A Star is Born

RISHON LE-ZION, Israel — So I’m sitting at an Internet cafe in a mall in the center of the city. The top floor is full of games for children, and the machines are playing various songs. Every fifteen minutes I hear: “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” – in English. That’s one thing I never thought I’d see. Perhaps English is becoming a global language.

Goodbye, Comma, My Old Friend

Washington Post columnist Robert J. Samuelson blames peoples’ alleged misuse — or, more accurately, the lack of use — of the comma on the frantic pace of modern life. I agree. It’s another sign of the Internet ruining our ability to communicate clearly and effectively.

Vandalism by Editing

I was fired from my first job in journalism.

It was 1998, and I was a senior in high school who had worked for several months as a sport agate clerk for the Belleville News-Democrat in southern Illinois. You know the Scoreboard page in the Sports section that’s full of game schedules and box scores? I collected all of that information from Associated Press wire services, formated the data, and then laid out that page.

I thought I had been doing a good job, but three major mistakes over a couple of weeks sealed my fate. I forgot to include the golf scores the day after the first round of the Masters golf tournament. (I was never a fan of golf, so I had forgotten that it was occurring.) I forgot to change the A.P.’s baseball schedules from Eastern to Central time, so an unknown number of St. Louis Cardinals fans — who are just as passionate as Red Sox fans — arrived at Busch Stadium in the third inning. On the phone the next day, Saturday morning, I endured my first angry diatribe from an editor.

The editor-in-chief wanted to fire me following those two events, but the sports editor, Joe Ostermeier, persuaded him to give me another chance. I suppose he thought that I had learned my lesson. But my final mistake was indefensible.

Now, agate clerks could not run spell-check on the Scoreboard page because the listing of hundreds of players’ names would cause the program to take hours to finish. So we had to be sure that everything was spelled correctly while typing and formating box scores. Unfortunately, I had been making one not-so-tiny error while typing the baseball box scores: I had been spelling the hometown team as the “St. Louis Cardnials,” not the ”St. Louis Cardinals.”

Many baseball fans — like the sports editor — clip every single game’s box score as a momento. To have such a error enshrined in a person’s baseball history was beyond the pale. I was fired.

I’m telling this story because it is a personal example of a trend that has been growing more and more pronounced over the past ten or fifteen years: People, particularly those who are young, are increasingly unable to write well and spell correctly. Television was the first blow because people started to read less often — good readers turn into good writers. (But only when they read quality prose.) The invention of spell-check also eliminated the need to know, well, spelling. (The Boston Globe’s computers, as a matter of fact, did not have spell-check when I worked there in 2000 because the editors wanted their reporters to know how to spell. I don’t know if this has changed.) The Internet and text messaging, however, may be the final nail in the dictionary’s coffin.

The very nature of the Internet decreases attention spans — much more so than television ever did. We multi-task while attempting to operate as quickly and efficiently as possible. Speed becomes much more important than quality. How often does one read a long, complex, well-written essay on a blog? (I hope mine is an exception.) Are proper grammar and spelling in e-mails, instant messages and text messages important as long as one’s point is communicated?

If the need for these language skills decreases, then people will use them less often. If people use these skills less often, then they will lose those skills. If these skills are lost, then the ability to communicate effectively will eventually disappear altogether. The “slippery-slope” argument is usually a logical fallacy, but I think it is relevant in this context because an overall trend is observable and measurable. Here is just a few examples: High school students are now using instant-messaging slang in academic papers and everyday life (see here, here and here). I weep for the future.

Still, this article in today’s Boston Globe on a local “Grammar Vandal” is giving me hope:

Nothing is immune to the Grammar Vandal’s keen eye, not even the blue T-shirt she wore on a recent walk to point out grammar errors along Newbury Street. McCulley couldn’t possibly walk around wearing a shirt saying “Without Me Its Just Aweso.” So she took a Sharpie to the shirt, adding a comma after “me” and an apostrophe to “it’s.”

“Of course, I’m obsessive,” she said.

