10 Comments

Philippa:

Deep Breath: Hooooookaaaaay… The sign would strike me as not only derogatory but confrontational. I think I would be inclined to approach the woman in EXACTLY the same way as I would any new neighbour (for now leaving aside dicussions of how you arbitrarily approach someone whom you already perceive to be different, that’s another question for another day). I would ask her where she’s from and if she likes the neighbourhood. I might even take a card and some bread/cake. Test the water. See what happens. Expect anything and nothing. Keep us informed.

Mar 19, 2008 - 3:08 pm Norman Simms:

Yes, it’s all very spooky. Perhaps what is most scary, though, is that we–I include myself, of course–find ourselves feeling and uttering things that were once (and still are) said about the Jews, so that we and I have to keep reminding ourselves of important distinctions–why it is not just a psychotic episode we are passing through when we feel paranoid, threatened by an otherness that hides its true intentions and identity, and which represents by word and deed, as well as by signifying clothing, groups manifestly and proudly wishing to destroy Israel, murder Americans, and take over the world on behalf of a questionable ideology using the words and concepts of a major religion. What is frightening too about Obama’s preacher’s ranting remarks (which fits right into this same phenomenon) is not just that they are part and parcel of a major trend in Black Liberation Theology but that they are formulaic components of leftwing intellectual discourses.

Norman

Mar 19, 2008 - 5:57 pm Bambi:

There is a distinction between what was whispered about Jews and what we’re whispering about Islam - acts of violence have been commmitted in the name of Islam and those acts are supported by the q’uran. There is no 10 commandments in the q’uran, no golden rule (although ironically this apt dweller references it), and it is spelled out that they must convert or destroy every non-Muslim.

I’m glad that bohemia is becoming afraid because it’s bohemia that needs to understand what we’re all facing - they’ve been too politically correct and have perpetuated this problem by appeasing angry muslims, criticizing Israel and Jews, or entirely ignoring that the problem exists.

Mar 19, 2008 - 7:04 pm David Thomsom:

“…said about the Jews”

Some sensible people have may perceived Hasidic Jews to be somewhat “foreign”—but they were never considered dangerous. Regrettably, this cannot be said of a good size segment of the Muslim community. We therefore have the moral and intellectual right to be suspicious of Islamic believers. The evidence easily justifies our wariness. Bigotry is the unjust opinion of others not backed by facts. That’s not what we are doing!

Mar 19, 2008 - 8:50 pm Edgar:

What strikes me most in all this is the mention of the “really big men” with her. A woman of that strict Muslim belief wouldn’t be with any man other than her husband, unless another close relative I’m told. in that case, with several family members together all the time, never mixing, I WONDER what they talk about??

Mar 19, 2008 - 10:12 pm Virginia Ray:

Fwd: An amazing speech (by Obama)
I received this letter in an e-mail:
I hope you had the chance to hear Barack Obama’s entire speech - but if not - please access it now. I believe that he can do more to heal this country and bring us that step closer to healing our relationships with the “other” whether it be human or animal - we need to move beyond race and gender to the plight of other species. He can take us part way there.
P.
I wrote back this answer:
I do not feel the speech was amazing in that Obama has no civil rights record except as accepting racism from his pastor and his wife without comment to date - he said what most of us know about race relations and ignored the sexism and anti-semitism of his friend and mentor, Rev Wright.
I think both those threads and how they intersect have profoundly affected Obama’s foreign policies.
I think that means he will ignore the status of women in Muslim theocracies.
Obama has not spoke on the status of Muslim women in the middle east which is an important foreign policy issue in light of his minister’s misogyny.
Most of the Afracentrict Liberation Theologies are anti-Semitic . Wright is anti-Semitic. How has that affected Obama’s Foreign Policy decisions? Because women are oppressed in the Muslim cultures which are part of Obama’s past and present. He has female relatives who are Muslim and presumably living in a Muslim culture. Yet we hear nothing from him on this issue.
Since he thinks the Iraq war was wrong,, how does he intend to deal with Darfur? I do not think the use of military force to end oppression is wrong. Since the left does and Obama does, I want to know how he is going to stop the rape of women in Darfur? It is so easy to say what you would have done when you were not there.
Obama did not speak about whether he supports female slave holding middle east theocracies if they are Palestinians.
What is he going to do about the position of women in the middle east as he is “talking” to all these patriarchs?
I did not hear anything about the sexism in Wright’s speech - how Hillary doesn’t know lynching when women are raped and murdered everyday by the fathers of their children, when girls as young as six are sold by their own parents - when we have honor killings in this country and girls from Somalia are sent home to have their clitorises’ cut off. How Hillary does not know what it is like to be defined as a non person in the constitution. ?! Did the ERA pass while I was sleeping?
When the Muslim religion holds women in slavery, and Obama has so many ties to the Muslim Community, I want to know if he has ever attempted to speak for women rights in Muslim theocracies.
What Obama said is easy to say and has been said by all civil rights workers since the 60’s although most of us do not go to church or follow ministers. Perhaps it did need to be said again but Obama did not answer the questions that concern me.
God is in the details, where Hillary likes to play.
The anti-Israel rants of this minister have been well chronicled. Among the gems:
The Israelis have illegally occupied Palestinian territories for almost 40 years now. It took a divestment campaign to wake the business community up concerning the South Africa issue. Divestment has now hit the table again as a strategy to wake the business community up and to wake Americans up concerning the injustice and the racism under which the Palestinians have lived because of Zionism
Pastor Wright is a supporter of Louis Farrakhan (who called Judaism a “gutter religion” and depicted Jews as “bloodsuckers”) and traveled with Farrakhan to visit Col. Muammar al-Gaddafi, archenemy of Israel’s and a terror supporter.

