The Munk Debate – Blair vs Hitchens

I should begin with an apology. I have not written anything in quite a while and I wish I could say that it was merely work or other commitments that had taken up too much of my time. The reason I have been away is simple: I was threatened. I was told by certain individuals that they desire to see me dead. Perhaps I should have been a braver individual. But I do value my life, at least for now, and I would like to live just the slightest bit longer. And reading about the horrible things happening to people all over the world simply because they write what they thought made me cautious. So I took a few months, but was I to live in fear forever? Always there will be those who threaten with death. I cannot give up my freedom. Indeed what is life without freedom, and so here I am.

Yesterday, I saw the Munk Debate between Christopher Hitchens and Tony Blair. The motion: “Be it resolved religion is a force for good in the world.” The debate began with an opening from Hitchens, which in my opinion was weak from a man of his caliber. He could have been significantly stronger and forceful. Blair followed with his opening, and it was brilliant. An excellent orator, he made some very fine points. And then the rebuttals began, and Hitchens destroyed Blair. Repeatedly. The closing round was Blair repeating himself with what he began, and Hitchens finishing assault. On the whole, I found the debate uninteresting. I thought it would be interesting to see Hitchens demolish Blair. But it turned out to be an uneven match; Blair kept undermining himself and the debate was quite dull.

There were a number of things said, but there were a few things that when brought up made me gaze in horror. One of the examples of how religion was helping that Tony Blair brought up was a meeting between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. My mind immediately went: “WHY WOULD YOU BRING THAT UP!!” And Hitchens pounced on it as I expected. What is the source of the conflict? The religion. Being the wrong kind of Christian for the last 400 years in Northern Ireland gets you and your children killed. How on Earth did Blair think he could use Northern Ireland as an example for the good religion is doing? Maybe he assumed we’d all forget the past, and just look at the work being done right now. Unbelievable.

Moving on. Tony Blair, for those who don’t know, is the representative of the Quartet (the UN, US, EU and Russia) to the Middle East. He made the remark yesterday that the Middle East crisis had little to do with religion and more to do with politics. If there was ever a moment where you would want to smash your head into the wall, that was it. The Middle East is not a religious issue? Are you THAT unaware of the world? Do the words Hamas, Hezbollah and Zionism mean nothing? Do the words Islam, Christianity and Judaism mean nothing? How is the Palestine conflict only a political one. And Hitchens struck back: the conflict exists because the scripture talks about what land belongs to whom because of a covenant made some three thousand years ago with a supernatural being. If it were not for religion, what would draw people there? If it weren’t for religion, there wouldn’t be a Middle East conflict.

The rest of the debate was watching Blair backpedal to every dark aspect of religion Hitchens brought up. The progression of Blair’s argument went from “Religion is also good” to “Religion has done bad, but also good” to “OK, religion has done some really really bad stuff, but does some good” to “Religion could be good” to “My religion tells me that religion is love which is good”.

I was right. It was a politician facing Hitchens there.

I wouldn’t recommend the debate. If you want something more intellectual, look up A.C. Grayling on Intelligence Squared. If you want some passion and fantastic debating, look up Stephen Fry and Christopher Hitchens on Intelligence Squared.

http://www.intelligencesquared.com/

I got home, and my brother was watching Kingdom of Heaven.

I do believe he was the smarter of us last night.

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