Christian bigotry toward Muslims

It always interests me when I hear Christians talk about Muslims and their practices. They can always give detailed explanations of their motives and intentions, which is fascinating considering that most don't know even know any Muslims or have studied Islam themselves.

Jerry Boykin, here, has an idea that Muslims have nefarious objectives behind their actions. This is something that I hear a lot. In fact, his statement that Muslims claim all places of worship as "holy grail for Allah" particularly stuck out to me because last week a heard a Christian teaching that Muslims build mosques, not to worship, but to claim it for the land for themselves. Apparently, it is all part of an elaborate plot to take over America.

It's also amusing how Boykin condemns tolerant Christians because they "know absolutely nothing about Islam" when he further goes on to say that Muslims get kicks out of "cursing Jesus Christ." Indeed, Muslims hate Jesus so much that their Quran derides him by calling him a "servant of God," a "prophet," and "blessed." 19:30-31
I've noticed that many Christians seem to be under the impression that Muslims all hate Jesus, as in this comic by Jack Chick, for example. (Yes, I read chick tracks. They're amusing.)
Of course, there are several things wrong with this comic, but what I'm getting at is how Muslims are portrayed as angry, violent, Jesus-haters.
It worries me when I hear Christians who have a large platform saying things like this, especially in churches, because most Christians have no way of correcting this misinformation. They are mostly surrounded by like minded people, who shape their perspective, and one of their biggest influences on virtually every issue are the self-proclaimed experts who claims to speak on the behalf of God, such as a pastors and people like Chick and Boykin. Because of them, their image of Muslims will remain bigoted and one-sided.

African-American women are invisible

A study from Psychology Today stated that AA women are "invisible." Not only are we not noticed, and people have difficulty remembering our faces; but they also do not pay attention to what we say. They think that we are interchangeable with other AA women. Of course, we already knew that. The television tells us everyday, "We won't acknowledge you unless you look white." While we see male AA characters who actually look as if they are of African descent, virtually all female AA characters are subject to a paper bag test. Women who look Hispanic, mixed, or white with a perm are cast in our roles.

"Black" Daphne from Queer as Folk is a typical example

Television on the other hand typically uses male AA actors who actually appear to be Black, so it is no surprise to me that the study showed that they were listened to and noticed by the participants in the study. The phenomena of AA women being represented on TV by women who do not look like they're of African descent is related to why society does not acknowledge us, and I wish that another study would further explore this topic.

In addition, I can also see that AA women feel ignored as well, which is why many seem rather obsessive on topics concerning Interracial and Black-love relationships and dating. Perceiving that they are regarded as irrelevant, they feel a stronger need to get validation from men. When some women don't love themselves, they try to compensate by relying on men for attention.

A day or two ago, I came across a series of paintings by Margret Bowland that express the invisibility that AA women experience because we do not fit into the white standard. Besides their perceptiveness, what makes her paintings even more remarkable is the fact that she is European-American. She has such keen insight into what it is like to be an "other," to not be respected because you are not someone else.

The following is a portion of a statement by Bowland on this issue. You can read it in its entirety here.

We inhabit a purely relative world, in terms of belief structures, yet each of us knows and in a sense, believes in, the need to be beautiful. My work is about beauty—what it means to be beautiful and what significance the idea has in the twenty-first century in the world of art. We all know that being beautiful is as important as being rich, that being beautiful is itself a form of wealth. One must be tall, thin and white. One’s features must be diminutive and regular. We recognize deviations from this norm, but recognize that these deviations, even if appealing, are far from ideal. The need to be beautiful fuels one of the largest and most ruthless industries in our world. 

Beauty makes sense to me, has weight for me, only when it falls from grace. It starts to matter when it carries damage. Sorrow allows it to cast a shadow. It becomes three-dimensional. It enters our world.

Looking at Manet’s Olympia, I wondered about the two women depicted—the young, naked prostitute and the black maid servant—about the relationship between them and to the man observing them. His implied presence began to unite them to me, not as lovers, but as the prey sharing a foxhole. In my imagination, the women of my paintings entered that room. What my century brings to the ideas of race and beauty and sexual allure began to overlay Manet’s.

The Myth of Traditional Marriage

So, I was reading in my sociology book today, and was struck by a passage that talked about love and marriage. Apparently, the two were, and remain in many areas around the world, separate from each other for most of history. Romance only began to be coupled with marriage in modern times, and the whole experience of falling in love emerged during the Middle Ages with aristocrats' extramarital love affairs. While they had romances with others, the relationships they had with their spouses were cold and distant.

