Islamophobia rears its ugly head again in the attack on the TV series, All-American Muslim

The Jaafar family, one of the participating families in the Learning Channel's
'All-American Muslim' reality TV show.
Photograph: TLC

i first heard about this upcoming series while listening to an npr interview with a commentator who wrote a piece about it in the guardian...

wajahat ali...

I think it's refreshingly bland. It's honest, it's real, it's human. And it's nice to see a show where Muslims aren't terrorists, taxi cab drivers or potential terrorists, you know? They're just people.

i've actually been hoping for a show like this for quite a while... i had thought that maybe a sitcom a la the cosby show might do it but i was very pleased to hear about "All-American Muslim" and thought it might give a real push toward mitigating some of the more rampant islamophobia that has been plaguing the country...

guess not...

The cable channel TLC may have thought it was promoting the cause of ethnic and religious harmony by running a program that sympathetically examines the lives of five ordinary American Muslim families. But now the show itself has become a source of conflict, with the conservative Florida Family Association urging advertisers to boycott it and at least one major retail chain complying.

Media critics are already issuing scathing criticism of the decision by home retail giant Lowe’s to respond to the Florida Family Association’s campaign against the program. Gawker, for example, writes, “American Muslim, a TLC reality show that depicts the lives of Muslims in dangerous anti-American professions like ‘police officer’ and ‘high school football coach,’ is obviously the most egregious example yet of creeping Sharia. So thank (the Christian) God that all-American retailer Lowe’s has decided to pull advertising from the show!”

[...]

As viewed by the Florida Family Association, however, the normality and all-American quality of the families profiled is in itself a cause for suspicion.

“The Learning Channel’s new show All-American Muslim is propaganda clearly designed to counter legitimate and present-day concerns about many Muslims who are advancing Islamic fundamentalism and Sharia law,” the group writes at its website. “The show profiles only Muslims that appear to be ordinary folks while excluding many Islamic believers whose agenda poses a clear and present danger to liberties and traditional values that the majority of Americans cherish.”

in response, the home improvement chain, lowes, has pulled its advertising...

Lowe’s actions are already being described as “a public relations disaster” and have aroused anger among the American Muslim community.

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, for example, has issued a statement saying, “Sadly corporations, such as Lowe’s, have succumbed to the idiocracy of such garbage campaigns, which are orchestrated by groups and organizations which lack credibility, legitimacy, and are founded on the basic notions of bigotry and racism reminiscent of a shameful era in this country’s history.”

personally, i think this kind of attack is both disgusting and shameful... i've said repeatedly here that i have a fair number of islamic friends and count them among some of the finest people i know... they're people trying to make it just like the rest of us and to demonize them as a few brutally ignorant people in this country are trying to do is despicable...

here's the trailer for the series...



yes, bland, but also accurate... muslims in the u.s. live lives very much like everybody else... truth be told, muslims around the world live lives very much like everybody else... this overwhelming urge to demonize those whose beliefs, skin color, national origin, diet or surnames don't match our predetermined notion of what we think they SHOULD be needs to stop...

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An Air Force officer gives his unvarnished opinion of the DADT repeal

intolerance won't go away, it'll just go underground...

I also had the distastefull [sic] duty of delivering the mandatory 'Repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell' brief, and ensuring documentation of same for 100% of the squadron. Definitely one of those 'salute smartly, and carry out your orders' kind of assignments.

for obvious reasons, i can't reveal the source... i do know, however, that he flies predator drone missions...

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Burning a Koran really pisses some folks off...

can't say as i blame 'em for being pissed altho' i do have a problem with mob psychology where innocent people end up dead...

it would be nice if the nutcase u.s. pastor who thought it necessary to perform such a reckless and intolerant act in the name of christianity had to face some serious consequences... at a bare minimum, he should be forced to go back and read the real message of christ in the gospels... i see people like him as evidence of the real evil afoot in the world...

Mob kills 8 U.N. workers in Afghanistan

Officials say a crowd of up to 1,000 people attacked the United Nations compound in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif, killing eight guards believed to be from the Philippines. The attack was sparked by a mosque sermon describing the burning of the Koran by an American pastor.

[...]

The rioting erupted after mosque preachers at Friday prayers -- the most important of the Muslim week -- sermonized against the burning of the Koran by an American evangelical pastor in Florida. After the service, up to 1,000 worshipers marched on the U.N. compound and overran it, police said.

believe me, i'm not recommending it, but i'm frankly somewhat surprised that the afghans haven't retaliated by burning a bible... can you imagine the kind of conflagration THAT would unleash here in the good ol' u.s. of a...?

meanwhile, here i sit at dulles airport in d.c., waiting for my flight to dubai where i will connect to a flight to kabul... woo-hoo...

