3aksser, being a good person, and the ideal Lebanese State

Note: this is the second blogpost in a series of 3 about approaches to practical life and inspired by what I'm seeing and hearing around me in Lebanon. Here's a link to the first one; it deals with the question of the "daww 3ale" (high beams) at night. I'm not sure exactly in what way, but I've benefited a lot from conversations with Michel about driving in Lebanon when it comes to these posts, so I'd like to thank him :)

If you've driven in Lebanon, you've probably had the experience of turning into a one-way street only to see another person coming towards you the wrong way - I'll call driving the wrong way 3aksesser from now on.

There are several attitudes I've seen adopted in this case, and I've been trying to figure out which one I should adopt if I want to be a good person:
- an understanding attitude: if everyone takes the mafra2 (the street you're going into) 3aksesser, and you're feeling magnanimous, you just back off or move your car to the right and let the person pass
- a principled attitude of attachment to the law: because the other person is breaking the law, you'll force them to back off until they can pass and throw in some mean looks while you're at it to show them how ashamed they should be of breaking the law
- an always right, always angry attitude: some people don't think of the question of who's right in a road disagreeement as one that depends on the facts. They only look at one variable: their position in the issue. If a "principled" person refuses to let them pass when they're driving 3aksesser, they'll be outraged. If someone who's driving aksesser comes their way, they'll be outraged. These people will get angry and force the other person to go back, maybe even getting out of their car and getting threatening if they sense resistance on the other person's part

For me, the angry attitude doesn't really qualify for what a good person is or should be - because, in the end, morality relies on our ability to be someone other than ourselves and see that someone sees - so the competition is between the understanding attitude and the principled one.

People who hold the principled attitude will tell you that if there was a proper, functioning Lebanese government, people would be punished for going against the traffic. While that's not happening, it's on us as citizens who care about the law to model lawful behavior and frown upon unlawful behavior. If we act like unlawful behavior is okay then we're part of what's making it okay.

I used to find these points compelling. However, there's something that makes me very uneasy with this sacralization of the ideal State that these points rely on. I don't like the idea that the only way for things to be right in this country is for the State to be in control of every inch of territory and for all laws to be perfectly enforced. Very often, what I see in the description of this ideal state we will have reached "lamma yezbat el balad" (when the country finally becomes functional, works out) is the imposition of an idealized European framework - even though even Europe doesn't function this way. Very often, that idealized State becomes an excuse to dismiss what we have before our eyes and blame whoever seems to be preventing that State from happening or who's acting like it's not there. We blame them instead of thinking about why exactly the problem at hand is a problem and what we can do to fix it. On that note, I suspect that it's once we let go of that framework of the sacred idealized State as the ultimate solution for all problems that we can start to work a solution out when it comes to Hezbollah's weapons and their current monopoly over decisions of war and peace.

Sorry I got a bit sidetracked. To come back to our topic, I think it might be useful to stop seeing 3aksesser as a backwards phenomenon that will be eradicated once our ideal perfect Lebanese State is in place. It's no wonder mentions of such a State (e.g., "kif beddo yezbat el balad" = how is the country gonna work out) often go hand in hand with terms like "bajam" and "tatar" that conjure up racist images of an undisciplined, barbarian people. We need to stop fitting every difference between our situation and the idealized State on the backwards/advanced axis - things are richer and more interesting than that.

After much thought, I decided that we should start seeing 3aksesser for what it is: something that can be helpful and save us a lot of time in many cases; but I still think it should be looked down upon when it's exaggerated or when it's (too) dangerous. I think I'm a better person when I let it be and maybe even engage in it when it makes sense. Compared to the crusade against 3aksesser in all its forms, the battle against unreasonable 3aksesser is one that is more just and that is more likely to be won.

Thoughts on "something needs to be done about Syria"

I have written a couple of posts against common arguments that are used in opposition to U.S. intervention in Syria. While that eventually seems to have been taken off the table thanks to Russia's savviness, I think that moment is still rich and very interesting. There is no doubted it shaped the current media and social media configuration around the Syria issue.

In this post, I want to focus on a  trend I see implicit in a lot of commentary/exhortation on Syria. I take a U.S.-centric perspective here because it makes the "we" I use (see below) more direct.

There as a trending argument that seems to go as follows: "The situation in Syria is so bad that we have a moral duty to do something." Variations are {horrible picture / video} and then "and the West doesn't do anything."

