The Week’s daily round-up highlights the five best opinion pieces from across the British and international media, with excerpts from each.
1. Rebecca Bodenheimer in CNN
on a misstep by a usually-woke awards show
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How the Golden Globes missed the mark
“Many people presumably take the stance on the Golden Globes that Gervais took: It's just an awards show, and not even a well-respected one at that. But it's still considered to have an impact on Oscar nominations, and calling oneself a Golden Globe winner can help an actor command a higher rate. For a director, it might mean the difference between getting your next movie funded or not. So, inclusion isn't just an abstract concept - it matters.”
2. Michelle Goldberg in the New York Times
on death and destruction in the Middle East
The nightmare stage of Trump’s rule is here
“Unlike with North Korea, it’s difficult to imagine any photo op or exchange of love letters defusing the crisis the president has created. Most of this country has never accepted Trump, but over the past three years, many have gotten used to him, lulled into uneasy complacency by an establishment that has too often failed to treat him as a walking national emergency. Now the nightmare phase of the Trump presidency is here. The biggest surprise is that it took so long.”
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3. Hamid Dabashi in Al Jazeera
on revisiting Christianity in 2020
Decolonising Jesus Christ
“The figure of Jesus Christ has come to represent many different visions and served various functions throughout time and across geography. As we mark the 2020th anniversary of his birth, amid global turmoil, tension and uncertainty, perhaps the multiplicity of meanings he has embodied should have us rethink dominant narratives among Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and other believers worldwide.”
4. Jane Dalton in The Independent
on plant-based piety
Vegans have won this court case – but they're losing hearts and minds
“To me, being a dietary vegan is pretty ethical already. But resorting to the law to enforce one’s rights is hardly the best way to promote support for one’s views. The perception of vegans as shouty turns many people off veganism; nobody likes to think something is being foisted on them, or that they’re being judged. Indeed, many people react badly to it.”
5. Kapil Komireddi in the New Statesman
on the Modification of India
Is India still a democracy?
“In 2019, many well-heeled media personalities in Delhi and Mumbai were appalled when India was ranked 140 in the World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders. That the world’s largest democracy was ranked so low was, to them, proof of an international conspiracy to discredit Modi. Many now loudly denounce the aggressive coverage of the prime minister as a left-wing conspiracy against India, from foreign publications that once swooned over Modi. What such fulminations don’t account for is all that is happening around them in India: the silencing of critics, the hacking apart of intrepid reporters and the quashing of dissent. The democratic content of the republic is being hollowed out, but the people believing themselves to be the guardians of democracy are concerned most of all with image. India, you see, has become Modified.”
