How the West became No. 1; Dinesh D'Souza defangs the multiculturalists

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Sept 2, 2002 | by Hans S. Nichols

In his contribution to the country's latest round of self-analysis, Dinesh D'Souza does not pretend to be high-minded or overly academic. Instead, he aims for a basic defense of both the idea and application of this thing called America. While the title, What's So Great About America (Regnery, $27.95, 218 pp), is less of a rhetorical question than a declarative statement, D'Souza leaves plenty of room to entertain the question fairly. What's so great about D'Souza's book is that he leaves the impression of not having reached any foregone conclusions.

True to his other works, D'Souza skillfully sketches the opposition's argument and then deconstructs it lemma by lemma. In the past, his critics have accused D'Souza of creating convenient straw men and then blowing them down, unpacking arguments no one has really made. But his targets in this book will find little wiggle room to flee from their own arguments.

In this book, D'Souza concedes many of the points made by America's Islamic foes. It is entirely understandable that parts of the world feel threatened by the United States, because "America is a subversive idea. Indeed, it represents a new way to be human." Add to that the Islamic critique of the United States "shows a deep understanding of America's fundamental principles--which is more than one can say about American understanding of Islamic principles." He notes that many Muslims criticize the decadence of the West, calling our women "loose," and "they're right."

As such, the author believes we should think of radical Islam as a defensive movement. Echoing economist Robert Nelson, D'Souza recognizes that America, with its secular devotions and capitalist creed, is its own church. America's religious virtues--commerce and material progress--feed on themselves and disseminate, threatening the way of life suggested by pure Islam.

But even if the Islamic world understands the West, the West does not understand Islam. Of all the misunderstandings, perhaps the most dangerous is that "Islam means peace." Relying on the scholarship of Bernard Lewis, D'Souza contradicts the politically correct cliche. He writes that "the terrorists who profess the name of Allah and proclaim jihad are operating squarely within the Islamic tradition.... Indeed, they are performing what Islam has typically held to be a religions duty." Since there is little hope of countering this ideology with mere words, D'Souza looks to military force to keep America safe from the violent intentions of Islam.

After explaining why the Islamic world hates the United States, D'Souza confronts America's domestic critics. tie does so by offering "two cheers for colonialism." D'Souza explains how and why the West has leaped past Muslins and Chinese dynasties in the last 500 years, tie argues that the West--known at the time as Christendom--evolved past other cultures because it invented three institutions: science, democracy and capitalism.

Of course, the Brahmins of multiculturalism explain the ascendance of Western dominance with words such as "ethnocentrism," "colonialism" and "slavery." But D'Souza demonstrates that these elements have been present in every civilization since the beginning of time.

What is unique about the West, and in particular America, is that these bugbears were programmed for self-destruction. So while the U.S. Constitution contained its infamous three-fifths clause regarding "other persons," it also was imbued with the ideas that led to the dissolution of slavery. Similarly, native populations in colonial provinces won their independence by appropriating the language of their occupier.

Still, D'Souza's parsing of Jean Jacques Rousseau may make some conservatives uneasy. For the right, Rousseau is the culprit behind the sixties counterculture--the original spokesman for the "If it feels good, do it" ethos. While there's little in D'Souza's book to suggest that he subscribes to this Rousseauian view of self-expression, he does not seem sufficiently enraged by it. However, he does see the selfless acts of the firefighters and police on Sept. 11 as evidence that Rousseau's hold on our times is not as great as many of his critics--and devotees--have maintained.

D'Souza is at his best deranging the multiculturalists and exposing their tortured logic. Offering a grand blueprint for a return to virtue is not yet his specialty. Still, his book is such a potent elixir for multicultural hobgoblins that readers should wait for it to arrive in paperback. That way, it can be folded into one's back pocket, ready for reference should a devout multiculturalist be spotted on the lam, hiding from debate.

HANS S. NICHOLS IS A REPORTER FOR Insight.