RIP Christopher Hitchens.
One of the greatest writer, orator, and intellectuals of our time.
"[Hitchens was a] valiant fighter against all tyrants including God" - Richard Dawkins
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RIP Christopher Hitchens.
One of the greatest writer, orator, and intellectuals of our time.
"[Hitchens was a] valiant fighter against all tyrants including God" - Richard Dawkins
He suffered greatly in the end and shared the experience in word just a few days ago. Sad.
He put the lie to innumerable myths, the last being, "There are no atheists in foxholes.
Though, as an aside, one CAN find erections in foxholes and foxes in assholes :)
I'll miss reading his columns, agreeing and disagreeing with his prolific mind.
RIP Christopher Hitchens, a great man and a great mind.
Hitchens in full flow ...
Christopher Hitchens on Jerry Falwell - YouTube
lol. Yeah he was a legend!
Here's a slightly more general video of him chatting about some things:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FS2H9...eature=related
A great provocateur - always true to himself and prepared to abandon any rigid lines of thinking. He said in his last interview that the one thing he was consistently against was authoritarianism.
Hitchens was an eloquent hypocrite, a man who wanted Kissinger put on trial for crimes against humanity, but who supported the violence of regime change in Iraq.
Some lives, it seems, are worth trashing -as long as its not his, or his friends and neighbours lives. Human rights, for Hitchens, are not universal, but a matter of selection -I think we are supposed to be grateful that this pompous, self-appointed judge of humanity decided, after 2001, that certain people only exist to be blown up by Hitchens and his friends.
That Hitchens should have believed that revolution from above, organised by elites - most of whom bear a not-so-startling resemblence to him- is preferable to popular revolutions from the base upwards is typical of someone whose politics was spawned in the sewer of Leninism -his hypocrisy was thus not exposed in his support for regime change in Iraq, but the attempt to prosecute Kissinger -intellectually, they became soul mates. This is a man who thinks Israel is a democratic state because its government is elected by the citizens of Israel, who then sees the occupation and brutalization of the Palestinians as a separate issue, because it is convenient that way -but it isn't convenient for the people who live under that particular regime, but mercifully for them, Hitchens was, and remains, an irelevance.
He suffered terribly from cancer, I would not wish that on anyone; he is now at rest.
A counterblast and a half from Stavros - matched somewhat by the merciless critique offered on BBC radio today by former fellow traveller Tariq Ali.
To be fair, we're all self-appointed judges. Moreover Hitchens had insufficient influence to have anyone or anything blown up. Kissinger did. But, yes, I was furious with Hitchens' perspective on the Iraq war and his cheerleading for the war on terror. I agree that on these issues Hitchens is irrelevant...unlike Kissinger, Hitchens did not have the ear of persons in power. On more individualistic issues, many found him and will continue to find his writings to be very relevant.