Is Robert Fisk a Psychologist?

by Kim Petersen
Dissident Voice
March 21st, 2011

Much of what journalist Robert Fisk writes strikes a congruent cord with me; however, there are patches of his writing where he brays discordantly. In his recent article, Fisk launched into an ad hominen-laced tirade against Libyan Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

Writes Fisk, “Gaddafi is a fruitcake and … he probably does occasionally chew carpets as well” and “Gaddafi is completely bonkers, flaky, a crackpot on the level of Ahmadinejad of Iran and Lieberman of Israel…” Yes, Fisk did add in Lieberman, but the implication is that Arab rulers are flakes while flakes do not become rulers in Israel.

Fisk avers that seldom do fruitcakes rule in Europe: “The Middle East seems to produce these ravers – as opposed to Europe, which in the past 100 years has only produced Berlusconi, Mussolini, Stalin and [Hitler] …”

Read the rest here.

Comment:  I read Robert Fisk's articles on the 'middle east' quite regularly and was somewhat surprised by the demonizing tone he adopted.  He is not alone of course, and he is by far not the worst offender.  

The general manner in which Gaddafi's sanity has been called into question is typical of the (post)colonial mindset that privileges the West as the reservoir of rationality or reason.

Reason exists when the Western mind confirms it.  And it seldom exists outside of the Western mind and its need to center reality around itself (whiteness).

The massacres that G. W. Bush perpetrated is not drawn from a mental illness or incapacity to reason.  His murders - which far outweigh what is happening in Libya (a sovereign country under Gaddafi) -  is a matter of wrongheaded policy or ideology.

That Obama has ostensibly added to the Shock and Awe devastation is not an indication that his mental stability or his reason is also wanting.

Racism constructs demons in the Other (or as the Other).  The frothing mad Arab with a penchant for white woman and gluttony is well defined in the histogriaphy of race (Hollywood staples).

So too is the oversexed, bestial, black man who is a rapist even when he is asleep.  The myth of the black rapist in American history has been the catalyst for many a crackdown and massacre of blacks throughout its history.  Remember Emmitt Till?  Or, the Tulsa Oklahoma Race Riots of 1921 and Dick Rowland?  (See my 2006 post Crack'ed in Pokhara for reflections on both of these young men.)

I am also not forgetting the libidinous black welfare queen with an army of kids from different fathers or the de-sexualized Aunt Jemima (Oprahfied) matron who waits patiently while white folks work their sh*t out century after century.

The terrorist gene in Islam that finds its way into conversations about Muslims and violence just about everywhere.  US Pastor Terry Jones just declared the Qur'an a violent book and guilty of killing innocent people.

The terrorist gene in the Qur'an spreads to its adherents and makes them mad and incapable of living in peace, anywhere (just see how they cover their heads and blow up sh*t in France ... all over really).

To stop the disorder of genes that cause Arabs to froth at the mouth and act irrationally it is necessary to impose order for their own good.

Stop them for they do not understand their madness and its consequences.

Where mad Arabs under Islam contributed to great civilizational feats it was a mere fluke.  A random occurrence not understood and certainly not appreciated by the mad ones.

The West is rational.  It interprets greatness.  So too it explains the feats of the mad Arabs.  So they may know what they achieved unknowlingly.

This as Edward Said wrote is the project/construction of "orientalism".  Framing Arabs, Muslims, Islam, the Other.

It is the reason why every movie where Muslim people are found walking the streets the call to prayer plays in the background.  The call to prayer signifies the Muslim orient and it allows a handle to the Western mind to carry the baggage of orientalizing the other.

Gaddafi is said to be slaughtering thousands of his people and there is no evidence.  "He is a maniac killing his own and he must be stopped before the massacres turn the desert sand red."

This morning I heard Hillary Clinton say Gaddafi is warning the alliance that this will be a long fight while at the same time looking for a place of exile.

"It is not surprising his decision making is unstable like that ... " she remarked.

And Obama's and hers is spot on consistent.  Taking out the despot in Libya and supporting the despots in Saudi Arabia (the country from which those 19 terrorists on 9/11 killed almost 3000 people in the US).

Calling the Saudis "unstable" or a beacon for anti-American terrorism is of course irrational given that ... well ... you know ... the terrorists are to be found in Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan.

There is the main arena for taking out the cancer of Islamists/Jihadis/fundamentalists, etc.

Swift thinking, rational genes.  All available for you to view over and over again on CNN and the Western media that propagate the desired rationality of theWest over the irrationality of the Other (Muslims).

Onward!