BREAKING: Shooting at a Wisconsin temple, 20+ shot, 4 dead, kids being held hostage?

JD88 · Aug 12, 2012

Northside Storm said: ↑

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What are you even trying to say at this point?
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Is it really worth continuing this conversation?

rocketsjudoka · Aug 12, 2012

JD88 said: ↑

I merely said they should attempt to look more like the general populace of the country they live in.

If I moved to any Middle Eastern country to live, would it be wise to wear my Levis, Abercrombie shirt, sandals and sunglasses?

Im sure your argument will be 'well America is more civilized then Middle Eastern countries.' To which I would counter with, again, put down the brochure. Its not really.

The 2012 version of the US is dangerous, backward, and full of race hate.
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I can agree with you that there is a very good likelihood that the Sikhs were targeted because the shooter might've mistaken them for Muslims but you are going beyond just explaining to justifying.

Your argument really isn't much different than blaming a rape victim for looking and dressing good.

I know a few Sikhs and on Friday was at the local Sikh temple for a memorial ceremony. Practically all of the Sikhs there are hardworking professionals who obey the laws, keep to themselves and are responsible residents to the communities they live, for the most part middle class to wealthy suburbs. Other than that the men have turbans and beards, while the women wear headscarves they are pretty much living the American ideal. Now you are saying that because of ignorant xenophobes like John Wade they need to do more to blend in. Instead of putting the blame on American Sikhs why not put the blame on the people like John Wade for being ignorant and paranoid to the point of wanting to target people like Sikhs?

VanityHalfBlack · Aug 14, 2012

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HorryForThree · Aug 14, 2012

JD88 said: ↑

When travelling in other countries, before I leave I let my hair grow out, and I stop acting like a Marine because, its unsafe to be an American, especially an American in the military. That is called common sense.

If they lost the beards and middle eastern clothing, do you think they would have been less likely to become a target? I do. You probably feel they shouldn't have to, because this is America, and we allow people in with open arms and are nice to everyone. That may be what the brochure reads when you first get here, but take one look around and you will see otherwise.

Again, the guy was a nut job and clearly had hate in his heart, but stop with the 'America is the place to come be free and do what you want' fairy tale story. Thats not the case in the real world.
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I actually agree with this sentiment insofar as it explains behavior. At the end of the day, we have to accept the fact that we live in a racialized society, and that to a large extent, there are many, many people who hold antipathy towards the 'other', whatever that other may be. Cultural pluralism is a great notion theoretically, but practically speaking its difficult not to realize how pervasive prejudicial practices can become, particularly when they can be couched in alternative terminology.

This rhetoric is largely present in discussions of political issues. Illegal immigration is opposed on principle by many, but it is an undeniable fact that a large contingent of those opposing illegal immigration do so under extremely problematic and discriminatory pretenses, openly on display through public rhetoric on this topic. Depictions of illegal immigrants as being prone to criminal behavior (and aggrandizing every criminal act conducted by one), blaming them for eroding American institutions, and the heavy handed rhetoric of illegal immigrants transgressing upon 'our way of life' are standard talking points in many circles. The difficulty is in distinguishing those that genuinely oppose the policy on principled stances against those who dont. The same dynamic can be applied to a wide range of issues (debates on Islam/Muslims, gay marriage, etc.).

The question is whether we allow ourselve to simply acquiesce to such a reality, or confront it as patently unacceptable with our own societal underpinnings. You may consider this confrontation to be polyannaish, but for the rest of us, it's the type of society we actually want to engender and part of that is calling out bigotry and racism for what it is.

AroundTheWorld · Aug 14, 2012

vaids_13 said: ↑

The difficulty is in distinguishing those that genuinely oppose the policy on principled stances against those who dont. The same dynamic can be applied to a wide range of issues (debates on Islam/Muslims, gay marriage, etc.).

The question is whether we allow ourselve to simply acquiesce to such a reality, or confront it as patently unacceptable with our own societal underpinnings. You may consider this confrontation to be polyannaish, but for the rest of us, it's the type of society we actually want to engender and part of that is calling out bigotry and racism for what it is.
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So are you saying that freedom of speech should be restricted so that debate on Islam should not be allowed?

Rocket River · Aug 14, 2012

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blo...rican-tragedy.html?fwcc=1&fwcl=1&fwl&mobify=0

August 13, 2012
An American Tragedy
Posted by Naunihal Singh

The media has treated the shootings in Oak Creek very differently from those that happened just two weeks earlier in Aurora. Only one network sent an anchor to report live from Oak Creek, and none of the networks gave the murders in Wisconsin the kind of extensive coverage that the Colorado shootings received. The print media also quickly lost interest, with the story slipping from the front page of the New York Times after Tuesday. If you get all your news from “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report,” you would have had no idea that anything had even happened on August 5th at all.

