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/lit/ - Literature

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File: 247 KB, 1127x914, Hitchens.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
5951730 No.5951730 [Reply] [Original]

I miss him.

>> No.5951868

Anyone who doesn't should have died in his stead. Fuck this world. Agreement/disagreement becomes irrelevant amid the pleasure of watching a true raconteur at work, an anachronistic mix of eloquence and venom. God damn.

>> No.5951885

>>5951868
He just took a shit on everything and people without the will or eloquence to do the same looked upon him in awe. He is the self-insert into reality for wannabe intellectuals. I think I'll pass. He could be entertaining at times, but he warrant little more than a "meh" and hardly even a footnote in anything.

>> No.5951916

Daily reminder that you too one day shall die.

>> No.5951934

>>5951885
>He is the self-insert into reality for wannabe intellectuals.
Yeah, I hear that and I honestly think that's a cheap, shallow shot. Because he had the charisma and enigmatic personality to carry a lot of his aggressive points, it doesn't detract from his abilities as an public speaker and an essayist (of which gets overlooked too much). I will agree that his 'fanbase' can be absolutely insufferable, but I think that's more congruent with his contemporaries and their oeuvre.

>> No.5952353

>>5951730

>tfw all people will remember him for is his anti-theism

that was a big part of what he did, especially once it started getting him millions of dollars, but damn this nigger was one hell of a journalist.

His writing is masterful, whether or not you agree with him. I will miss him entirely because of his eloquence.

>> No.5952363

I'm not glad he's dead, but I'm glad he's gone.

>> No.5952379

>>5952363
yeah me too

>> No.5952384

>>5952363
>>5952379
typical spineless knee-benders

>> No.5952401

>>5951730
Fuck off. Alexander Cockburn was twice the mind and man that Hitchens was, and he rightly called Hitchens out for being a scuzzy hypocrite

>> No.5952412

i wish he had stuck to writing about mother teresa and etc. frauds

>> No.5952416

>>5952384
The world could do with less neocon warmongers.

>> No.5952434

>>5952416
This, fuck him. We can do without the morons dumb enough to be blinded by wit and rhetoric.

>> No.5952441

>>5952416
The world wasn't shifted at his one political misstep, you yapping Trotskyist.

>> No.5952444

>>5952441
The world was not shifted by anything Hitchens did

>> No.5952446

>>5952434
No one moved to do anything by anyone. The world is once again safe for the monied elites.
Very postmodern of you.

>> No.5952449

>>5952446
>No one moved to do anything by anyone.
People ought to be moved by sound arguments grounded in facts, logic, and substantive responses to opposing viewpoints, not by Hitchens' brand of eloquent sophistry.

>> No.5952454
File: 47 KB, 403x392, frog.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
5952454

>watching interviews where reza aslan takes cheap shots at Hitchens by using subtle fallacies the average viewer is too dumb to understand or too trustful of his academic credentials to question

funny how he popped out of the woodwork to occupy the void left behind by hitchens and tries to pass himself off as well known in the world of religious debate

That Hitchens can't defend himself against this onslaught is one of the great injustices of this world

>> No.5952458

>>5952441

ask the current residents of the mosul. they might have done well without hitch's iraq war cheerleading.

>> No.5952459

I don't understand his position on Iraq/US imperialism. Even after the fact, he wouldn't admit he was wrong.

>> No.5952463

>>5952459

his position is that the US is a moral agent, and it has a duty to inflict itself on everyone else.

>> No.5952475

>>5952454
>tries to pass himself off as well known in the world of religious debate

Neither Hitchens nor Aslan is a serious figure in "the world of religious debate." They are pop-intellectuals, not serious top-shelf scholars by any means.

>>5952463
His position is naive and reductive. He is no better than the Christian Crusaders, only he substitutes Liberalism vs. Repressive Islamism in place of Christianity vs. Islam. He readily points to Saddam's violations of international law when he defends Iraq, but in the face of the blatant illegality and absence of any aggression or belligerence in Afghanistan, he quickly pulls out "America is an free country liberating the oppressed people of Afghanistan."

Regardless of whether or not you think this is a noble or just goal, you're an idiot if you think it is realistic or pragmatic in any way. Hitchens lived long enough to see the fundamental fallacies of humanitarian intervention take effect in Iraq and Afghanistan, but he could've lived for a thousand years and we'd never have seen him admit it.

>> No.5952482

>>5952475
speak for yourself fedoratron

Reza has four PhD's in theology and the history of religions.

>> No.5952486

>>5952444
So why so much butthurt over him and not calls for Bush, Cheney etc to be put on trial?

>>5952458
>they might have done well without hitch's iraq war cheerleading.
He was not a Washington insider.

>> No.5952495

>>5952486
>So why so much butthurt over him and not calls for Bush, Cheney etc to be put on trial?
This isn't a thread about the Bush administration, it's a thread about Hitchens. Outside of this thread there are way more people calling for trials for Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Gonzales/Yoo than there are people speaking Hitchens.

>>5952482
Yes, I'm not saying he's not established or that he's a hack. But next to someone like John Esposito, he and his work are not particularly great or held in high esteem in academia.

