Fears rise over growing anti-Muslim feeling in U.S.

[ck4829]

Amid threats of Koran burning and a heated dispute over a planned Muslim cultural center in New York, Muslim leaders and rights activists warn of growing anti-Muslim feeling in America partly provoked for political reasons.

"Many people now treat Muslims as 'the other' -- as something to vilify and to discriminate against," said Daniel Mach of the American Civil Liberties Union.

And, he said, some people have exploited that fear in the media, "for political gain or cheap notoriety."

The imam leading the project to build the cultural center, including a prayer room, near the site of the September 11, 2001 attacks said there was a rise of what he called "Islamophobia" and the debate had been radicalized by extremists.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100912/us_nm/us_usa_muslims_view

Making a group out to be the "other", the "them", and the scapegoat is ALWAYS the start of something very bad.

Look, regardless of how you feel about religion in general, Islam in general, Muslims, American Muslims, what Muslims do on the other side of the world, etc.; making them a scapegoat and making them the "them" in "us vs. them" is simply unacceptable for any liberal or any sane person for that matter. If you hear yourself saying this about Muslims, stop. If you hear someone else saying this about Muslims, tell them to think about what they are saying. If you hear this is in Church, walk out. And if you hear this on TV, then turn the channel.

It is up to each and every one of us to make sure we don't go any further down the road of us vs. them.

[Initech]

1. Terry Jones opened a can of worms that should not have been opened.

[sakabatou]

3. The can's been opened since 9-11 by the right-wing noise machine

[Initech]

4. It's been there, but it's got a whole lot worse in the last year.

[Chulanowa]

5. Terry Jones is just riding the wave

The US' Islamophobia has been ramping up ever since 1979. And don't for a minute fucking pretend it's all the right wing's fault; if I had a nickel for every Islamophobic comment I saw just here on DU, I could buy my own internets.

[ZombieHorde]

2. They may catch up to atheists as the most hated group in the US.

Personally, I think the most hated group in the US should those who use the word "literally" when they mean "figuratively."

Making a group out to be the "other", the "them", and the scapegoat is ALWAYS the start of something very bad.

Not always. Metal bands, rap musicians, and D&D fans were scapegoated for a while, but nothing really came of it.

[customerserviceguy]

6. One of the things the nutball FL fundie pastor reaped

was a whole big group of quotes from around the world about this. While most were of the simple hand-wringing "I hope he doesn't do this" variety, some were dark and ominous, threatening violence against Americans for what one deranged individual would do to an object.

I wonder how those comments will be used by the reich wing to achieve their agenda of fear.

[DBoon]

8. He was basically the world's greatest troll nt

[customerserviceguy]

9. All the ones I've seen in gardens

have funny mustaches, too!

[Mimosa]

7. This growing antipathy is really bothering a Muslim MD who's my friend

My friend tells me in his group of friends which are mainly health professionals, they are becoming depressed. I've known him since the late 90s and he says it was never this bad, even after 9/11. He's a really easygoing friendly guy and isn't particularly strict.

My other doctor friend, who is very observant, is always looking sad lately. He doesn't want to talk about it but his whole demeanour has changed over the last 6 months.

I sense there's almost something in the air like the antipathy towards Jews in Germany in the 1930s.

[applegrove]

10. Was it 'Obama is a muslim' that started this round of muslim hate?

[m00nbeam]

11. We all need to stand up and be the voices in the wilderness

If one of us stands up against the bigotry, more people will follow.

I am grateful for all of my friends from all different religious, spiritual and atheistic/agnostic beliefs. I learn something from every one of their personal world views.

[Douglas Carpenter]

12. this is not just the issue of one crazy church burning the Koran or one hate campaign against one

community center in New York.

Right now there is a nationwide campaign of anti-Muslim hysteria being whooped up by right-wing politicians, the crazy wing of fundamentalist Christianity and the likes of Newsmax and Fox News. There is a grave danger of this hysteria becoming - if it has not already - completely mainstream discourse in American society. There are campaigns against mosques all across America right now.

