FRTM - We made a terrible mistake tonight.
- From: Ubot Dev Team <ubotdev@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: frtm@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 1 Jul 2010 23:42:43 -0600
Friends,
I'm not normally one to engage in drama, so forgive me, but something
was said tonight that I feel needs to be addressed. It's something
potentially damaging to our group as Toastmasters, and I think its
important that, as Toastmasters, we should hold ourselves to a higher
level of accountability than was demonstrated tonight.
I think that political rhetoric is entirely fair game, and that we
should all feel comfortable sharing our political beliefs, even if
said beliefs are controversial. However, I think there needs to be an
exception when it comes to discriminatory speech. We are surely
protected by the first amendment to say nearly anything we want about
anybody, but I think it is important to our club and to our status as
toastmasters that we never use hostility or discrimination in
approaching a people's race, culture, or religion.
One of our speakers tonight made comments about Muslims that broadly
painted the entirety of their religion as one that promotes terrorism.
While I realize that the mainstream media has done a lot to make these
kinds of ideas popular, these ideas are not only wrong, they are
offensive and divisive.
The world has a lot of Muslims in it, and the overwhelming majority of
them are peaceful people who just want to live their lives. Most of
them are not very different from ourselves, only having a few
different beliefs. Most of Islam does not condone committing violent
acts against other human beings. Violence is as much a sin in Islam as
it is in any other religion.
Many Muslims are US citizens, who pay taxes and contribute to the
community the same as anyone else would. Many Muslims fight in our
military. In fact, a great deal more Muslims have fought and died
protecting our freedoms than the relatively few who have committed
terrorist acts against us.
If we had a guest tonight who was of the Muslim faith, we could be
assured that he would not be returning. He would have felt isolated
and alone, and like we didn't accept him because of his religion. Is
that the kind of group we are? Is that how we should treat people?
I don't diminish the horrible acts that the extremist few have
committed. But if we are to judge an entire people on the acts of the
extremist few, then no religion, race, country, or culture is
innocent. I hope that in the future we can work harder to be a group
that embraces mutual respect.
Sincerely,
Chris Winstead
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