The Intelligent Conversationalist

by Imogen Lloyd Webber

  CASE STUDY 2. RELIGION … AND TERRORISM

  It’s not just extremist Islamic groups that radically interpret scripture to an intolerant degree. Believers in all the world’s big religions can choose from both violent and peaceful messages to justify their behavior.

  * * *

  NOTEWORTHY NUGGETS: VIOLENCE

  • Integral to Buddhist thought is the edict not to kill or inflict pain on others, but Buddhist monks have been guilty of precisely that in Sri Lanka.

  • However many messages of love and peace that Judaism and Christianity may contain, they have not prevented the existence of Zionist militants or for Christianity, any number of attacks from the fifteenth-century Spanish Inquisition to those on abortion providers today.

  • Gandhi, a Hindu, was assassinated by … a Hindu.

  * * *

  And then we come to Islam. As with Christianity and Judaism, Islam’s texts include peaceful and warring messages.

  * * *

  NOTEWORTHY NUGGET: ASSASSIN

  There exists a debatable myth you should be aware of that the word assassin is derived from the Arabic word for hashish user from the Middle Ages.

  * * *

  Islamic terrorism has multiple motivations; religion is only one of many factors. The relationship between the Arab world and the West is challenging thanks to culture, societies, ideology, history, and Western imperialist foreign policy (see Cheat Sheets 14, 16, and 17). Then there’s political and economic hardship within Arab countries.

  The majority of specialists believe that Islamic law bans terrorism and that it is a violation of key Islamic principles. Osama bin Laden was not a graduate of an Islamic university and ignored fourteen centuries of Muslim scholarship. Instead he was inspired by Sayyid Qutb, someone President Gamal Abdel Nasser, the second president of Egypt, executed in 1966. Qutb himself became radicalized because he was imprisoned and tortured in one of Nasser’s concentration camps for fifteen years.

  * * *

  KEY TERM: JIHAD

  • Jihad means struggle or effort. It’s not necessarily violent and it can be applied to secular fights—for instance, it has been to women’s liberation.

  • The greater jihad is the inner struggle to fulfill God’s high standards in the way lives are lived.

  • The lesser jihad is the outer struggle against Islam’s enemies.

  • All Muslims thus see jihad as a treasured spiritual value.

  * * *

  Most experts agree that the laws of jihad ban malevolent and undiscriminating murder unless it is for self-defense. It is not to be used to conquer, colonize, and convert other nations to Islam. Even if engaged in a holy war, Muslims are urged not to harm noncombatants, women, and children—or property. Thus the activities of al-Qaeda, ISIS, and Boko Haram are viewed by the vast majority of Muslims as completely unacceptable, and there have been numerous fatwas (rulings) condemning and forbidding terrorism. A few terrorists grab the headlines, but this minuscule minority does not define a diverse and complex religion of 1.6 billion followers.

  * * *

  KEY TERMS: ISIS AND BOKO HARAM

  • ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (also known as ISIL, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant). Number of members hard to estimate, but thought to be less than 50,000. Just under 4,000 are from the West, with around 200 from the US.

   ISIS is predominantly made up of Sunni Muslims (the Iraqi government and military is mostly Shia) and has its roots in the Iraqi faction of al-Qaeda.

   Its influence rose as a result of the power vacuum created by the Syrian conflict (from 2011) and it fell out with al-Qaeda in 2013.

   ISIS got a lot of its initial funding through kidnapping. Note the US, UK, and Poland don’t pay ransom money; the US and UK often try to get their citizens back militarily.

  • Boko Haram is a terrorist group that mostly operates in northeast Nigeria. It has links to al-Qaeda and has pledged support to ISIS. You’ll have heard of them because in 2014 they targeted a girl’s school. A girl’s school being the scariest possible concept for a fanatic; it’s why the Pakistani Taliban shot then fifteen-year-old Malala Yousafzai in the head.

