2 posts tagged “prejudice”
hmmm
do i have your attention?
which of the above did i just read right here on a VOXblog?
three guesses
.
.
.
if you guessed Islam, you would be correct
yes, folks, i was perusing VOX the other day and found this blog headline:
"Proposed Constitutional Amendment Against Islam"
was i curious?
is the Pope...oh, never mind
needless to say, i read the thing and found myself utterly appalled
some moron has "drafted" an "amendment"/petition to ban the practice of Islam from the US
it's not going to happen or anything - it's just some stupid thing on one of those petition sites - but the whole idea of it is really disgusting
i won't bore you with the details - or sicken you - i felt physically ill while reading the "amendment"
look - we need PEACE on this earth - as long as people like these are contributing to the spread of this kind of hate speech, we're not going to achieve that peace
they can go on and on about how this religion or that religion is crap - and how THEIR religion is the BEST EVER, but NONE of it will lead to any kind of understanding between religious cultures and peoples
here's the thing...
i follow none of the religions above
as a matter of a fact, for those of you who don't already know, i'm quite happily atheist, or "godless", or an "unbeliever" or whatever hole you want to pigeon me in
judge me if you must...
but, i believe in Freedom of Religion (which yes, includes my right NOT to be religious)
even suggesting something like this goes against EVERYTHING i believe that America stands for
(regardless of the fact that a number of these ideals are being compromised as we speak)
is this even a sane thing to propose?
no
it's sane if you want to punish the entire Muslim population of the United States for actions they had nothing to do with
it's sane if you want to alienate a lot of the planet - and much of the US
it's sane if you want the rest of the world to think the US is full of horrible, bigoted imbeciles
it's sane if you want to engender fear, hatred and prejudice on all sides
WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE?
Enough is Enough!
Get a Grip!
YOU are not the only ones on THIS EARTH!
YOU do not get to say which RELIGION people can follow!
YOU are obviously dangerous fanatics!
YOU are clearly insane!
and that's my rant for today
thank you
p.s. the op-ed below, is a fitting end to this post
From the Los Angeles Times
Muslim true/false
April 2, 2008
Winning hearts and minds -- the Bush administration, foreign policy wonks, even the U.S. military agree that this is the key to any victory over global terrorism. Yet our public diplomacy program has made little progress on improving America's image. Few seem to recognize that American ignorance of Islam and Muslims has been the fatal flaw.
How much do Americans know about the views and beliefs of Muslims around the world? According to polls, not much. Perhaps not surprising, the majority of Americans (66%) admit to having at least some prejudice against Muslims; one in five say they have "a great deal" of prejudice. Almost half do not believe American Muslims are "loyal" to this country, and one in four do not want a Muslim as a neighbor.
Why should such anti-Muslim bias concern us? First, it undermines the war on terrorism: Situations are misdiagnosed, root causes are misidentified and bad prescriptions do more harm than good. Second, it makes our public diplomacy sound like double-talk. U.S. diplomats are trying to convince Muslims around the world that the United States respects them and that the war on terrorism is not out to destroy Islam. Their task is made infinitely more difficult by the frequent airing of anti-Muslim sentiment on right-wing call-in radio, which is then heard around the world on the Internet.
Finally, public ignorance weakens our democracy at election time. Instead of a well-informed citizenry choosing our representatives, we are rendered vulnerable to manipulative fear tactics. We need look no further than the political attacks on Barack Obama. Any implied connection to Islam -- attending a Muslim school in Indonesia, the middle name Hussein -- is wielded to suggest that he is unfit for the presidency and used as fuel for baseless rumors.
Anti-Muslim sentiment fuels misinformation, and is fueled by it -- misinformation that is squarely contradicted by evidence.
Starting in 2001, the research firm Gallup embarked on the largest, most comprehensive survey of its kind, spending more than six years polling a population that represented more than 90% of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims. The results showed plainly that much of the conventional wisdom about Muslims -- views touted by U.S. policymakers and pundits and accepted by voters -- is simply false.
