To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page.
It
took the U.S. secretary of defense, for God's sake, to get a Florida
preacher to cancel his plans for pyrotechnic sacrilege on Sept. 11. A
few days later, CNN asked some of its blog contributors to reflect on
the incident . . . "now that the crisis is over."
It
took the U.S. secretary of defense, for God's sake, to get a Florida
preacher to cancel his plans for pyrotechnic sacrilege on Sept. 11. A
few days later, CNN asked some of its blog contributors to reflect on
the incident . . . "now that the crisis is over."
We're
neck deep in two wars (excuse me, one and a half) and an imploding
economy, not to mention global warming, endemic violence and hurricane
season, but Terry Jones' creepy publicity stunt has the status of a
national crisis: America's close call! We came this close to offending Muslims!
Oh, we are a sensitive nation.
And Jones was, indeed, dabbling at the margins of holy war, which media coverage managed to turn into a global phenomenon. ". . . he ignited an international conflagration of outrage," as CNN put it, though he didn't do it by himself.
One
of the core paradoxes of our news industry is that it grew in breadth
and scope -- in its ability to reach billions of people -- well ahead of
its growth in depth and insightful coverage. It's as sensation-mongering
as it was in its penny broadsheet days, and thus a marginal, gun-toting
preacher and his obscene little plan to burn several hundred Qurans
became capriciously catapulted into an international news story and a
"national crisis."
All
the while, we press on with our "war on terror," which over the last
nine years has managed to become fabulously expensive background noise
(except, of course, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and other places
where it's actually being waged, and among the troops fighting it and
their anxious or shattered families). This war of oil and empire presses
on in its inevitability, having long ago transcended the original lies
that birthed it.
Funny
thing is, there's plenty of Terry Jones in our mission (originally it
was a "crusade," remember?) in the Middle East, plenty of holy hell and
demonizing of Islam. There has always been a shadowy, 12th century edge
to the war, which was launched amid serious (and seriously reported)
neocon bluster about a "clash of civilizations." And throughout the
fighting, high-ranking Evangelical Christians -- from Lt. Gen. William
Boykin, former undersecretary of defense, to Lt. Col. Gary Hensley, chief of U.S. military chaplains in Afghanistan -- have contorted the war into a quest for souls and a clash of deities (our God is the real God).
Before
the November 2004 assault on Fallujah, a lieutenant colonel told his
troops (as quoted by a BBC reporter): "The enemy has got a face. He's
called Satan. He lives in Fallujah. And we're going to destroy him."
And
the religion-tinged racism of our military occupation is
well-documented by conscience-stricken veterans of the war on terror.
For instance, Mike Totten, speaking at the 2008 Winter Soldier hearings
in Washington, D.C., discussed how the Army twisted the word "hadji,"
which means an Islamic religious pilgrim, into the "gook" stand-in of
the Iraq war. "The hadji is an obstacle. Get him out of the way,"
Totten's sergeant major was wont to say. Totten added: "Denying a person
their name gave us permission to separate ourselves from the people of
Iraq."
Compared
to all this, Terry Jones and his erstwhile Quran barbecue plans were
chump change -- a planned spectacle of his own and his congregation's
ignorance. While the burning would have enraged many Muslims and
possibly incited some to vengeful violence, it might also have
emboldened the religious bigots within the ranks of our own military and
among the war's diehard supporters. (And of course there were some
copycat Quran burnings reported, even though Jones held off on his own
plans.)
So
Jones became an official crisis -- a PR crisis -- who needed to be
publicly rebuked and, God willing, stopped. Modern, industrial wars,
fought by a modern empire, aren't supposed to be holy wars, even though
war itself is a concept steeped in the fanaticism of religion and
nationalism. Just as George Bush's PR team had to stifle their crusadin'
commander in chief, so the far savvier Barack Obama has to insist on a
sober, separation-of-church-and-state war fought only for reasons of
national security.
"In
a world of global communications, crackpots such as the would-be
Quran-burners in Florida can disrupt the U.S. war on terror," Brian
Fishman, a counterterrorism research fellow at the New America
Foundation, wrote as his contribution to CNN's "lessons learned" blog.
To
distinguish the responsible pursuers of the war on terror from
crackpots like Jones, Fishman quoted Gen. David Petraeus' words to the
troops in Afghanistan: "Live our values. Stay true to the values we hold
dear. This is what distinguishes us from our enemies."
From
Guantanamo to Bagram to Baghdad to Fallujah, let us live our values,
perpetrating only the torture we allow in our own prisons, only the
violence we allow in our own ghettoes, only the toxic horrors we allow
in our own soil and water, and only the corruption we allow in our own
halls of Congress.
