(June 23, 2015 at 12:56 pm)TaraJo Wrote: Ok, a few thoughts on this.
It's absurd to see the Faux News crowd talk about this. They actually blamed the shooting on a hatred of Christians, in spite of the fact that his manifesto pretty clearly placed his hatred at other races, not the nations' dominant religion. They seem to be willing to point their fingers in all kinds of crazy directions, but they're unwilling to admit racism is a thing.
I'll be the first to admit, I've seen people who claim to be advocates for black people that have kinda jumped the shark. But I've also seen real racial issues in the country, too. I do have to admit, the more hyperbolic racial advocates aren't helping their cause; instead, they're just crying wolf and convincing people that nothing they have to say is worth listening to (which, in turn, means they're also going to be ignored when real racial issues come up).
You could say the two groups are mirror images of each other: One refuses to acknowledge that race isn't an issue at all anymore while the other forcibly injects race into every issue. In the end, I think we need to find a way to meet somewhere in a more reasonable, middle ground.
And with this coming up on the heels of the black teenager being tackled by the white cop and the Baltimore riots and a host of other cases involving police killing black people for, at best, questionable reasons, I can see some serious anger from black communities. And I think it's justified to have that anger. The only question is, what is going to be done about it? Are the police going to keep killing black men for no good reason, while black communities continue to burn themselves down in protest? Or are we going to take a realistic look at race issues in America and attempt to deal with them in a realistic manner?
No there is no "middle ground", there are however people both on the left and right ignoring the elephant in the room, the same way Jews and Muslims in Palestine and Israel use race as a doge to avoid religion being the cause.
Roof got his bigoted sense of morality from the KKK and to claim that is not a religious organization is bullshit. On the other side, liberal blacks don't want to accept that slavery existed precisely because white European Christians forced their religion on blacks.
Now again, religion is the cause of racism, unless this is accepted, you will not manage differences to a more civil degree. I had a Hindu call me a bigot an racist, despite pointing out to them that there are atheists born in India, who were raised in Hinduism, who left the religion. This is no different to me than Ayaan Hirsi Ali being a former Muslim herself telling liberal Muslims that BOTH Sunnis and Shiites are using the same books.
It is really important for liberals to understand that the same books they use to justify pluralism, and empathy, are the exact same books others use to justify bigotry and violence.
Taking away religion as an excuse isn't a call to end it. It is a call to accept it and face it so that we can take that distraction out of the picture and reduce horrible events like this.
