It really is funny how events in life are all interconnected. Everything happens for a reason, nothing is an accident. Once all of the pieces come together, then true understanding occurs.
Yesterday I was relaxing and playing some Call of Duty 4 with some friends when we joined a lobby with a guy who was probably the most ignorant and racist bigot I have ever heard open his mouth. It all started when one of my friends overheard this guy and the rest of the team talking about the coming NHL playoffs. My friend make some comment to the effect that hockey is a lame sport. Then out of nowhere this guy starts going off and demands to know what sport is better. My friend replied "I watch basketball and football". The other guy, apparently upset by this answer, starts going on and on about how watching niggas run up and down a court throwing around a ball is lame. Now at this point I was a little caught off guard. Already stressed out from school, I wasn't in the mood to deal with this blowhard's ignorance. I told him not to use the n word as I found it offensive, especially in the manner that he was using it. He went on to remark that basketball would be more interesting if all the players ran around with guns and shot each other. "After all", he asserted, "wouldn't that make the game just like real life, a bunch of good for nothin niggas killin each other off"
At this point I lost it. Whatever calm or composure I had prior to that left in a hurry. I proceeded to tell the guy EXACTLY how I felt about him and his 1950's Jim Crow outlook on life. He spent the rest of the match complaining that I was too sensitive and calling me and my two friends "niggas", (oddly enough both of my friends were White). Later that night we jumped in to another match that featured a moron telling two other guys in the virtual lobby that they were Mexicans and demanded that they come mow his lawn. Now how he even came to a conclusion about their racial background is beyond me because all of this happened online. Its not like we were all meeting up in person or something. We couldn't see each other. This guy just decided that they Mexican. Oh and apparently being Mexican is somehow a bad thing? Once again I lost my temper and after slaughtering the idiot and his little posse of internet thugs in the next game I proceeded to tell him exactly what kind of an idiot he really was.
Really? I understand that they are just words but people need to realize that words and ideas have meaning and power. It must become the norm that any form of oppression is wrong, no matter who the perpetrator or the victim is. It was words and ideas that fueled the slave trade, words and ideas that made colonialism and its devastating effects on the native populations exceptable, words and ideas that gave rise to the Nazis and the Holocaust. Shall I continue? Just because these people hide behind the internet doesn't make their comments any less offensive than if they would have said it to my face. The only thing hiding does is save them from a trip to the hospital had they been stupid or brave enough to confront me personally. More importantly, what do these comments say about people's attitudes and beliefs? Are these morons the norm or an abnormality? Is tolerance and political correctness a public display meant to mask sinister inner feelings or is it an honest effort to treat everyone with dignity and respect?
I said earlier in the post that everything happens for a reason. This story does in fact come full circle. This morning I saw an article on yahoo that scared me witless. The Homeland Security Secretary has decided that Islamic Jihad is no longer the top threat to America. 9/11, as horrific and scary as it was, has been superseded by what informed authorities consider to be an even graver threat. Recently the Department of Homeland Security circulated a 9 page memo on the resurgence of Right wing radicals. The report warns of "Right-wing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration."
Time to connect the dots. Here in America we have ignorant, racist, fanatics whose only moral compass is the second amendment or the right to bear arms. This is serious business people. The government itself has already declared this movement a threat to national security. So go ahead and keep listening to those who say that Rush Limbaugh isn't hurting anyone. Its precisely hate-mongering radicals like him that are fueling this movement. Just because we have a Black president doesn't mean that racism in this country is dead. Those same people who get online and insist that being a Mexican is a fate worse than death are the same people who send death threats to politicians who favor amnesty for illegal immigrants. Scarier still, these are the same people who are card carrying members of the National Rifle Association. Its the whole guns and God movement except they forgot the God part.
The Homeland Security memo should be expanded to include all forms of violent radicalism, not just the antics of those on the right. While their rhetoric may be harsh (wanting President Obama to fail is overboard no matter how they try to explain their comments away) it so far hasn't resulted in violence yet. As far as we can tell the recent string of shooting sprees in public and family spaces across the country were not politically motivated. However a group of 12 Black teenagers did find it neccessary to jump two vicitims, both White, while hurling racial insults at the pair. When will the world realize that human life is the most sacred thing that we have? Are hate and bigotry so entrenched in this world that there is no way out? It starts with everyone becoming responsible for thier own actions. Until that day comes, nothing will improve.
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