How long can one keep caring about people who don’t care about themselves?

Jeff in England sent me an e-mail from the Daily Mail with this article headline and summary:

Radical Islamic sect “has half of Britain’s mosques in its grip.”
Nearly half of Britain’s mosques are under the control of a radical Islamic sect whose leading preacher strongly opposes Western values.

I replied:

Wake me when the British are ready to DO something about this.

My comment to Jeff represents a mood, not a final position, but it’s not without significance. Years ago I had a similar feeling about the Republican party. Along with other conservatives, I used to get all stirred up by unfair attacks by the left on Republican politicians. Then I realized that the Republicans themselves didn’t seem to mind these attacks. It was so odd. The Republicans would be viciously smeared, and conservative commentators would get all upset about it, but the Republicans themselves never seemed to notice, or at least they never reacted. At a certain point I thought, if the targets of the smears don’t care that they’re being smeared, why should I care?

Posted by Lawrence Auster at September 13, 2007 09:28 AM | Send