Anger and Pride by Oriana Fallaci.. Her first essay about 9-11-2002 attack

e mail | november 2001 | Oriana Fallaci

[Victoria Delsoul]

Thanks for the flag. I didn't know she was a leftist by reading her essay. She is fantastic. Her essay is a journey into the past and the present. She writes about American and Italian culture and their differences. She gives us an extraordinary account of her encounters with the Muslims during different situations and their ignorant culture of hate. She tells us for instance how they have invaded Italy and have a total disregard for the Italian culture. And yes, she says she has cancer.

For instance about the Muslims she writes, "A tent put up in order to beg-condemn-insult the Italian government that hosted them but wouldn't give them the papers necessary to rove about Europe and wouldn't let them bring the hordes of their relatives to Italy. Mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, cousins, pregnant sisters-in-law, and if they had their way, their relatives' relatives as well. A tent situated next to the beautiful palazzo of the Archbishop on whose sidewalk they kept the shoes or sandals that are lined up outside the mosques in their countries. And along with the shoes or sandals, the empty bottles of water they'd used to wash their feet before praying. A tent placed in front of the cathedral with Brunelleschi's cupola and by the side of the Baptistery with Ghiberti's golden doors.

A tent, finally, furnished like a sleazy little apartment: seats, tables, chaise-lounges, mattresses for sleeping and for fucking, ovens for cooking food and plaguing the piazza with smoke and stench. And, thanks to the customary irresponsibility of ENEL, which cares about our works of art about as much as it cares about our landscape, furnished with electric light. Thanks to a radio tape player, enriched by the uncouth wailing of a muezzin who punctually exorted the faithful, deafened the infidels, and smothered the sound of the church bells. Add to all this the yellow streaks of urine that profaned the marble of the Baptistry. (My, these sons of Allah sure have a long range! However did they manage to hit the target when they were held back by a protective railing that kept it nearly two whole meters away from their urinary equipment?) And along with the yellow streaks of urine, the stench of the excrement that blocked the door of San Salvatore al Vescovo: that exquisite Romanesque church (year 1000) that stands at the rear of the Piazza del Duomo and that the sons of Allah transformed into a shithouse. You're well aware of this.

You don't understand or don't want to understand that if we don't oppose them, if we don't defend ourselves, if we don't fight, the Jihad will win. And it will destroy the world that for better or worse we've managed to build, to change, to improve, to render a little more intelligent, that is to say, less bigotted--or even not bigotted at all. And with that it will destroy our culture, our art, our science, our morals, our values, our pleasures... Christ! Don't you realize that the Osama Bin Ladens feel authorized to kill you and your children because you drink wine or beer, because you don't wear your beard long or a chador, because you go to the theater or the movies, because you listen to music and sing pop songs, because you dance in discos or at home, because you watch TV, wear miniskirts or short-shorts, because you go naked or half naked to the beach or the pool, because you fuck when you want and where you want and who you want? Don't you even care about that, you fools? I am an atheist, thank God. And I have no intention of letting myself be killed for it.

I love this line… "I am an atheist, thank God."

[dennisw]

I liked re-reading the parts you quoted. Too bad she has cancer as you say.

[The Great Satan]

Funny. I read If the Sun Dies twenty years ago, and the one thing I remember from it was the thing about von Braun's smelling of lemon-scented soap.

[The Great Satan]

Wow! This woman is even more contemptuous of Islam than I am. I didn't think that was possible.

[ArneFufkin]

Fallaci ... now I remember what I wanted to order in tonight.

[Brian Allen]

What to say?

[NorthernRight]

This article appears in an official translation, authorized by Fallaci, at:
Oriana Fallaci: Anger and Pride.

[backhoe]

I'm glad you'll consider more of her work- it's been so many years since I've read her earlier stuff that I can't recall specific details, I just remember putting her in the "writers you want to pay attention to" category I keep in my mental notebook. The excerpt in #23 is a good example of her non-standard but very effective technique.

[backhoe]

Perhaps not too oddly, Paglia is another writer whose work I recommend and admire because she is a keen observer and gifted writer. She does not suffer fools of any kind gladly.

[Forgiven_Sinner]

I knew of Oriana Fallaci from 15-20 years ago when she was married (lover?) to a Greek revolutionary, and I loved her writing then. She, like Camille Paglia, had a passion for truth and honesty that disassembled her natural leftism. I'm delighted to have bookmarked this and her "I am ashamed" article. She has grown in passion and wisdom since I last read her. Now, she may be ready to become a Christian, once she learns that God's goodness is independent of Christians' wickedness.

Her intelligence and passion are irrefutable. Her critics will merely critisize her without refutation, embarrassed by her rightness and their own defenselessness against her arguments.

Tomorrow I will search the web for more articles by her.

[buzzyboop]

Thank you for the post.. bump for later.

[goldstategop]

Oriana Fallaci is a Leftist. But she has no patience with the political correctness, the lies, the shibboleths, the pretensions, the anti-Western mentality of the post modern Left. As I read this essay of hers, for all of her secularism and atheism, I'm struck by her sensitivity, intelligence, candor, and penetrating judgment that have made her a journalistic legend. She's lived a remarkable life and there are few people like her around in the world anymore. Certainly I'm hard pressed to think of another writer who doesn't spare anyone the way Fallaci does. You just have to admire the way she thinks and writes and this conservative does. She's refreshing for someone from the Continent and not at all like the writers we're used to hearing from over there. May God Bless Her and the Saints Preserve Her.

[eddie willers]

a passion for truth and honesty that disassembled her natural leftism.

There is a bedrock of 'Axiomatic Truths'.

Whether you start on shaky ground....or from a fertile field....
if you are in an honest intellectual pursuit....
and if you keep digging and panning and sifting...
you will eventually arrive at this bedrock of Truth.

The start is not important...the arrival is.

Our Declaration of Independence states these Truths in the broadest of terms....
Ayn Rand crystallized them for me.
I was struck by this passage that could have come from her pen:

What are the symbols of American strength, wealth, power and modernity? Certainly not jazz and rock and roll, not chewing-gum or hamburgers, Broadway or Hollywood. It’s their skyscrapers. Their Pentagon. Their science. Their technology. Those impressive skyscrapers, so tall, so beautiful that while you raise your eyes to gaze at them you almost forget the pyramids and the divine buildings of our past.

[Think free or die]

Wow! Thank you for this posting; long and worth every minute.

[dennisw]

Good! Glad you like.

[NYCVirago]

Bump for later reading...

[Gritty]

The Crusade has been in progress for some time. It works like a Swiss watch, sustained by a faith and a malice comparable only to the faith and malice of Torquemada when he led the Inquisition. The fact is that dealing with them is impossible. Reasoning, unthinkable. Treating them with indulgence, tolerance or hope, suicide. Whoever thinks differently is deluded.

My. This woman can write!

And despite her leftist outlook, she is right on target when dealing with the Sons Of Allah. Too bad our own Left hasn't gotten the word yet.

[Thud]

ping

[Lurker]

This is the best thing I've seen posted here in a while.

Thank you Dennis.

L