I found this amusing because it reminded me of Conservatives "First comes love, then comes marriage..." idealistic view of relationships. They like to delude themselves into thinking that God has ordained one man and woman to fall in love and marry when really it hasn't been that way for most of our history. They don't realize that our perspectives on marriage are the results of centuries of social evolution, and that our perception of them will keep changing. God has not etched on a stone tablet how relationships are supposed to look, and we have not only recently deviated from some social norm. On the contrary, what Conservatives consider to be God's will for marriage is a recent development that the world hasn't seen before.

On a side note, it amuses me how Christians call one man-one woman "traditional marriage" when one can clearly see that polygamy is more traditional, at least in the Bible in any case.

African-Americans supporting racism and ignorance

I just read this article about Lil Wayne’s hatred of dark skinned women. Now, I don’t care about Lil Wayne nor his statements (as I’ve never listened to his music or that of any other rappers, for that matter), and I won’t discuss the irony of his disgust for dark women, considering that he is dark himself. Also, I’m not surprised by his comments as I’ve heard rappers say similar things. However, I am disappointed that when they make such statements, AAs not only do not bat an eye but continue to lap their music up. If anyone of European descent said that we were ugly or inferior in anyway because of our skin color, AAs would be appalled, yet they throw millions of dollars toward rappers who only demean our worth and refer to us as "bitches" and "hoes". How oblivious are we that we actually pay someone to insult us--especially AA women who idolize singers and other celebrities who have a paper bag test for the women they associate with and allow in their videos? I will not expect the conditions of African-Americans to change in this country while we continue to oppress ourselves. As long as we, and the people that we esteem, associate our worth to the color of our skin and the texture of our hair, the problems that plague our community will continue to persist.

Another reaction to Lil Wayne's statements that I find quite irritating are some people’s dismal of them as just a preference, as if our “preferences” just arise from nowhere and are therefore trivial. We are all aware of the racial hierarchy in this country from when we are just children. These “preferences” of men are merely the racism they learned during childhood manifesting itself when they are adults. We can’t remedy problems when we will not even acknowledge that they exist. The more that we have discussions about colorism, the more likely it is that people will confront the self-hatred and internalized racism that fuels their biases toward skin color. 

The Atheist that Stole Christmas (The Christian Perception of Victimization)

They're trying to take "Christ" out of "Christmas." 

It's not even December, but I'm already hearing that familiar cry of victimization. The phrase bothers me, to a lesser extent, because it assumes that just because one is not a Christian that he or she is automatically anti-Christian. To hear many Christians talk, one would presume that it is every non-Christian's aim to stamp out all references of Christ, or that we quail at the mere sight of a cross. But just because we left the religion doesn't mean that we hate everything that is connected with it. Heck, I still listen to Richard Smallwood and Kirk Franklin. So, yeah, I find it rather insulting that the church keeps sending the message that just because I'm an atheist, that I have nothing better to do with my time than to obsess about removing baby Jesus from their nativity scenes.

However, what annoys me the most about this phrase are the privileged connotations that go along with it. I can't tell you how many times I've heard the phrase "Happy Holidays" condemned as an evil plot against Christianity just because it doesn't recognize Christianity as being supreme. Christians have such a sense of entitlement in America that they feel that every thing that does not acknowledge them is a direct attack. Do you celebrate Chanuka or Kwanzaa? Too bad. Jesus is the reason for the season, so your holidays cannot be recognized at all. Tell me, if Christianity is not a religion but instead is a personal relationship, why is it necessary to force it on everyone else? If Christmas is all about Jesus for you, fine, as it is your "personal relationship" after all, but stop trying to make others join it. I mean really, you don't see Jews protesting when business put up signs that say "Merry Christmas," but Christians protest holiday trees because it does not mention them. A lack of privilege over other religions is a sign of a oppression apparently.

This reminds me of how a couple of times I have heard Christians say that they are oppressed because they are not allowed to proselytize in public schools. It is as if they just cannot understand why someone would not want them to teach children about their religion, when they know that they would raise hell if a Muslim, Mormon, JW, etc. came on school grounds and did the exact same thing. However, because they are Christians, they feel as if they should get a pass.

Have you heard of the Christian movie "Christmas with a Capital C." It pretty much sums up the sentiment I described in this post.

Slavery and Religion

I don’t want to be one of those people—the anti-religious who think there are absolutely no redeeming qualities in religion, but reading things like this only help to alienate me from faith in general.

To make my position clear, I’ll first start by saying that I don’t believe that any religions are inspired. People create religions for primarily three reasons:

1.  To get answers about things they do not understand, such as why the world works the way it does and were people go after they die
2.  To promote their own agenda and to control the masses
3. To gain inner peace and tranquility

Reasons one and two are the ones with which I have a problem; however, I will be focusing on two today. But, I probably should just start by saying what motivated this topic before post loses any sense of order.

