The Passion; Eschatological Racism or Hermeneutic Oppression?
By Noam ChomskyWith regard to the Mel Gibson's The Passion, since what is called The Passion is largely unfamiliar to me, let me replace it by "X," and see if I understand the argument against X. Let's consider several kinds of properties attributed to X:
First category. X is dominated by "the white male gender." It is "limited by cultural, racial and gender biases," and "establishes and perpetuates social organization with hidden political, social and economic purposes." X is "thoroughly embedded in capitalist colonialism," and doesn't "end racism or disrupt the patriarchy." X has been invoked by Christians to bring people to "embrace regimentation, murderous collectivization, and worse"; though no one mentions it, X has been used by Nazi ideologists for the same ends. X's dominance "has gone unchallenged." It has been "used to create new forms of control mediated through political and economic power." Ludicrous claims about X have been made by "state systems" which "used X for astoundingly destructive purposes...to create new forms of control mediated through political and economic power as it emerged in each system."
Conclusion: there is "something inherently wrong" with X. We must reject or transcend it, replacing it by something else; and we must instruct poor and suffering people to do so likewise. More generally, we must take a vow of silence and induce the world's victims to do so likewise since language and its use typically have all these properties, facts too well-known to discuss.1