[Syndicate] RE: RHIZOME_RAW: READ WELL...
furtherfield
info at furtherfield.org
Mon Sep 17 02:16:43 CEST 2001
Of all times - now is the time for people to stand up, put all their
infantile & backward nationalist insecurities aside. Get communicating to
those who want real peace globally on the net, anyway, anyhow. So the world
does not fall into a clich'e macho haze of uptight, confused mindless males
blasting off rockets at each other, killing women, children via their
misplaced hatred.
Don't believe all the press about attacks, some of them will be inventions,
not just in America either. Propaganda will enfuse the traditional lowest
denominator syndrome. Loads of jobs are now being lost because of the
economic slump - this will create more frustation and isoaltion. The world
has got to keep its cool or things will get real nasty for everyone...
m.garrett
>> And guess what: that's Bin Laden's program. That's exactly
>> what he wants. That's why he did this. Read his speeches and
>> statements. It's all right there. He really believes Islam
>> would beat the west. It might
>> seem ridiculous, but he figures if he can polarize the world
>> into Islam and the West, he's got a billion soldiers.
>
> I agree with this theory. We (Americans and the West) are playing
> right into Osama bin Laden hands if the inevitable conflicts are
> anywhere perceived as a "War Against Islam".
>
> To me, the President's calls for "tolerance" of our Arab and
> Moslem-American neighbors is totally phony and inadequate. During the
> Persian Gulf war, American soldiers were encouraged to use terms like
> "Camel Jockey" and much worse to describe the Iraqi enemy. It is a
> tradition in wartime to demonize the enemy. But in this war, we don't
> even have a name for the enemy. "Osama bin Laden" isn't a big enough
> enemy. "Terrorism" is too abstract an enemy. "Islam" itself, I fear, is
> what some Americans are latching onto as the real enemy - and the
> President is doing far too little to discourage this. I think he
> believes that fundamentalist Christians, xenophobes, and racists in the
> USA are too important a constituency to alienate, perhaps he is afraid
> to say anything divisive to his own people. At least Giuliani went out
> of his way on Day 1 to point out that people who discriminate against or
> harass Moslems in NYC will be found and importantly they will be
> *punished*. Bush has said nothing in his speeches to the nation - he
> only ever mentioned this issue once in his phone call to Giuliani and
> Pataki. In fact, his overt religiosity only serves to further perpetuate
> the idea of this as a religious war.
>
> Not only is the President's inaction morally reprehensible , but it's
> strategically stupid: Islamic extremists would just love to be able to
> paint this as a "War Against Islam". Such a PR disaster would certainly
> galvanize the Moslem world against the USA.
>
> All it would take is one speech. One speech where the President chides
> us for our latent racism, where he makes an example of the likes of
> Howard Stern (who is daily advocating putting all Moslems into camps),
> where he tells us that anger at our Moslem sisters and brothers weakens
> us immeasurably, both spiritually and strategically, and that such
> behavior will be punished as surely as any other act of treachery. A
> speech where the USA claims the moral high ground for our very real
> traditions of tolerance and diversity.
>
> Clinton would have done it.
>
> -Cf
>
> [christopher eli fahey]
> art: www.graphpaper.com
> science: www.askROM.com
>
>
>
>
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