Recently several people whom I consider friends (real friends, not Facebook connections) have posted the picture below to their Facebook walls. Okay, fine. It is their wall and they can post whatever they want. However, this particular idiotic photo tipped something in my wee-little brain and ticked me off. With that in mind know that I am going to rant a little bit about how we (myself included) post these things with no other purpose than to spur hate or anger and perpetuate a bias that has grains of truth among an ocean of sand.

Filmmaker makes a crappy, obscure internet movie that upsets Muslims… Throw him in jail…

Let’s examine the text at face value. Okay, he did make an obscure film. That’s a fact. There were a few protests in Muslim nations that were reported to be about this film so I suppose you can lend some truth to the “upsets Muslims…” part. The big problem I cite with this part of the text is “Throw him in jail.” WAIT A DAMN MINUTE.

Was the dude put back into prison? Yes. Was it in any way due to the film? Nope. Still, that part is left out because this text sounds like we put the poor guy into prison because he made a movie that upsets Islamic people. This feeds the bias that our government supports Islamic people and kisses their (collective) ass.

Our government may kiss asses of many people and countries, but this picture serves only to keep the ‘Murika is good and we don’t need to associate with brown folks’ mentality alive. Should we lose our national identity? Of course not. We should also realize that we are citizens of a big world and we can’t hate a whole group of people because of a few crazies that belonged to that group. I don’t like assholes (though I sometimes am one) of any type. Supporting this type of bias only shows willing ignorance or hate. Which are you?

Idiotic rapper makes a song about murdering the families of Americans he doesn’t like… Invitation to the White House.

Now let us look at this part. “Idiotic rapper...” that’s an opinion. “…makes a song...” Um, I believe he had a couple of lines in a group sing – technically correct though. “…about murdering the families of Americans he doesn’t like…” He said ‘‘kill those fucking Yankees who have been torturing Iraqi captives…kill them all slowly and painfully.” Pretty harsh, but I have to say that I’m not a fan of illegal torture either. “Invitation to the White House.” Yes, he was invited to the White House due to the insane popularity of his song. So? The White House has hosted many people who have actually killed and/or continue to incite violence. One statement 8 years ago is a mere speck on that record. I’ve said offensive shit much more recently. He was part of a protest regarding a Korean missionary killed by Islamic assholes in retaliation to South Korea sending troops to support the US in the Iraq invasion. It was a reaction to a horrible event. I’ve had those too, have you? The absurd amount of ‘MURIKA after 9/11 comes to mind.

So, I guess what I’m getting at is that what this text on photo says is mostly true from a certain perspective. Unfortunately it leaves a lot of detail to your imagination with the blatant intention of making you hate all Muslims and Obama. That’s the point of this photo with text. We can play in kiddie land and say ‘I’m just presenting facts’  with this, but let’s be realistic – you’re spreading hate through ignorance to increase bias. That is being an asshole.