Peter King and the Roost

White Americanized Christianity has led to the death of close to a million people in Iraq and Afghanistan alone. Which leads us to this interesting and depressing paradox. In order to continue doing what we're doing, in order to continue to get oil fuel and the objects of our consumptive love so cheaply, the United States continues to be involved in international issues in a way that's detrimental to those outside of the US (and quite a few within the US). Then, we try to do everything within our power to keep those chickens from coming home to roost, so to say.

So we bring violence to the homes of millions around the world, and then get upset because some of it manifests itself in the US. Not only that, but we tend to blame the wrong crowds - not just for the global violence, but for the homegrown violence as well. Reprehensible Reptile Peter King's HUAC hearings are, for all their wanton ugliness, not getting quite the press they deserve.

photo © 2011 longislandwins | more info(via: Wylio)

If we *really* wanted to tackle the radicalization of Islam, we'd stop giving radical leaders ammo with which to point at us (western, Christian, white culture):

• We'd stop trying to occupy and/or bomb Muslim countries.
• We'd stop supporting the Israeli state's oppression of Palestinians.
• We'd stop this charade of dragging American Muslims in front of national televisions to question their patriotism and whether or not they've done enough to stop terrorism (while justifying terrorists that support causes that we are comfortable with).
• We'd stop targeting entire Muslim communities in the US, while largely ignoring the increasing threat of white supremacist groups.
• We'd stop equating the entire Muslim community with terrorists.
• We'd stop sending in CIA agents to infiltrate mosques and Arab centers to bait young American Muslims to develop, support, and enable self-made terrorist plots.
• We'd stop this policy of guilty-before-proven innocent when it comes to Muslims and turning them into second-class citizens who are not able to pray or worship where they can (under the pretense that their worship is an offense to America's freedom, of course).
• We'd stop passing laws that attack a community's resolve to handle interpersonal conflicts via traditional/religious means (even when they don't contradict with state or federal laws).
• We'd stop bringing in so-called moderates who are nothing but shills for the xenophobes, the Clarence Thomases of Muslims in America.
• We'd stop pretending that we're not being a racist and/or xenophobic nation while actively promoting racism and xenophobia under the guise of "security."

But that would probably mean we'd need to change some habits...