This argument is actually a disguise for two possible (incompatible) arguments:
(1) it is morally impermissible to stand idle when others are suffering this much. In other words, the existence of this intensity of suffering itself, on its own, means we need to do something. Not doing something is immoral because it entails a failure to fulfill a duty. That duty is precisely the duty to do something.

(2) if we don't do something it's going to continue and there are ways to make it stop. The war (at its current scale) stopping is a good thing, it's a better alternative than the war going on. That indicates there is a way to make things better. Not doing anything would mean not executing that particular alternative that could make the situation better, and failing to make things better when you can is bad.

The first kind of reasoning is not only very dangerous, it is also deeply flawed for the same reason: it can be used to justify any action in any circumstances. Instead of being a careful approach that tries to weigh options, it bases itself on the very dubious claim that any "something" is better than "nothing." We should be careful about that argument, and never forget the when you can. We need to know when we can and we need to know why we can and do it.

When things are bad, we have a moral duty to think about how we should relate to it and THEN act if there is something to be done. It's NOT about doing any action because, whatever it is, it's presumably better than no action.

Note: it's interesting that, despite their fundamental difference, both arguments rely on the fact that even if there is a moral distinction between action and omission, omission cannot be devoid of moral consequences or weight. 

The question of the daww 3ale

Note: this is the first blogpost in a series of 3 about approaches to practical life, thought of from the perspective I get from what I'm seeing around me. The reading that's inspired this is Raymond Gueuss' 'Outside Ethics.'

It can be surprising to realize that the question that ethics tries to answer is "what should I do?"

Ethics in common understanding or even for some ethicists seems more limited than that, it seems to be concerned with difficult choices, like whether or not it can be the right thing to break the law when it can create some good result.

Most of the time, we are faced with some decisions that are not as difficult as that last one, like what to have for lunch. Here I'm trying to investigate the area in between the decisions and situations we think of when we say ethics and those we don't think of, things we can call "almost-moral-dilemmas."

One of the almost-moral-dilemmas I face on the road in Lebanon is the daww 3ale. That's the high beams. Very often when you're driving at night on a mountain road, the lights on the side of the road are not on. People use their high beams so they can actually see something, except (sometimes) if there's someone in front of them or someone coming the other way. I'm going to describe the second case. This post is mainly about my own perception of it but it seems like everyone in Lebanon who drives on mountain roads at night deals with the question.

When you're driving with your high beams on and someone comes the other way, the "polite" behaviour is to turn your high beams off and stay with the normal light setting until the other car passes you by. The same behavior is expected of them.

Unfortunately, very often, the other person has the daww 3ale for a few seconds before they turn them off, and sometimes they just leave them on. That introduces some uncertainty about their moral character and problems for you as a driverf.

I was polite for a while but then I started getting frustrated by people who just left it on. I felt like an idiot. So I started flashing the lights when I came opposite someone who leaves the high beams on, sometimes doing it to people who didn't deserve it. Then some days I started leaving them on anyway when I was in a bad mood and I didn't feel like making the effort.

I haven't found a consistent approach to deal with it that makes sense. It seems like, as a driver, you're either an idiot who is nice to everyone - even assholes -, or the moral police who calls bad people out in a pretty blindly self-righteous way, or the asshole themselves. I choose from each depending on how I feel but I still think about this question afterward.

The next post is going to be about a more moral almost-moral-dilemma, which 3aksesser (driving against the traffic) and how it's inaccurate and limiting to think about it in terms of civilized vs. backwards (a language used not by foreigners this time but by Lebanese people from different social and economic classes).

"Anti-war" argument #4: Public opinion is against a strike

Note: for a list of arguments and responses (one per post) and more background on why I'm doing this, see this index page.

Note 2: I'll focus this on the U.S. but analogous arguments and counterarguments can be made for the U.K. or other countries.

There is no denying that public opinion in the West and in particular in the U.S. is not in favor of a strike on the Syrian regime, with approval rates in the U.S. ranging between 25% and 29%. Non-Baathist opponents of U.S. military intervention in Syria, a.k.a the "anti-war" crowd, have made the argument implicitly and explicitly that a strike would be anti-democratic and therefore immoral.

For instance, The Telegraph's Peter Foster reports on "one anti-intervention congressman (Justin Amash of Michigan) tweeting that calls to his office were 200 against action, and only four in favour [sic sic ew British English]."

One one hand, this is a good point for a Congressman to make, since his job is to listen to his constituents and vote on their behalf. On the other hand, I think that, in certain cases, and I'll argue that this is one of them, national or humanitarian interests and values can and should trump popular opinion. I am trying to make a more limited argument than it looks: I am saying that the decision of whether or not to strike Syria is the type of decision that needs to be more insulated from popular opinion. I'll justify my claim by taking you back to the Iraq war.

