I'll agree with you that there is far less inflammatory rhetoric from Democrats than Republicans. Part of this may be due to the fact that Democrats (Obama, in particular) have been in charge of U.S. foreign policy and diplomacy for the last 7 years, and alienating 1.5 billion people worldwide is a pretty awful diplomatic strategy. For this same reason, other than his infamous use of the word "crusade" to refer to the War on Terror, Bush was far better than the current batch of GOP candidates in this regard. But I think there are still some notable examples of prominent Democrats and liberalish figures showing far less respect for Muslims and Muslim life than they would for any other group.Jerloma wrote:It's the liberals who get outraged when anyone says anything about Islam or Muslims. Pissing off the liberals is the tea party's whole reason for fucking existing. They're not at liberty to fire them though. Try to find an example of a democrat or a liberalish public figure who is not a politician make an anti-Muslim remark without any public backlash. How many liberals try to disassociate themselves from someone like Bill Maher because he's unapologetic about Islam?Joe K wrote:Not going to do this now while I'm at work but I'm confident that I can pull together a list of 10 quotes about Muslims from current U.S. Congressmen or Presidential candidates that would likely be career ending if said about any other major religious or ethnic group. Maybe later tonight.Jerloma wrote:Of course, none of this lends any credence to the idea that you can say whatever you want about Muslims and get a pass.
1. Robert Gibbs, former Obama Press Secretary, justifying the drone killing of Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, a 16-year old U.S. citizen who had no apparent links to terrorism other than being the son of Anwar al-Awlaki: "I would suggest that he should have a far more responsible father." Can you imagine, in any other context, a figure like Gibbs justifying the killing of an unarmed, 16-year old U.S. citizen on this basis? If the FBI raids a house looking for illegal drugs and weapons, is it cool if they end up killing whatever kids happen to be inside?
2. Joe Biden, discussing the Israeli military's killing of ten individuals (including U.S. citizen Furkan Dogan, who was born in the upstate N.Y. town as my mother) who were carrying humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip: "Look, you can argue whether Israel should have dropped people onto that ship or not and the – but the truth of the matter is, Israel has a right to know – they're at war with Hamas – has a right to know whether or not arms are being smuggled in. And up to now, Charlie, what's happened? They've said, 'Here you go. You're in the Mediterranean. This ship – if you divert slightly north you can unload it and we'll get the stuff into Gaza.' So what's the big deal here?" Regardless of what you think of the Gaza flotilla issue, can you imagine the sitting U.S. Vice President having such a flippant reaction -- what's the big deal here? -- to another country's killing of a U.S. citizen participating in a humanitarian mission if that citizen wasn't a Muslim?
3. Harry Reid and Howard Dean both spoke out against the Park 51 mosque, joining in on one of the most high profile Islamophobic campaigns in recent years.
4. Not sure if you consider Sam Harris to be "liberalish," but he's said the following things about Islam: "I am one of the few people I know of who has argued in print that torture may be an ethical necessity in our war on terror."; "We should profile Muslims, or anyone who looks like he or she could conceivably be Muslim, and we should be honest about it."; "In our dealings with the Muslim world, we must acknowledge that Muslims have not found anything of substance to say against the actions of the September 11 hijackers, apart from the ubiquitous canard that they were really Jews." But none of this has had any impact on his prominent stature as a writer, thinker or public figure.
In fairness to your point, you think that many (all?) religions, and not just Islam, deserve far more criticism. But as a practical matter, you and I both know that if liberals and/or Democrats increase their criticism of Islam, that Christianity, Judaism, etc. aren't going to get the treatment. So instead of having a society that is more appropriately skeptical of religion, in general, we'd just have a society where the rampant Islamophobia of the right-wing is more broadly accepted.