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The Constitution is not subject to opinion polling [UPDATE]

among so many other disgraces, what's happening in the u.s. regarding religious tolerance is a true national disgrace...

keith olbermann...



[UPDATE]

glenn zooms in on the islamophobia touched on above by keith... it's worth posting in full because it also touches on our ever-expanding surveillance state...

One of the most under-reported political stories is the increasingly vehement, nationwide movement -- far from Ground Zero -- to oppose new mosques and Islamic community centers. These ugly campaigns are found across the country, in every region, and extend far beyond the warped extremists who are doing things such as sponsoring "Burn a Quran Day." And now, from CBS News last night, we have this:

Fire at Tenn. Mosque Building Site Ruled Arson

Federal officials are investigating a fire that started overnight at the site of a new Islamic center in a Nashville suburb.

Ben Goodwin of the Rutherford County Sheriff's Department confirmed to CBS Affiliate WTVF that the fire, which burned construction equipment at the future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro, is being ruled as arson. . . .

The chair of the center's planning committee, Essim Fathy, said he drove to the site at around 5:30 a.m. Saturday morning after he was contacted by the sheriff's department.

"Our people and community are so worried of what else can happen," said Fathy. "They are so scared" . . .

Opponents of a new Islamic center say they believe the mosque will be more than a place of prayer; they are afraid the 15-acre site that was once farmland will be turned into a terrorist training ground for Muslim militants bent on overthrowing the U.S. government.

"They are not a religion. They are a political, militaristic group," Bob Shelton, a 76-year-old retiree who lives in the area, told The Associated Press.

Shelton was among several hundred demonstrators who recently wore "Vote for Jesus" T-shirts and carried signs that said "No Sharia law for USA!," referring to the Islamic code of law.

Others took their opposition further, spray painting a sign announcing the "Future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro" and tearing it up.

Earlier this summer opponents criticized the planned mosque at hearings held by the Rutherford County Commission, as supporters held prayer vigils.

At one such prayer vigil, WTVF reported opponents speaking out against construction.

"No mosque in Murfreesboro. I don't want it. I don't want them here," Evy Summers said to WTVF. "Go start their own country overseas somewhere. This is a Christian country. It was based on Christianity."

• Continue reading

The arsonists undoubtedly will be happy to tell you how much they hate Terrorism. And how there's a War on Christianity underway in the U.S. The harm from these actions are not merely the physical damage they cause, but also the well-grounded fear it imposes on a minority of the American population. If you launch a nationwide, anti-Islamic campaign in Lower Manhattan based on the toxic premise that Muslims generally are responsible for 9/11 -- and spend a decade expanding American wars on one Muslim country after the next -- this is the inevitable, and obviously dangerous, outcome.

* * * * *

Three other items worth noting:

(1) Kudos to The New York Times for publishing this Op-Ed by Palestinian-American journalist Ali Abunimah, with views on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict -- and the role played by the U.S. -- which are typically excluded from the American debate on those issues.

(2) Reflecting the fact that primitive fundamentalism is found in all religions and is by no means unique to Islam, this Jerusalem Post article details how an Israel singer was sentenced by a rabbinical panel to receive 39 lashes for the crime of singing in front of an audience mixed with men and women. That article rather substantially exaggerates the punishment -- the video reflects that the "lashes" were essentially symbolic and undertaken voluntarily, fundamentally distinguishing it from involuntary, genuine punishment for moral "sins" -- but the notion that such an act merits punishment is nonetheless instructive.

(3) This short though important post documents how children are being trained to give up all privacy, and to be good, dutiful Surveillance State citizens, through constant, pervasive surveillance in schools. As I wrote recently here, what is lost from the societal elimination of privacy is difficult to describe but of incomparable value:

Many people are indifferent to the disappearance of privacy -- even with regard to government officials -- because they don't perceive any real value to it. The ways in which the loss of privacy destroys a society are somewhat abstract and difficult to articulate, though very real. A society in which people know they are constantly being monitored is one that breeds conformism and submission, and which squashes innovation, deviation, and real dissent.

The old cliché is often mocked though basically true: there's no reason to worry about surveillance if you have nothing to hide. That mindset creates the incentive to be as compliant and inconspicuous as possible: those who think that way decide it's in their best interests to provide authorities with as little reason as possible to care about them. That's accomplished by never stepping out of line. Those willing to live their lives that way will be indifferent to the loss of privacy because they feel that they lose nothing from it. Above all else, that's what a Surveillance State does: it breeds fear of doing anything out of the ordinary by creating a class of meek citizens who know they are being constantly watched.