On her walk around Back Bay, the grammar vigilante’s judgments were sure and steady. Though Newbury Street is considered among the classiest of thoroughfares in an educated city, its signs are riddled with errors.

The fact that this Grammar Vandal exists is proof enough that language skills are on the decline. I doubt that her efforts will lead to an increased public awareness of the importance of proper English; old-school, anal-retentive purists will continue to disparage contemporary illiteracy while fewer and fewer people (not “less” and “less”) confuse “its” and “it’s.” But I’m hopeful that her efforts will gradually make people in Boston, a highly-educated city, realize that not even they are immune.

One of the most important aims of a liberal-arts education — which may be becoming less important in today’s globalized world — is to teach people how to communicate effectively and efficiently, but I still see people who are even majoring in English and journalism who cannot write well. As my high-school experience shows, I used to be one of them. But I hope that I have regained that ability after years of studying, writing and editing — though I’m still nowhere near perfect. I just hope that everyone will do the same.

Are Hate-Crime Laws Beneficial?

While I was the editor and publisher of Spare Change News, one of the issues we considered is whether to advocate for a change in Massachusetts state law that would classify attacks on homeless people as a “hate crime.” Violent assaults had been increasing over the last several years, and we wanted to draw attention to this important issue.

We never officially advocated for such a change — although one columnist supported such a move in his column — and, in retrospect, I realize now that I was never convinced that hate-crime laws benefit minorities in general.

It seems I’m not the only one who feels this way. Nat Hentoff, writing in today’s Washington Times, agrees:

But what of the millions of the rest of us who are not members of communities given special guarantees of harsher penalties against their attackers? Some years ago, a young white woman, I heard during my research, was sexually assaulted and terrorized by a white predator. A friend of hers, another white woman, was also the victim of similar brutality by a black man. The white attacker of the first white woman received a significantly shorter prison sentence than the black attacker of the second woman, his act having been prosecuted and judged a “hate crime.” The first white woman was greatly puzzled. Angrily, she said, “Was what happened to me of less importance to the law then what happened to my friend?” So much for “equal protection of the laws.”

Yes, it is horrible when someone attacks a person because of his race, religion, ethnicity, national origin or sexual orientation. But, from a legal standpoint, it is impossible to determine whether those feelings were his primary motivation. Say a person assaults a man who happened to be black (or homeless or whatever). How can you prove that he committed that crime simply because he was black (or homeless or whatever)? In many instances, it is difficult.

From a practical standpoint, hate-crime laws are also merely symbolic and do little to prevent crime. Say an assault on a person results in a five-year prison sentence. Now, say that an assault on a homeless person results in a ten-year sentence. Does anyone think that a criminal will decide not to attack someone if he knows that he will get five more years? Of course not.

But there is a deeper philosophical issue at play. It is wrong to assault a person — period. The victim’s personal characteristics are immaterial. Secondly, a designation of special protection implies that a certain people are inherently weaker and essentially second-class citizens. Isn’t everyone equal? If I were assaulted simply because I were Jewish, I would not want my attacker to receive a harsher sentence because of my religion.

This question applies to homeless people in particular. One of our goals at Spare Change was to communicate to the public that homeless people are just like everyone else. But if homeless people deserve special protection, then they are no longer like everyone else. It is just as wrong to beat up a homeless person as it is to attack, for example, a Boston University college student. The penalties should be the same because everyone is equal.

People who advocate for hate-crime laws, in general, have good intentions. But they ignore the practical and philosophical implications of such measures.

Grappling With the Mitzvot on Shavuot

At sundown tonight, Jews around the world will begin celebrating Shavuot, the holiday that commemorates when the Israelites received the Torah at Mt. Sinai thousands of years ago. But, today, the Torah itself divides Jews. We aren’t even sure what we received or what we’re supposed to do with it.

Orthodox Jews claim, with very arguable legitimacy, that they are observing the Torah’s 613 commandments in the way that Jews have done since Sinai and that any other interpretations of the laws are deviations from the norm. Conservative Jews balance traditional views of the Torah with modernity. Reform Jews believe that each individual should decide which commandments he will observe. Reconstructionist Jews think that any adherence to the laws should be out of cultural affiliation, not a religious one. Karaite Jews — yes, they still exist — believe in the Written Torah (the first five books of the Tanakh, the Jewish Bible) but not the Oral Torah (the Talmud). Secular Jews may not observe any of the commandments.

