Thursday, June 15, 2006

Can't those Muslim women take a joke?

Only yesterday, I was insulted in a vile way on a message board, and the poster immediately said "Oh I don't know what's gotten into me with this sarcasm. It was just a joke :)"

I knew what had gotten into her--hostility. People who cannot own their hostility put it into "jokes"--"jokes" that are hurtful and vicious. This is a favorite tactic some men use with women. If the woman objects, the response is "Oh look--you can't even take a joke." Just like that, the incident is the woman's fault. But of course.

Cpl. Joshua Belile of North Carolina, one of the soldiers to whom I'm supposed to be grateful, is one of those men. After he came back from his tour of duty in Iraq, he wrote a little song and posted it on a website. The song (in part) goes like this:

I grabbed her little sister and put her in front of me. As the bullets began to fly, the blood sprayed from between her eyes, and then I laughed maniacally. . .I blew those little fuckers to eternity. . .They should have known they were fucking with the Marines.

I like it that when we liberate people, we can also produce art about our accomplishments. Of course, the posting of the song isn't the worst part. That would be Belile's "apology":

I apologize for any feelings that may have been hurt in the Muslim community. This song was written in good humor and not aimed at any party, foreign or domestic.

You see, it was joke. He didn't "mean anything" by it.

Belile should not only apologize (and by that, I mean a real apology, but that would require empathy) to Muslims, he should also apologize to women and girls, because the lyrics are clearly misogynistic as well.

1 Comments:

People who do this steam me up so bad, and I don't accept it when they use the "joke" excuse. It's as if they like to shock or insult, but then don't want to suffer the reaction from people they've shocked. It's cowardly, passive-aggressive and just mean-spirited.

In this case, it's beyond disgusting. This guy's got a lot of apologizing to do indeed.

By Blogger Unknown, at 12:37 PM  

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