the road to hell

[popecrunch]

A few days ago, the construction site of a Muslim community center in a suburb of Nashville, TN was attacked by arsonists. Construction equipment was damaged and destroyed. Although no person or group has come forward to claim credit for the attack, the message is clear and echoed by members of the local community: No Muslims Allowed

Comments

[chipuni]

I've never said that people think the same, believe the same, and act the same through their lives. People do change; people can grow; people can develop. I've developed, I've changed. And you have.

What I'm saying is that people rarely change from their internal hatred. I want to give three examples from my own life:

My parents are convinced that all blacks are shiftless and stupid. Reality -- that my wife has gotten an MLIS, has received her J. D., and has passed the bar -- has still not changed their mind. Their sense of self-worth comes from believing that their skin color makes them better, smarter, and harder working than people of different skin colors.

My mother's parents were convinced that all non-Estonians are shiftless and stupid. Reality -- that my father successfully ran several businesses -- had not changed their mind. Their sense of self-worth came from believing that their ethnicity makes them better, smarter, and harder working than people of different ethnicities.

At my last job, two of my co-workers were convinced that they were the only ones who were Right. Even when a different solution proved that it worked correctly, they would demand that it be re-written to match their One True Solution. Their sense of self-worth came from believing that their ideas made them better and smarter than people with different ideas. (It didn't matter that one of the other people they were arguing with was a former Computer Science professor with thirty years' experience in major projects and academia.)

Those were all internally-generated hatreds, tied to their sense of self-worth.

But I'm going to say something shocking: after a lot of thought, I don't believe that the current wave of Islamophobia is an internally-generated hatred. I think that it can shift dramatically, led by orators.

I believe that people are really angry over the recession -- and turning that anger in dozens of directions.

I've said my piece. Feel free to respond; I don't want to drag this on any more. I'll read your response, but I'll be quiet on this topic now.

[popecrunch]

Islamophobia being a misdirected economy terror wasn't an angle I had considered, I'll have to give that some thought. Thanks for the new perspective.

[kibbles]

My husband's grandparents were the same way as your parents but they eventually accepted his parents, despite their internal hatred of blacks. Actually now she spends more time talking to my mother in law than my father in law.

I've been challenged with a lot of my internal dislikes and hates, and have managed to let go of them. Even personal ones where people caused me serious physical harm. It's hard but it can be done. Can't say why or why not, but it happens. I've seen it with others, too.

I'll have to agree with you with the Islamaphobia -- it's not internal, not so much. Because look how long it's taken to come out. We first went into all these wars with a heroic attitude. We were bringing freedom and democracy to them. We were HELPING. Not that I believe it, but we were partners with them to bring a new something or other whoI knows what kind of bullshit, but it was doing them a favor. And hey, we're all in this together! It's just a code word for outsider, brown people who are different, who have name similarities to a president that we don't like because of dingdingding his skin color more than anything and it's just really messy and ugly.

And as a NYer now living outside (and who has deep personal reasons to be upset over 9/11 without going into the gory details) of NYC, I get infuriated to see people who never set foot in NYC and never would have because it was a regular godless city full of thugs and whores and crack, waving the flag over the concept of the towers trying to avenge deaths of people they never liked in the first place.

Bleah.

[chipuni]

Thanks for your response. :->

[kibbles]

You're welcome, and then an hour later I remembered there ARE still family members that dislike my MIL and was sad again. :(

[kibbles]

And YET they think that, but my husband (who is actually working on the memorial currently) says that most everyone is against the mosque (he said he would work on it ESPECIALLY if it had overtime), and there ARE huge pockets of conservativism.

And of course, me out here in Iowa now, we're actually pretty liberal with a lot of stuff, and we haven't fallen apart yet. (Same sex marriage, working on medical marijuana, stuff like that...)

[popecrunch]

As a sidebar, a godless city full of thugs and whores and crack sounds like my kind of town.