  * * *

  There was a big argument in 2015 on the semantics of whether the US government should call ISIS Islamic terrorists. The reason there is caution is that the label helps extremists depict their cause as a religious crusade between Islam and the West. There is the risk that not every Muslim, especially since the US recently invaded two Muslim countries, will be able to differentiate that a war against Islamic terrorists is not a war against Islam. In the same way it would be incorrect to label the IRA bombings “Catholic terrorism,” the term “Islamic terrorism” could be unhelpful and risks turning friends into enemies. As we discuss in Cheat Sheet 17, this is an intra-Muslim battle, not a Christian-Muslim one, and Muslims are the primary victims of this terrorism. Also keep in mind that nationalism is often disguised as fundamentalism; religion is used as cover for the political, for gaining power.

  We now turn to history. For without understanding our past, we have no chance of getting a grip on our present.

  * * *

  WISE WORDS

  What is tolerance? It is the consequence of humanity. We are all formed of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each other’s folly—that is the first law of nature.

  —Voltaire

  * * *

  SOCIAL SURVIVAL STRATEGY

  Argument: “Nationalism is often disguised as fundamentalism.”

  Religion is often used as a cover for those trying to gain political power. This topic is always complex, and if it arises, it is one of those times that if you’re not a specialist and not learning from one, be aware of how little you probably know.

  Crisp Fact: “Shrimp are referred to as an abomination four times more than homosexuality in the Bible.”

  This fact’s an oldie, but it’s still a goodie. We all know that bits of the Bible shouldn’t be taken at face value, but this is a handy nugget to have in your brain.

  Pivot: “I’m sure I saw this topic done well on The West Wing. Why is it that Aaron Sorkin had only one TV series that worked? What was it about Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and The Newsroom that didn’t quite hit the mark? And Sports Night lasted only two seasons.”

  Anyone who owns a TV set probably has an opinion on Aaron Sorkin. Even if you’re with a Republican annoyed by Sorkin’s liberal sensitivities, you can swiftly shift the tête-à-tête to the logistical challenges they must have faced when they shot the infamous long “walk and talk” scenes in The West Wing.

  SUBJECT FOUR—HISTORY

  HISTORY SUMMARY

  The key theme to think about when discussing anything related to history is that you can probably blame the British, as the reason it is coming up in conversation now will be as a result of an impolite move the Brits made in times gone by. For instance, in regards to the Middle East, the post–World War I boundaries made no sense on religious or ethnic grounds, and we’re paying for that today. And who can be blamed for the decision? For all intents and purposes, the Brits. A startling fact to bring up is that Henry Hudson sailed up the New York river that would later bear his name on September 11, 1609. And needing to get out of a cantankerous confab? Remark that Qatar was originally set to host the FIFA World Cup in 2022, the first Arab country to do so, and inquire if the person you’re speaking to is a soccer fan. It is the world’s most popular sport, after all.

  The important thing to remember about history is that it is written by the winners. Fair and balanced when you read all about it? Not so much.

  History comes from the Latin historia (which in turn was borrowed from the Greek). It is infinite. You can never stop learning about it. It is my passion, what I read, as we Brits call majoring in, at university. Thus to me, this subject was by far the most daunting. What to leave out? In my view everything is relevant.

  I moved to America on February 1, 20
10. This subject contains a soupçon of all I have needed to know about to get by in this country. On air, at parties, and meeting boyfriends’ parents. Hopefully this will serve you in good stead.

  Along with most immigrants I’ve spoken to on the topic, I always feel guilty that my grasp of American history is a bit shaky. This is because wherever one is brought up, the history one is taught tends to be of that country. If we do study America, it’s normally about the impact it had on our own lands when it hit superpower status. Many an immigrant finds it startling to learn quite how long and how large slavery loomed and of the subsequent institutionalized racism that African-Americans have had to fight in the land of the free. The more I read, the more I see the history of civil rights—from the fight for freedom from Britain, then against slavery, then for equality of the races and sexes—as the history of America. If you’re American, Cheat Sheet 12 concerning basic American beginnings may contain information that is so obvious to you, you end up skipping it. But around 13 percent of your nation’s population are immigrants. And what’s contained in 12 isn’t so ingrained in us, so I’ve written it for us foreign types. It is also for those Americans who ask us foreigners how we celebrate Thanksgiving in our native lands.