This hysteria has dangerous ramifications, not only for the American-Muslim community but for the entirety of society and the direction it is going. The 20th Century has surely shown that hate campaigns are not controllable and can and do lead society down extremely self-destructive paths.

This hysteria has even more dangerous ramifications for American foreign policy.

There are right-wing religious crazies in America who now pretty much dominate the Republican Party and there are the neoconservatives who are bent on promoting a permanent American war in the Middle East and I believe they must be stopped or America and the whole world will experience a catastrophe beyond imagination. The religious crazies believe they must help facilitate the battle of Armageddon in order to usher in the second coming of Christ. This is not a small marginal group of kooks. This is a group who are to a large degree now calling the shots in the Republican Party while their allies the neoconservatives work out the details.

Opposing this hysteria, denouncing it firmly and not allowing this hysteria to become mainstream discourse is one of the most important stands anyone can take - The consequences of anti-Muslim hysteria growing and becoming even more mainstream are just too dire.

[Steely_Dan]

13. I Don't want To...

...cause a flame war here or be considered radically against or President...

However, our President has (had) an opportunity to take the lead on this issue. The atmosphere is getting toxic. I am one who feels that President Obama had an opportunity to read the mood of the country and "proactively" intervene. It's called leadership.

-P

[TexasObserver]

14. The GOP and its media toads crank up hot button wedge issues for elections.

It's September of an even numbered year.

That some jackass with a church of 50 can command more media than a million anti war demonstrators is a result of rightwing controlled media. There is very little "liberal" media. Even the liberals are usually not that liberal.

[pampango]

15. NYT OpEd: Was it easier to be a Middle Easterner during the Bush era?

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/12/opinion/12khakpour.html

Xenophobia and racism still abounded (just after 9/11), but the lid stayed on the pot. Perhaps when Republicans held both the White House and Congress, conservatives weren’t sweating a thing; for them, people of color, along with all our white liberal friends, were lumped together in one misery-loves-company fringe. But now that the tables have turned, conservatives have positioned themselves as aggrieved victims. (I recall the advice of an older female relative: Always let men you’re in relationships with have all the power; it’s when they lose power and get insecure that your problems start.)

The world Hushi and I were in, before 9/11 and just after, was not a picnic for brown people. And there’s no need to cast 2001 to 2008 in an ideal light. None of us breathed easy. It’s just that we expected to breathe easier as time went on.

Little did we know that it would take almost a full decade for the proverbial 9/11 fallout to fall out, for anti-Muslim xenophobia to emerge, fully formed and fever-pitched, ostensibly over plans to build an interfaith cultural center near ground zero. Even in New York, stronghold of progressive ethics and cultural diversity, my former home of 12 years, August 2010 became the evil twin of that still-innocent August 2001.

It reminds me of how I used to experience so many mixed emotions when I’d see women in full burqa in Brooklyn: alarm at the spectacle (no matter how many times I’d seen it), followed by a certain feminist irk, and finally discomfiture at our cultural kinship. And then it would all turn into one strong emotion — protective rage — when I’d see a group of teenagers laughing and pointing at them.
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The author doesn't really defend Bush but laments the "us vs. them" fear campaign targeting Muslims that repubs have unleashed to regain power. It is a common repub tactic - scare people about the evil that gays, immigrants, Blacks, atheists, and socialists (whatever "them" seems to work best for them in a particular election cycle) represent - to get people to vote against their own interests.

[GeorgeGist]

16. Hopes rise over anti-bigot feeling ...

[GeorgeGist]

17. Hopes rise over anti-bigot feeling ...

[Fumesucker]

18. This atheist says: "Welcome to the club, Muslims"..

Atheists have long been the whipping boy of many good Christian Americans, now we're going to get a little company in the barrel.