This morning, I received an email from someone who called Obama a Muslim.
I'd guess that hundreds of thousands, even millions of people have forwarded some kind of email, or made some remark in an email about Obama being a Muslim or having been trained in a madrassa.
The truth is that Obama went to school in Indonesia in a non-religious school. He is not a Muslim, never was one. He is a Christian.
Here's my take on who the people who forward such messages are.
First, there are the people who want to believe it and are willing to forward on this kind of message without the most basic fact-checking.
No intelligent pundit or politician or honest, un-bigoted person, including Republicans and right wingers, would EVER forward such a message or make any kind of such statement.
It's pretty simple when you exclude the intelligent, unbigoted and honest people. That leaves bigots, liars and morons.
Now, if you're one of those people, you might want to delve into your self and figure which of these you are.
Okay. I'll add two more categories. First there are intolerant, sodden with the koolaid, right wing extremists who either listen to too much right wing talk radio or who have right wing stupidity bred into their bones, literally. Their parents were right wingers and very possibly bigots too. For some this inherited bigotry goes back for many generations. It's something millions have overcome and risen above. But millions have failed to do so. They are still intolerant, ignorant and full of hate or just plain bigotry.
A lot of you who fit the profile of having forwarded one of these emails, or worse, having started one, probably don't realize you're a bigot. Maybe you're a racist. Maybe you're an anti-muslim, maybe both.
Maybe your priest or minister doesn't like Obama's position on abortion and just threw in the Muslim lie to help sell the idea of opposing him and you've bought that story. Maybe you've even forwarded or printed out pictures of Obama that make himlook like a a terrorist. I've actualy seen printouts like this at a local take-out snack place. I look at the guy who displays these and consider him to be the lowest piece of... life. Not surprisingly, the same guy also posts blatantly racist pictures that are anti black and anti Latino. Ironically, his son dates an African American.
Finally, there's one more group of people who forward the messages. These are righ wingers and or bigots who are not stupid, but they think the people they forward the message to are. Or they think the recipients are intolerant bigots. Either way, they are nasty, ugly people. It raises an interesting question. Who is worst, the bigot or the person who panders to bigotry and uses it to promote intolerance and lies to further his cause.
Permission granted to respond to ALL and send this article to groups that have received "Obama is a Muslim" emails. Don't let the cretins and haters send this garbage out unanswered. There are a lot of people on those lists who are offended by the message but don't know what to say or who don't want to get in an argument. But beware, there are nuts out there. Some of those liars, bigots, morons and panderers will get nasty. I got the email this morning because some right wing jerk decided to hassle me by putting me on mailing lists.
