Acid and Assholes

I don't usually comment on the moronic statements made on right-wing blogs because, really, who's got the time? There's enough idiocy from professional morons like Nooners and D'Souza to keep me busy for a lifetime, and it's not like I post that often anyway.

I'm willing to make exceptions, however. Take this analysis from "Bryan" at Hate Air, in which Bry reviews a newspaper report that a middle school student was suspended for throwing ham in the direction of some immigrant students from Somali, apparently to insult/harass them for their Muslim faith:

This incident didn't happen in a vaccuum [sic]. Last August, a man rolled a pig's head into a Somali mosque in Lewiston. But prior to that, according to a commenter on the SunJournal site reacting to this story, Somalis attacked apartments and cars with acid (apparently the SunJournal didn't report on that, because I can't find a story about it–it either didn't happen or it's down the media memory hole). And prior to that, white supremacists paraded around and acted like fools over the arrival of the Somalis. The mayor of Lewiston asked Somalis to stop moving to town 5 years ago, because their swift influx was maxing out the city's resources. CAIR has been hovering over the situation the whole time. But note out of all of this behavior, the only group that actually got violent was within the Somali community (and that's also the hardest to find any reportage of). White supremacists have been irrelevantly ranting for years. Kids have been mean to other kids forever. Acid attacks are new though.

You see, it's the Somalis' fault because they "actually got violent" -- except for the fact that Bry doesn't have a fucking clue as to whether any Somalis actually got violent. Oh, but he's got it good authority from some asshole commenter on a website -- a person he knows nothing about. What more proof do you want!?! (Coming next: Bryan acknowledges his illegal relationship with underage goats as soon as I post it on the SunJournal website using the same commenter name as Bry's imaginary friend.)

And when you take away the unsubstantiated wingnut rumor, you're just left the with xenophobic mayor, the parading white supremacists and the folks who desecrated a mosque. And not a single act by Somalis. (Let's not even bother to mention the lack of any connection between Bry's fantasy Somalis and the middle school harassment victims. You can't start a race war if you insist on such details.) No wonder Bry thinks those little brown brats should shut up and take it.

What is the moral of the Bry's post? Well, Bry has two: "This is where 'hate crimes' legislation gets us" and "This is where the inherent and credible threat of violence gets Muslims." It not clear what the illiterate's second point is, but my guess is he's saying that Muslim middle schoolers deserve harassment because Muslims are violent. Or just because they're Muslim.

It also appears that the "acid attack" meme is gaining traction as a wingnut smear against Muslims and/or non-white foreigners. But acid attacks are nothing new and they're not unknown in wingnut circles either.

(Sorry, no link to the bigot.)