Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Hate is hate


'Hanging Palin' causes Halloween display uproar

Freedom of speech is pretty awesome. I'm all for it. But I know ignorance when I see it and those of you who are championing this guy, saying "it's just art" and that it should be left up there because you hate Palin, too, should consider this:

What if it were an Obama doll?

What if someone prominently displayed a mannequin resembling the man who might be the first black President of the United States hanging from a rope? Oh, the outrage! Oh, the condemnation!

Two years ago, at Louisiana's Jenna High School, the discovery of nooses attracted the attention of the FBI. Yes, that FBI. Just for the presence of nooses with nothing in them.

But because Palin is a white woman, nobody is batting an eye. Is implied violence only offensive when it's against racial minorities or gays? Those of you rallying around this display, would you be able to hold your tongue and call it "freedom of speech" if, across town, someone had Obama "surrounded by flames" as McCain is in this same display? I doubt it. Hating white people is no better than hating black people.

Are you free to believe and say what you want? Why yes, of course. But I have to ask: when your hateful statements are basically the same as their hateful statements, who have you become?