lundi 30 juin 2008

Who are the terrorists?




Between 1947 and 1953, America went mad with fear of communists. They were everywhere, plotting to destroy America and impose Soviet style totalitarianism. Of course, everyone knows of Senator Joseph McCarty and his paranoid stance regarding all things he thought were anti-American. Everybody could be suspected and there was a real witch hunt all across the country.

Like in all dictatorships there were hearings in front of the Senate, people had to face questions asked to them like Fouquier-Tinville used to, and many were blacklisted. Even Charly Chaplin had to go into exile!!!

Eventually this madness came to an end with the downfall of McCarty.

You would think this episode has taught some lessons on the other side of the Ocean?

Now, the US is swept by a wave of Islamophobia, suspecting a would-be terrorist behind each and every Muslim. For years, Fox news had a scale of different colors to tell Americans which level of terrorist threat might be expected for each day of the year. I can't receive Fox any longer so I don't know if they've stopped this fear factor game.

What I know is that there hasn't been one single act of terrorism in America since 9/11. Many Americans would tell it's evidence of the effectiveness of the anti-terrorism measures that have been implemented in the past 6 years. Many others would reply that maybe anybody didn't even try to commit any act of terrorism in America.

What I know also is that there has been another shooting spree a couple of weeks ago, with 6 people dead. And I also know that hundreds if not thousands of Americans have been shot to death by their fellow American citizens since 2002. I haven't heard that one single killer was Muslim or coming from any Arabic country.

So who are the real, effective terrorists in the US?


1 commentaire:

Ned Ludd a dit…

The term "islamophobie" is misused here as almost everywhere else. Islam is an ignorant superstition like xianity and judaism.

That would not be so bad, except that many adepts of these superstitions take the self-selected "rules" to heart and act upon them to bring about their "god's" "desire".

These people are dangerous and in that sense I am islamophobic, judeophobic, and christophobic.

It is a rational response to people, i.e. true believers, who are nuts.