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Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the most famous Muslim-turned-atheist, is doing the rounds to promote her new book Nomad. Initially, she had planned to write a philosophical discourse which she had decided to title Shortcuts to Enlightenment. But she abandoned this project to continue with her roster of memoirs and autobiographies, and wrote the memoir Nomad instead. I've written before that this approach is probably more financially lucrative, and anything she says will be attributed to her opinions or her "personal story" and therefore cannot be refuted by scholars or historians. Welcome, therefore, to the Ayaan Hirsi Ali franchise, replete with adultery, and family and political betrayals - she did abandoned Holland in the midst of the country's grips with the murder of its citizen Theo Van Gogh. What happens to an ex-Muslim atheist who's out of the limelight? Well, she gets forgotten and ignored. And since Ali has never been one to stay out of the limelight, she seems always to have a dramatic comeback.
What is interesting about this new book, whose pages are filled with steamy family portraits and provocative chapters like "School and Sexuality," is its subtitle: From Islam to America: A Personal Journey Through the Clash of Civilizations. As usual with Ali, everything is about her. Wafa Sultan, another former Muslim, and much less egotistical, is the one who alluded to the phrase "clash of civilizations." But Sultan, in her wisdom and understanding, claims that there is no clash of civilization, but a clash between the backward Islam and the civilized Christian West. Here is her elaborate explanation:
The clash we are witnessing around the world is not a clash of religions or a clash of civilizations...It is a clash between two opposites, between two eras. It is a clash between a mentality that belongs to the Middle Ages and another mentality that belongs to the 21st century. It is a clash between civilization and backwardness, between the civilized and the primitive, between barbarity and rationality.Ali, in her supreme self-centeredness, cannot see through this description. After all, in her eyes, the clash is not between these two opposites, as Sultan explains, but between her (Ali) and the rest of the world. In fact, she has now decided that she, in her lofty conclusions, will clash with the very element that has made the West a formidable foe to Islam; she will fight Christianity.
That was what came across in her interview (or promotional stop) at the Colbert Report. Here is the video of the interaction. At one point, Colbert, the liberal, refuses to accept Ali demonizing Islam. But, perhaps he is less of a liberal than he makes out (TV shows are notoriously left-leaning, and he has to "play the game" to keep the ratings up). What Colbert does, unprecedented in other shows and interviews I've watched, is to invite Ali to Christianity, after having made her admit that she's an atheist. Partly, I think it is his way of telling her to put her money where her mouth is, since she is telling Christians to proselytize to Muslims, and get them to convert to the "better religion" Christianity.
At this point, Ali goes all out in mocking Christianity, which she has no intention whatsoever of joining. She makes fun of the Eucharist, brushes aside the notion of hell in Christian theology, and denounces Jesus Christ, saying she prefers the Enlightenment philosophers to him. Colbert did keep pushing her (in the guise of talk-show humor) until she reached this vocal and hostile condemnation.
Another revealing moment in the show was when Colbert asked her if she is now a Westerner. Her answer was, "I'm becoming one." After close to two decades in the West, including holding important political positions in a Western democracy (the Netherlands), what is there to work out? A forthright, "Yes I am a Westerner" would have been a welcome answer.
What makes Ali undermine Christianity so confidently ? Well, on the front cover of her new book, there is an endorsement by none other than the high priest of atheism, Richard Dawkins himself, who wrote, "This woman is a major hero of our times." And riding on the boldness that other atheists like Christopher Hitchens display, Ali has no qualms about publicly disclosing her religious (non) affiliations.
I wonder how Ali will be received in America? I get the feeling she will just circulate around the neo-cons and right liberal elites, writing her articles and possibly throwing out a book or two for the liberal vultures who love seedy stories about Third World "victims." I suspect she will get quite wealthy in the process. America, though, is not the "progressive" Europe. Religion in America hasn't been abandoned, and Christianity still informs the lives of the majority of Americans.
Ali also has her AHA foundation to promote and upkeep. Perhaps that's why she was hesitant to proclaim her uncontested Western affiliation; her foundation's primary concern is the defense of Muslim women abused by the Islamic culture and religion.
Finally, this is neither here nor there (perhaps - although I do hold a strong attachment to physical appearances), but Ali looks like she's lost quite a bit of weight. Her sordid personal life; living in a country that is not as liberal or religious-free as Europe; and resorting to the lowest denominator to promote her thoughts (writing a memoir rather than the philosophical discourse she had originally planned), must be taking their toll.