I wish I wasn’t writing about this. Under different circumstances, I would use this month’s blog post to share the best Christmas songs, show the heart of charity, or talk about anything related to Christmas, really. But in the last month alone, we’ve seen death and bigotry more than we’d like to (if at all), and I believe it’s time for me to share my take on the issue of terrorism…or at least the way a lot of us choose to deal with it.

A month ago, Paris suffered a massive attack that left everyone around the world shocked, afraid, and angry. A couple of weeks ago, we saw another taste of it in California. But I’m not here to address terrorism itself. I’m here to discuss the way we’re reacting to it—more specifically, the people suffering because of our reacting to it. The Muslims.

If the only person I’m writing to was Donald Trump (should he bother to read anything that doesn’t favorably compare him to a deity), my message would be short and full of expletives. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. Politicians are talking about shutting down borders to Muslims. Across the world, women wearing headscarves are harassed, mosques are vandalized, and anyone born and raised Muslim (even US citizens) are being told to “go away and don’t come back.” Even a college president advised his students to carry guns to, and I quote, “end those Muslims.”

Looking at it from a biblical perspective, I can’t think of a single verse that would condone such disgusting behavior. We’re called to speak with both truth and love to everyone, regardless of who they are and/or what they believe. Truth without love is callous, love without truth is vulnerable. In bigotry, there is neither truth nor love. Bigotry dehumanizes. Bigotry feeds on fear, anger, and pride. Bigotry turns people against each other. Ecclesiastes 7:7 says “oppression drives the wise into madness.” When we choose to act on such senseless hate, we prove that we’re no better than the people responsible for the numerous deaths we’ve seen in the last year.

But that’s not what’s so scary about the situation. What’s so scary about it is that everyone in some way, shape, or form is guilty of bigotry. It can be so subtle that we don’t notice it unless we’re watchful enough. And “watchful” doesn’t exactly describe the entire human race. As a result, I’m guilty of bigotry. My friends are guilty of it. My family is guilty of it. Countless people who’ve lived and died in this world since biblical times were guilty of it. And in some way, you’re guilty of it too.

I know we’re all scared. Everyone has a right to be in times like this. People at my workplace and in my Facebook feed talk about a coming war, and though I hope it’s not the case I suspect it will be. In the Old Testament, God wanted Israel to be a beacon of light that would show, rather than tell, of God’s power and love. The New Testament explained how Christians can be that beacon of light to people. 1 Peter 2:1 tells us to “put away all malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander.” How are Christians supposed to do that by treating people in a way that dehumanizes them simply because we think they’re coldhearted tyrants? Taking a pile of manure to the Smithsonian and calling it an original Van Gogh painting has more class and productivity. Don’t get me wrong, caution is important. But attacking people isn’t an example of caution so much as setting everyone up for disaster. And if Muslims do end up wiping us out after everything we’ve done to them, I won’t be surprised.

Though the religion we grow up with plays a part in who we are, it doesn’t ultimately define us. The choices made and the motivations behind them are what define us. If you find yourself tempted to say anything like “this person is such and such, therefore he/she must be one of the worst people in the world,” there’s a few steps you should take. One, shut up. Two, put yourself in the other person’s shoes and think how you’d feel if someone said that about you. And three, ask yourself if what you’re thinking is motivated by love or truth in regard for the other person. Because at the end of the day, if you want to show that not every American is an arrogant asshole, you can start by at least acknowledging that not every Muslim is a terrorist.

Photo source: http://alwaysquestionauthority.com/2012/05/30/christian-bigotry-lawrence-m-krauss-does-religious-liberty-equal-freedom-to-discriminate/

Hello, I’m Leah G. Alfonso. I write so that I may speak.

The last year has been eventful, to say the least. We’ve argued about the confederate flag, legalizing gay marriage, and pretty much everything else under the sun. But that’s not what I’m talking about today–at least, not directly. I’m asking the question in the title and directing it at the people who fight bigotry.

There are two reasons for this. First, over the summer I read Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind. Midway through the book, I stumbled on a paragraph that mentioned Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Here’s what Scarlett Butler–I mean, Scarlett Kennedy–I mean, Scarlett Hamilton–I mean, Scarlett O’Hara–had to say about people from the North who read the book:

“Accepting Uncle Tom’s Cabin as revelation second only to the Bible, the Yankee women all wanted to know about the bloodhounds which every Southerner kept to track down runaway slaves. And they never believed her when she told them she had only seen one bloodhound in all her life and it was a small mild dog and not a huge ferocious mastiff. They wanted to know about the dreadful branding irons which planters used to mark the faces of their slaves and the cat-o’-nine-tails with which they beat them to death, and they evidenced what Scarlett felt was a very nasty and ill-bred interest in slave concubinage. Especially did she resent this in view of the enormous increase in mulatto babies in Atlanta since the Yankee soldiers had settled in the town.”

As much as I despise Gone with the Wind, I started thinking about that paragraph a little more. It’s no secret that a lot of people have misconceptions and stereotypes for people of different ethnic backgrounds and/or beliefs. So that made me wonder if the unprejudiced have just as many misconceptions as the prejudiced.

The second event that brought this subject to my blog happened a week and a half ago, when I saw a confederate flag hanging in Michigan. Surprised and disappointed, I expressed my feelings about it on Facebook. Less than twenty-four hours later, my comments sparked an interesting conversation about people who have the flag hanging in their homes, what it means as a symbol, and whether or not it is/should be legal in the first place.

Those two events seeped into my thoughts and traveled repeatedly around my head until they formed the question in the title: are we all guilty of prejudice? Or, more specifically, are we prejudiced against the prejudiced?

Like I said earlier, a lot of misconceptions and stereotypes exist due to the habit of judging people. I’ve seen a lot of notes across the web saying things like “I’m Cuban, therefore I must love swimming,” or “I’m a cheerleader, therefore I must be a slut,” or, my personal favorite, “My favorite color is black, therefore I must be suicidal.” It’s impossible to be a human being without people judging you based on what they see. The thing is, these common stereotypes aren’t always accurate. In the words of Lemony Snicket in The Bad Beginning, “first impressions are often entirely wrong.” Bottom line, you only see half of the truth. It seems like everyone who fights prejudice would know that.

Or…that’s what it looks like.

In the last several hundred years, we’ve argued that discrimination is wrong. And if that’s what you’re fighting for, chances are you’re fighting a lost battle. Thing is, some of us still fight for the right to single out people of different skin color, gender, sexual preferences, etc. We can talk all day long about the people we come across who do that. Heck, we’ve been doing that for years. But are we making misconceptions about those people? Are they victims of stereotypes and discrimination just as much as anyone else?

I’ve heard arguments that groups like KKK (or people not quite as violent) are prejudiced simply because they’re evil. And while it’s true that KKK is well known for its violent history, I have a hard time believing that one sin makes some people more evil than others. We’re all fallen, and therefore we’re all capable of turning to sin. That’s how it’s been since Adam and Eve, and that’s how it’ll be until the second coming. We just have different tastes in bad habits.

I don’t know why I saw the confederate flag hanging on a balcony in Michigan. I don’t know if we’ll ever manage to purge the country of prejudice for good. And if we can, I don’t know how. I can only speculate like everyone else. All I know is that the true enemy is sin, not the sinner.

Until next time, this is Leah G. Alfonso saying “So long.”

Photo source: http://sites.bu.edu/ombs/2013/10/16/why-are-people-sexist-racist-and-judgmental-behind-cognitive-bias-and-prejudice/