I've been thinking about this a bit (on the ride home, listening to NPR beg for money), and it is starting to strike me as a bit fucked up that he was fired for that statement. Is it really bigoted? He said that when he sees people dressed in muslim garb getting on his plane, he gets a bit nervous.

Is that really that bigoted? It's pretty retarded, we've all seen pictures of the 9-11 hijackers, they werent all 'muslimd' up, they looked like businessmen. I dont think the terrorists are dumb enough to get all garbed up muslim style before hijacking a plane, most likely you'd never know by appearances if someone on your plane had evil intentions.

I dont think he should have been fired, and I agree it makes NPR look like they're trying to leftify their ranks, or at least appear that way. Bad choice by whoever decided this.

I don't think it's bigoted...he was simply being honest.
I'm positive all of us hold opinions, privately or publicly, that dance the line between un-PC and bigoted.

Those opinions don't always come from ignorance and hate, sometimes they come from somewhere quite genuine.
Sometimes *gasp* stereotypes legitimately apply.

Look...we have the President of the US now refusing to visit a Sikh temple.....because he's afraid of pictures of him wearing the required turban would look bad.

When did everyone become so easily offended?
When did everyone become the individual arbiters of what is and is not offensive for groups to which they don't belong?

FFS, we're a bunch of sensitive pussies.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

I don't feel like people would like my personal opinions on the stereotype discussion too much.

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"Counting all the assholes in the room, I'm definitely not alone!" ~ Michael Poulsen, Volbeat, Still Standing.

Juan's written response to the matter.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/10/ ... eiss-bush/
Worth the read.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

That's better.

Somewhat interesting, but I can't get past the second sentence without taking issue.



This is just so wrong. Some Muslims wear certain garb as part of their religious beliefs. Some Christians also wear certain garb as part of their religious beliefs. Some Muslims have committed terrorist acts. Some Christians have also committed terrorist acts.

There's a direct parallell here. If he says he's worried when he sees someone wearing Muslim clothing, shouldn't he also be worried if he sees someone with a crucifix around their next? If he's worried when he sees an Imam, shouldn't he worries if he sees a Bishop?

Someone who wears religious clothing doesn't do it to identify themselves 'first and foremost' as a member of that religion. They're simply doing as part of their faith.

He's basically saying 'I am scared of Muslims'. Period. It's a bigoted statement because he doesn't apply the same reasoning to members of other faiths.

egh...he's getting fairly bi-partisan support over this whole dust up.

This is going to be a solid loss for NPR.
They're no longer going to be a slightly polarizing (in public opinion) organization, they're going to be a full blown political football.

O'Rielly will see to that.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

Squanto, let's take a brief rundown of some more recognized stereotypes...

Southern whites - dumb bigoted rednecks, like to hunt and thump bibles
Women - should stay home, dumb blondes
Jews - control money and media
Blacks - dumb, criminal, some don't want them handling their food
A whole bunch of other groups that I don't have the time to mention
Muslims - terrorists that will hijack or blow up a plane

Many people (and they ARE wrong) carry stereotypes that hold silly views or minor fears associated with their target group. Very few of those illogical fears actually involve a sudden and violent death. I don't care who you are and what you believe in, everyone is scared of sudden and violent death. As this terroristic threat is more recent to US citizens, I expect a certain amount of apprehension. I expect that some people are concerned that the consequences of being wrong about their Muslim stereotype is not just unfairly offending someone or a group...it's being dead. That's a high price to pay. Does it make their fears illogical? Of course, but given that the consequences if their stereotype is right involves death, I'm willing to give some people a little slack. It depends on exactly what they say, how they say it and whether they are being maliciously insulting in the process.

Justifying racial, religious, and ethnic stereotypes as ok if the fear of death is involved is such a poor argument I don't even know where to begin.

You know what I think of when I see someone who's Muslim? Nothing. I don't just assume that the person I see is out to kill me or otherwise harm me. If anything, I feel sorry for that person a little bit because they're probably a good person who just wants to live their life and practice their religion in peace, yet they can't because as a nation we're intolerant bigoted assholes.

I was working at Adelphia on September 11th. Sitting across from me everyday was a friend who was of Egyptian descent, both parents naturalized citizens,born in Buffalo. He was Muslim. When the attacks happened, he stood there and openly wept, just like may others did. As time went on, and it became obvious that it was Islamic terrorists that did this, he started getting shit. Constantly. He came close to tears some days, because he couldn't understand why. He was an American, just like all of us. He was affected just as much as any of us by what happened. Yet because he shared a religion with the attackers, he was somehow 'one of them'. It still makes me sad.

