The Mystery is Solved

THIS IS THE FINAL post about the strange propaganda email I received about the shoe bomber.

Spoiler alert: this post reveals all, so if you don't want to read the end first, you have some options:

1. If you want to read the original email, go here.
2. If you want to see the liberal message which formed the bulk of this right-wing propaganda piece, go here.
3. If you want to see the subtle changes and omissions the author of the email made to the story, go here.
4. But if you want to simply start at the end, or if you have already read those other posts, read on...

Last time, I ended by asking why a conservative email propagandist would want to hide the shoe bomber's own confessions about why he did it, and instead provide a quite different picture of his motives.

The answer to that question explains everything.

The purpose of this email was not to push the liberal agenda about our courts being capable of handling terrorists, and it wasn't at all about the media trying to bury a story.

Those were smoke screens.

The real purpose of this email was to drive home just two misleading ideas:

1. The idea that Islam and Terrorism are synonymous—that loyalty to Islam = loyalty to bin Laden = hatred of America = terrorism.
2. The idea that the only reasons for terrorist acts is that "they" are Islamic, and hate us for our freedom.

That last bit, the bit about hating us for our freedom, is the only part of the Judge's comments which wasn't essentially liberal, and it just happens to be the very point which the omitted part of the bomber's statement contradicts.

I'm not arguing, by the way, that the shoe bomber was correct in his observations—only that it seems pretty clear that he believed them.

I'm not even arguing that bin Laden believes them.

But if we are going to put an end to terrorism, wouldn't it be smart to try to understand the motivations of the people, like the shoe bomber, who actually carry it out?

Well, he has told us his reasons, and they weren't that he hates our freedom.

They had to do with the deaths of children, the rape and torture of Muslims, and with the belief that we, Americans, hate Muslims just because they're Muslims.

I can hear some of you saying, "But none of that is true."

It doesn't matter whether it's true. His attack was not based on whether it was true—it was based his beliefs.

It does matter that he believed it.

That doesn't, of course, excuse his act. I'm not saying we should set him free to try again.

But listen to his words.

He said he "admitted" his allegiance to Islam.

You don't "admit" to something unless you are talking to someone who thinks it's wrong.

He assumed that the American court viewed his religion as a crime.

There are two ways we can respond to this information:

1. We can use it.
   
   We can understand that the "they" in the question "Why do they hate us?" is not the entire Islamic world.
   
   Rather, it's a relative handful of extremists.
   
   These extremists have been propagandized into believing
2. 1. that Americans hate Islam, and
   2. that, solely on the basis of that hatred toward their religion we are
   3. 1. encouraging the rape and torture of Muslims,
      2. encouraging the deaths of Muslim children, and
      3. crafting an entire foreign policy to do Islam in.
         
         We can understand this, and then we can set about finding ways to undermine that propaganda, and stop the organizations that are taking advantage of it.
         
         Or...
3. We can bury the information, substitute the idea that Muslims in general hate Americans, and come to believe that they are all evil terrorists.
   
   If we take the second path, we will, of course, come to hate Islam, begin structuring our foreign policy to eliminate it, and prove that the shoe bomber is right.
   
   Which will encourage more shoe bombers.

That seems to be exactly what the author of this email is after.

Strange, since that is also what bin Laden seems to be after.

The entire purpose is to subtly forward the idea that Islam is evil and scary and to make the reader more prejudiced against Muslims.

It's a masterpiece of conflation and misdirection—getting the reader to confuse a small terrorist organization with a traditional world religion while appearing to be about how the news media tried to bury a liberal statement by a Reagan appointee.

It's the second example of the anti-Islamic theme—the attempt to foster religious hatred and conflict—that I have run across in the last month in these right-wing emails.

It's a new pattern in the propaganda.

It's not a pretty pattern.

At least, that's what I think today.