Oh Lord, we pray.
Common Dreams is powered by optimists who believe in the power of informed and engaged citizens to ignite and enact change to make the world a better place. We're hundreds of thousands strong, but every single supporter makes the difference. Your contribution supports this bold media model—free, independent, and dedicated to reporting the facts every day. Stand with us in the fight for economic equality, social justice, human rights, and a more sustainable future. As a people-powered nonprofit news outlet, we cover the issues the corporate media never will. |
It
took the U.S. secretary of defense, for God's sake, to get a Florida
preacher to cancel his plans for pyrotechnic sacrilege on Sept. 11. A
few days later, CNN asked some of its blog contributors to reflect on
the incident . . . "now that the crisis is over."
We're
neck deep in two wars (excuse me, one and a half) and an imploding
economy, not to mention global warming, endemic violence and hurricane
season, but Terry Jones' creepy publicity stunt has the status of a
national crisis: America's close call! We came this close to offending Muslims!
Oh, we are a sensitive nation.
And Jones was, indeed, dabbling at the margins of holy war, which media coverage managed to turn into a global phenomenon. ". . . he ignited an international conflagration of outrage," as CNN put it, though he didn't do it by himself.
One
of the core paradoxes of our news industry is that it grew in breadth
and scope -- in its ability to reach billions of people -- well ahead of
its growth in depth and insightful coverage. It's as sensation-mongering
as it was in its penny broadsheet days, and thus a marginal, gun-toting
preacher and his obscene little plan to burn several hundred Qurans
became capriciously catapulted into an international news story and a
"national crisis."
All
the while, we press on with our "war on terror," which over the last
nine years has managed to become fabulously expensive background noise
(except, of course, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and other places
where it's actually being waged, and among the troops fighting it and
their anxious or shattered families). This war of oil and empire presses
on in its inevitability, having long ago transcended the original lies
that birthed it.
Funny
thing is, there's plenty of Terry Jones in our mission (originally it
was a "crusade," remember?) in the Middle East, plenty of holy hell and
demonizing of Islam. There has always been a shadowy, 12th century edge
to the war, which was launched amid serious (and seriously reported)
neocon bluster about a "clash of civilizations." And throughout the
fighting, high-ranking Evangelical Christians -- from Lt. Gen. William
Boykin, former undersecretary of defense, to Lt. Col. Gary Hensley, chief of U.S. military chaplains in Afghanistan -- have contorted the war into a quest for souls and a clash of deities (our God is the real God).
Before
the November 2004 assault on Fallujah, a lieutenant colonel told his
troops (as quoted by a BBC reporter): "The enemy has got a face. He's
called Satan. He lives in Fallujah. And we're going to destroy him."
And
the religion-tinged racism of our military occupation is
well-documented by conscience-stricken veterans of the war on terror.
For instance, Mike Totten, speaking at the 2008 Winter Soldier hearings
in Washington, D.C., discussed how the Army twisted the word "hadji,"
which means an Islamic religious pilgrim, into the "gook" stand-in of
the Iraq war. "The hadji is an obstacle. Get him out of the way,"
Totten's sergeant major was wont to say. Totten added: "Denying a person
their name gave us permission to separate ourselves from the people of
Iraq."
Compared
to all this, Terry Jones and his erstwhile Quran barbecue plans were
chump change -- a planned spectacle of his own and his congregation's
ignorance. While the burning would have enraged many Muslims and
possibly incited some to vengeful violence, it might also have
emboldened the religious bigots within the ranks of our own military and
among the war's diehard supporters. (And of course there were some
copycat Quran burnings reported, even though Jones held off on his own
plans.)
So
Jones became an official crisis -- a PR crisis -- who needed to be
publicly rebuked and, God willing, stopped. Modern, industrial wars,
fought by a modern empire, aren't supposed to be holy wars, even though
war itself is a concept steeped in the fanaticism of religion and
nationalism. Just as George Bush's PR team had to stifle their crusadin'
commander in chief, so the far savvier Barack Obama has to insist on a
sober, separation-of-church-and-state war fought only for reasons of
national security.
"In
a world of global communications, crackpots such as the would-be
Quran-burners in Florida can disrupt the U.S. war on terror," Brian
Fishman, a counterterrorism research fellow at the New America
Foundation, wrote as his contribution to CNN's "lessons learned" blog.
To
distinguish the responsible pursuers of the war on terror from
crackpots like Jones, Fishman quoted Gen. David Petraeus' words to the
troops in Afghanistan: "Live our values. Stay true to the values we hold
dear. This is what distinguishes us from our enemies."