… reported in the New York Sun,:
http://www.nysun.com/article/71373 , Mr. Obama has chosen Zbigniew Brzezenski to advise him on Mideast policy and it was reported Obama is sending him to Syria!? I have been unable to find the reporter so only Obama’s response confirms that there is something to it.

Zbigniew Brzezenski, in the words of one of my listmembers, is “this dinosaur resuscitated from the Jimmy Carter administration, a man who spent over 30 years attacking Israel, an Arabist who recently signed a letter demanding that Israel negotiate with the terrorist group Hamas, and a defender of the notorious Walt-Mearsheimer ideology that Israel and Jews have too much influence on American foreign policy against the interests of the U.S. ”

Obama denied this report in the sense that he sent ZB to Syria, and said they just met for coffees and sent each other emails.

I cannot find the response of the reporter who wrote the original article, so all of this is just stuff I would like the media to investigate. But Power is often in Darfur working on those problems - perhaps she will only write a book but I thought she was supposed to be helping there. She wrote a book about the oppression of the Iraqi problem (A Problem from Hell) but then when Bush invaded she stood with her friends on the left and opposed the invasion. I wonder what she will advise Obama to do about Darfur?

I would like to ask; Where is Rev Wright? Is Barack sending him to Africa to drum up global support for Obama’s Campaign? The way Power was doing in the Scotsman’s newspaper? Are people such as Wright and Zbigniew Brzezenski and Power going to be BO’s messengers to foreign media and leaders?

Mar 20, 2008 - 12:17 am Virginia Ray:

I think all face masking is a threat and unacceptable to women.

Identification signals good intent - masking is what the abuser does. So you cannot identify them or their gender.

We had a discussion on this blog about what liberties are we willing to give up for security. I am willing to give up the right to cover my face with ski mask or abaya in public.

The burqa and/or abaya has to be outlawed along with ski masks and masks. In light of how often women are victimized and being one of the prey, I say we have a right to demand the people we mingle with in civil society are unmasked.

Mar 20, 2008 - 12:44 pm Amy:

I would ask that the landlord require the woman to take down that sign on her door and, if she does not, take it down for her. She does not have the right to put signs up on private property so that they will be seen in common areas of the building. This is not a First Amendment issue, because there is no “state action” involved (unless the government funds the building somehow). I am always suspicious of those who feel that they have to broadcast their beliefs.

Mar 21, 2008 - 2:17 pm Lakshmi:

I suggest you ask the landlord whether these people are artists and have right to live in your building.

Regards from Germany!

Mar 22, 2008 - 6:49 pm bungalow babe:

This sign/situation is so bizarre/ frightening/provocative that it requires some serious contemplation before proceeding.

If this was my neighbor, I would first get the support of my fellow neighbors and then slip a note under the door saying that we are most interested in meeting the person or persons who felt moved to share their radical religious beliefs in such a public way. I would then NOT sign my actual name or apartment number but create a new, anonymous email address for the occasion.

I might also call the FBI or police. Another thought is to tip off a metro reporter for, say, The New York Times, slipping them
this photo. Maybe let THEM do the espionage work.

Regarding women in burqas WITH sunglasses…the last time I found myself totally freaked out was when I came face to face with a posse of similarly attired women on the Champs Elysee on a Saturday night in August. There is no argument in the world that can make me feel okay about a religion or culture that mandates this for their women.

Mar 23, 2008 - 6:44 am

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