Training children from an early age to have no expectation of privacy -- to live on the assumption that their every move and even thought (which is what Internet activity is) will be monitored and recorded by authority figures -- exacerbates these harms quite substantially.

ya know, sitting here in a struggling little country like kosovo and reading about the insanity that's going on back in the u.s. isn't a particularly pleasant experience...

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The really sad thing about Ted Nugent

ordinarily, i just dismiss this certifiable moron with a shake of the head and a shrug of the shoulders... i don't believe in giving his kind of idiocy any more bandwidth than it deserves, which is zero, zip, nada...

i'm breaking my own rule with this one, however, because as i was reading it, i had the sad, if somewhat obvious, realization that nugent is merely saying out loud what a lot of people in the united states say on a routine basis... the only difference between those people and ted nugent is that ted nugent has a megaphone to broadcast his hate... and, make no mistake... nugent's hate is of the same variety as that of rush limbaugh, just less prettified... in fact, you can find the same thing coming from the likes of bill kristol, lou dobbs, and congressmen such as steve king and eric cantor... being congressmen, of course, they would NEVER resort to such crudities as nugent, but the mindset is the same...

On President Obama, the southern rocker said he believes "Mao Tse Tung" had arrived, "and his name is Barack Hussein Obama."

"I wanna throw up," Nugent said.

He started off the interview by jabbing supporters of animal rights, claiming he wants to kill 100 more of something every time he hears the two words together in a paragraph.

"I'm not just killing them I’m fucking slaughtering them and I’m going to gut them and skin them, quarter them and butcher them and feed them to the soup kitchen and homeless shelters of America," Nugent said. "Not because I need to, because it will cause Bill Maher to shit blood. That’s my goal in life."

Oddly, while he boasts about wanting to feed the poor and hungry masses, Nugent's words for his fellow Americans who depend on food assistance are quite vulgar and surprising.

"Welfare isn’t supposed to be used for hairdos," he said. "If you need food stamps, eat the fucking pet!"

what i'd like to do with this guy and others of his ilk is to put them on a plane to afghanistan, not to fight or be killed, but to have to live and work on a daily basis with afghans in an organization like the international rescue committee or the aga khan foundation... yes, he'd have to be dragged there, kicking and screaming, but getting exposed to some of the brutal realities of extreme poverty and despair and having to live with it in your face every day might give assholes like this a different perspective... otoh, maybe not... assholes of nugent's age are pretty impermeable to letting go of their bullshit...

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Attack of the gays - OH, NO-O-O-O-O-OOOOO...!

oh, my freakin' lord...

the american family association has lost the last wheels on its little red wagon...



i hope lewis black has checked out this latest addition to afa's screaming insanity... i'm sure he could do something with it, maybe even better than than this hysterical and dead-on rant...



i've said it before and i'll say it again... i have NEVER run across a comedian who is able to speak the truth so intelligently, so honestly, so succinctly, and, yes, so crudely, as lewis black... you laugh from the bottom of your gut AND you come away enlightened...

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Radical Christian activist terrorism

this is what happens when you have fundamentalist christian ideologues attempting to impose their religious beliefs on an entire nation, beliefs fueled by rigid dogmatism, bigotry, homophobia, and intolerance of other religious beliefs, all implicitly sanctioned by the presidential administration and the republican party... even though it's been overused and abused, the correct term here is indeed the "american taliban..."

Three Burleson men who belong to a "radical Christian activist group" were in the Johnson County Jail on Friday night after a church deacon caught two of them attempting to ignite an explosive device on Independence Day at a church under construction in north Burleson [Texas], authorities said Friday.

[...]

Cmdr. Chris Havens, the Police Department spokesman, said the suspects boasted about belonging to a leaderless group of 10 or 15 who share a belief that society has become too focused on self-improvement and self-gratification and has lost focus on the glorification of God.

"They admit to being Christian and being brought up Christian, but they believe there should be one denomination and one church, not multiple denominations," Havens said.

at least they're putting these twisted young men into the proper category...

"We put them in the category of a domestic terrorist group," Havens said. "We hope to discover the names of other individuals involved and if other devices have been prepared along with any plans they may be talking about to further their cause."

needless to say, had these been muslim young men, there would have been 24/7 national news coverage for at least the next three days...

(thanks to atrios...)

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From Air Force One today, two for one

there's two "OH, REALLYs" here, one in the first paragraph and the other in the second... can you pick 'em out...?

President Bush said yesterday he fears that the backlash against immigration being incited by opponents of his legalization proposal could result in the nation losing its soul.

