Freedom Speaks

“As you probably know, a white guy entranced by an extremely version of Tea Party-style right-populist paranoia deliberately crashed an airplane into an IRS building in Texas yesterday. I’m not especially interested in debating semantics, but I think it’s very clear that if this had been done by a brownish-looking Muslim guy whose suicide note paralleled Islamist political themes that the right wing would be pissing its pants and demanding that anyone who refused to label the attack “terrorism” be put up on treason charges. But the new rules seem to be that politically motivated violence when undertaken by white people isn’t terrorism.” (Matthew Yglesias)

America has been shaken by Terrorism since September 11, 2001. There is a state of fear and brandishing that will be very hard to go away. Terrorism and Al-Qaeda post 9/11 has sparked tremendous media coverage on a daily basis and national concern within Homeland Security. The country has heightened security at airports and various other government buildings. But how far has this mass hysteria actually gone?

Today people of Muslim and Middle Eastern decent cannot walk down the street in America without being tormented or profiled due to the acts of a small population. They cannot drive down the street without being pulled over for a “routine traffic stop”. They are now discriminated against as a whole when many have been born and raised here in America and no nothing of any terrorist acts. Terrorism is not Islam, it is not a country. The whole country of Pakistan nor Iraq are trying to kill all of America so why are we classifying them all as such?

By definition Terrorism is an act of violence or threatening of violence, especially bombing, kidnapping, and assassination, carried out for a political purpose. In reality, terrorism is comprised of many different types and manifestations. There are religious terrorists, which we see heavily portrayed in the media today. However, there are also national terrorists, social terrorists and domestic terrorists (terroriststudies.com). Each type of terrorist has a different purpose that they wish to fulfill, thus making the “Muslim” assumption of and affiliation with terrorism partially invalid.

Terrorism has become the modern day form of socially acceptable racism. You hear the word terrorism and the Middle east is what automatically comes to mind, Al-Qaeda is what automatically comes to mind. If you google Terrorism and click on images, you see images of burning buildings and fair skinned men with long beards and turbans on their heads. You can pick up the newspaper and see an image of a Middle Eastern man, who grew up in Chicago, with his face plastered on the front page with the words guilty above his head. You go to the airport and random searches are not so random as only people of Middle Eastern decent are being searched. We have institutions like Guantanamo Bay that are no different than the concentration camps during the holocaust and are filled with Middle Eastern Terrorist.

But what about the home grown terrorists? You don’t hear about the Christian Dominionism. They are American grown Terrorist who believe they have to create the world as GOD wants it. Eric Rudolph, a member of Christian Dominionism, committed a series of bombings across southern U.S. in the 1990’s because he violently opposed abortion and homosexuality (blogtalkradio.com). What about the Klu Klux KLan? The Klan has been around for years, and still is, living to create a pure White world.  As if that isn’t enough, what about the Zviadists terrorists of Georgia? Then there is John Bedell, who felt that the governments military operations and handling of illegal drugs were unjust, who attempted to kill officers at the Pentagon (The Hawkeye).

As you can see Terrorism comes from many different origins, genders, sexes, and races. So before you point the finger at the Muslim guy dropping his kids off to school, think about the unabomber, and other U.S. serial killers that could potentially fit into one of the different categories of terrorism. Americans are highly regarded in other countries, and I’m sure a trip to Israel would not result in such a hysteria or the though that all American middle age white men are bombers.