If you're opposed to the war in Syria, you are probably also of the opinion - which I share - that the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 was a tragedy; it was a terrible moral and strategic mistake. I found this really cool Wikipedia page on "Popular opinion in the United States on the invasion of Iraq," it seems well cited and it gives us the following regarding U.S. public opinion:

• Opposition to military action against Iraq was 27% a month before the invasion (02/03).
• Popular support for going to Iraq without going through the UN Security Council was at 47% days before the invasion (03/03).
• It was 62% after the beginning of the war (03/03).
• It was 79% two months into the war (05/03).

The point I'm making is that the moral case for or against a war should be separated from what is unfortunately a deeply uninformed and ignorant public when it comes to anything beyond U.S. borders (for instance, according to this CBS poll, in April 2003, 53% of Americans thought that "Saddam was personally involved in the September 11th attacks."). I think the Iraq war was unjust, criminal, stupid, and wrong regardless of what the U.S. public thought and I demand intellectual honesty on Syria from those who share my opinion on Iraq.

The U.S. public is against a strike on Syria because of fatigue and because of realizing how blind it was when it came to Iraq. Their response to any other kind of intervention would be the same even if the moral or strategic case for that intervention was clearer and more compelling than the case Syria presents. It follows that U.S. public opinion is important in an amoral type of political analysis but it does not really contribute to any compelling moral argument against or in favor of the war.

Another thought I'll share quickly because this post is already long is that austerity measures are never popular, yet we go against popular opinion and implement them in certain cases of recession because economists know that it's the right policy option and there's no way around it - econ is not my area of expertise but it looks to me like Grece is one of these cases. here's a danger in delegating every decision to experts and their false neutrality, but there's an equal danger in putting the ideal of (direct) democracy above everything else, especially given that the public tends to be too reactionary and short-sighted. I'm more ambivalent about following this line of thought because of the problems it poses when you fall on either side, but it's something everyone who cares about democracy and politics should think about seriously.

"Anti-war" argument #3: Violence breeds violence

Note: for a list of arguments and responses (one per post) and more background on why I'm doing this, see this index page.

Maybe I take my Facebook feed too seriously, but I've been seeing "the Syrians don't need more violence," "more bombs will not help," "violence is not the answer," etc too much to ignore it anymore. This argument is beautiful if you're running for miss Universe - or #missHabalon - but you need more to be convincing.

The only case in which this argument can be consistent with the rest of your beliefs is if you're what I call an absolute pacifist - meaning you think avoiding committing violence is good regardless of the situation - OR if you're what I will call an optimistic pacifist, meaning you think that avoiding violence will always lead to a better situation. Otherwise, you believe that violence is desirable/effective/useful in certain conditions and, in order to be consistent, you need to specify what these conditions are and show that they are not met in Syria today.

I will ignore absolute pacifists because I am assuming that my reader cares about what happens to people in the world and not only about whether or not one is resorting to violence. Therefore, instead of engaging in more abstractions, I'm going to contradict optimistic pacifism by providing a few historical examples where it seems like violence was used to being about a better situation in the world or was good more generally:

• The Allies fighting Nazi Germany in WW2: This example is so overused I don't feel like going into it.
• Operation deliberate force: In August-September 1995, in response to the refusal of Army of the Republika Srpska (VRS) to put an end to massacres of Bosnian Muslims, NATO forces conducted an air campaign that saved a lot of lives. Most writings I have seen on the Bosnian side assert that inaction by the UN and NATO earlier in the conflict allowed for terrible things like the Srebrenica genocide.
• Maybe this is more controversial, but there's no doubt in my mind that some - not all - of the violence we see and have seen conducted against perpetrators of oppression by its victims is justified - either because there is something about it that makes it justified in itself or because it can lead to a weakening of oppression. I won't choose a particular case here but there are plenty, from colonialism to apartheid.
• This cool video of an Australian kid standing up to his bully.

Non-violence can work in certain contexts, but its success in this context can't be used to justify inaction or decry violence on the part of people who, like in Syria, don't have access to the luxury of non-violence being effective anymore.

A final point: to those who are against violence because it allegedly prevents a diplomatic solution, this post by Elias Muhanna is the most realistic proposal for a diplomatic solution by people close to the regime, and it is utterly unrealistic. How can a a regime that just massacred - by the most credible estimates so far - 1400+ of its own people be trusted to hold free and fair presidential elections within a year, give a prime minister real powers, etc??

