Big Think Blog

Rumors of Arab descent have followed Obama since the beginning of his campaign to the point that Obama volunteers once politely asked two Muslim women to not sit behind the podium at a summer rally, for fear they would be photographed with the candidate. Even John McCain defended Obama’s religious background, responding to a woman at a rally last week who said she didn’t trust Obama because “he’s an Arab,” to which McCain responded “He’s a decent family man, citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues…He’s not.” Is McCain implying that the opposite of an Arab is a decent family man and citizen? Like McCain, voters and media alike have been quick to come to Obama’s defense, but few have taken issue with the new use of Muslim as slanderous. CNN’s Campbell Brown did admit that the news media has been complicit in turning the word Muslim into a racial slur, asking “When did that become a disqualifier for higher office in our country… The equivalent of dishonorable or radical?” True, no one should sit back and accept falsehoods about a candidate’s fundamental beliefs, but in defending the candidate are we dishonoring the world’s second largest religion and furthering the misunderstanding between West and East? Below, Dalia Mogahed touches on the mutually negative perceptions between the West and Middle East.



Here are a few related links:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0608/11168.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YIq5Q15L1o

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/13/campbell.brown.obama/index.html