Political Correctness and the war on Terror

Submitted by Rick Moran (United States), Sep 8, 2004 at 10:02

Dr. Pipes has once again hit the nail on the head. Intimidation by terrorists is nothing new; it is, of course, how they operate. It's the self-imposed obfuscation of WHO the terrorists are that make the attitude of the world press so inexplicable and, to my mind, indefensible.

Calling the terrorists "Muslim extremists" or, more accurately, "Islamic facists" has been verboten since 9/11. The reason is political correctness. To avoid the outrage of both American Muslims (who have been mostly silent about atrocities commited in the name of Allah) and the worldwide militant Islamic community who openly sympathize with the goals of Osama Bin Laden, the press-in their never ending quest to be "fair"-have abandoned any semblance of rationality about who is committing these barbarous acts and have opted for a non-controversial (in their mind) approach.

This is eerily reminiscent of coverage by the London Times from 1933 when Hitler first took power until the fall of Czechoslovakia in 1938. The famous Times correspondent Norman Ebbutt would write dispatches from Berlin detailing the monstrous policies of Hitler and his henchmen. But his editors back in London would ignore, censure, or even change those dispatches to reflect the appeasement policy of the Chamberlain government. (Ebbutt finally left Berlin in disgust in 1937.)

In their quest for political correctness, is our press enabling the terrorists and blinding the American people to the dangers of global islamic facism? I believe Dr. Pipes has answered that question.

---

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".