Out of the billions of people in the world that practice Islam, 19 of them attacked our country. 19.

Clearly that means that persecuting and demeaning all of them is the right thing to do. (The preceding sentence was sarcasm.)

NPR handled it wrong, that's for sure, but yeah, now it's in the echo chamber, and will be bounced around for a few weeks at least.

I feel the same way you do, but I'm not talking about when just anybody sees any Muslim around town. I'm talking about what Juan Williams was talking about - when someone is about to board a plane and they see a Muslim. Seeing as Muslim/Islamic extremists do happen to have a track record of hijacking/blowing up planes, I'm willing to give someone a little bit (A LITTLE BIT) of slack if they have some worry/apprehension/fear. I know the fear is not logical, but if they keep it to themselves fine. If they speak about it publicly in a respectful tone, without maliciously insulting people, I can cut them more slack than I would to someone else voicing the other stereotypes I listed above.

Come now Tom...lets use Occam's razor here since emotion has gotten into the fray.

Knowing everything you know about Juan Williams...do you in your heart of hearts believe the man is a bigot based on 1 sentence taken out of context?

You know...because when you put it in context he's making the same argument you are.

The answer is plain to me. He is not a bigot, never was, and this is manufactured bullshit.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

The more I read, the more confusing this all is.

I watched the entire segment with Papa Bear. Williams makes his comments about how he's worried if he sees Muslims on a plane. Later on though, he gets on O'Riley's case for lumping all Muslim's together as extremists.

If he's saying he gets scared when he sees a Muslim, isn't he doing exactly that? It's just a duplicitous message.

I can't really decide what Williams is trying to say. He's contradicting his own points.

Is he a bigot? Probably not. Did he make a bigoted statement? I think so.

NPR handled this poorly, but Williams is not squeaky clean on this either IMO.

Man this is bad for NPR...now we have senators introducing bills to defund them (not that it matters, they only get about 2% of their budget from the Feds).
I caught about 10 minutes of the O'Rielly replay last night and he was hammering on the fact that they got $1.8 mill from George Sorros just last week.
Aint no witch-hunt like a Fox News witch-hunt...just ask Acorn.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

I can't imaging DeMint's bill getting very far.

That being said, you never know. You're dead on that once Fox jumps all over this it's going to be ugly.

Let's use our imaginations for a second, and pretend he was white. And let's imagine he said this about black people instead of Muslims. I'm pretty sure there wouldn't be people defending him saying he has a right to say so because his opinions are protected by the First Amendment.

The accepted racism in this country against Muslims makes me sick. And some people wonder why so many people around the world hate us...

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"Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Hockey Night in Buffalo

You're right...ever since president Obama declared the end to "The Global War on Terrorism", Jihad against Westerners has completely ended and Al Queida are now Jahovas Witnesses.

No reason to harbor any opinions about Islam at all.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

You know, from what I've been seeing about this, what this guy said was not the best move. He likely didn't intend for it to sound like he's a bigot, but that's how it came across. However, if you see the whole video, it sounds like he just used that as a set up in saying look it's not all Muslims and all of us, including himself apparently, need to realize that. He was saying the same stuff people here have said, about Timothy McVeigh and stuff, and realizing that there are good Muslims who aren't extremest, etc etc.

I dunno... it was a stupid move by him, but an equally stupid move by NPR. And if I'm basing it from this statement alone, I certainly don't consider him a bigot.

This is the part that most people are missing.
He made that comment as a set-up to a conversation about how we shouldn't prejudge anyone based on their religion.

*sigh*

It was a reasonable conversation and one I'm afraid this country desperately needs...I guess we're not going to hear it on NPR.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

Wouldn't most people cut a black person some slack if they said how they worried about walking downtown in an all white small southern town? Wouldn't most people cut a woman some slack if she worried about starting a job as a firefighter or police officer? Wouldn't most people cut a white person some slack if they worried about getting stuck in a minority neighborhood if it was also a high crime area?

Not everyone can overcome their fears, but we should expect people to speak reasonably and respectfully about them. I don't see how Juan Williams was so out of line unless he threw in some Limbaugh type stupidity. Having unfounded or illogical fear about certain groups does not equal racism. Racism is acting or speaking out maliciously against that group because of your illogical thoughts/fears. Shutting down dialogue and simply expecting people to think logically and fairly all the time is a pipe dream.