The tragic events in the Milwaukee suburb were also treated differently by political élites, many fewer of whom issued statements on the matter. While both Presidential candidates at least made public comments, neither visited, nor did they suspend campaigning in the state even for one day, as they did in Colorado. In fact, both candidates were in the vicinity this weekend and failed to appear. Obama hugged his children a little tighter after Aurora, but his remarks after Oak Creek referred to Sikhs as members of the “broader American family,” like some distant relatives. Romney unsurprisingly gaffed, referring on Tuesday to “the people who lost their lives at that sheik temple.” Because the shooting happened in Paul Ryan’s district, the Romney campaign delayed announcement of its Vice-Presidential choice until after Ryan could attend the funerals for the victims, but he did not speak at the service and has said surprisingly little about the incident.

As a result, the massacre in Oak Creek is treated as a tragedy for Sikhs in America rather than a tragedy for all Americans. Unlike Aurora, which prompted nationwide mourning, Oak Creek has had such a limited impact that a number of people walking by the New York City vigil for the dead on Wednesday were confused, some never having heard of the killings in the first place.

The two incidents were obviously different in important ways: Holmes shot more people, did so at the opening of a blockbuster film, and was captured alive. There were also the Olympics. However, it is hard to escape the conclusion that Oak Creek would have similarly dominated the news cycle if the shooter had been Muslim and the victims had been white churchgoers. Both the quantity and content of the coverage has been clearly shaped by the identities of the shooter and his victims.

The relative neglect of Oak Creek was not a foregone conclusion. Although the shooting took place at a gurdwara, or Sikh temple, the narrative of the incident contained enough archetypal elements to be compelling to all Americans. The murders took place at a house of worship on a Sunday. There was the heroic president of the congregation who, even though he was sixty-two, battled an armed attacker, sacrificing his own life. There were the children who sounded the alarm and joined fourteen women huddled in a tiny pantry for hours, listening to the agony of the wounded outside. There were the relatives at home, receiving texts and phone calls from loved ones. There were heroic police officers, a shootout, and the attacker’s death by self-inflicted gunshot.

There is also Wade Page himself, with his hate tattoos, photographs in front of swastikas, and his Southern Poverty Law Center dossier. Page so fits our stereotypes of white supremacists that, if he did not exist, it would have been necessary for Quentin Tarantino to invent him. Page appears to have hated blacks, Jews, Latinos, and probably everything else associated with modern multicultural America. Here is a figure whose malevolence should frighten all Americans, not just Sikhs, in the same way that Holmes should terrify all of us, not just those who watch movies at midnight.

Sadly, the media has ignored the universal elements of this story, distracted perhaps by the unfamiliar names and thick accents of the victims’ families. They present a narrative more reassuring to their viewers, one which rarely uses the word terrorism and which makes it clear that you have little to worry about if you’re not Sikh or Muslim. As a Sikh teaching at a Catholic university in the Midwest, I was both confused and offended by this framing. One need not be Pastor Niemöller to understand our shared loss, or to remember that a similar set of beliefs motivated Timothy McVeigh to kill a hundred and sixty-eight (mainly white) Americans in Oklahoma City.

A week later, post-Paul Ryan, Oak Creek has largely receded from public consciousness, along with the important policy issues it raises. There will be little debate about claims that the Department of Homeland Security has understaffed its analysis of domestic counterrorism in response to political pressure. There will also be little attention to the accusation that the military has repeatedly been willing to accept white supremacists in its ranks. Representative Peter King will continue to hold hearings about the threat posed to America by Islamic extremism while refusing to investigate domestic right-wing groups, even though right-wing groups are more worrisome by any systematic measure.

In the end, the events of Oak Creek are tragic on at least two levels. There is the tragedy inherent in the brutal murders, the heroic sacrifices, the anguished waiting, and the grief of relatives whose lives will never be the same. But there is also the larger one of our inability to understand this attack as an assault upon the American dream and therefore a threat to us all. The cost of this second tragedy is one that the entire nation will bear.

Naunihal Singh is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame.

Photograph by Jeffrey Phelps/AP Photo.

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/08/an-american-tragedy.html#ixzz23aMQi59r
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Rocket River

K mf G · Aug 15, 2012

VanityHalfBlack said: ↑

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welcome to the club, sorry you had to find out this way

rocketsjudoka · Aug 15, 2012

Rocket River said: ↑

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blo...rican-tragedy.html?fwcc=1&fwcl=1&fwl&mobify=0

Rocket River
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I tend to agree with this piece that it is surprising how quickly this shooting has faded from the news cycle or sparked any other wider discussions. While it is understandable that the Aurora shooting would get more attention just based on the number of casualties it does seem like the Oak Creek practically has disappeared from national consciousness.

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BREAKING: Shooting at a Wisconsin temple, 20+ shot, 4 dead, kids being held hostage?

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