Now the Muslim identity is becoming increasingly problematic in the USA and I believe that years and years of promoting identity politics has left the country without the means of even admitting to itself that the islamic identity clashes head long with that of a secular nation state.
Okay, I'm going to be the bad man in the room but someone's gotta say it.
Connecting a specific incident to a broad-based generalization about an entire group of people is always a dangerous proposition. Why? Because context matters.
Let's take a look at Jim Adkisson. He walked into a unitarian church and started shooting people specifically because of a hatred of gays, liberals and democrats. He was a dyed in the wool conservative who followed the writings and media of O'reilly, Hannity and Savage religiously. In a sworn affidavit, he stated;
"During the interview Adkisson stated that he had targeted the church because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country, and that he felt that the Democrats had tied his country's hands in the war on terror and they had ruined every institution in America with the aid of major media outlets. Adkisson made statements that because he could not get to the leaders of the liberal movement that he would then target those that had voted them into office. Adkisson stated that he had held these beliefs for about the last ten years."
Now, Adkisson killed 2 people and wounded 7 others. Thankfully he was tackled and disarmed by quick thinking church members before he could do more damage.
Does this incident mean that the "conservative identity is becoming increasingly problematic in the USA"?
Not at all. But using the same logic for the Hasan shootings, it does.
Look at Timothy Mcveigh. His actions killed a whole lot more people than either Adkisson or Hasan. Using the same logic that is being applied to Hasan, this would mean that any caucasian U.S military veteran should be barred from owning or bearing any kind of arms and be monitored by the State the same as registered sex offenders, for our general security of course.
Now, I'm not meaning to make folks angry here but stating that what Hasan did is indicative of Islam in general is using a pretty damn big brushstroke. Afterall, there are 1.4 billion muslims on the planet, almost 5 times more people than the entire population of the U.S.
To further complicate matters, one issue that hasn't had a lot of light shined on it is the dependency of the U.S military has had on Muslims in it's operations overseas AND the effect that dependency has had on the nation's it is trying to help.
Please allow me to explain.
Most U.S servicemembers are not functional in Arabic. Yes, anyone can learn how to say hello, goodbye and such but from an operational standpoint if you can't communicate with the general populace -ESPECIALLY- in a counter-insurgency environment then you've already lost and might as well go home.
To fill this gap, the U.S military has depended heavily on translators. Yes, some officers and NCO's have learned how to speak functional Arabic (we're talking Iraq, Afghanistan is another matter and group of languages entirely) but by an large there has been a massive shortage of translators since day 1 and there still is. So, the U.S military had a couple of choices;
1) Recruit from within the U.S, taking muslim recruits and sending them overseas largely as translators. While this helped to bridge the gap it wasn't nearly enough so we come to the next option;
2) Recruit locally overseas. Getting a hold of someone who can speak both english and arabic in Iraq means that statistically speaking, that person is going to be generally well-educated. Also, translator jobs in Iraq and Afghanistan pay VERY well in comparison to just about any other vocation. So, folks who otherwise would be doctors, lawyers and engineers... the professional class that any country needs to run it's power and water treatment plants as well as educate the populace and treat their diseases... have instead largely been co-opted to become translators. This has had the effect of delaying or retarding the national rebuilding effort as folks who -could- be employed to help rebuild have instead been employed to travel around with foreign troops as a liason.
The local recruits also face a major problem- they actually live in-country with their families, which means they are a huge target for the enemy. Anyone who's signed up to be a translator in Iraq and Afghanistan knowingly puts not just themselves but also their family in harm's way, so you could say they're taking a major risk and doing a very gutsy thing to help out the Americans.
The point I'm trying to make is that overall, there are many Muslims, both U.S citizens and foreigners, who have gone above and beyond the call of duty to help the U.S as translators and such. In short, you could definitely say that there are many true hero's who are Muslim and also wear the U.S uniform or are employed by them. Without them the U.S adventures overseas would have most assuredly have failed or resulted in far greater death and destruction than has already occurred.
What Major Hasan did is deplorable and has no excuse, just as what Jim Adkisson and Tim Mcveigh did has no excuse either.
But I do not believe it is indicative of a problem with 1.4 billion people, anymore so than the killer of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin would be indicative of a problem with any Israeli citizen who considers themselves to be right wing politically.
It may be fun to make sweeping generalizations, but when you step back and look at the whole picture, Islam is indeed a peaceful religion. It has been co-opted for political and military purposes many times in the past, but so too has Christianity.
I seem to remember this CRAZY thing in Spain called the inquisition (church has just a teensy part to play in that) and the decimation of millions of aboriginals in the America's (north and south) in which we were just doing our Christian duty of spreading the faith to a supposedly backward people.