>> No.5952500

>>5952416
>Thinks some wars are justified
>Warmonger

Fuck off pacifist

>> No.5952503

"I'm not happy that he's gone, but I'm glad he didn't exist." - Richard Feynman

>> No.5952510

>>5952500
>thinks Iraq was justified
>not a warmonger

>> No.5952514

>>5952500
Every warmonger thinks their war is justified. Hitchens openly advocated for two wars of aggression. He was a warmonger.

>> No.5952528

>>5951730
Why?

>> No.5952657

>>5952500
>pacifist
You think this is the 60's and you get some macho points for being pro-war?

Get out of here Cumia, people shouldn't suffer due to your insecurities

>> No.5952665

>>5952486
>He was not a Washington insider.

he had a hand in convincing the administration to go to war with iraq. in his memoir he mentions meeting with the bush administration to plead his case for going to war with iraq, among other things.

>> No.5952680

>>5952475

i was thinking about this today. i think hitch had a cartoonish and overestimated idea of the "just war." his father was a naval commander during WWII and i think in some ways he always wanted to measure up fight the Just Fight just like his stoic, dignified old man. this of course conveniently ignores the fact that the Good War is a pretty uncommon thing, and that most wars are either purely wicked or only partly wicked. he was overestimating how common a thing it is, and in his eagerness attached himself to some pretty questionable adventures.

>> No.5952785

his turn towards neoconservativism is unsurprising the more you read about the man. whichever vehicle allowed him to best be the anti-fascist, ass-kicking toughguy he believed himself to be is what he aligned himself with. at the dawn of the 21st century this turned out to be the american conservatives.

>> No.5952788

>>5952785
why not fight the patriarchy? ;-;

>> No.5952793

>>5952788

i don't ever remember reading anything he wrote on feminism, but there was that dust up over an article he wrote on women not being funny.

this of course was already well after everyone on the left hated him.

>> No.5952795

>>5952680
>>5952785

these are two very excellent posts, by the way. the progressive left should have seen him for what he was. left/right ideology was in a way not even the point for hitchens. he was just about what he believed was good vs evil.

>> No.5952856

>>5952785
A lot of Trots became neocons.

>> No.5952870

>>5952856

yep, and for that very same reason, i think.

>> No.5952875

>>5952793
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sWV_CJ1WU78#t=335

>> No.5952881

>>5952856
yeah and I get really really tinfoil hat over that

>> No.5952887

>>5952875

well, there you go. this further supports the points i made upthread about his seemingly progressive politics being based more on us vs them/good vs evil macho principals than anything truly egalitarian.

>> No.5952890

>>5952887
*principles

>> No.5952920

there has been better. he was a showman, sure, but i'm afraid that's it. history will not be very kind to him, i don't think.

>> No.5952923

>>5952875
>"I aspire to take care of my partner"
>labeled a sexist
What a dumb broad

>> No.5952940

>>5952788
Because that's retarded. There's nothing there, but fangirl novels and imaginary slights

>> No.5952951
File: 714 KB, 600x782, Peter Hitchens Thomas Cranmer.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
5952951

His brother Peter is far superior.

>> No.5953055

>>5952875

What does /lit/ think about his linking of creative writing ability to music that he talks about in the opening of this video?

>> No.5953087

>>5952353
Don't worry we'll remember him as a disgusting imperialist also.

>> No.5953107

>>5952353
I'll remember him as a gin soaked popinjay

>> No.5953177

It's a right shame that he's so often maligned as taking the usual life guided course of Left-to-Right, as if it were the usual pre-prepared navigation on a sat-nav. The more your read about his life and his own excursions to Iraq and the Middle East, he talks about the general atmosphere and pervading sense of dread during the Saddam regime and it's quite obvious that he became emotionally invested in the cause. Having come back with such a vivid picture of what life was actually like over there, reading his stuff, you empathise with his decision to support the invasion.

What really surprises me is that he has defended himself and articulated his reasoning so well and so eloquently but that his opponents still clutch at the same points that he himself has repeatedly rebutted.

>> No.5953303

>>5952510
You can take issue with how the war was conducted, but certainly not the moral reasoning, surely?

>> No.5953982

>>5953303
>we need to be able to sell oil for a certain price to maintain our power
>this dude is selling cheap oil and undermining our power
>let's fuck the Middle East up and justify it with lies
>whoops we found a more cost-efficient way of producing oil, let's bail and leave the region in tatters
>muh Amurrican morals

>> No.5954036

>>5951730
Eloquent, Incendiary, and my political opposite. One of the few men that truly made me think. I miss him, too, OP.

>> No.5954053

>>5953982
>oversimplifying 101

you shouldn't post on 4chan like you post on facebook

>> No.5954096

>>5954053
Google some essays written by experts on the subject if you want to be properly educated. This shit isn't even literature.

>> No.5954382

http://www.academia.edu/2049233/Neoconservatives_and_Trotskyism_

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-purest-neocon/

>> No.5954456

>>5954382
http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/articles/0304/0304neocontrotp1.htm

good backup to those