Thursday, October 11, 2007

I've Been Doing Some Anti-Racism Activism On The Side

Our statement that was released to the Hatchet:

Dear President Knapp, Students, and GW Community,

We hereby take responsibility for the flyering incident that occurred on Monday morning. This creative political action was part of a rich American tradition of raising awareness, in this case, about Islamophobia. We exposed the upcoming Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week sponsored by the GWU Young America’s Foundation for the celebration of racism that it is. This is a real event that is being hosted at our campus. Most people who saw the fliers were offended, but with a second glance, saw that the absurdity of the message was clearly a horrific exaggeration of the racism that is behind this event.
We regret that some people were unable to discern the intent of these posters and took offense. We wanted to counter the true hate speech that is embodied by the upcoming Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week. We hoped students would feel outraged and come together (much like they did Monday night) and work to counter systemic Islamophobia and the equation of Islam with terrorism. It was inspiring to see that students directed their attention to the real threat. We want to reach out to our Muslim brothers and sisters in the Holy Month of Ramadan in hopes that they will embrace our misrepresented, but honorable stand against racism.
Campuses allied in their commitment to a hate-free environment and critical thinking should not allow Islamo-Fascism Awareness week to take place. The institutionalized and glorified type of Islamo-phobia of this event being imposed upon us from outside forces (The David Horowitz Foundation) is a dangerously divisive force. Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week is the real threat to our community. We hope that the students who take offense to this and hear the call to action will do something to protest Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week.
It is to our great dismay that the student body and the media missed the clear, if subtle, message of our flier: the hyperbolic nature of the flier was aimed at exposing Islamophobic racism. As such, it is imperative that we unequivocally condemn racism (especially in its most egregious organized forms) on our campus. We hope that as a community we can come together to oppose the true racist propaganda that we initially set out to expose: Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week.

Signed,

Students for Conservativo-Fascism Awareness
Adam Kokesh
Yong Kwon
Brian Tierney
Ned Goodwin
Maxine Nwigwe
Lara Masri
Amal Rammah

It seems we were so effective with this action that now we are discussing the racism of Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week on national TV! Of course, Students For Conservativo-Fascism Awareness is working with a number of groups to organize an alternative week of activities at GWU including speakers, movie screenings, and a candle-light vigil and prayer ceremony. I will be giving a speach called "Recovering From Racism" about the effects of war and occupation on racism and my experience with the dehumanization of the Iraqi people. I wish I could give you all more details about this action but since the university is "still investigating," there are certain things I shouldn't discuss.

Taking Advantage of a Great Opportunity to Make Fun of Democrats:

In light of the "leadership" exhibited recently by Pelosi and her cronies, this cartoon is particularly appropriate. Pelosi has said that she would begin the impeachment process if it were a bipartisan effort. Surely she knows what it means to actually lead. But by her logic, she can only do the right thing if the Republicans say it's the right thing to do. This is ludicrous.

What this is really a reflection of is the absolute corruption of the Democratic party that has come to value preserving its own power over any principles or morals. At least Republicans, corrupt as they may be, were actually effective at changing things when they were in power. This corruption of Democrats is epitomized by their handling of the vote on the floor that they tried to overturn a couple months ago regarding and Agricultural Department spending bill. This video captures the moment nicely: