I just waded through most of the thread, which mostly involves Magellan being unmercifully pilloried for suggesting that anybody should be “wary” of Middle Easterners. I don’t myself agree with the position, but the total lack of credence given to his subsequent arguments (until the last page or so) smacks of a bunch of left-wingers screaming “Heresy!!”.
Under certain circumstances, both average Americans and the American security establishment are justified in counting evident Moslem belief as one factor that contributes to a feeling of disquiet. In conjunction with other behaviors that are not solely incriminating by themselves (e.g., recently entered the country, odd behavior, no visible means of support, etc.), a feeling of wariness is both inevitable and appropriate.
This wariness is usually unfounded; and, in the case of the security establishment, often results in false-positive harassment. I think that average Moslems should understand why these injustices are, if not necessary, at least understandable. If Westerners feel a certain sense of dread around Moslems, it is much more a consequence of the recent actions and attitudes of Fundamentalist Islam than an expression of the age-old proclivity of humans to engage in racial stereotyping.
I am sure that left-wing witch-hunters, ever in search of the racism that they believe must lie at the foundation of all injustice, will think I have improperly reversed the last statement. So be it, but understand that I don’t for one minute think that bowing toward Mecca, even in an airport, is any reason to be wary. I am in favor of profiling, but a profile that begins and ends with “Moslem” should not stir the threat meter.
Good grief - I leave my Pit thread for a while and a Great Debate breaks out.
But first things first: sorry, eleanorigby, but I’m very married, complete with irrepressible two-year-old daughter. Being landed gentry would be nice but I’m an American ex-pat who has been here for 14 years and I’m just lucky they haven’t deported me yet. I shall regretfully decline the flirtation, although if I’d known that women go for a good rant I would have tried this ages ago.
I understand the course of your reasoning here but Magellan is being pilloried for suggesting that we need to be “wary” without committing to any statement of how this wariness should manifest itself nor how he envisions us identifying specific individuals to be wary of, and in those unmentioned details lie a lot of devils. It’s all very well to say “We should be afraid of scary people” but potential actions deriving from that statement cover a very wide range of actions from simply feeling mild anxiety occasionally to organising a police state and requiring everyone to carry identification papers. Without further context, the statement is so broad as to be meaningless.
Look at the debate over the Arizona immigration law. Very few people want illegal immigrants to escape any punishment for entering the US state illegally - what the kerfuffle is about is the potential it provides for the police to harass anyone looking vaguely Mexican and to require even legal US citizens to carry proof of citizenship on them when out in public. Now, the police may not be so extreme in their behavior and may in fact be sensibly circumspect in application, but I consider the best measure of a law the extent to which it can be abused. Similarly, if we start requiring all Muslims to endure special scrutiny purely for being Muslims, we are already stepping onto the slippery slope of treating them all as “others”. That way lies internment camps.
Someone (I believe it was wmfellows) pointed out several pages back that the thing to take away from attacks by Islamic radicals is not that Muslims are dangerous but that radicals are dangerous. And for that you must monitor not faith nor faces but behaviors and actions. Painting the entire Muslim community everywhere as potential terrorists is not the answer and ostensibly muddies the waters of appropriate security supervision. Eternal vigilance, not stereotyping, is the price of freedom.
We object to suicide bombings because 1) other people are doing them to us, and 2) we can’t exact our revenge on the perpetrators because they’re already dead. It’s very frustrating. But our national rhetoric is filled with stuff about people giving their lives for their country. We’re perfectly fine with guerilla warfare and people killing themselves for a cause as long as it’s ours.
Ever see the film Red Dawn? America is invaded by Russia, and a group of teenagers in Colorado start a guerilla war against the occupying forces. At one point they blow up a post office which could (and probably does) have civilians in it. Later, one of the characters is wounded and is left behind with a hand grenade to blow up the enemy troops following (with the understanding that she would die too). She ends up dying before the troops reach her, but the grenade goes off when they move her body.
It’s okay, people! I take it all back! Valteron has read a book. Two books, even. Which makes him an expert on Islam, over anything anyone else has to say on the subject.
When will someone teach you how to think, Valteron?
It’s irrelevant anyway - nobody here is “appeasing” anyone. It is not appeasement to declare that in fact a rather substantial percentage of Muslims are not planning on killing anyone and especially not Valteron. He may give *himself *an aneurysm, but there’s nothing we can do about that.
My only point was, if you are going to shore up your arguments with the words of someone famous, don’t use a bulldog-faced, racist fuck like Churchill’s.
Another dream dashed. I’m crestfallen.
Perhaps you could put it aside and use the info for later. Congrats on your little girl.
Exactly.
I agree. I don’t see that protesting against racial profiling (or ethnic or religious) is being a liberal apologist or not keeping American safe (and what does that even mean? There will always be people who want to take down governments or established order.) Muslims seem to be the Communists of our day to some people. There is also this, which no one here (in particularly magellan) seems to be willing to provide: by what criteria are these dangerous-type Muslims to be identified? And someone please show me where it is ONLY Muslims that want to harm America (or EU etc). It’s more that destroyers use Islam as a beard for their evil. An important distinction, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it escapes a few here.
