So, earlier this week during one of several ongoing Benghazi “fact-finding” investigations, an American student stood up, identified herself as Muslim, and asked the question “How do you fight an ideology with weapons?” In response, she got a lot of angry, reactionary rhetoric about the rising tide of terror bombers coming to blow up our neighborhood Starbucks. What she didn’t get was an actual ANSWER.
So— here’s one. The only reasonable answer to that question is this:
One does NOT fight against an ideology. Instead, one concentrates one’s efforts toward fighting against criminal terrorists.
The motives for the crimes committed and the subjective ideology that inspires the criminals to acts of terrorism is irrelevant. Terrorists of every stripe have been cloaking themselves in ideological symbolism for 3,000 years. It’s never about what you believe, or claim to believe— nor should it be. Everything depends upon one’s actions— what one does.
There are 1.6 billion Muslims in the world right now, and less than 1/10 of them are Muslim Fundamentalists. Less than 1 percent of THOSE are Militant Muslim Fundamentalists. And less than 1 percent of THOSE are criminal terrorists.
No one should be attacking the peaceful, law-abiding 99.999% percent of Muslims in the world today. That would be stupid and counterproductive. Instead, one should concentrate one’s fire on the militant criminal terrorists (duh!)— and leave everyone else out of it.
Here’s a comparative analogy: There are 2.8 billion Christians in the world right now, and less than 1/10 of them are Christian Fundamentalists. Less than 1 percent of them are militant Christian Activists. And less than 1 percent of THOSE are criminal terrorists (and there ARE such groups, both in the United States— the Army of God and Hutaree, for example— and worldwide. Remember Kony and the LRA?). Do we blame the other 2.7999999999 billion Christians for the actions of a few misguided shitheels? (BTW, this general percentage checks out all across the human demographic spectrum— there is pretty much the same percentage of atheist and non-religious terrorists in the world as well. It’s usually not a “religious” thing— it’s a “psychopath” thing.)
Governments and politicians seriously need to stop trying to purposely obfuscate the situation by inserting bullshit religious references or arguments into the mix to cloud the issue or elicit support or sympathy where there should be none.
It is my assertion that people should be dealt with NOT according to “what they believe” or where they choose to prop (or not prop) their feet on the Sabbath– but instead, according to their actual actions. That cuts ideology and accusations of religious persecution out of it, and goes straight to the heart of the matter.
It’s should be all about WHAT YOU DO. No matter who you are. End of story.
Also worth mentioning is the fact that by this time— July 2014— all recent “Benghazi hearings” have become, essentially, mere works of political theater intended for mass distribution via broadcast media. It’s all a lot of posturing and over-inflated proselytizing. The real investigations happened over a period of several months shortly after the event, and their findings are a matter of public record.
In political theater the attempt to elicit outrage and anger are a mainstay in the resultant wrangling, especially when trying to curry the support of various sectors of the public (and the press). Outrage and anger are far more effective in getting people to vote (or donate) than logic or reason.
The script is as follows: invent a crisis, then fight each other over it in order to garner funds for your side, or the personal projects of those on your side. Not brain surgery, that.
I know a political media circus act when I see one.
Meanwhile, speaking of “outrage”— at this very moment, Amazon.com is fighting a court battle against a proposed class action lawsuit that alleges (truthfully) that Amazon purposely inflated prices on Amazon Prime products to offset the cost of supposedly “free shipping.” Amazon’s position is that it doesn’t MATTER that they tacked the monetary equivalent of the shipping costs— totaling millions of dollars— onto the “buying price” of the items in question— customers technically got what they signed up for: “free shipping.” Because the additional charges weren’t specifically CALLED “shipping charges.”
That’s some pretty blatant bullshit. Why the hell doesn’t Congress investigate THAT?