There’s a Name for People Like You

President Obama made a forceful response to Donald Trump’s proposed Muslim ban and his insistence that the act in Orlando be labeled as radical Islamic terrorism: “There’s no magic to the phrase radical Islam … What exactly would using this language accomplish? What exactly would it change? Would it make ISIL less committed to try and kill Americans? Would it bring in more allies? Is there a military strategy that is served by this? The answer is none of the above. Calling a threat by a different name does not make it go away.” In other words, loose rhetoric and inflammatory tweets are dragging us into a heated public debate about which words to use to describe the motivations we imagine prompted a homicidal sociopath; even as it’s clear that, after only a couple days, we’re only getting a partial picture of what those motivations were. From The NYT’s Max Fisher: Gays, Guns and Jihad: Motives Blur on Closer Scrutiny.

+ Instead of putting a name to the murderer, we should remember the names that really matter: Luis, Edward, Amanda, Christopher, Akyra. Meet the victims of the Orlando massacre, many of whom were celebrating in one of the few places they felt comfortable doing so. They deserve better than to be fodder for hate speech and a handful of self-serving tweets.

+ “If you’ve never understood a bar as a refuge, then maybe you’ve never felt the fear of showing affection to someone in public.” Shavonte Zellous of the WNBA’s NY Liberty: I Am Orlando.

+ “I can’t stop thinking about the possibility that someone like us was hurt or murdered at Pulse on Sunday morning, outed in the very worst way, in a phone call every family dreads.” Matt Thompson in The Atlantic: To Be Outed in the Worst Possible Way.

Copied to Clipboard