By Roberta Actor-Thomas
Mary Becker should receive a passing grade in a critical thinking class at the nearest junior college before she writes another commentary.
In a single paragraph she writes that “Polls also suggest,” “There are numerous questions” and best of all, “Many folks are suggesting.” She doesn”t want a mosque in lower Manhattan, but her logic is so defective, it”s difficult to know where to begin. I”ll give it a go:
1. “Everyone says” arguments don”t belong in editorials, or anywhere else, for that matter.
2. The rights enumerated in our Constitution aren”t subject to opinion polling and they are not granted by the majority. They are inalienable. We have a Republic and follow the rule of law, not the whims of the mob or what “polls suggest.” Freedom of religion is not a popularity contest and the owner”s legal use of their private property is protected by law. Upholding the Constitution is not political correctness.
3. After Sept. 11 several Sikhs were murdered by ignorant extremists who only saw their turbans and foreign appearance and so assumed that they were Muslims. I think Mary Becker would have been very put out if Sikhs had then blamed all whites or all Christians for those heinous crimes. If some member of a minority group blamed her, as a white person, for an injustice or act of violence against their community, I”m sure she would complain loudly and publicly about the unfairness of this.
No one suggested that we deny permits for Catholic churches when the IRA was blowing up pubs and busses in North Ireland. It”s irrational and immoral to blame an entire group for the actions of a few maniacs. I think Becker knows this, yet, here she is, proposing that Americans do just that.
The Taliban have killed and maimed moderate Muslims who have never given up fighting for a decent society since long before the attacks of Sept. 11.
I know refugees from that region, now American citizens with all the same rights as Mary Becker enjoys, who have been courageous in their resistance to extremism.
Becker”s mean-spirited prejudice is a slap in the face to these people and the families of Muslims who died in the WTC.
She seems to be saying that they have lost their right to worship or gather in a privately-owned building two blocks from where their loved ones were murdered.
Becker should take a long look at the list of the names of the dead, it seems there is no national origin that is not represented. You can”t tell from a name whether someone was newly arrived or if their family has been here for generations. All you know is that they were each unique human beings who went to work that day and never came home again.
If we follow Becker into her abyss of ignorance and unreasoning fear, Al Qaeda will have achieved its goal to destroy liberty and justice in America. We must not let that happen.
Roberta Actor-Thomas is a programmer/analyst in the health care industry. She lives in Lakeport.