What caused me to think about this topic today was Phillis Wheatley (1754?-1784), a talented Senegalese woman who was kidnapped and sold to John Wheatley when she was seven. He taught her to read and write. She used her knowledge to create poems that astonished Americans at the time. They didn’t believe that an African girl could be brilliant. She published Poems on Various Subjects; Religious and Moral in 1773, which was praised in both Europe and North America. With her prominence, it would be marvelous if she used her talents and influence to move others to understand the barbarism of slavery, helping to liberate her brothers and sisters, as Olaudah Equiano did for example. Instead, she created poetry like this. (I highlighted the most notable parts.)

‘Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land,
Taught my benighted soul to understand
That there's a God, that there's a Saviour too:
Once I redemption neither sought nor knew.
Some view our sable race with scornful eye,
"Their colour is a diabolic die." 
Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,
May be refin'd and join the' angelic train.

Two things are notable about this poem. The first is Wheatley’s praising slavery as an act of divine providence. The fact that anyone, especially someone whose race is a victim of it, could think that such cruelty and brutality is a gift from God is astonished me.  Being someone’s slave is worth it in the end because you will die and spend eternity worshiping a God who put you in that position to begin with?

The second piece of this poem that I found disturbing is the apologetic way that she refers to our race. If we are cleaned up and civilized, we can too can be permitted into heaven behind the Europeans. Oh, joy.

In addition, her reference to Cain is also interesting. Christians have long used the myth that Cain was cursed with black skin by God to advocate racism against Africans. She actually believes this lie, and thinks that we should be tolerated in spite of this fault. But, before I go on, I want to clarify I’m not blaming Wheatley personally for this. She was a victim of a society that has used religion as a medium of control. It disgusts me that not only did Americans use this reasoning to justify slavery, but also they were able to integrate it so much in our psyche that we even accepted inferiority—even to the point where we were grateful for slavery. However, what is important is that this thinking still motivates our actions to this day.

How much does myth and superstition control African-Americans? Do you know someone who routinely wastes her money by throwing it away to preachers or and churches expecting God to “multiply her seed” so that she can “reap her harvest?” What about someone who continues to make foolish mistakes because “God will make a way” or will provide? Have you heard songs like this?

“Faithful Is Our God”

I'm reaping the harvest God promised me
Take back what the devil stole from me
And I rejoice today, for I shall recover it all

“The Blessing of Abraham”

You are the seed by faith receive

The blessing of Abraham

Wherever you are, where er' you go

Whatever you touch is anointed to grow



"God Will Make a Way"

God will make a way

Where there seems to be no way

He works in ways we cannot see
He will make a way for me

From: http://www.musicbabylon.com

It’s about time that we learned that neither God nor prayer nor magic beans will grant prosperity. There is no force that trails  you, allows good things to  happen to you, or that mops up your messes up when things go wrong. Your life is entirely in your hands. If you seek opulence, then it will have to be through your hard work, determination, and education—not because you gave a seed of a hundred bucks to your preacher. This is just one example, but I look forward to when religion stops holding us back.

Minorities are the Borg

A great disadvantage of being a member of a minority is constantly being seen as only a part of a collective. For example, European-Americans are regarded as individuals, while a minority is just seen as a member of the racial or religious group to which he or she belongs. If John is EA, his actions are only seen as a representation of himself, and he is not expected to conform to any racial standard. However, as a minority, his every action would be evaluated on how closely he fit into a stereotypical mold, and if he did not, he would just be deemed an exception. I call this perception of minorities the "Borg Effect." We aren't expected to have our own voice, and the actions of a few are seen as the responsibility of all.

I saw the Borg Effect at work today after reading Sarah Palin's objections to a mosque being built two blocks away from Ground Zero. She tweets:

Peace-seeking Muslims, pls understand, Ground Zero mosque is UNNECESSARY provocation; it stabs hearts. Pls reject it in interest of healing

First, it's interesting that she addresses them as "peace-seeking," as if they by nature they are uncharacteristic. She must distinguish good Muslims from the supposed normal, violent Muslims. Secondly, she, and apparently many Americans, expect all Muslims to take responsibility for the attacks of 9/11. As one narrator said:

On Sept. 11, they declared war against us. And to celebrate that murder of 3,000 Americans [as if Muslims aren't Americans too and none were victims of 9/11], they want to build a monstrous 13-story mosque at ground zero.

So, the responsibility of 9/11 does not rest on the suicide boomers head, or on the terrorist organizations, but on every single one of the one billion Muslims of the world. By this logic, should we forbid any European-Americans from operating near the location where the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building was bombed? Lovely.