For instance, Gallup found that 72% of Americans disagreed with this statement: "The majority of those living in Muslim countries thought men and women should have equal rights." In fact, majorities in even some of the most conservative Muslim societies directly refute this assessment: 73% of Saudis, 89% of Iranians and 94% of Indonesians say that men and women should have equal legal rights. Majorities of Muslim men and women in dozens of countries around the world also believe that a woman should have the right to work outside the home at any job for which she is qualified (88% in Indonesia, 72% in Egypt and even 78% in Saudi Arabia), and to vote without interference from family members (87% in Indonesia, 91% in Egypt, 98% in Lebanon).
What about Muslim sympathy for terrorism? Many charge that Islam encourages violence more than other faiths, but studies show that Muslims around the world are at least as likely as Americans to condemn attacks on civilians. Polls show that 6% of the American public thinks attacks in which civilians are targets are "completely justified." In Saudi Arabia, this figure is 4%. In Lebanon and Iran, it's 2%.
Moreover, it's politics, not piety, that drives the small minority -- just 7% -- of Muslims to anti-Americanism at the level of condoning the attacks of 9/11. Looking across majority-Muslim countries, Gallup found no statistical difference in self-reported religiosity between those who sympathized with the attackers and those who did not. When respondents in select countries were asked in an open-ended question to explain their views of 9/11, those who condemned it cited humanitarian as well as religious reasons. For example, 20% of Kuwaitis who called the attacks "completely unjustified" explained this position by saying that terrorism was against the teachings of Islam. A respondent in Indonesia went so far as to quote a direct verse from the Koran prohibiting killing innocents. On the other hand, not a single respondent who condoned the attacks used the Koran as justification. Instead, they relied on political rationalizations, calling the U.S. an imperialist power or accusing it of wanting to control the world.
If most Muslims truly reject terrorism, why does it continue to flourish in Muslim lands? What these results indicate is that terrorism is much like other violent crime. Violent crimes occur throughout U.S. cities, but that is no indication of Americans' general acceptance of murder or assault. Likewise, continued terrorist violence is not proof that Muslims tolerate it. Indeed, they are its primary victims.
Still, the typical American cannot be blamed for these misperceptions. Media-content analyses show that the majority of U.S. TV news coverage of Islam is sharply negative. Americans are bombarded every day with news stories about Muslims and majority-Muslim countries in which vocal extremists, not evidence, drive perceptions.
Rather than allow extremists on either side to dictate how we discuss Islam and the West, we need to listen carefully to the voices of ordinary people. Our victory in the war on terrorism depends on it.
John L. Esposito is an Islamic studies professor at Georgetown University. Dalia Mogahed is executive director of the Center for Muslim Studies at Gallup. They co-wrote "Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think."
This is the name of the article i read today from March 20th in the L.A. Times http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-kramer20mar20,0,4477514.story?track=mostviewed-storylevel
(i only just read the article because while we were away for over five weeks in the states, i save all my articles to read later - so, i'm a little behind)
anyways, this article was written by Larry Kramer, who is an author and founder of the the group, ACT UP (a protest group) - he is also, simply, a 71-year old gay man trying to live in a society that can't bring itself to accept him for who his is
and i gotta say, i don't get it - hate for gay and lesbian people - what is everyone's problem, really? - are jokes at the expense of the gay community that funny? - why does it seem like the ultimate sacrifice in a political career to admit support for gays? - have some decency, people! - we're all people - who cares if a guy chooses to love another guy or a woman chooses to love another woman - and who cares if a person chooses to love both men and women - who cares! - what i find really intolerable (and is addressed in the Kramer article as well) is that we treat gay people as second-class citizens, merely because of whom they love - and that it's sanctioned by the government and by other people in power and quite acceptable to be so openly bigoted in this way - it's just as ridiculous as treating people differently because of race or color or class (i hate that word) - they are us! - just people - trying to live in this world
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