Barack H. Obama revisited
One of the least attractive features of the current presidential campaign in the USA has been the scaremongering around Barack Obama. There have been allegations, which are just about understandable, if asinine, that he is some kind of dangerous socialist. What I have found rather more worrying is the branding of Obama as a Muslim. Just that phrase – ‘branding Obama as a Muslim’ is, in itself, worrying; the double implication is that being a Muslim makes one somehow ‘other’ and that that ‘otherness’ not only raises doubts about his qualifications to be President but about his integrity and intentions.
I’m sure that people of that ilk will, of course, deny doing any such thing; after all, people often referred to ‘LBJ’ and ‘JFK’, so why not ‘BHO’ or ‘Barack Hussein Obama’. The answer, I’d say, is that more than a few people (while I’m sure they’d protest their innocence and make declarations about the number of their Muslim friends) are quite happy to play off racial fears in order to win an election.
Predictably enough, the left/liberals/progressives (delete as not appropriate) were up in arms; this didn’t do much good. However, the issue does need addressing and, until fairly late in the game, it was only outrage that played into the hands of the unpleasant parts that preferred McCain to Obama.
One reply was very straightforward in its simple attack on the unpleasantness and – dare I say it? – unAmericanness of the attacks:
That did, I think, a good deal of damage to the McCain campaign and was equally supportive of the Obama campaign. However, the ‘Obama is a Muslim and so might be a terrorist’ meme was already in circulation. The Great Schlep might have done something to counter that in Florida, but I think a memetic counter-attack could have used ditties like this:
I’d recommend Roy Zimmerman; he’s funny and acute in his songs. I’d particularly check out Thanks for the Support, Defenders of Marriage, I Approve this Message and To Be a Liberal.
The sadness is that the memetic, subliminal and underhanded approach would have been more successful than the direct appeal to intellectual argument and certain groups were very happy to exploit this regardless of what consequences that might have for the quality of democracy in America.
xD.
December 2nd, 2008 at 2:03 pm
The first BO disappointment is his conservative appointments – he was supposed to be a bringing fresh air to the White House.
December 3rd, 2008 at 2:57 pm
It depends what you mean by conservative. In British terms, some are perhaps small-c conservatives; there are no neocons and no palaeocons.
xD.
December 26th, 2008 at 10:25 pm
I agree that using Obama’s middle name ‘Hussein’ to make him sound ‘alien’ is very unpleasant. You rightly point out that the implication that someone being a Muslim would make them unsuitable to be President is in itself worrying.
On the other hand, the Obama camp (not Obama personally, to be fair) showed themselves not to be beacons of tolerance when they barred two Muslim women from an Obama event because they thought it wouldn’t look good.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/world-news/muslim-woman-wearing-head-scarf-denied-seat-at-obama-rally-13894323.html
December 30th, 2008 at 11:57 pm
That’s quite interesting, actually. The Dems ended up doing what the GOP did because what the GOP did was effective. Perhaps the Obama campaign should have done a Powell and simply pointed out the ridiculousness of promoting an incompatibility between being a Muslim and being an American.
xD.