
Jamal Khashoggi: What the Arab world needs most is free expression - IBM
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/jamal-khashoggi-what-the-arab-world-needs-most-is-free-expression/2018/10/17/adfc8c44-d21d-11e8-8c22-fa2ef74bd6d6_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.1a257f67d4a2
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orsenthil
Very well written piece. It shows care for his society. Free information and
well being for his community.

RIP, Jamal Khashoggi.

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manfredo
I'd like to ask, to what degree is immoral state violence acceptable to
produce social progress?[1] While I'm appalled by seems to be the
assassination of a political opponent, Bin Salman's plans to move towards
secularization, loosen the country's dependence on fossil fuels, etc. seem
promising. If allowing certain freedoms means halting Saudi Arabia's progress
towards these goals is it a worthwhile tradeoff?

Consider the US Civil war as an analogue. It wasn't an act of totalitarianism
- forcibly subduing the south was legal, while totalitarianism has the
connotation of extralegal use of force. And it wasn't undemocratic - Lincoln
won the election. However it was certainly an instance of the government
forcing its will on a segment of the population through immense violence. My
belief is that immense violence was justified, to allow slavery (and slavery
was the keystone reason for the Civil War) to be perpetuated would have been a
greater evil. At face value many, including myself, would state that killing
2-2.5% of the total population in suppression of a rebellion is a bad thing.
But ending slavery constitutes sufficient social progress to make it worth it.

A more morally gray area would be the overthrow of Egypt's elected government.
I don't want to sign praises of the military junta, but some family relatives
that are religious minorities (Coptic Christians) praised the military regime.
And they made no premise of trying to portray their rule as democratic: they
essentially said, "yes, it is a dictatorship. And in spite of that I fully
believe it is better than rule by the Muslim Brotherhood. Similarly, while
many (including myself) were optimistic about Syrian rebels fighting against
Assad, it's tough to say that a peace under Assad would have been worse than
the fate Syria got.

Another good example is Singapore's dictatorship. On one hand, silencing
dissidents is something I consider bad. The fact that a party that receives
~60% of the vote gets to control ~90% of leadership roles is unjust. But by
most other metrics of success, it's difficult to find fault in the country.
High incomes, low rates of crime, and extensive services provided to the
populace are the envy of most other countries. It's tempting to say that these
could all be possible without dictatorial intervention, but the kind of long-
term policy (and sometimes heavy-handed policies like relocating residents to
eliminate de-facto racial segregation) that created Singapore's success are
difficult to pull off in democracies.

I hope this doesn't come off as an attempt to justify Saudi Arabia's apparent
actions, or read as an apologia of dictatorship. I still wouldn't choose any
other countries' system over my own - at least none other than similar Western
democracies. If it turns out Khashoggi was assassinated, it would definitely
be a permanent mark against MBS (or whoever made this decision). Rather I just
want to prompt reflection of what often seems to be the unqualified assumption
that forceful governments results in a bad outcome, and democracy and liberty
results in good ones. I certainly agree that assassinating a journalist,
dismembering him, and subsequently denying it is unjustified even if it was
eliminating a roadblock to social change in Saudi Arabia. But I do want to ask
HN: where _is_ that line?

[1] Judging by the responses, this was not an effective way to ask the
question I want to ask. A better question is "to what degree does social
progress made by foreign leaders offset their moral ills?"

Edit: I realize this was a potentially controversial question to pose, but
it's something I've started to reflect on after talking to people that have
experienced recent events in the Middle East. A lot of them expressed
frustration with the tendency to view foreign policy through a simple,
moralistic lens. The result of such a perspective often has negative
consequences (e.g. the Iraq war. Hussein carried out atrocities orders of
magnitude worse than the assassination of a journalist, but our moralistic
response was orders of magnitude again more devastating).

~~~
pm90
Ends do not justify the means. And it’s not just a moral faith: the savage way
in which you grab power and silence dissidents creates an environment where
bad ideas are allowed to not fail and fester until they destroy everything.

~~~
manfredo
> Ends do not justify the means.

So was Egypt better under the Muslim Brotherhood than the military junta? The
"means" of their overthrow were certainly bad (a military coup), so does that
automatically mean it would have been better for Egypt to have continued to be
ruled by the Muslim Brotherhood. Is Singapore a morally bad country? We don't
know for sure if they would have achieved the same results with a democracy,
but in our mental image of "shitty, immoral countires" does Singapore pop into
mind?

It's easy to make moralistic claims like this, but to a certain extent we all
agree that certain ends to justify certain means. Police shouldn't kill a
criminal for stealing an orange. But they probably should kill a criminal if
they're holding someone hostage at knifepoint (Purely speaking in terms of the
morality of killing people in commission of a crime, I don't know if shooting
at a someone holding a hostage is good policing)

~~~
prophesi
I think you're missing the point of the article (if your original comment was
actually a comment on the content of the article in the first place).

The Arab world is in a dangerous place because you can be -dismembered- for
your ideas. Not for holding someone hostage at knifepoint. If you allow no
room for criticism, you're allowed free reign.

~~~
manfredo
I think you're still missing the point I'm making. A world in which you can be
dismembered for disseminating political ides is terrible. Of course. That's as
obvious as calling the sky blue.

But is something like a military seizing power from a democratic government to
prevent a sectarian crisis a bad thing? Where is the inflection point in these
sorts of questions?

An example I think is valuable is the People's Republic of China. Of course
I'm appalled by people getting disappeared, mass government surveillance, and
gamifying totalitarianism through social credit. But in a sense, I can
empathize with why a mainland Chinese person could view the PRC and CCP in a
positive light. In spite of its evils it has drastically improved the well
being of (most) its people - targeted minorities like Uyghurs not included.
Crackdowns on dissent seem immoral to me from my western view of the world,
but among many Chinese there's a sense that curbing dissent is necessary to
prevent social collapse. There's this phrase that goes along the lines of
"China is it's own worst enemy". Most of China's most destructive conflicts
have been civil wars. The country is understandably skeptical of peaceful
transition of power - something inherently necessary for a democracy. Is China
capable of adopting a western-style democracy and extensive civil liberties
without collapsing? I don't know, but I can see why many (most?) Chinese
wouldn't want to gamble the future of their country on such a bet. In a
similar vein, I'd like to see the thought process of someone who supports MBS
and his allies in spite of this assassination.

