| Arrogant Provincialism | Worthy of Respect |
| Abolition of slavery, perhaps for the first time in human history | Maintaining legal slavery until 1962 (Saudi Arabia and Yemen) |
| Pioneering the ideal of equality for women | Cultural acceptance of forced marriage, honour killing and female circumcision. Wives may be legally beaten (under Sharia). |
| Freedom of expression | Threats to kill for exercising free speech |
| Freedom of religion | Apostasy punishable by death |
| Sexual freedom | Adultery, homosexuality punishable by death |
| Representative democracy | Fundamentalist theocracy |
To my mind, the argument of cultural equivalence is rather easily rebutted, along the following lines:
- Every culture must surely consist of both good and bad characteristics; and,
- It is so unlikely as to be impossible that the proportion of good to bad in every culture on earth is precisely equal, given that they’re so “diverse”; ergo, some cultures are superior to others.
Of course, this argument assumes a moral hierarchy, something that the relativists eschew. So the following approach might prove more productive:
- “Is your position really that the culture of present-day AmeriKKKa, based as it is on a noxious combination of rampant consumerism, environmental destruction and fascist cultural imperialism, comprises the moral equivalent of that of the blamelessly pure at-one-with-Gaia Native Americans? “
Any rebuttal along these lines is likely to bring to light the fact that the argument of cultural equivalence is actually acting as a sort of intellectual facade, as at this point its exponent is likely to change tack – and in so doing reveal their real stance; namely, that our (Western) culture is the evil one, to which almost (?) all others are superior.
“How can we expect immigrants to integrate into western society when they are at the same time being taught [by self-loathing Westerners like Mr. Jacques] that the west is decadent, a den of iniquity, the source of all evil, racist, imperialist and to be despised?”
Ibn Warraq
Ja hvad er mest korrekt?
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