Evan Carp’s editorial last Friday was more of a Witch hunt than a Wespeak. Though I have many concerns with his comments, here I want to address his rendering of Islam. Carp writes (in reaction to a forum sponsored by the MSA addressing the Danish cartoons violently representing the Prophet Muhammad and riots against those cartoons): “For some reason, we can ignore the fact that thousands upon thousands of Muslims bloodily rioted in the streets throughout the whole world because the quiet, blond-haired [no blonde-haired person has ever done anything wrong], mild-mannered Scandinavians insulted the MYTHOLOGY that they, Muslims have been brought up believing their whole lives,” (my emphasis).
Russell T. McCutcheon writes, “The power to label someone’s story as myth, and to classify our world-view as scientific over against their world-view as mythic, is not only to classify stories, but people (are they gullible or intelligent?), societies (are they uncivilized or civilized?) and cultures (are they primitive or advanced?). The apparently straightforward distinction between false and true tales (mythos vs. logos) is therefore loaded with social significance and consequence” (from Guide to the Study of Religion, p 102).
The result of Professor McCutcheon’s analysis? This mythos/logos discussion is a co-constructing fact to “European expansionism and colonialism, an interest for which people characterized as primitive, uncivilized and gullible do come in handy as needy beneficiaries of European civilization” (ibid).
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