The hate is just out now…
by digby
Aisha Shafi stuffed pens and notebooks into her sons’ backpacks and buzzed around her San Marcos home as she made sure the boys were ready for the new school year.
When she stepped through the door, her husband offered a suggestion: “Maybe you shouldn’t wear your hijab today,” he said.
Shafi was the mom carpooling the neighborhood kids to school that morning. She slid the scarf off her head and threw on a baseball cap from her husband’s alma mater, the University of Kansas.
She loaded her boys, 9 and 12, into the car and then, as she passed the first stoplight, draped her hijab back over her hair, angry at herself for being scared.
As the days crawl toward the inauguration of Donald Trump, many Muslims across the U.S. anxiously wonder how much the president-elect’s tough-talking rhetoric will be matched by legislative actions.
Even in liberal California, home to about 500,000 Muslims in its southern regions alone, there is a lingering worry that Trump has conjured something through his words that as president he won’t be able to control.
“I’m really concerned that Trump has brought out something that was maybe hidden before,” said Shafi’s husband, Majid Mahmood. “The hate is just out now, especially when you see an increased rate of hate crimes against Muslims.”
Yes. As bad as Bush and Cheney were they worked to keep a lid on this stuff. Trump does the opposite. Demagogues need to gin up the passions of their followers and he’s an expert at it.
If nothing else we shouldn’t ever have to hear their lectures about “religious liberty” ever again. Of course, that won’t stop them. Rational consistency is old-fashioned. We live in a world of post-truth relativism. Also known as: “whatever works in the moment.”
Since a large faction of the American population has once again embraced indecency, racism and hatred (apparently they feel very oppressed when they can’t do this) I think it’s entirely possible that things will get out of hand. These folks are not being paranoid.
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