  We follow this up in Cheat Sheet 13 with a grid of American presidents. There have been forty-four presidential administrations but only forty-three presidents—Grover Cleveland served two nonconsecutive terms. You’ve got to feel sorry for the commanders in chief. The nation wants its presidents to be grandfatherly figures that solve all of America’s problems, which of course is an unrealistic expectation at the outset. There is more to leadership than rhetoric, but that’s often all these men have been left with apart from in the area of foreign policy, thanks to the separation of powers. Interestingly, America wasn’t always headed the presidential route. Some wanted George Washington to wear a crown. However, he and the framers of the Constitution refused. What is the one thing the White House lacks? A throne. Two gentle reminders: Mount Rushmore, near Keystone, South Dakota, features George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. It wasn’t their idea: Their faces were completed in 1941. And a reminder: If you’re going to say Obama is worse than Nixon in relation to the media, you might acknowledge that Nixon officials discussed murdering a reporter. What this Cheat Sheet will really do for you is to help you in playing quizzes on your smartphone and in being generally smug.

  That smugness will probably disappear when you read Cheat Sheet 14 on American imperialism. Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. By 1900, America had gotten big. It reached from the Atlantic to the Pacific. It had the world’s largest economy. The USA established itself as a world military power with the Spanish-American War and its late entrance into World War I. Yes, there has always been a bit of an interventionist vs. isolationist (noninterventionist) debate going on within the United States. But face facts: The first nation to have nuclear weapons and the only one ever to deploy them, America is cemented into the status of superpower. America just needs to remember two things: that it should regularly remind its politicians that this doesn’t mean the nation has superpowers and that it needs to keep a close eye on its presidents, since foreign policy is where they have most jurisdiction. Every president, whatever his or her views coming into office, always comes to depend on the intelligence agencies. No president is going to give up the CIA, a secret service founded after World War II that has one client. When in doubt in international chat? Proclaim that in this interconnected age, national solutions are not enough; global solutions are required. (That was one of my favorites at MSNBC. Incredibly difficult to make happen, of course.)

  My home territory and what I’m probably best known for on American TV is next. The royals. Indeed I am PEOPLE Now’s Royals correspondent. Yes, the monarchy is a historic anomaly. Yes, there is a fundamental ambiguity in having a hereditary monarchy head a parliamentary democracy. But it works. And as we Brits say, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” It may seem antiquated, but the queen is still a figurehead to two billion people, a third of the world. The monarchy is there to be above politics. It represents stability and continuity and shines a spotlight on good causes. For Brits, the monarch is a focus for national identity, unity, and pride. The monarch has two selves, the mortal personal one, which may not always be lovable, and the immortal spiritual side. The latter represents that there will always be an England. Why the interest in America concerning the British royals? Throughout history, even in republics, we have irrationally elevated certain individuals. Americans have political dynasties. And celebrity culture exists. Prince Harry on the front lines for his country versus the reality TV prince du jour? Actually, which one is better to talk about? And who doesn’t love a wedding or a birth, the distraction of a fairy tale in this age of relentless bad news?

  Because I thought you’d appreciate the irony, Cheat Sheet 15 is a grid of the kings and queens of England from 1066, when William the Conqueror created a nation. The ironic part? We’ve had fewer monarchs since then than America has ever had presidents. If you’re really keen to beat British friends at trivia, there’s even a rhyme to remember the kings and queens of England since William I (the Conqueror), which it is unlikely they’ll ever have bothered to learn:

  Willie, Willie, Harry, Steve,

  Harry, Dick, John, Harry Three.

  Edward One, Two, Three, Dick Two,

  Henry Four, Five, Six, then who?

  Edward Four, Five, Dick the Bad

  Harrys twain and Ned, the lad.

  Mary, Lizzie, James the Vain,

  Charlie, Charlie, James again.

