Don't Remember

This might get kinda long. I had something I wanted to say and now I have more after being out all day.

I spent all day at work today. I guess I haven't gone into much detail about myself on this thing yet so here it is. I work at an amusement park for an unamusing amount of money per hour. I've just graduated and moved to a liberal city on the west coast. I'm about as far from ground zero right now as you can get and still be in the Lower 48.

I regularly see people at work that I assume are Muslim. Mostly women wearing the hijab (headscarves). Sometimes a bit more covered up than that. Nothing too out of the ordinary. It's not often that I see as many presumed Muslims as I did at work today. I have no problem with this. In fact, I saw women wearing the full burqa/niqab combo along with the hijab for the first time today. Still no problem. One of the (many) points of America is that people are allowed to practice all their freedoms here including speech, religion, and right to assembly. It's fabulous really.

I heard the most disgusting things coming out of the mouths of some of my fellow Americans today. Mostly out of my fellow white Americans. I've never been so ashamed of people of my race in general. Some of the things I heard shouldn't be typed or repeated. But of some of the milder there were many scoffs of "foreigners" and a lot of talk about how we could "let them into the park on 9/11". Because clearly, since 19 men none of these people knew or agreed with doing horrible things on the other side of the continent nine years ago is a good reason to bar an entire class of people from freely going about their business.

Now that I've got that off my chest, let me talk about what I wanted to touch on originally. Segue!

Many of the kids I was helping amuse today weren't alive in 2001. I remember exactly where I was and what I was doing. I was in school. Some business class that didn't do me any good. At the time I didn't even know what the World Trade Center looked like. Sheltered southern girl. I suspect that this is very similar to people talking about how they remember what they were doing when they found out that the Challenger blew up, or Kennedy was assassinated, or Pearl Harbor was attacked. The world has changed so much in the last nine years. Much of it for the worse. I and grew up in those nine years. I came of age, started driving, voting, and drinking in those nine years. (I just got really close to telling you how old I am.) In essence, who I am as an adult has been changed by the events on 9/11/2001. I would not be the same sort of political thinker if I had come of age under an inept and awkward Bush Administration who was not armed with the political power gifted it by the events of that day. I would not be a liberal in all probability. And there are people who have never known anything else!

I know this isn't groundbreaking. I imagine the same can be said by older people than about me and the Vietnam War, the Nixon Administration, or (again) the Kennedy Assassination. But knowing how our country and our world have changed since then, I cry for the children of the post-9/11 era. Don't get me wrong, I know the world wasn't all sunshine and daisies before then. But these children are growing up in a world where the First Amendment isn't a given. You're only allowed free speech and free exercise of your religious liberties if you don't look like you might be a terrorist. They have a world where anyone who says the wrong things is looked at suspiciously by their government. Where the economic stability of the now as well as their own futures are not too high a price to pay for two ill-advised wars. And lets look at these wars for a moment.

First is the joint invasion of Afghanistan by the US, UK, and the "coalition of the willing" shortly following 9/11 in 2001. We're still there. We've been fighting and dying in Afghanistan for nine years now. That's longer than any other war America has ever fought aside from Vietnam. And we're on the way to passing that one. Believe me. Second is the even more ill-advised invasion of Iraq originally to be termed Operation Iraqi Liberation until some genius at the Pentagon realized that spelled OIL. Known as Operation Iraqi Freedom, we've been fighting there since 2003. "Combat Operations" are over now. Twice. Once for each President, natch, and we only have 50,000 more fighting men and women there.

But you all know this. In short, these kids don't remember. They have never experienced a world without these problems. And unless we get our house in order and start framing our policy around something other than a regrettable tragedy of nearly ten years they won't ever know anything else.

I've remembered!

If you read my previous post on SB 1070, the for-profit prison system, and marriage equality you will remember that I said I had another issue that I thought important to discuss but had forgotten it at the time I sat down to write. Well....I've remembered!

It's this "Ground Zero Mosque" business. Everyone's freaking out. The President has weighed in on the topic during the annual Iftar dinner (did Bush do that too? Would that make him a closet Muslim?) at the White House. Polls have been taken every which way with (surprisingly) Fox News' being the best. And news and opinion people of all stripes have had their say. So now I'm going to have mine.

Firstly, check out the map at the top of the 538.com post I linked to. It's the second link down in the above paragraph. That's what people mean by "at Ground Zero". They actually mean not at Ground Zero. The proposed location is some 5 blocks from Ground Zero in a closed Burlington Coat Factory. So important fact number one is that when someone says, "They're going to build a Mosque at Ground Zero! That's so wrong!" they have their facts wrong.

Important point number two, more widely disseminated by the media, is the fact that this is really a community center. It will have worship spaces. But it'll also have a swimming pool and art rooms and all sorts of stuff. It's a sort of Islamic YMCA as this sketch from Mike Luckovich of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution makes clear.

Important point number three, which should be noted to be the most important, is that Amendment One to the Constitution states in part:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

 That's the first part of the very short, very explicit First Amendment. Our country doesn't have an official religion. Congress can't make an official religion. And people are free to practice their religion how, when, and where they want provided that it doesn't infringe on anyone else's rights; which Islam doesn't.

President Obama had a moment at the Iftar that I think reminds me of the way he talked on the campaign trail. It's very moving. In part, this is what he had to say.

 Recently, attention has been focused on the construction of mosques in certain communities -– particularly New York.  Now, we must all recognize and respect the sensitivities surrounding the development of Lower Manhattan.  The 9/11 attacks were a deeply traumatic event for our country.  And the pain and the experience of suffering by those who lost loved ones is just unimaginable.  So I understand the emotions that this issue engenders.  And Ground Zero is, indeed, hallowed ground.

But let me be clear.  As a citizen, and as President, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country.  And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in Lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances.  This is America.  And our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakeable.  The principle that people of all faiths are welcome in this country and that they will not be treated differently by their government is essential to who we are.  The writ of the Founders must endure.

You're free to make the argument that a mosque or Islamic cultural center that close to Ground Zero is in poor taste. I don't think it is. But that's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about people who want to actually stop the construction/move in. They want to use eminent domain and other governmental powers to keep this from happening. And that's unconstitutional. In short, I don't care if you think muslims are the spawn of satan. In this country they're free to worship. And I'll fight for that right. Me. The damned atheist. Freedom of Religion, as it's enshrined in the Constitution doesn't just mean Protestant versions of Christianity that you're okay with. You don't get  to pick and choose. The freedoms granted American citizens by the Constitution come free to everyone regardless of race, color, creed, sex, religion, ability, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran status, pregnancy, how many piercings they have, whether they like oranges or not, or any other status that you can thing of to use to discriminate against people.

Let's be honest. This is just intolerance and muslim bashing. Just like the rest of the last ten years. I'm pretty thoroughly ashamed of my country and how it has reacted to the events of 9/11. It could have been a turning point for us and for the world. Instead it's just another excuse for war and division.

EDIT: They have a wonderful post with a couple of points I didn't even think of over at Feministe. Take a look.