THE END OF THE ORIENTALIST CRITIQUE: Charles Paul Freund has a brilliant must-read piece in Reason Online which finds Edward Said and company definitely guilty of... Occidentalism! So how does Occidentalism differ from Orientalism? It doesn't!

Orientalism, the systematic stereotyping and degradation of Easterners that dehumanized them in the eyes of the West, enabled the colonial powers not only to mistreat whole populations, but also, in some of the West¹s blackest moments, to slaughter them in horrifying numbers. What makes it possible to commandeer passenger planes filled with innocent travelers, including children, and use them as bombs to murder thousands of people in office buildings? It is a systematic stereotyping and degradation of Westerners that dehumanizes them, and makes their death a pious deed for some and a cause for celebration for others. It is Occidentalism.