* The Octavia Nasr Affair Proves That America Can't Handle Nuance

Posted on by Mustapha

That’s it uncle SAM. You have proven that you will never understand this part of the world.

When your media insists on converting a nuanced Christian observer (A right wing extremist in some eyes) into an anti-semitic Jihad loving, terrorist hugging nutcase, I lose all hope that you’ll ever understand, let alone help solve our complicated issues.

I never liked Hezbollah, In fact I believe they’re the reason many things are wrong in my country. I never liked Mr. Fadlallah either. But yes, I respected him, like Octavia did and like the overwhelming majority of the Lebanese did (US allies and otherwise). I respect him the same way Sayyed Nassrallah, the actual leader of Hezbollah, respects his Israeli arch-enemies for caring for their dead. That doesn’t turn me into a terrorist and that shouldn’t have warranted the firing of Octavia.

But like I argued earlier, it’s CNN’s loss. Perhaps they should hire Debbie Schussel instead.

Go ahead America, wallow in the “you’re either with us or with the terrorists” mentality and isolate yourselves further away from the rest of the world. Personally, I’m moving on.

Update: Here’s how typical regional bloggers are reacting.

.

0 Responses to * The Octavia Nasr Affair Proves That America Can't Handle Nuance

  2. Mustapha, I am like you but her statement is much more ambiguous than this. She wrote “One of Hezbollah’s giants I respect a lot.”

    What is this supposed to mean Mustapha? Has the party other “giants”? Is it made up of only giants? What does she exactly mean by “giants”? And why does she consider him a Hezbollah man when we know that there was continuous tension between the two?

    If anything, she should be fired for writing an unprofessional, probably ideologically confused, statement. At this stage you want to appear objective to your audience & this statment when it refers to “giants” it becomes controversial, especially for Americans “butchered” in the 80s in Beirut.

  3. Pingback: All Around the World News

  4. The words that mattered were “Sad to hear” rather than “I respect”.

    Fadallah was a thug and there was nothing to be sad about in his passing no matter how much respect he was due (for being a successful thug).

  5. This American reads your blog to try to understand. So help me out with this nuance problem I have.

    When Hezbollah leads hundreds of thousands of people to chant “Death to America”, is there some other meaning of the word “death” that I don’t understand? Do they say it with some sort of wink I’m not seeing?

  6. Pingback: Lebanese blogosphere weekly link roundup (2010/07/11) | +961

  7. Pingback: Lebanese List » Blog Archive » Lebanese blogosphere weekly link roundup (2010/07/11)