I'm serious, if you have good evidence for the possibility negotiated settlement at this point or reasons to blame the opposition for its impossibility, please send them my way.

Remark: there are good articles pointing out that Syria is not Bosnia or Kosovo and that the case for intervention is more difficult to make in Syria; I don't dispute that. I'm just hoping for people to go into the specifics instead of using this unrealistic, lazy call for avoiding violence.

"Anti-war" argument #2: America's enemies are killing each other, let them be

Note: for a list of arguments and responses (one per post) and more background on why I'm doing this, see this index page.
Note 2: I'd like to focus this series of posts on liberal arguments against intervention, but this argument in particular is very prevalent so I decided to treat it although it's more in the realist tradition.
Note 3: I'd like to thank Ayman Mhanna for the Daniel Pipes reference.

According to popular opinion (and The Economist, sadly) the Syrian civil war pits Iran-backed Hezbollah and the Syrian regime on one side and Syrian rebels who are supposedly mostly al-Qa’ida or al-Qa’ida backed jihadists - response to this last notion coming soon - on the other.

According to that view, Syria is a black whole evil people and evil money are getting sucked into and consumed in. The argument I'm looking at here is that if that's the case, from a U.S. perspective, there's no point in doing anything to make this war shorter - let the bad guys kill each other. For example, Daniel Pipes writes: "Also, as Sunni Islamists fight Shiite Islamists, both sides are weakened and their lethal rivalry lessens their capabilities to trouble the outside world."

This point is reminiscent of an Arabic saying: "بطيخ يكسر بعضه;" "let the watermelons break each other." (thanks Yamli!). Although there are a gazillion moral and factual problems with this argument, I am going to put them aside and attack it from within its own framework and assumptions.

The problem with this argument is the same one with the realist argument in favor of drone strikes (i.e., more drone strikes = more terrorists killed = less terrorists overall = more national security): it's incredibly myopic when it comes to the dynamics of terrorism. As the great Farea al-Muslimi explains in his testimony to Congress, AQAP actually uses drone strikes as a tool to recruit militants!

The violence in Syria today is coupled with - at least before August 21st - a failure of the U.S. and its allies to react to the violence and support the opposition properly. This has contributed greatly to the material and psychological conditions for jihadi factions to be able to fight in Syria and recruit there and elsewhere. Eventually, if left to its own devices, the war in Syria - like the drone strikes if they continue - will end up creating more jihadists and threaten U.S. national security more in the long run.

"Anti-war" argument #1: Evil people want the U.S. to intervene

Note: for a list of arguments and responses (one per post) and more background on why I'm doing this, see this index page.

In a widely shared article (at least as far as my Facebook news feed is concerned), the legendary Robert Fisk remarks that Obama is "fighting on al-Qa’ida’s side." The rest of the article is not really worth commenting on; clearly the point is to use a catchy shocking headline that will lead to lots of sharing. In any case, I'll focus on the argument.

Stripped down to its bare bones, the argument is:

1. al-Qa’ida is against the Syrian regime

2. The U.S. is against the Syrian regime {and about to confront it even more directly than it had before}

3. Therefore the U.S. is on al-Qa’ida's side

4. al-Qa’ida are the bad guys so the U.S. is on the bad guys' side

Alternatively, 4'. al-Qa’ida is an enemy of the U.S. so the U.S. is contradicting itself / being hypocritical

I'll focus on 3 and 4. The problem here is that this approach takes an overly manichean view of the world. It reminds me of 2006, when, during Israel's war on Hezbollah, anyone who called Hassan Nasrallah out for making a decision to go to war without asking the Lebanese state - or anyone for that matter - for their opinion was told: "so you're with Israel?"

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend" doesn't work past 4th grade. Especially not in the Arab world, otherwise we would all be friends - or maybe enemies.

One last point: to be a little bit more philosophical about it, a bad person or a person who does not have your best interest at heart wanting you to do something doesn't mean you shouldn't do that thing. It might mean you should be more careful but that can't be the only element entering your calculus.

PS: @MaxBlumenthal makes a similar but implicit point with Israel and AIPAC instead of al-Qa’ida here. He tries to constitute two camps: the pro-war camps with evil people like AIPAC, and the good people in the anti-war camp. I think the same counterarguments apply. Blumenthal also makes other better points that I don't have the time or space to address here.