Each of these approaches has its strengths and weaknesses. Orthodox Judaism, if we disregard the exaggerated divisions between internal sects, has created a unified, if complex, religious system that is internally consistent — but it disregards the academic scholarship proving that the Torah was never a single, finished, unified piece of law that appeared at a specific point in time. Conservative Judaism attempts to strike a balance between the two intense poles of traditional religion and rational modernity — but, as a result, it can become lukewarm and uninspiring. Reform Judaism encourages each individual to find “his own Judaism” — but, if anyone does whatever he wants, then there is little that these Jews can cite as a common, religious bond.Reconstructionist Judaism rightfully sees that culture can be a unifying force for Jews, but it dismisses the lessons that the Torah’s myths and metaphors can provide. Karaite Judaism recognizes that the Oral Law is not divine and was indeed composed by men  – but it does not appreciate the necessary additions that these rabbis developed over centuries in order to harmonize an ancient text with their modern times. (Does using electricity count as using fire, an action that is banned on Shabbat?)

As I stated in a prior post, I prefer to interpret religious myths as metaphors for a higher truth. But the mitzvot — what we call the commandments in Hebrew — are varied and complex. Some could be viewed as metaphors, some are plainly literal and sensible, and others are completely ludicrous.

• Metaphor: “You shall not boil a kid [goat] in its mother’s milk” (Exodus 23:19). This verse is used to justify the Jewish practice of not eating meat and dairy products simultaneously, but that interpretation seems to be a stretch. Wouldn’t it refer only to goat meat? I’ve always viewed it as a symbol stating that life (mother’s milk) should not mix with death (cooked meat), much like it is forbidden to touch a dead body.
• Literal and sensible: “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13).
• Literal and ludicrous: “He who insults his father or his mother shall be put to death” (Exodus 21: 17).

The view that one takes of the Torah depends on how a religious Jew, regardless of the stream of Judaism to which he adheres, views God. If one believes that God is a guy up in the sky who delivered a set of laws to be followed literally, then one must agree, logically, to kill his children if they insult him. Obviously, this is absurd. But if one views God as a collective, spiritual consciousness that permeates a culture or people, then we can allow for myths and metaphors that transmit higher ideas and meanings. If one does not believe in God, then one can state that the laws were good ideas and standards of conduct that were created to ensure that a desert tribe would survive in a harsh climate and brutal time.

The problem with interpreting and observing Torah is that no single paradigm works universally. If one believes that all of the commandments are the literal word of God, then one must kill children who insult their parents. So an across-the-board, literal interpretation must be ruled out. But if one views the Torah as myth and metaphor, then how does one view the mitzvot that make sense literally? Many of the mitzvot are sensible once one considers the context: eating pork in a desert without refrigeration, after all, was dangerous, so it was banned. However, once that historical and technological context changes, does our obligation to observe that commandment change? If one views the commandments as secular ideas and a culture’s codes of conduct, then what happens to the meanings behind the religious myths and metaphors?

The only logical answer is the Torah is a combination of religious meaning, solutions to practical problems, and a society’s codes of conduct. But where are the lines drawn today? And we wonder why we’re still grappling with the mitzvot today.

Still, there are other questions relating to the event at Sinai. The idea of being “chosen” to receive the Torah has been an issue with which Jews have grappled for centuries. Did God choose the Jews? Did the Jews choose God? What does “chosen” mean? What role shouldchoice play in our observance of the mitzvot today?

But there is another, even larger, issue: Who is a Jew? Discussing the commandments is pretty much pointless until we know who is “obligated” — depending on which interpretation one has – to observe them. The is the most divisive issue in the Jewish world today. Secular progressives in Tel Aviv consider themselves just as Jewish as an Orthodox rabbi in Jerusalem – although I’ve had some secular Israelis, who are Jews by definition, tell me that they consider themselves “Israelis” and not “Jews” because they are not religious.

