161–170 of 228 posts
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Here is Hitchens on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart - http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-june-8-2010/christophe... - just delightful.
The interview starts "How's it going? / It's too early to tell.", which is superficially referring to how late of a partier he was, but deeply referring to how (that afternoon) he'd checked himself out of the hospital that diagnosed him with esophageal cancer.
There was a Munk Debate last year where Hitchens debated Tony Blair on whether religion was a force for good in the world. I highly recommend it: http://www.munkdebates.com/debates/Religion Everyone knew Hitchens didn't have much time left, so it was great to see him doing what he does best against someone as high-profile as Blair.
He was an amazing person. He could write and speak with such force, yet such complexity and refinement at the same time. I deeply admired him even when I disagreed with him completely.
Farewell, Hitch.
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This video is appallingly deceitful. E.g. where he argues that the USSR was not only not socialism, but in fact as far from it as possible. He deftly redefines the core idea of socialism to make it look superficially plausible. If socialism was ever about one bug thing, it was the collective ownership of the means of production . This was the slogan of all socialist movements, particularly Marxist socialist movements…
> And the USSR was exactly that kind of society No, it was not. Your username is Slavic, so perhaps you grew up in the Eastern Bloc; I certainly did. Those were not socialist countries. Private enterprise was definitely banned, but the goods were not collectively owned either. The entire country was owned by a small clique with a rigid pyramidal structure. Dictatorship is a much better word.
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If you read Revelation and take only one layer of meaning from it, you didn't really read Revelation. I find myself writing the ridiculous sentence that Hitchens perhaps took a religious prose poem/vision/prophecy/allegory/history too literally. I understand that he had an axe to grind. But he hasn't done justice to the thing he argued against.
I think Hitchens is arguing against what people actually believe. Christians believe in heaven based (among other things) on Revelation.
I take Hitchens as trying to find a common ground for argument by appealing directly to the text. So it is on point if his interpretation of the text does not do it justice, especially if the Christians interpret it differently in a way that is more internally consistent.
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I'm not splitting hairs about my main point, which is that Leys doesn't actually respond to Hitchens's main criticism. But let me respond about "obscenity": You call Mother Theresa "respectiable". Hitchens's whole book advances the argument that she is nothing but, and is in fact contemptible. His argument is not germane to your point, so I won't delve into it. Hitchens, in a video (you can find it on youtube, can't…
I don't mind expressing disrespect for religions, I am an agnostic myself, I even think this title was a good catch. But you don't seem to address my point, which is that Hitchens denies the implications and sexual connotation of calling his book "The Missionary Position", which is bad faith. He could have skip the point, or just said he was sorry Simon Leys didn't like it, but saying it is nowhere obscene is plain i…
EDIT The meaning of the word "obscenity" is quite clear, just saying something is obscene does not make it so. If you are asserting there was obscene content you should support your assertion and say what the obscenity was.
Hitchens was essentially a Marxist (by his own admission) who was also in favor of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the foreign policy it represented. So there was very little I agreed with him on. But I'm terribly upset about this and I'll tell you why. Because of his willingness to debate. I'd literally scan right wing talk radio schedules for his name because you just knew it would be a great show. In a world where s…
Anyone who knew Hitchens knows that "heaven" as depicted by cristianity is a "celestial North Korea, where the sole purpose is to praise the dear leader incessantly, compelled to love someone you fear (essence of sadomasochism). You'd think the Lord himself would get bored of this after a couple of billion years"... So, wishing him in heaven from another atheist as you say you are is really saying you don't know much…
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I believe Hitchens point on this is taken directly from the bible. There is no biblical basis for your description of heaven. If you read Revelations, though, heaven is described exactly the way Hitchens described it. To put it another way, I think when Hitchens calls it "the christian conception" of heaven, it wasn't a description of what certain christians believe, but of the biblical description.
If you read Revelation and take only one layer of meaning from it, you didn't really read Revelation. I find myself writing the ridiculous sentence that Hitchens perhaps took a religious prose poem/vision/prophecy/allegory/history too literally. I understand that he had an axe to grind. But he hasn't done justice to the thing he argued against.
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Noam Chomsky quite well articulates what so greatly annoys me in the use of term "marxist". http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4Tq4VE8eHQ It has hardly any relation to the original context or meaning of the writings of one Karl Marx.
raises hand I've read the writings of Karl Marx. This guy advocated a "dictatorship of the proletariat", wherein the proletarian party seizes all capital and crushes, with force, any capitalist influence, any attempt for capitalism to re-establish itself. This alleged workers' government maintains control until the world is ready for communism, which might take quite a while. Meanwhile, there is "communal" ownership-…
Marx acknowledged that Capitalism works extremely well for wealth creation, and it was the consequences of this that he tried to address. If you view the inevitable phenomenon as a really bad thing for society, then of course force seems reasonable.
I think it's fair to argue that the crushing weight of the social hierarchy often feels extremely violent to those at the bottom.
In order to ignore this, we Capitalists must either convince ourselves that each is harmoniously filling his role, or that each generation (at the bottom) is better off, or that life isn't fair, etc. By being unwilling to ignore this or adopt one of the easy explanations, Marx doesn't introduce force/violence into the political process, he just stops pretending it's not there.
So generally the Marxist view in the modern world (where social upheaval is quite unlikely) means that we are willing to consider toppling established institutions. It is for this reason that I credit the tea party (in its opposition to the Fed, etc.) as a Marxist group. Would shutting down the Fed be an act of violence (even if enacted by congress)? Arguably yes, since it would harshly and abruptly change the distribution of wealth. Abstractly changing the distribution of wealth via policy is in a sense identical to sending an armed thug to everyone's door who either demands money or offers money. You see where this is going, but my point is that I think it's possible (and advisable) to focus most of our attention on soft violence, not stuff like Lenin did, since that is the prevailing legacy of Marx in modern life, unfettered by the complications of past wars, dictators, etc.
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Anyone who knew Hitchens knows that "heaven" as depicted by cristianity is a "celestial North Korea, where the sole purpose is to praise the dear leader incessantly, compelled to love someone you fear (essence of sadomasochism). You'd think the Lord himself would get bored of this after a couple of billion years"... So, wishing him in heaven from another atheist as you say you are is really saying you don't know much…
Hitchens never seemed to understand that "North Korea" isn't the Christian conception of heaven. To wish for him to be surrounded for all eternity by those he loves most, in the presence of the source of all love, truth and beauty... I think that's something we'd all like to experience along with him. Edit: Unclear phrasing
But if you don't unquestioningly share the christian or biblical values, and dont find til biblical god's special kind of love particularly appealing, then an eternity trapped in this might not seem so blissful.
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I think Stephen Fry put it best during a tour of Salt Lake City that was conducted by a Mormon evangelist: ---- She gave us a good tour and we saw this tabernacle here and this here and so on and then at one point she said, "I just want to tell you a little about the church of the Latter Day Saints." And we all politely stood and then she said how in the afterlife all families will be reunited. "You’ll be with your f…
As a former Mormon missionary, I can assure you he was not the first person to think of that particular comeback.