Today’s red meat loving right-wing base doesn’t mind hearing terrible things about Muslims, immigrants and anyone else they decided they don’t like. But when outrageous talk provokes outrageous action, , they won’t bother looking in the mirror or at their leaders for answers. Instead violence only provokes more violence and their leaders will be the ones clamoring to bring it to them.
Engagement has always been the way to quiet the angry rumblings of international animosity. Winning hearts and minds was never accomplished through violence. But most in the grassroots right-wing conservative movement don’t even know the difference between Sikhs and Muslims and often mistake them for one another. How can they be expected to vote for leaders who claim to understand the nuanced way to deal with a culturally different and population? They just want to vote for people who preach violence and intolerance.
The reason we have freedom of religious is not only to protect the religious group, but to prevent discord within the population in general. Antagonizing an entire group of people, especially religious fanatics, is a great way to provoke a response and we need to collectively come to that realization.
In the last decade, it seems that terror attacks just prior to elections have become all the rage. It’s almost becoming a regular expectation even when it doesn’t happen. As a population of intelligent and calm-minded people, we need to learn to expect such atrocities in today’s environment and not over-react to even the most terrible of provocations. If we can’t do that, then the bad guys win – the war mongers among us who would rather steal power through antagonistic methodologies and violence, and those who perpetrate the violence by provoking the reactions they set out to provoke.