In the autumn of 1066, while the combined forces of William the Conqueror were making preparations for the invasion of England, minstrels wandered among the campfires singing the ”Song of Roland” to lift the warriors’ hearts and instill in them a fighting spirit.
The story of the valiant death of Roland was the stuff of legend. According to the tale, Roland, a March Lord of Brittany and a nephew of King Charlemagne was a renowned fighter and the epitome of a Christian knight. As the saga unfolds, he is betrayed by a jealous stepfather, ambushed and killed by Muslims at Roncevaux Pass in the Pyrenees Mountains.
Charlemagne avenges Roland’s death by attacking the city of Saragossa, destroying all the Jewish and Muslim religious items found there and forcing at sword point the conversion to Christianity of everyone in the city with the exception of Queen Bramimonde, who is eventually led to Christianity “through the agency of love.”
Despite the fame of this chanson de geste (heroic saga) as the oldest surviving major work of French literature, the storyline has contained a factual flaw for more than a thousand years. According to Charlemagne's courtier and biographer, Einhard, Roland was ambushed and killed by a force of rebellious Basques, not Muslims.
But then, as now, in Western literature, it made for a “better story” to have a Christian hero struck down by swarthy Muslims than by Europeans.
Did I say “swarthy Muslims?” Yes, I did. The Song of Roland, written during the Middle Ages, vilified Arab and African Muslims for something that European Basques had done. Similarly, initial reports by many American news organizations of the terrorist attacks in Norway pointed to Muslims as the villains. In both instances, it made for a more easily understandable tale to blame the usual suspects – visibly identifiable strangers. And in both instances, the swarthy Muslims fit the role of villain nicely.
It is too confusing to Western minds to call Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian Christian, a “terrorist,” just as it is still too confusing to the Western mind to admit that Adolph Hitler, a monster, was also a Christian. It has always been extremely difficult for Westerners to admit to arch villains who looked like themselves. So, the blond, blue-eyed Breivik is cast as a “lone madman” rather than a terrorist. Even Hitler often was called a madman, as if he were an aberration in his culture, even though a multitude of his fellow Germans were fully participatory in the genocide that was the Holocaust. The Western media does not see the acts of a Hitler or a Breivik as characteristic of Christians, yet it practically declares that Islam is synonymous with terrorism.
Immediately after reports surfaced of the killings in Norway the American press began its orgy of bigotry. The Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin wrote of the July 22 massacre in her blog: "There is a specific jihadist connection here.” The explosions occurred about 3:20 in the afternoon Oslo time, and Ms. Rubin had found her “specific jihadist connection” by 5:06 p.m. Washington time when she posted her blog that same day.
Just as it is no surprise that the Washington Post would publish Ms. Rubin’s factual errors, it is no surprise that Fox News and the Wall Street Journal were quick to wrongly lay the blame for the massacre at the feet of Muslims as well.
While James Fallows of The Atlantic magazine wrote that “The Washington Post Owes the World an Apology” for Rubin’s article, Stephen Walt wrote in the online magazine “Foreign Policy” that it was “not out of character” for the Wall Street Journal to follow suit because “its editorial page has been a reliable source of threat-mongering and distortion for years.” Even though Norwegian authorities had stated publically that they had no reason to suspect Islamist groups for the attacks, the Wall Street Journal published an editorial on the day of the killings that clearly blamed “jihadist” for the deaths. No real apologies have yet been issued by either newspaper.
The Western news media does not feel it needs to apologize for characterizing Muslims as pathological killers and blaming them as the source of all terrorism in the world because these media outlets are part of a culture that has a long history of casting “the Muslim” as the villain, even when the known facts speak otherwise.
It is too complex a phenomenon to try to fully explain in a short article such as this, but this problem is rooted so deeply in the soil of so many Western nations that it will take more than a mere scratching at its surface in order to fully address it.
Western iconography has all too often depicted the “swarthy Semite” as the arch enemy of civilization. And this includes a wide spectrum of Semitic people, including Arabs, Jews and others from the Middle East. It is no mere accident that many depictions of Satan in Western art show him with stereotypically Semitic facial features. Fear of, and animosity towards, Semitic people is encoded in the DNA of Western culture. Evidence of this is found scattered from the 4th century writings of Saint Augustine who stated: “How I wish that you would slay them (the Jews) with your two-edged sword, so that there should be none to oppose your word” to the exhortations of Pope Urban II in the 11th century calling upon Christians to “destroy that vile race (Turks and Arabs) from the lands of our friends.” Enmity in the West towards Semitic people is a fact that is much denied by our press and politicians, but it is a fact that is little doubted by those who have been the targets of that animosity.
Very few cultures define themselves by the suffering they inflict upon others. So it is not surprising that Americans are numb to the numerous and constant affronts to Muslims at home and abroad; and history will not treat kindly this practice of American journalism. But the American media does not need to wait for history to judge them. They are being judged by the global community each time they release bigoted and factually incorrect statements laced with derogation. A news reporter bearing false witness is of no use to anyone interested in the truth.
So as we Americans, and many other Westerners, sit in our homes and absorb the stories about how Muslims are the source of every horrific tragedy that befalls the peaceful West, we should be mindful of our own history of false accusations leveled at a people for more than a thousand years.
