Integration, healing: thoughts on women's rights, empowerment, and saying stupid things.

Ok, so this post was prompted by watching the news and being told that Sarah Palin had said something stupid. She had apparently tweeted that there should not be a mosque built near Ground Zero in the interests of healing. That's not really the stupid thing, that is her opinion. The thing that made her look stupid was the made-up word, 'refudiate' which the media made a big thing of. Now, maybe it was a simple thing where she did it on her cell, and didn't catch the right letter.... who knows? (my cell tries to do similar things to me...if I let it, it would make all kinds of nonsense sentences).


The thing is, though, we need healing. The mosque really isn't at Ground Zero. And comparing moderate, normal Islam to the extremists who hit the Trade Center is like comparing a splintery plank bench to a down sofa. They are both things you can sit on, but that's it. (enough people have made the comparison with Christian extremists, or cultists of various degrees) Most Muslims are people who want peace. Who want to be able to worship God in their own way, following in the footsteps of Mohammed. And it would be wonderful to have a symbol of peace and healing next to the site that was caused by extremists. Yes, its frightening to see what extremism can do, but isn't the reaction of folks who don't want the mosque extremist in their own way?

We seem to be splintering our society more and more, and I'm not sure why, or how we can fix it. I was reading a book on motherhood, and in it was an essay by a black mother saying that essentially she participates in reverse discrimination, to a degree, in that there is a program called 'Jack and Jill' which is for black children, to make them aware of who they are and their heritage. In it, she admits that a lot of black parents apparently have problems with their kids dating white kids (there's a lot more to the essay, but that struck me...). I just don't know where the line gets drawn. Integration is only ok to a point?

Its the whole thing with women's rights too. There's still a double standard somehow. To get back to Sarah Palin, she ran Alaska for a while. She obviously must have been capable to some degree. But then she needed a makeover because she wasn't classy enough? She's not portrayed in a fabulous light by the media, but she must have some brains to have managed to become governor of Alaska. I don't like her, but I do think she is used, to a certain extent, as a whipping boy, so to speak. We all say stupid things from time to time, only hers are immortalised.

I just keep feeling that even as we get more and more integrated as a society, people are retreating more and more to labels and separating ourselves out, labeling ourselves as 'Other', and grouping negatively. I know I'm not saying this clearly (I'm writing very stream-of-concioussness). I just wonder. I have friends who identify themselves very strongly as a particular facet of themselves, but I see them as a whole. Its very hard to explain. I don't see people as 'black' or ' white' (or purple, for that matter). I dated a man from Trinidad for a while, and he pointed out that we were a biracial couple. (I don't remember the context of the comment, I think it was in response to a news story). It was something that I never really thought about as a defining characteristic, it was part of who he was.

I went to school with a lot of different folks, and had a lot of exposure to different cultures growing up, so maybe I'm completely different from the average American, but I never saw where anyone was from, or the color of their skin, as the defining characteric of who they are. Its like with me, I consider myself an American. But I'm also Egyptian. I'm a woman. I have a hearing impairment. I act. I sing. I do ceramics. But none of these are more important than any other. I don't define myself by being Catholic, or being short. Or by being single or childless. These are all part of what makes me me.