Racism Back in Fashion?

I’m sure by now we are all tragically acquainted with the battle over the mosque to be built near Ground Zero. What began as a generally well-accepted construction project somehow turned into a media blitz and then a public battle as, this past weekend, dueling protests (both against the mosque and for it) met on the street outside the designated construction site. Of course, the fight isn’t just over the mosque; if it were just about the mosque I doubt enough people would have cared to even stage a small rally. This is a demonstration of the power of latent Islamic fear, mistrust and hate.

Why do I say this? Well first of all, no one gets riled up about an issue the way the public has if they aren’t emotionally excited in some way – that’s why no one cared about the mosque until the media started playing up the idea that it would be a breeding ground for terrorists. The second reason why I believe this is about racism, is because so called “Islamophobia” is now spreading across the nation. Even in Chicago we now have signs on cabs with anti-Islam messages.

If the drama over the mosque  were an isolated incident, I don’t think I would be too alarmed. After all, 9/11 didn’t happen all that long ago and in any type of war or attack, people will look for an easy group to blame (even if, as in this case, the group or religion didn’t actually have anything to do with the attack), on a certain level it’s human nature. The public at large has also been given a lot of misinformation about Islam which doesn’t make matters any better. What’s alarming is how quickly and passionately people were willing to air their hatred, even without a good grasp of either the issue or the group in question; also, this is only one of a series of race-based fear campaigns which seem to indicate that racism is coming back into fashion.

Slews of stories about “anchor-babies” and Obama being racist against whites have abounded over the past few weeks and year, and all of them play on latent racial fears. A prime example is the recent n-word scandal involving former radio show host Dr. Laura. I’m not talking about whether or not she’s racist, I don’t necessarily think she is. Uneducated about why it’s inappropriate for her to ever use the word, yes, but I’m on the fence about actually racist. Regardless, in the backlash people actually began to come out in support of her (notably Sarah Palin), saying it’s her right to say whatever she wants, wherever she wants. Dr. Laura also publicly stated she resigned because she doesn’t want to be silenced. And people are responding positively, saying it’s our second amendment right to say whatever we want, it’s our right to say racist things. I mean, that might technically be true, but is that really what you want to be using freedom of speech for? Not only that, but do we really want our media personalities to be telling the public at large that racism is their right and to display it loud and proud? Call me crazy, but I think this is something to be worried about.  

Now I’m not naïve, I know racism wasn’t dead and will probably always exist in some form or another, but at least in our country racism was not tolerated, it was considered ignorant and ugly so that even those who might have racist tendencies would be kept tolerably in check. Now these feelings are being aired out and cast as a right, a right to hate and misunderstand and distrust because “those” people might cause “us” some type of nebulous harm. It’s absurd. And when we begin to condone racism in any form, you can bet your bottom dollar it will escalate.