The story of the valiant death of Roland was the stuff of legend. According to the tale, Roland, a March Lord of Brittany and a nephew of King Charlemagne was a renowned fighter and the epitome of a Christian knight. As the saga unfolds, he is betrayed by a jealous stepfather, ambushed and killed by Muslims at Roncevaux Pass in the Pyrenees Mountains.
Charlemagne avenges Roland’s death by attacking the city of Saragossa, destroying all the Jewish and Muslim religious items found there and forcing at sword point the conversion to Christianity of everyone in the city with the exception of Queen Bramimonde, who is eventually led to Christianity “through the agency of love.”
Despite the fame of this chanson de geste (heroic saga) as the oldest surviving major work of French literature, the storyline has contained a factual flaw for more than a thousand years. According to Charlemagne's courtier and biographer, Einhard, Roland was ambushed and killed by a force of rebellious Basques, not Muslims.
But then, as now, in Western literature, it made for a “better story” to have a Christian hero struck down by swarthy Muslims than by Europeans.
Did I say “swarthy Muslims?” Yes, I did. The Song of Roland, written during the Middle Ages, vilified Arab and African Muslims for something that European Basques had done. Similarly, initial reports by many American news organizations of the terrorist attacks in Norway pointed to Muslims as the villains. In both instances, it made for a more easily understandable tale to blame the usual suspects – visibly identifiable strangers. And in both instances, the swarthy Muslims fit the role of villain nicely.
It is too confusing to Western minds to call Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian Christian, a “terrorist,” just as it is still too confusing to the Western mind to admit that Adolph Hitler, a monster, was also a Christian. It has always been extremely difficult for Westerners to admit to arch villains who looked like themselves. So, the blond, blue-eyed Breivik is cast as a “lone madman” rather than a terrorist. Even Hitler often was called a madman, as if he were an aberration in his culture, even though a multitude of his fellow Germans were fully participatory in the genocide that was the Holocaust. The Western media does not see the acts of a Hitler or a Breivik as characteristic of Christians, yet it practically declares that Islam is synonymous with terrorism.
Immediately after reports surfaced of the killings in Norway the American press began its orgy of bigotry. The Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin wrote of the July 22 massacre in her blog: "There is a specific jihadist connection here.” The explosions occurred about 3:20 in the afternoon Oslo time, and Ms. Rubin had found her “specific jihadist connection” by 5:06 p.m. Washington time when she posted her blog that same day.
Just as it is no surprise that the Washington Post would publish Ms. Rubin’s factual errors, it is no surprise that Fox News and the Wall Street Journal were quick to wrongly lay the blame for the massacre at the feet of Muslims as well.
While James Fallows of The Atlantic magazine wrote that “The Washington Post Owes the World an Apology” for Rubin’s article, Stephen Walt wrote in the online magazine “Foreign Policy” that it was “not out of character” for the Wall Street Journal to follow suit because “its editorial page has been a reliable source of threat-mongering and distortion for years.” Even though Norwegian authorities had stated publically that they had no reason to suspect Islamist groups for the attacks, the Wall Street Journal published an editorial on the day of the killings that clearly blamed “jihadist” for the deaths. No real apologies have yet been issued by either newspaper.
The Western news media does not feel it needs to apologize for characterizing Muslims as pathological killers and blaming them as the source of all terrorism in the world because these media outlets are part of a culture that has a long history of casting “the Muslim” as the villain, even when the known facts speak otherwise.
It is too complex a phenomenon to try to fully explain in a short article such as this, but this problem is rooted so deeply in the soil of so many Western nations that it will take more than a mere scratching at its surface in order to fully address it.
Western iconography has all too often depicted the “swarthy Semite” as the arch enemy of civilization. And this includes a wide spectrum of Semitic people, including Arabs, Jews and others from the Middle East. It is no mere accident that many depictions of Satan in Western art show him with stereotypically Semitic facial features. Fear of, and animosity towards, Semitic people is encoded in the DNA of Western culture. Evidence of this is found scattered from the 4th century writings of Saint Augustine who stated: “How I wish that you would slay them (the Jews) with your two-edged sword, so that there should be none to oppose your word” to the exhortations of Pope Urban II in the 11th century calling upon Christians to “destroy that vile race (Turks and Arabs) from the lands of our friends.” Enmity in the West towards Semitic people is a fact that is much denied by our press and politicians, but it is a fact that is little doubted by those who have been the targets of that animosity.
Very few cultures define themselves by the suffering they inflict upon others. So it is not surprising that Americans are numb to the numerous and constant affronts to Muslims at home and abroad; and history will not treat kindly this practice of American journalism. But the American media does not need to wait for history to judge them. They are being judged by the global community each time they release bigoted and factually incorrect statements laced with derogation. A news reporter bearing false witness is of no use to anyone interested in the truth.
So as we Americans, and many other Westerners, sit in our homes and absorb the stories about how Muslims are the source of every horrific tragedy that befalls the peaceful West, we should be mindful of our own history of false accusations leveled at a people for more than a thousand years.
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