From
Guantanamo to Bagram to Baghdad to Fallujah, let us live our values,
perpetrating only the torture we allow in our own prisons, only the
violence we allow in our own ghettoes, only the toxic horrors we allow
in our own soil and water, and only the corruption we allow in our own
halls of Congress.
Oh Lord, we pray.
It
took the U.S. secretary of defense, for God's sake, to get a Florida
preacher to cancel his plans for pyrotechnic sacrilege on Sept. 11. A
few days later, CNN asked some of its blog contributors to reflect on
the incident . . . "now that the crisis is over."
We're
neck deep in two wars (excuse me, one and a half) and an imploding
economy, not to mention global warming, endemic violence and hurricane
season, but Terry Jones' creepy publicity stunt has the status of a
national crisis: America's close call! We came this close to offending Muslims!
Oh, we are a sensitive nation.
And Jones was, indeed, dabbling at the margins of holy war, which media coverage managed to turn into a global phenomenon. ". . . he ignited an international conflagration of outrage," as CNN put it, though he didn't do it by himself.
One
of the core paradoxes of our news industry is that it grew in breadth
and scope -- in its ability to reach billions of people -- well ahead of
its growth in depth and insightful coverage. It's as sensation-mongering
as it was in its penny broadsheet days, and thus a marginal, gun-toting
preacher and his obscene little plan to burn several hundred Qurans
became capriciously catapulted into an international news story and a
"national crisis."
All
the while, we press on with our "war on terror," which over the last
nine years has managed to become fabulously expensive background noise
(except, of course, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and other places
where it's actually being waged, and among the troops fighting it and
their anxious or shattered families). This war of oil and empire presses
on in its inevitability, having long ago transcended the original lies
that birthed it.
Funny
thing is, there's plenty of Terry Jones in our mission (originally it
was a "crusade," remember?) in the Middle East, plenty of holy hell and
demonizing of Islam. There has always been a shadowy, 12th century edge
to the war, which was launched amid serious (and seriously reported)
neocon bluster about a "clash of civilizations." And throughout the
fighting, high-ranking Evangelical Christians -- from Lt. Gen. William
Boykin, former undersecretary of defense, to Lt. Col. Gary Hensley, chief of U.S. military chaplains in Afghanistan -- have contorted the war into a quest for souls and a clash of deities (our God is the real God).
Before
the November 2004 assault on Fallujah, a lieutenant colonel told his
troops (as quoted by a BBC reporter): "The enemy has got a face. He's
called Satan. He lives in Fallujah. And we're going to destroy him."
And
the religion-tinged racism of our military occupation is
well-documented by conscience-stricken veterans of the war on terror.
For instance, Mike Totten, speaking at the 2008 Winter Soldier hearings
in Washington, D.C., discussed how the Army twisted the word "hadji,"
which means an Islamic religious pilgrim, into the "gook" stand-in of
the Iraq war. "The hadji is an obstacle. Get him out of the way,"
Totten's sergeant major was wont to say. Totten added: "Denying a person
their name gave us permission to separate ourselves from the people of
Iraq."
Compared
to all this, Terry Jones and his erstwhile Quran barbecue plans were
chump change -- a planned spectacle of his own and his congregation's
ignorance. While the burning would have enraged many Muslims and
possibly incited some to vengeful violence, it might also have
emboldened the religious bigots within the ranks of our own military and
among the war's diehard supporters. (And of course there were some
copycat Quran burnings reported, even though Jones held off on his own
plans.)
So
Jones became an official crisis -- a PR crisis -- who needed to be
publicly rebuked and, God willing, stopped. Modern, industrial wars,
fought by a modern empire, aren't supposed to be holy wars, even though
war itself is a concept steeped in the fanaticism of religion and
nationalism. Just as George Bush's PR team had to stifle their crusadin'
commander in chief, so the far savvier Barack Obama has to insist on a
sober, separation-of-church-and-state war fought only for reasons of
national security.
"In
a world of global communications, crackpots such as the would-be
Quran-burners in Florida can disrupt the U.S. war on terror," Brian
Fishman, a counterterrorism research fellow at the New America
Foundation, wrote as his contribution to CNN's "lessons learned" blog.
To
distinguish the responsible pursuers of the war on terror from
crackpots like Jones, Fishman quoted Gen. David Petraeus' words to the
troops in Afghanistan: "Live our values. Stay true to the values we hold
dear. This is what distinguishes us from our enemies."
From
Guantanamo to Bagram to Baghdad to Fallujah, let us live our values,
perpetrating only the torture we allow in our own prisons, only the
violence we allow in our own ghettoes, only the toxic horrors we allow
in our own soil and water, and only the corruption we allow in our own
halls of Congress.
Oh Lord, we pray.