“You’re a slut and I hope you kill yourself.*click*”
Halfway through my day today this was legitimately a call I had received. Someone had literally taken time out of their day, to wait on hold listening to all the advertising and hold music, for the purpose of making an anonymous phone call to advise the poor fuck that answered the phone about their sexual promiscuity and how that may be solved via a swift exit from life.
Like really? Is your blood sugar low? Are you irritable and need a snack? Are you deprived of joy and need a hug? Are you coming to the sad realisation that your mother wishes you were the one she should have swallowed? Do you need to go outside and get some sun to absorb some of that glorious vitamin D THAT I HOPE YOU CHOKE ON YOU COMPLETE WASTE OF OXYGEN?
This isn’t about that unfortunate individual who needs some more productive hobbies however, he just made me annoyed enough to write about the more pressing issue that’s been on my mind over the last while.
Did I miss the fucking memo somewhere that told the world to go nuts with acting like complete pricks?
This isn’t some revelatory statement mind you, I am well aware of the long standing toxicity that has been floating about for oh, the last several hundred years. HOWEVER. There seems to be this trend on the upswing at the moment where a handful of people in the media that have come out making some really fucking stupid statements about other communities, minorities and other perceived scary things (I’m looking at you, Sonia Kruger et all) and now it appears to have served as some sort of xenophobic green light to have everyone throw their moral outrage at anyone not white as the driven snow and as christian as the wood they used for the cross.
I watched the Brexit insanity with a profound sense of gratuity that my ancestor decided to steal a handkerchief that landed him on the boat out here. Now Britain’s more colourful racists have come out of the cracker box like it’s white christmas; attacks on the Polish community are becoming common place, kids are going home crying because they’re being told they have to get out of the country, and people are being abused or attacked in the streets for not looking “British enough” despite having their family there for several generations.
Locally you’ve got Pauline Hanson, resident 90’s punchline politician who has made a disturbing comeback because of the absolute horse shit state of affairs with the recent election and the political landscape in general. Her election results have given her the platform to sprout her absolute divisive vitriol and the media won’t. fucking. stop. giving. her. airtime.
She will rail on television about how she wants to ban Muslims because of the “extremist problem” we have in this country. I’m sorry, I didn’t realise I was living in the midst of daesh contested territory where I can’t go down the street for a bottle of milk without dealing with a suicide bomber or IED. Oh wait, that’s because I’m NOT. Hanson wants to claim that people are scared? They’re only scared because they lack proper critical thinking skills and people like her insist on using the language of fear to divide the community. How about those in the Muslim community who no longer feel safe because of this shit?
It was the Asian community in the 90’s the last time she was on the political circuit, this time it’s the Muslims because they’re a persistent hot topic for conservatives to play to idiot bogans who don’t know how to differentiate between someone who is a terrorist and someone who is a person who happens to follow Islam.
Stop with the freedom of speech defence. You are racist. In Australia, we don’t have a bill of fucking rights, it isn’t protected in our constitution, it is merely implied as per the high court. Just because we have an implied policy that the government does not get to interfere with political discourse, it does NOT mean that you get open slather to incite fear and hatred of a community to further your own political agendas.
You know what pushes people to “extremism”? Bullshit statements like the ones that have been coming out of the mouths of xenophobic assholes like Pauline Hanson. I’m going to use one of the weirdest references to parallel the scenario: the original 90’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles live action movie.
Picture it. You’ve got these teenagers all over New York, young and impressionable, that are constantly spoken down to, patronised, generalised, victimised.
They get the charismatic individual in head coverings and dramatic music who comes out and says I see you. I acknowledge you. I know you. In fact, this is legitimately the line from the movie he uses when addressing the hoards of teenagers while ritualistically promoting someone into his fold in front of them:
“Money cannot buy the honour which you have earned tonight. You make us all proud. Only effort, discipline, loyalty, earn the right to wear the Dragon Doji. You are here because the outside world rejects you. This is your family. I AM YOUR FATHER. I want you all to become full members of the foot. There is a new enemy. Freaks of nature who interfere with our business. You are my eyes and ears, find them! Together we will punish these creatures. These… Turtles.”
This place welcomes them with open arms and lets them be who they want to be. They can skate, they can play games, drink, smoke, play cards, whatever. This gets them into the fold. Then they are given opportunities to run about and do a few petty crimes, help with a few wallet thefts, pinch TV’s off the back of trucks, stuff like that. Then they get the speeches. Then they get the invite to the inner circle- The Foot Clan. Before you know it you’re now in the thick of it committing serious crimes, murder, and terrorism.
Now see that same scenario in our society right here, right now except without ninja turtles (though that would be beyond amazing) and you’ve got yourself a easy 1,2,3 into a suicide bomb vest. The divisive and marginalising statements being thrown about in the media at present are they are inciting racist dickheads to get a perceived free pass to enact violence against another community. Violence breeds more violence. It will breed hatred and resentment on both sides, which then goes on to create extremists regardless of whether they are Islamic or christian or just fucking racist.
If you want to ban everything that came from Islam, then put down your toothbrush and enjoy gingivitis. Throw out your coffee, stop playing smoke on the water on your guitar, stop receiving free medical care in hospitals. These are a handful of some pretty important things to have originated in the Islamic world, but by all means go ahead and talk about extremists as the most important contribution from the Muslim community.
Don’t blame the Muslim community to justify your inbred racism; the terrorist groups aren’t a “Muslim problem”, they are what happens when a group cherry pick the good bits out of their religious text in order to push their agenda and rally against minorities.
Politicians do it every time they use their bible to rail against marriage equality, while eating at lobster shack. The catholic church threw their magical lord words into the mix with their heavy lobbying against birth control all the while the priests of their flock fiddled with young boys behind closed curtains.
I don’t equate every christian with the Westboro Baptist Church or the Ku Klux Klan. Nor do I equate them with the cannibalistic Anti-Balaka christian militia who massacred Muslims including children. Nor do I consider every christian I meet to be a member of The Army of God who systematically murder doctors and bomb family planning clinics on a regular basis.
It’s these assholes that marginalise, demonise and antagonise minorities that drive the itchy trigger finger radicals to do some
seriously dumb shit. There are millions of refugees scattered across the globe with no home because of these fundamentalist racist bigoted cunts on both sides of the fence.
That a bunch of backwater pricks in the middle east cherry pick their Qu’ran for the sake of oppressing minorities; that the taliban and the daesh and all these other spoons are literally the middle eastern version of a redneck… does not mean every member of the religion should be tarred with the same brush.
Not every catholic is a kiddy-fiddling paedophile, not every christian is a homophobic abortion clinic bomber, not every Muslim is a fucking terrorist.
I blame our education system for failing to teach the critical thinking skills they require to override the crap their parents taught them.
I do like your rants. They look and probably sound a lot like mine (I like to growl mine between clenched teeth on my daily 7 miles bycicle ride home from work). Looking forward to reading more
There is a lot of growling while angrily typing. I’m surprised I haven’t gone through more keyboards.