http://news.yahoo.com/nyc-subway-ads-call-defeat-jihad-savages-161817278–abc-news-topstories.html
“The American Freedom Defense Initiative is principally a venture made up of Gellar and author Robert Spencer, who runs the website Jihad Watch. The organization is listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Gellar noted they have more than 30,000 Facebook followers, donors, and participants in their events.”
I totally get where this lady is coming from. It is intoxicating to be outrageous and have a following. Russ Martin the Dallas radio talk show host, sold t-shirts back at the beginning of the Iraq war that said Give War a Chance. Myself, I saw no reason to give war a chance. Didn’t seem to make any sense at all. The only value I could see in it was the publicity cache.
This lady is getting attention, far out of proportion to what is warranted. The message certainly is ugly. But, the ad doesn’t say Hate Islam. It says Defeat Jihad, which is one aspect of Islam which has come to connote and seem savage.
She is stirring the pot. Her prior acts have persuaded the Klan Watch that her organization is a hate group. The Klan Watch of the Southern Poverty Law Center doesn’t usually list you without reasons. But she is expressing what many like her believe. And I have to support that. While I despise hate groups and what they stand for I respect the right to hate. I can hate the message but it serves me ill to hate the messenger. Of course those that know me know that if the acts of violence come to me I will meet them with resistance.
I wonder if she joined her brethren in Tennessee last week for the White Supremacist convention. (White supremacists to gather in Tenn. http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2012/09/14/white-supremacists-to-gather-in-tenn/57779764/1 ) Can you imagine such a gathering. Some saying sig heils and some saying “niggers did this”, and “wetbacks did that”, and “those sand nigger and their burqua wearing bitches are all terrorists”. I mean who wouldn’t call that a good time after a case of beer and some salty nuts?
We must allow this message of hate to be broadcast. But we should never stop being vigilant against the acts of violence they incite. It is a price to be paid in a society that values free speech. Yes, yes, I know that calling this a free society can be an exaggeration at times.
I honestly do not understand this Christian right feeling so put upon or so frightened by other cultures. What a terrible spiritual prison to be incarcerated in. I have hated with the best of them. I reveled in it. It felt right. Just like a lot of bad things I have done, which also felt right when I was doing them. As I look back I marvel at the lack of awareness I suffered in my arrogance and in self-will. What religious person looks forward to walking in the sunshine of the spirit with hate in their heart.
Through all my angry and hateful times I could still recognize the power and rightness of Martin Luther King and his message. If the Muslims who encounter the message of hate and they retaliate, then they would be part of the self-fulfilling prophesy that Jihad equals Islam.
I hope like the Nazi march in Skokie IL, the number of actual Nazi sympathizers is so negligible as to embarrass those of us waiting to disrupt them. You speak and travel freely. I will do likewise and when I run into this paid for message of hate, I hope I give it no more than a nominal amount of attention and then move on to better things.
lawdisorder.blog 