If They Say Something Stupid Often Enough…
….do they think it becomes true?
I remain honestly perplexed at the ability of URQ bloggers to base their writing, and presumably their thinking, on lies. Not just debatable assertions, or simple errors of fact; I mean deliberate lies.
This morning I’m scratching my head over this declaration from Girl on the Right:
“While not all Muslims are terrorists, all terrorist [sic] are Muslims.”
Shall we be charitable and assume that Right Girl doesn’t read very much, except for other URQ blogs and Mark Stein? After all, as we know, to keep the URQ mindset alive means that one must limit one’s exposure to reality; otherwise there’s just too much inconvenient truth to ignore or rationalize away. Given that, it’s conceivable (although just barely) that Right Girl has never heard of Shining Path. Or FARQ. Or the IRA. Or Aum Shinrikyo. Or the Army of God. Or the Basque independence movement. Or the Tamil Tigers. Or the Lord’s Resistance Army. Or Timothy McVeigh. Or the various Sikh terror groups (yeah, I know, they’re dark skinned and dress funny, but they’re actually not Muslim, Wendy).
Nor would one expect her to acknowledge that abortion clinic bombers or murderers of abortionists are terrorists. The definition gets pretty selective on their side of the fence, have you noticed?
But even so…one would think that all the references to First Nations demonstrators as “terrorists” coming from the URQ side (however stupid this assertion might be) would invalidate that astonishing dishonest hypothesis.
The Big Lie. Some strategies just never get old, do they?
Um … “Steyn.” It’s “Steyn.”
I have written the following to Michael Coren who has invited this bigot to be on his show on Wed 9 July
Dear Michael,
When I lived in Canada for a period of 4 years, I regularly watched your show. I did not agree with some of your views but I liked the reasoned and calm way you put things across. I was therefore shocked to learn that you have invited Wendy of the website Girl on the right on your show. I believe that were you aware of the many hate filled columns she has written, you would not have invited her. Her writing was so bigoted that STEPHEN Taylor removed her from the Blogging Tories. Google her and you will read what she has written. Here are a few examples.
In this column she wishes that all Muslims are killed because she considers all of us terrorists. Read the last line.
http://www.girlontheright.com/2007/01/nothing-turns-me-on-more-than-dead.html
This is another example of her bigotry
http://www.girlontheright.com/2006/07/islam-must-be-stopped.html
In yet another column she accused native Canadians of f……g their own daughters.
http://girlontheright.com/category/natives/
These are just a few of the columns she has written. Tell me, is the kind of hate filled, racist bigot you want on your show?
I would appreciate a reply
Regards
Suhail
i am awaiting his response
CC, I think you must be talking about that Alpha Male art critic who dabbles in political commentary. I’m talking about Mark STEIN, author of the “MuzzBusters” series.
Have you read them? They’re great.
Four surly, un or under-employed misfits, previously unknown to each other, are summoned to a mysterious office in the middle of the night. Windy, with the supernaturally loud voice; Levy, gifted with the ability to raise an obscuring fog even in sealed room; Shaydie, a midget armaments geek, and Mac, who commands a horde of venomous winged monkeys, all brain dead but obedient.
They receive mysterious guidance from what appears to be a putrefying severed head in a bell jar, and have no end of jolly times and hijinks fighting evil terrorists, all of whom, of course, are Muslim. As of course we know all terrorists are.
Irving Kristol: There are different kinds of truths for different kinds of people. There are truths appropriate for children; truths that are appropriate for students; truths that are appropriate for educated adults; and truths that are appropriate for highly educated adults, and the notion that there should be one set of truths available to everyone is a modern democratic fallacy. It doesn’t work.
It makes more sense if you think of the vast bulk of the wingnuts like RightGirl as victims of the neoconservative “noble lie,” the nobility of which they seriously over-estimated given the ease of communication these days. In their reality (which the rest of us do not inhabit), “all terrorists are Muslim” is the truth appropriate to them, since a world without specific existential threats implies a world of unknown threats that is terrifying to them.
And the spectacular, yawning crevasse between that fancy and observable reality…?
I do think there’s a misapprehension that all terrorists are Muslims or that their causes are one and the same. Here in B.C. there is a fairly stronger sentiment against Sikh extremists than Muslim I suspect. But what I would do from a security standpoint is look at demography to target terrorism in prevention. What percentage of terrorists are Muslim? How many Muslims fly through Pearson International Airport on a given day? What is the likelihood that a Canadian-born citizen will need to be checked for security? I think using common sense and demography we could stop wasting the time of Canadians and use profiling techniques to target the most likely candidates of terrorism. And I think that’s what the far-right is getting at here. It isn’t gramma and little billy who need to be checked at the gate for weapons of mass destruction. And yet our airport security treats us as such.
Well, let’s see. In the last half century of Canada’s history, the noteworthy acts of terrorism have been committed by Francophone Quebecois and Canadians of Sikh origins (presumably).
“What percentage of terrorists are Muslim?”
Wrong question. What percentage of Muslims are terrorists?
I think the point is that the harassment of 99% of innocent people needs to end [what the hell is with the peek-a-boo machines that take naked pictures of you] and a more direct strategy of profiling demographics implemented.
I think the point is that the harassment of 99% of innocent people needs to end…
Why does it need to end?
So you’d hassle…who, exactly?
Sikh Canadians? Aboriginal Canadians? Catholics who oppose abortion? Francophones Quebecois? Anarchists? These are all groups whose most radical fringes have committed or threatened to commit acts of terrorism in Canada.
Raph,
You might want to google Bruce Schneier and check out his blogs and writings – he is the ‘guru’ of computer security and encryption and is one of the leading experts in general security.
His position boils down to this – people are not security risks by who they are, but rather by what they do. He points out that quite simply demographic or any other kind of profiling based what a person is will not work, but rather by how one acts – behavioral profiling.
So, instead of targeting all Muslim and\or ‘brown’ men between 18 and 35 for special attention, you target those passengers who do suspicious things, regardless of who they are. So, look for patterns such as paying for a ticket in cash, one way tickets, little or know luggage. Target observed behaviors, such are nervousness, sweating, inconsistent answers to questions. Combine it all with good intelligence data.
This has the benefit of not only catching terrorists, but drug smugglers, counterfeiters, human traffickers, money launderers and other criminal elements that may cross borders.
Ahmad Ressam was captured in Seattle not because he was Muslim or Arab, but because the Border Patrol Officer who questioned him thought he was acting ‘hinkey’ and decided, based on his behaviour, to have a closer look.
Behavioral Profiling is what works for El Al, not “demographic” or racial profiling – that was how they discovered an pregnant Irish girl was (unknown to even her) carrying a bomb on board a plane about 20 years ago. She didn’t answer the questions right and her story seemed odd so they checked her out. Had they targeted only based on demographic, the plane would have been blown up.
Demographic or racial profiling seems to work on paper, but never does in practice.
Mike, why would behavioral profiling work any better? Are Gramma and Billy acting strangely?
These are just security guards. They don’t have the psychological training to assess behaviour.
“These are just security guards. They don’t have the psychological training to assess behaviour. ”
But the point of behavioural profiling is that these people WOULD be trained properly to do that – as the security personnel at El Al are.
Behavioral profiling has science behind it, while demographic and racial profile just don’t work. Sadly, it requires people who are more intelligent than the $7.00/hr rent-a-cops that TSA and CATSA like to hire. Its more effective, but also more expensive.
So really the bottom line is that airlines and the so-called transportation safety agencies are more concerned with saving money than being effective.