The ultimate question, however, concerns conversion and which converts are “true Jews.” In the Bible, Ruththe Moabite became a Jew simply by telling her mother-in-law, Naomi, that “your people shall be my people, and your God my God.” One of Ruth’s descendents was someone you might know named King David. Incidentally, the Book of Ruth is read during Shavuot services. But the ultra-Orthodox establishment in Israel has the power to decide all religious matters (see how this creates conflict here and here and here), and they do not recognize non-Orthodox converts. The same issues divide the Jewish community in the United States.

I’ll propose a solution: Judaism, as I learned it while I was converting, has three cornerstones: God, Torah and Israel. As long as a convert sincerely feels like a member of Israel and cares about and grapples with these three issues, then he is a Jew — whether he went through an intricate, laborious process devised by men hundreds or thousands of years ago is immaterial. All the rest is commentary. All of us are trying to understand these issues, particularly on this day.

Jews and Intelligence

In the latest issue of Commentary magazine, Charles Murray examines the age-old stereotype that Jews have above-average intelligence. It’s a fascinating read, and I’m sure it will provoke significant reactions — both positive and negative.

Serving at the Pleasure of…

When I worked as a local journalist covering city politics in Boston, municipal employees would tell me that they “serve at the pleasure of the mayor.” The NBC drama “The West Wing” introduced viewers to the phrase in a presidential context. William Safire explores the saying here.

Judaism: Race, Religion, Ethnicity or Culture?

A reader e-mailed me this essay on whether Judaism is a race, religion or ethnicity. I thought I’d pose the question to my readers who are interested in Judaism or religion in general: What do you think? Defend your answer, and define your terms, if necessary. I’ll post my answer in the comments later.

How the Media Bought the War in Iraq

The fact that the Bush administration manipulated intelligence and lied to the American public in regards to the war in Iraq is common knowledge. But just as important is the fact that the mainstream media were complicit. As a former journalist, I look upon this era of media history with shame.

Bill Moyers of PBS recently aired a program examining how the mainstream media abandoned its responsibility to question the Bush administration and accepted its assertions without reservation. The first part of a series of YouTube clips with the program is at the top of this post. You can also watch the entire show here on the PBS website. I highly recommend that everyone watch the program.

The True Clash of Civilizations

First in a series of essays

Yes, there is a clash of civilizations going on. No, it’s not the one you think.

It’s not between Islam and Christianity, or Islam and Judaism, or Islam and Judeo-Christianity, or Islam and “the West.” It’s not merely about terrorism, religion and politics. Islam as a whole isn’t even on one side in this struggle — despite what Bernard Lewis and Mark Steyn believe. It’s bigger than each of these individual religions and cultures, but all of them do play a role.

There are Muslims, Jews and Christians on each side of this conflict. This struggle is hard to define and difficult to name, but the side that wins will determine the fate of society as we know it. This is bigger than September 11, 2001.

So, what is this conflict? The best way I can describe it is as a conflict between Skeptics and True Believers. These are more than ideas; they are entire mindsets and the two major ways in which people — of any religious faith or political creed — view the world. The clash is between two collective states of mind.

—

The Enlightenment, a reaction against the tyranny, warfare and fundamentalism of the Middle Ages, produced several beliefs and attitudes:

• Skepticism: The attitude that everything is debatable, and that people should ask tough questions and examine all available evidence without personal biases and through the empirical scientific method. One cannot assume anything is true unless there is evidence that supports the theory or idea.
• Religious and Political Liberty: Everyone is free to develop, maintain and follow his own personal religious and political beliefs as long as he harms no one else in the process. This is summarized by a quote by Oliver Wendell Holmes: “The right to swing my fist ends where the other man’s nose begins.”
• Freedom from Coercion: No one should be forced to adopt another religion or political belief.
• Political Change Through Peaceful Means: Violence as a means of political change is never permissible except in cases of self-defense.
• Toleration of Minorities: No one shall be deemed a second-class citizen because of his religious beliefs, political opinions, race or ethnicity. All religious beliefs and political opinions must be respected unless they harm other people.
• Government by the People: Whether it is through democracy, republicanism or the parliamentary system, the people of a state have the right to determine their own fate.

