My eldest son is on the phone and he told me that National Public Radio has fired Juan Williams. Without knowing the "facts", don't you just "know" that they were looking for an excuse, since he has become so associated with Fox News?
For the record, I LIKE Juan Williams. I hope Fox gives him his own show.
UPDATE: Here, via Inspapundit, is one view on the firing and the reason discussed.
Regards — Cliff
6 comments:
That "I'm not a bigot because I wrote books about the civil rights movement" canard is a great big steaming pile of rhetorical BS. His statement about Muslim garb is prima facie evidence of religious intolerance, and we can argue the merits of such until the cows come home, but such has NOTHING to do with race, or tolerance. An "honest discussion of the threat from Islam" contains the essence of the problem. "An honest discussion of the threat from Catholicism" would be relevant to those victims of priestly sexual abuse, but such would do nothing to create an actual and honest discussion while it focuses on the church and not its criminals.
The fact that Juan Williams cannot differentiate responsible Muslims from terrorists indicates a serious problem in his perception, and I would label that bigotry, yes I would. As for an ideologically-flawed news operation kicking out one of their own for their ideology, I'd hesitate to call that news at all.
I found the Catholic Church analogy interesting, since it makes your point and also doesn't. The sight of a Catholic Priest must bring the issue of pedophilia to mind for a lot of folks, and for them to deny that would be intellectually dishonest. On the other hand, little Jimmy's biggest pedophile threat is Uncle Bob and not Father Crosby.
A while back my son was driving to San Diego, where he was enrolling in the University of San Diego Law School. It was a Ryder Truck. He stopped in front of the former Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, to take some photos. The police came up and asked him to move it along, now. Profiling? Absolutely. Abusive of power? Probably.
I think it is fair to say that most Americans think that the big terrorist threat these days is from those associated with various forms of Al Qaeda, which is a divergent outgrowth of the Wahhabist Islamic sect. Now, the fact is, and we can look at Reporter Bob Woodward's latest book for confirmation, Al Qaeda is working on developing terrorist candidates who look just like any other WASP. That does not change the fact that seeing folks dressed in what we take to be "Muslim Garb" brings to mind a whole series of images. A guy in a suit, or a woman in a suit, says business. A briefcase or computer case confirms it. The computer and a slightly more casual dress suggests someone in the software business. A woman and two children says "Mother". A person in Muslim attire says Muslim and causes us to ask ourselves if this flight is going to be subject to a hijacking.
I still think this is a blot on NPR.
Regards — Cliff
Statistically, little Jimmy's biggest threat of being murdered is from Uncle Bob as well, and not Imam so-and-so either.
Our biggest problem is our inability to differentiate terrorists from civilians. To the extent that some are lazy enough (and bigoted enough) to correlate headscarves and beards with airplane hijackings, we are LOSING ground against terrorists, not gaining. As you point out, anyone can adapt their appearance far more easily than we appear able to adapt our prejudices. But we'll keep running according to our prejudices just the way we did when we incarcerated citizens of Japanese descent back in WWII.
To be effective, we need to focus on criminal behavior and not appearance or religion per se. When I toured DC after the Beirut Marine barracks bombing with a beard and all my belongings in a backpack, I was taken aside at each and every national monument and museum I tried to enter. My native fluency allayed fears to the same degree that I'm sure Timothy McVeigh exploited to accomplish his personal act of terrorism back in Oklahoma City. I felt neither safer nor fairly treated.
As for NPR's premise, I suppose anyone who fails to see the bigotry inherent in tarring an entire religion with the same brush as is being used to paint actual terrorists is going to fail to see the necessity in calling someone out for it. The "I wrote about the civil rights marches" part is the real smoking gun to me. He obviously learned nothing about treating citizens equally and fairly, and I don't blame NPR for having the ability to discern the differences.
Of course, the larger point, that you can be fired for sporting one flavor of prejudice but not another is an entirely different story. At least NPR has that in common with Fox...
I think that Mr Williams was just being honest about a visceral reaction. I think that NPR (1) overreacted to the case and (2) showed its lack of class by firing Mr William on the phone.
As for focusing on criminal behavior, if the terrorist is well trained, there will be only one criminal behavior. However, some folks believe that certain kinds of personality profiling can help limit those events. I am not sure I believe it is real. But, it is an idea that is out there. This is not profiling by what you wear, but by how you act.
If we don't go with profiling based upon how someone is acting, then it is all down to the intelligence collection effort. That presents its own problems, unless you are selling ease-dropping equipment to No Such Agency, in which case it is easy street.
Regards — Cliff
I also recall Franklin and his admonition that those who choose safety over liberty deserve neither and will loose both.
Somebody WILL blow up another building here in the US, and people WILL die. We could spend all our efforts on the implications of this, or we could keep our eyes on our prize, which is our liberty and our Constitution, and refuse to be cowed.
The entire premise of terrorism is to prompt a fearful reaction. As the British proved to the Germans and to the world during the blitz, it's possible to endure the casualties and insist on maintaining ones way of life. Unfortunately, we haven't shown ourselves nearly as brave, nor nearly as honorable as that. The real tragedy is that we ourselves have been the ones to gut our own Constitution and accomplish half the terrorists' agenda for them.
Shame on us.
Not a comment in response to Kad Barma, but over at the Instapundit we have this comment: "Plus, a reader emails: 'I worked at a wall street firm. If someone had called and asked why I fired a person, and I responded ‘that’s between his psychiatrist and him’, can you imagine the liability?'" This was after a comment from the head of NRP, in public, for which she later apologized.
Yes, I can imagine. When I was full time at DRC I worked with a woman whose Father sued a Wall Street firm for age discrimination and made Time Magazine and collected millions.
Regards — Cliff
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