Graffiti

On the way home a few nights ago, I got on my commuter train as usual. Finding a seat, I sat down, and noticed some graffiti scrawled on the back of the seat in front of me. Someone had written something like "Fuck America." Someone else responded by writing "Fuck terrorist Muslims." This is not the first time I've seen this type of graffiti on my commute.

The chain of logic is what is of interest here. Obviously whoever responded to the initial graffiti assumed that if someone wanted America fucked, then s/he must be a Muslim and a terrorist.

There is a tradition of that here. Despite American leaders' attempts to state the contrary, there are still many here who will simply equate Muslim = terrorist = the enemy. There's a racial component to this, of course. No one talked about "fuck terrorist Catholics" during the I.R.A.'s campaigns in Northern Ireland. And during WWII, German-Americans were not interned, yet Japanese-Americans were. I think there's no other conclusion to draw, other than that, in these instances, the demonetization of the enemy was based purely on racial considerations.

Little has changed.

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, but it was still a little disconcerting to see people standing on the street after 9-11, yelling at people who appeared to be Muslim or of Middle Eastern origin to go home, and other trite "witticisms" that Americans, who like to give directions to other people on where they need to go, pull out of their 'standard slogans' bag.

This story is old, I know, but it goes on.