All of these principles, to varying degrees, form the foundation of modern, Western society. The clash is not between civilizations and cultural identities (as Samuel Huntington proposed); it is between those who accept these Enlightenment principles (the Skeptics), and those who do not. Those who do not are the True Believers. Muslims, Christians and Jews can be on either side.

—

The True Believers who oppose these Enlightenment principles are not “the Muslims” just as “the Christians” are not in support of the founding ideals of modern, Western society. People of each religion are on each side. The trademark True Believer tendency is to believe without question that one’s religious or political belief is the only correct, valid and acceptable one, that any evidence to the contrary is false, and that everyone else should adopt the belief as well. Any action taken to spread or empower that belief is also acceptable — if not mandated.

True Believer Muslims are those who believe that Islam is the only true religion and that it is their duty to spread it throughout the world through any means necessary. True Believer Muslims are those who seek to enact shar’ia (Islamic law) throughout the Muslim world, if not the entire globe. True Believer Muslims kill former Muslims who convert to other religions. True Believer Muslims murder innocent people and blow themselves up — and encourage others to do the same — to advance religious and political causes. True Believer Muslims who are taxi drivers who refuse live in a pluralistic society and transport people who carry alcohol.

True Believer Christians also believe that their religion is the only correct one and seek to spread it in the same fashion as True Believer Muslims. These Christians are those who ignore science, blindly accept that the entire universe is 6,000 years old, and force schools to stop teaching evolution. True Believer Christians believe that the entire Bible is the inerrant and literal “Word of God” despite obvious contradictions and centuries of scholarship proving that the books have had countless authors, editors, changes and redactions. True Believer Christians protect those who hide child molestation because protecting the church is more important than protecting children.

True Believer Jews think that Israel has the unquestionable right to control every inch of land from the Sinai peninsula to the West Bank, and perhaps even the land currently owned by Jordan and Syria, based solely upon a literal interpretation of writings from thousands of years ago. True Believer Jews think that all Arabs and Muslims are inherently inferior, murderous and evil — and that the Palestinians do not have some legitimate grievences. True Believer Jews cannot forgive — they think that all Gentiles want to kill every Jew on earth. True Believer Jews think that only Orthodox Judaism is valid. True Believer Jews refuse to change divorce laws so women can remarry after their husbands disappear before divorcing them.

The fundamentalist wings of the world’s major religions are growing stronger, and the major threat to the world is not a war between Islam and Christianity, Islam and Judaism, or Islam and the West. The most frightening scenario is a conflict erupting between the True Believers in Islam, Judaism and Christianity that will engulf the sensible moderates and secularists on all sides. A secondary concern is that a series of mini-civil wars will begin within Christianity, Judaism and Islam over who will dominate the religions.

—

True Believers, however, are not only religious in nature — they can be political as well. President Bush is the best example. He leads by belief; he does not weigh or consider all of the available evidence and then come to a reasoned conclusion. This True Believer refuses to recognize any data and analysis that proves him wrong and then adjust policy accordingly. In his mind, he is always correct. There is no doubt.

The Bush administration also violates other Enlightenment principles by believing that the executive branch of the U.S. government is superior to the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the legislative branch and the judicial one. True Believer conservatives refuse to compromise and demean the opposition by calling the “Democratic Party” the “Democrat Party.” True Believer conservatives think they are always correct, that liberals are always wrong, and that the “Red States” are superior to the “Blue States.” (The opposite also holds true for True Believer liberals.)

True Believer liberals accept various creeds without question. They support feminism unreservedly without acknowledging that the movement has had some unintended, negative consequences (see here and here); they support socialism without realizing that the United States’ high standard of living is a direct result of capitalism; they oppose so-called sweatshops without knowing that many workers there would be living in destitute poverty without the income earned from them; they reflexively support other liberals like Hugo Chavez even as he slowly erodes civil liberties and democracy in Venezuela.