His comments came in an intense interview aboard Air Force One with McClatchy Newspapers. "I'm deeply concerned about America losing its soul," Bush said. "Immigration has been the lifeblood of a lot of our country's history." He added: "If we don't solve the problem it's going to affect America. It will affect our economy and it will affect our soul."

the first one is the easiest... bush is worrying about the nation "losing its soul...?" oh, c'mon, or, should i say, "OH, REALLY...!" the president who has presided over the most debasing, hate-filled, homophobic, religiously intolerant, race-baiting, accusatory, polarizing six and one-half years in the nation's history is worried about the nation losing its soul... < sigh > george bush must be the least self-examined man on the face of the earth...

didja catch the second one...? here's a hint...

Staffers at McClatchy's Washington, D.C., Bureau -- one of the few major news outlets skeptical of intelligence reports during the run-up to the war in Iraq -- claims it is now being punished for that coverage.

Bureau Chief John Walcott and current and former McClatchy Pentagon correspondents say they have not been allowed on the Defense Secretary's plane for at least three years, claiming the news company is being retaliated against for its reporting.

"It is because our coverage of Iraq policy has been quite critical," Walcott told E&P. He added, "I think the idea of public officials barring coverage by people they've decided they don't like is at best unprofessional, at worst undemocratic and petty."

i find it extremely ironic (or, should i say, "OH, REALLY!") that mcclatchy just happens to be the featured press outlet for this story... you can't tell me it's a coincidence...

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Totally beyond unbelievable

i thought i knew insanity... i thought i knew fear-mongering... i thought i knew bigotry... i thought i knew hate... surprise, surprise... i didn't know this...

The John Doe Manifesto
By Michelle Malkin

i pay as little attention to hate-filled pundits as i can... oh, yes, i'm aware that they're out there and i read references to their screeds in blogs i regularly visit, but i have so little interest in their venomous spoutings that i see no point in wasting precious blog space and bandwidth giving them any more of a forum than they already have... this, however, was more than i could stomach... the link above takes you to this, as vicious a piece of totalitarian, repressive, pus-oozing, maggot-filled trash as i have ever read... i thought ann coulter was bad, but this puts her to shame... read it... read it carefully... let the full impact wash over you... see for yourself what kind of mind it must take to write something like this... the only way i can describe my own reaction is that it must be similar to watching the snake charmer play his flute and seeing the cobra rise out of the basket, looking into its poisonous eyes, and feeling paralyzed... i'm stunned... literally...

Dear Muslim Terrorist Plotter/Planner/Funder/Enabler/Apologist,

You do not know me. But I am on the lookout for you. You are my enemy. And I am yours.

I am John Doe.

I am traveling on your plane. I am riding on your train. I am at your bus stop. I am on your street. I am in your subway car. I am on your lift.

I am your neighbor. I am your customer. I am your classmate. I am your boss.

I am John Doe.

I will never forget the example of the passengers of United Airlines Flight 93 who refused to sit back on 9/11 and let themselves be murdered in the name of Islam without a fight.

I will never forget the passengers and crew members who tackled al Qaeda shoe-bomber Richard Reid on American Airlines Flight 63 before he had a chance to blow up the plane over the Atlantic Ocean.

I will never forget the alertness of actor James Woods, who notified a stewardess that several Arab men sitting in his first-class cabin on an August 2001 flight were behaving strangely. The men turned out to be 9/11 hijackers on a test run.

I will act when homeland security officials ask me to “report suspicious activity.”

I will embrace my local police department’s admonition: “If you see something, say something.”

I am John Doe.

I will protest your Jew-hating, America-bashing “scholars.”

I will petition against your hate-mongering mosque leaders.

I will raise my voice against your subjugation of women and religious minorities.

I will challenge your attempts to indoctrinate my children in our schools.

I will combat your violent propaganda on the Internet.

I am John Doe.

I will support law enforcement initiatives to spy on your operatives, cut off your funding, and disrupt your murderous conspiracies.

I will oppose all attempts to undermine our borders and immigration laws.

I will resist the imposition of sharia principles and sharia law in my taxi cab, my restaurant, my community pool, the halls of Congress, our national monuments, the radio and television airwaves, and all public spaces.

I will not be censored in the name of tolerance.

I will not be cowed by your Beltway lobbying groups in moderate clothing. I will not cringe when you shriek about “profiling” or “Islamophobia.”

I will put my family’s safety above sensitivity. I will put my country above multiculturalism.

I will not submit to your will. I will not be intimidated.

I am John Doe.

Pass it on.

Reader Frank e-mails that he has created "I am John Doe" buttons. Buy 'em here.

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