Loving Thy Enemy

"I love Muslims,” says Pam Geller, a notorious right-wing blogger, “but the Ground Zero mosque is an offensive insult and a stab in the eye.”

That’s curious. Glenn Beck, who most likely also loves Muslims, has called the mosque proposal a “slap in the face.”

Which is it?

Beck even said, “Any attempt to describe it as something other than a slap in the face is another slap in the face.”

Did you see that? Pam Gellar slapped Glenn Beck in the face! And all of America, too!

The blasted thing hasn’t even been built yet, and we already look like we’re married to Mel Gibson.

But we still love those Muslims, gosh-darn it! Love them right to death!

A lot of conservatives will twist themselves into knots trying to show that they’re not bigoted. In fact, a simple analysis of recent news shows that they simply don’t know what bigotry is.

Try this thought experiment: Suppose you have a jerk for a neighbor. He plays loud music at all hours, lets his dog poop on your lawn, sets fire to your car, whatever. He also happens to be Mormon.

Fortunately for you, the man’s job gets transferred, and he has to move out of state. But you learn that the person who wants to buy his house, coincidentally, is also Mormon. What is your reaction?

Well, if you’ve got any brains in your head, you know there are lots of Mormons in the world, and most of them are not feces-distributing arsonists. So you shrug it off and hope for the best.

If you don’t apply the same standard to Muslims, and instead trump up reasons to treat them differently, you are a bigot.

Witness Beck, who claimed on his August 4 show that Islam is a religion that “is saying we should blow people up.”

Glenn, buddy: Roughly 1.2 billion people (roughly ¼ of the world population) follow Islam. If even half of them were terrorists, or America-hating terrorist sympathizers, all corners of the globe would have seen an apocalyptic bloodbath long before now.

Or, Witness Gellar, who started the American Freedom Defense Initiative (interesting name, I thought that’s what the military was for):

“There is an Islamic history of building triumphant mosques on conquered lands…. We know the imam in charge of this has been dishonest about the funding. He's tied to terrorism." 

That analysis would make sense, except that a blind baboon could find the holes in it:

1. We have not actually been conquered.  The stated aim of al-Qaida and the 9/11 hijackers was to destroy our way of life.  Though our economy has stumbled a little of late, you can still get 118 different varieties of barbecue sauce at the grocery store, see plenty of porn for free on the Internet, and sue the government for not respecting your Satanist rituals during your incarceration. Way to not even come close to accomplishing your mission, Mr. bin Laden.

2. To say the people behind this mosque are “tied to terrorism” is pretty vague and misleading.  You could use the same logic to argue that the members of your local Catholic parish are “tied to child molestation.”

If you’re truly not a bigot, your attitude should be: Let them build a mosque 2 blocks from Ground Zero. So what? It doesn’t prove anything, other than that we are still the greatest and most tolerant nation in the history of the Earth.

 

 

Chuck McKay is a Maine freelance writer, teacher, and a Threat to Our Cherished Way of Life. Email him at chuckrates@gmail.com.

Education Is Your Job (If You’re Not Too Busy)

Well, it’s the middle of August, when the air thickens with humidity and discussions about how the Red Sox are going to tank again (at least this time they have an excuse, and the health insurance bill to prove it’s a valid one).

Then there’s the various annual ads and articles about how best to outfit your child for “back to school,” as if that procedure has changed even slightly in the last 75 years.

Backpack. Binder. Pencils. Lunchbox full of crack cocaine and potato chips. Move on.

While the rest of the world changes rapidly, schools chug along like it’s 1961, and no one except a few consultants and activists seems to notice.

Why?

Well, those who post comments on the Bangor Daily News website seem to know everything. Let’s consult them. Just a moment...

Yup, I knew it: Every single problem with public education can be traced back to the teachers’ unions.

School violence? Blame the union. Decaying buildings? You can bet the NEA fed into it somehow.  Fights on the bus? The school board’s hands are tied.

Bad teachers? The Unions won’t let us fire them. Does anyone even know what a “bad teacher” looks like? If so, how many are there, really?

We can’t count them, apparently. Let me guess: it’s because the union won’t let us, right?

You may not like it, but I’m going to inject you with some actual facts:

Massachusetts routinely leads the nation in school performance. Teachers unions are very strong there.

Conversely, unions tend to be weak in Southern states, where test scores tend to lag behind the rest of the country.

Is it any coincidence that Massachusetts is one of the wealthiest states in the country, while people in the South, as I understand from listening to the radio, routinely have to eat something called “Poke Salad” for dinner?

This juxtaposition of obvious and readily available information has been brought to you by Diane Ravitch, former Assistant Secretary of Education under George W. Bush.

In her new book, “The Death and Life of the Great American School System,” Ravitch blasts the No Child Left Behind Act, which she once supported.

Ravitch claims the law puts unfair pressure on educators by not accounting for differences between schools in different regions.

You mean schools in the Bronx are not the same as ones in Skowhegan, and the kids from Skowhegan aren’t even the same as the ones from Kennebunk?

I am in shock.

The real problem with education is that it is run by politicians, who tend to favor lightweight reforms that look good in headlines, but don’t actually accomplish anything substantial.

Politicians answer to people with money, and people with money tend to have done alright for themselves with schools just the way they are.

Conservatives hold aloft the idea of privatizing schools. That’s not going to make anyone more interested in actual reform. Schools will still function the way people with money want them to, keeping kids busy and ranking them for success.

Real reform can only come from one place: Parents educating themselves about how kids learn and what really goes on inside classrooms.

A healthy quantity of informed and involved citizens can still get a politician’s ear, at least at the local level.

That is, if they’re not too busy blaming unions and talking about the Red Sox.