All of these people are True Believers. They see the world in black-and-white, us-versus-them terms — and not in complex shades of gray. While True Believer liberals are usually annoying and cause little damage (unless they establish Communist governments), True Believer conservatives like President Bush pose a direct threat to the world. Despite the United Nations, C.I.A. and Department of Energy’s assertions that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction, the Bush administration believed the country did. And the rest, unfortunately, is history. When a True Believer and another True Believer declare war against each other, everyone else should duck for cover.

—

The most frightening aspect of this clash is the fact that the Skeptics are at a disadvantage. Skeptics are inherently weaker than those who “know” they are correct. True Believers of all religious and political persuasions have a burning zeal that inflames and inspires their actions. Those who are open-minded and constantly debate, explore, learn and discuss have are full of doubt, which always weakens a person’s efforts. If I were fighting in a battle, I would want a True Believer on my side, not a Skeptic.

The most dangerous possibility today is that True Believers on opposite sides of the spectrum will battle each other and destroy modern civilization in the process. This is not an option. We cannot defeat Osama bin Laden with George W. Bush. Fire versus fire will burn the entire world.

Rather, the forces of the Enlightenment — those Skeptics among the Christians, Muslims, Jews, conservatives and liberals — need to organize and stop the True Believers within their midst. We need to be moderates who have the zeal of True Believers. After all, we’re fighting for ourselves.

Moderate Muslims need to eliminate the terrorist elements within their religion. Sensible Christians need to educate their fundamentalist brothers. Jews need to stop people like Avigdor Lieberman and the Kahanists. Conservatives need to remind the White House that the Republican Party used to stand for fiscal restraint and civil liberties. Mainstream liberals need to tell those on the far left that liberals used to question everything and not be beholden to any sacred cows.

Each of us has certain political, cultural and religious affiliations — but, at the end of the day, we’re all on this planet together. It’s time that we act like it.

Other Essays: The Battle of the Sexes and In Defense of Free Trade and Globalization

When Are “Racist” Jokes OK?

Don Imus. I have yet to form an opinion on the entire situation because I’m still not clear on what occurred. I know that he referred to the Rutgers women’s basketball team as “nappy-headed hos” on his radio show, but I haven’t heard the audio excerpt myself. I need to know the context, delivery, tone of voice and intention of that statement, among other issues, before I can make an intelligent statement about the Imus debacle specifically.

But I can discuss the issue in general. As this New York Times analysis points out, the subject of making jokes based on race, ethnicity and religion is complicated:

More than anything, it seems, [Imus'] downfall has pointed to a double standard — or what one might call simply a standard — at work in humor that uses racist and sexist stereotypes. If comedians or talk-show hosts are funny enough, in any of the hard-to-define ways that can be determined, they often earn a pass when offensive material is used.

The jokes, depending on the context, are viewed as either funny or offensive. (And sometimes both!) In the 1990s, political correctness reigned supreme, and jokes about these subjects were less prominent. Today, however, we have South Park, Dave Chappelle, Sarah Silverman and Carlos Mencia (see the clip above), all of whom are very successful. But Imus was fired. What gives? Well, the issue comes down to intention.

Here’s an example: I’m Jewish, and once in a while a friend of mine will joke about dropping a penny on the floor and seeing if I pick it up. Normally, that would be viewed as offensive. But I just laugh and respond with a joke about that friend’s religion (he’s Roman Catholic). No one’s ever offended.

And here’s why: My friend’s did not intend to insult my religion or ethnicity; he intended to make a joke. This is the crucial difference: it all comes down to intention. Racial jokes do not operate in a utilitarian context in which the end result determines what is ethical – the end result is the same (the jokes are made). So, therefore, all instances would be ethically wrong. Rather, the most applicable theorem is the Kantian idea that only the intention behind an action determines whether it was ethical.

Chappelle, Silverman and Mencia make provocative statements with the intention of making jokes — and sometimes even to prove a serious point. Imus’ “nappy-headed hos” comment, from what I understand, was a failed attempt at humor, and it contributed little to a serious discourse. This was the difference.