  William and Mary, Anne o’Gloria,

  Four Georges, William and Victoria,

  Edward Seven, Georgie Five,

  Edward, George, and Liz (alive).

  I’m probably most proud of Cheat Sheet 16. We cover World War I, World War II, and the cold war in it. Please read 16 just for me. Take from it that brinkmanship is always a part of international relations, but it is also vital to understand the opposition’s motives and legitimate interests. That a nation should never go to war believing it will be quick and cheap and all its consequences controlled. And if the peace is not secure, war is liable to occur again.

  The final Cheat Sheet on this subject, 17, covers the Middle East. You need to read it. You know you do. We look into the history of the hottest hot spots. We touch on terrorism. Explain the concept of the two-state solution, which you may come away believing is an illusion. And find out why there’s one thing that at least everyone can agree on about the region: Blame the British.

  There’s a thought that I want to leave you with, as you’ll be using this subject primarily in discussions about the state of the world today. In my final year at Cambridge I was lucky enough to study under Professor Christopher Andrew, who changed my view of the world so completely, so utterly, that I’ve never looked at anything the same since. The subject?

  The secret world and international relations. Spies.

  Whenever modern international relations come up, this is your get-out-of-jail-free card. Pundits can and do try their level best on air and in “ink” to provide us with enlightening commentary. But by definition, they are making comments with often very little knowledge of what is actually going on.

  For they lack key information from one crucial source: the second oldest profession. Spies. As Sun Tzu, the ancient Chinese strategist, philosopher, and military general, wrote: “It is only the enlightened ruler and the wise general who will use the highest intelligence of the army for the purposes of spying, and thereby they achieve great results.”

  One must never underestimate the impact the intelligence communities, the secret world, is having on international relations. While I was studying with the masterful Andrew, it was drummed into me that contemporary commentators tend to make at best incomplete and at worst incorrect assumptions about the topics of the day.

  Take World War I
I. Perspective on it was turned on its head in the 1970s, when the high-level intelligence produced by the code breakers at Bletchley Park in the UK was revealed. (Homework: See The Imitation Game. It stars male perfection personified, Benedict Cumberbatch, so hardly an arduous task.) Winston Churchill referred to the code breakers as “the geese that laid the golden eggs and never cackled.” The intelligence, code-named Ultra, provided such crucial assistance to the Allied war effort that according to General Dwight D. Eisenhower, it “saved thousands of British and American lives and, in no small way, contributed to the speed with which the enemy was routed and eventually forced to surrender.” Ultra certainly quickened the arrival of VE Day, and consequently the first nuclear bomb went off over Japan, not Germany. Since the end of World War II, intelligence has played a key role; the CIA was formed right after it to monitor the potential threat of communist countries and isn’t going anywhere.

  It is simply impossible—and illegal—for anyone to paint a full picture of present foreign policy for public consumption. Journalists can speculate in leading fashion, but they cannot know or reveal for sure. Take Strobe Talbott, former diplomatic correspondent of Time. He noted in February 1984 that he was struck by how “extraordinarily conciliatory” Ronald Reagan’s comments on the death of Yuri Andropov and his succession by Konstantin Chernenko were.

  It later came to light that Ronald Reagan’s almost overnight abandonment of his “evil empire” rhetoric against the Soviets in the 1980s was in no small part due to the secret world. Intelligence, including that provided by the British double agent Oleg Gordievsky, helped convince Reagan to change course. Thanks to the American president’s incendiary words combined with Soviet paranoia (the Russians were notoriously bad at listening to any sensible intelligence coming their way, Stalin being a classic example before his death in 1953—he had ignored the warnings about Barbarossa, that Hitler was going to invade the USSR, so got taken by surprise), a NATO exercise in 1983 was misinterpreted by the Soviets as a potential first strike. The world had come closer to nuclear war than at any time since the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. Reagan wrote in his memoirs: “I feel the Soviets … are so paranoid about being attacked that without in any way being soft on them, we ought to tell them no one here has any intention of doing anything like that.”