Your idea of “correction” seems a bit off to me. It’s “you’re” not “your”, welcome, btw. Just being magnanimous back at you. So you admit that you cannot discern the radicalized Muslim from the peaceful, law abiding one. And yet your solution is to treat them all as potential criminals. To use terms you may be familiar with: that’ll win some hearts and minds right there. (That was sarcasm. I make a point to delineate it because you seem–at least in this thread–to lack a sense of perspective and humor).
I will note that I can not, at first blush, identify which L-containing users discriminate based upon religion, so I must, once again, be wary of all of them.
Should all Catholics be looked upon as potential sexual predators because of the child molestation scandals? No? And if not, then I find it hard to justify looking at all Muslims as potential terrorists, given that Catholicism is a whole lot more centralized, standardized and unified.
Looks very much like ignorance promulgated, to me.
People of German (and Italian and Bulgarian) ancestry were treated very differently than Japanese.
In the case of the Europeans, foreign nationals were investigated, one at a time, by the FBI and, if deemed a threat, were interned. Depending on the individual situation, a person might or might not be detained during the investigation. (A number of U.S. citizens were also initially interned, based on marital relations with or parenthood by the foreign nationals.) Those of Japanese ancestry were rounded up without any effort to actually investigate their loyalty or actions and were all summarily placed in camps regardless of citizenship.
Pretending that the “same thing” happened to Germans and Japanese is simply promoting ignorance.
But you’ll agree that promoting ignorance is consistent with his world view. Even IF the Germans were treated the same way as the Japanese, that wouldn’t excuse or justify treating Muslims the same way. I know you know this, but it bears repeating for the more concrete operational among us.
It wasn’t ok when we did to the Native Americans, the Japanese or the Communists, and it’s not ok to do it now.
It all depends how you define the words you put in quotes, doesn’t it? If you define them as “being interned”, yesm the same thing happened. Did they go through the same process? No they didn’t. And no one said they did. elanorigby was under the impression that only the Japanese were interned (which is how I took her post, anyway, and she didn’t correct that impression). I put an an end to that bit of ignorance with a couple of sentences. Your imputing that I said that they went through the same process, as well. Nope, didn’t say it. Because I know that’s not the case. At the very least, the sheer numbers of Germans on the east coast made treating them the same as the Japanese (even if the desire to do so was there) quite impractical.
So, you were wrong about my promulgating ignorance, except in those who imagined me saying the same things that you imagined. On the bright side you’ve helped further fight elanorigby’s ignorance. I’m sure she appreciates it.
If you think the answer is me in either case, show where I did. As far as I recall I’ve been arguing for extra wariness, and have been mum on any steps that should be taken.
I disagree. We have identified a threat: that some Muslims want to kill Americans (as evidenced by the list earlier). It makes sense that we would try to prevent that group (those who want to kill, or abet in the killing of, Americans) from further success. So right off the bat, we can narrow our scope from the 300,000+ million people in the U.S. and concentrate on about 2.5 million. Sounds like a very effective first step, if you ask me. You’ve cut the threat to less than 1% of the population.
Well, I apologize for that. I perhaps did impute motive to where there wasn’t any. But rest assured, Rev, even the worst I might think of you is something admirable.
And again, I think you really need to look an intent. What is the intent of Powell’s Shock and Awe Doctrine? It is to show the military and political leadership of a country that the military might of the U.S. cannot be withstood, so you best give up pronto. It’s intent is not to kill innocent civilians. If it were, schools and hospitals and markets would be the actual targets—and easy ones at that. Not only are they not the targets, considerable steps are taken to accomplish “Shock and Awe” while minimizing the deaths of innocents.
My mistake then. I misread your intent.
I look at the threat identified by the list offered earlier. I conclude that I would like those things to be stopped or minimized. To do so, I wonder if there is a pattern. I see a pattern in that all were committed by Muslim radicals. I cannot identify that group specifically, so I see if there is a group I can identify. There is, because in the U.S., Muslims represent less than 1% of the population. I see that as a great starting point for scrutiny. As I look more closely, I can focus more effectively (after I become Emperor).
What does the presence of an additional threat have to do with anything? Just because you have flood insurance on your home doesn’t mean you don’t need fire insurance.
I know why they’re used. That doesn’t mean they are justifiable. But if if they are, it does not put them on the same moral footing as collateral damage.
We’re talking about intent. this is something the law recognizes and takes into account. Not all bad acts are morally equivalent.
I think they we need to be willing to draw a line in the sand and say that driving a truck load of explosives into a grammar school playground and killing and maiming little kids is UNACCEPTABLE. And if you do that, you will be viewed for the barbaric animals you are. Period. I can’t believe that you and others are not willing to draw that line. That doesn’t make U.S. bombing campaigns wine and roses, but the two are not morally equivalent, due to intent.
Excellent.
Why is it one or the other? You should be afraid to walk down an alley at night in a bad part of town. And you should be careful who you leave your baby daughter with. You should try to prevent both you being raped and her being molested. I would think you’d prefer if neither of you were blown up, as well. Muslim radicals are the group who would want to achieve that. (In the U.S., any way.) They’ve already tried to blow people up. They’ve already succeeded. Radical Islam has stated that they are planning further attacks. Now, we can’t identify who the radical Muslims are. But it would be great if we could identify them, right? Well, we do know that they will be a subset of Muslims. So we start there.