Responses to "anti-war" arguments

Full disclosure / Note: At the point where I am writing this, I support a U.S. attack on the Syrian regime. This and this (by Frederic Hof and @michaeldweiss respectively) are probably the closest articulations of my position so far. To give you some context, more generally, politically, I'd say I tend to be more or less to the left of the spectrum (real left not U.S. left).

I decided to write responses and thoughts on common, bad, or good arguments I read or hear against U.S. intervention in Syria. Maybe I'll change my mind, convince others, or learn something in the process.

Here are the arguments and responses I have collected so far:

• "Anti-war" argument #1: Evil people want the U.S. to intervene
• "Anti-war" argument #2: America's enemies are killing each other, let them be
• "Anti-war" argument #3: Violence breeds violence
• "Anti-war" argument #4: Public opinion is against a strike

Hope this proves useful/interesting!

Majdi w Wajdi: poor representation, not so poor results

Remark: I’d like to thank Ilana for helping me think through this post even though she might not completely agree with it.

Following a (way overdue) statement by the Lebanese Psychiatric Association that homosexuality is not a disease, a recent article in the Economist highlighted the increased intolerance towards homosexuals in Lebanon. Of course, there is still a long way to go; people’s attitudes in general are still far from acceptance and we continue to witness revolting practices like the Internal Security Forces subjecting individuals to anal examinations.

One interesting angle from which we can try to tackle Lebanese people’s attitudes towards homosexuality is media representations of LGBTs, the most prominent of which is probably Majdi w Wajdi.

Majdi and Wajdi are two gay men (played respectively by Abbas Chahine and Adel Karam) who are recurring characters on the Lebanese comedy show Ma Fi Metlo (previously La Youmal). To paint a more concrete picture, this is one of the first episodes where they appear, and this is a more recent one – unfortunately there are no subtitles for people who don’t speak Arabic, but you’ll get the idea. The idea is that Majdi w Wajdi are highly stereotyped: they are very effeminate, they have an insane obsession with sex and anything that has a phallic form (batteries, carrots, etc.), they have unstable relationships full of drama, etc etc.

The first thing I’ll say about Majdi w Wajdi is that the fact that they were on air on a show as popular as the show they are on is an indicator that people’s attitudes have changed. This would be unthinkable in most other Arab countries and even in Lebanon one or two decades ago. The other thing I’ll say is that, in my mind, there is no doubt that these two characters have – probably unintentionally – done a lot to increase people’s tolerance of homosexuality.

Ma Fi Metlo, La Youmal before it, and the legendary SL Chi are incredibly popular shows that draw their strength in great part from their ability to represent Lebanese society – in all its diversity, fragmentation, and ridiculousness – to itself. Each one of their characters reminds me of someone I have met in real life, and I think every Lebanese person feels the same way. A few examples that come to mind are Mr Loughat, who keeps trying to impress his interlocutor by speaking in (the worst) French and English, El Rafi2 Doumit, the boisterous, reckless Christian Lebanese Forces supporter, and Jean-Luc, the Americanized, hippie youth who starts every sentence with “mèèèn.”

The presence of Majdi w Wajdi on this show, despite how inaccurate a depiction it is, is a – again probably unintended – message that homosexuals are part of our society – they exist as much as the Doumits and Jean-Lucs of the world. The fact that a lot of other characters on the show (their friend Titi in the clip from the first link I included, the gym coach in my favorite Majdi w Wajdi episode) interact with them normally while acknowledging their homosexuality is also great. In considering Majdi w Wajdi, I would say it’s important for people who care about Lebanon’s homosexual community to step back from an immediate reaction of taking offense at how stereotypical they are and consider other, more positive, changes occurring.

That said, we should also realize that (like this paper on media representations of gays in the Philippines notes) a very skewed representation of gays like Majdi w Wajdi develops prejudiced attitudes and a simplistic, unfair conception of what being gay means. However, in making representations of homosexuals in the media okay, it opens the door for more accurate and complex depictions. For instance, Nadine Labaki has represented more human homosexual characters in two Nancy Ajram video clips (mentioned here by the gay Lebanese Blog “Hi mom. It’s me Beirut Boy.”) and her movie Caramel. I hope we can see more of these depictions in the future, as they can help increase acceptance of LGBTs in Lebanon and the region given the dissemination of a lot of Lebanese cultural production throughout the Arab World.

PS: I googled around a bit and I found two very interesting posts by gay Lebanese bloggers about Majdi w Wajdi; one lays out why he hates Majdi w Wajdi, and the other (on “Hi mom. It’s me Beirut Boy.”) explains his more nuanced feelings about it, which are probably closer to mine.