One of the things that has happened in the wake of a shooting spree at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin is that some pretty prominent people have displayed rank ignorance of the most basic distinctions between different religions. Fox News host Gregg Jarrett, for example, seems to think that it was a Jewish temple that was attacked, asking one of the members if there had been any previous acts of “anti-Semitism” at the temple.
But he’s not alone. Gen. Mike Gould, superintendent of the Air Force Academy, was equally clueless. During a briefing at the Academy following the incident, he said it had taken place at a “Sikh mosque.” And when my friend Mikey Weinstein contacted the AFA’s public affairs office to correct that mistake to Gould didn’t repeat it, an officer in that department said, “They’re Hindus, right?” Fail.
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StevoR
August 9, 2012 at 11:45 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
They’re all badly Sikh~ing a clue.
busterggi
August 9, 2012 at 11:50 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I once attacked a concrete block and was accussed of anti-cementism.
Heck, 99.9999% of theists don’t know the history or dogma of their own religion, they just have a dozen or so buzzwords & catch phrases which they mostly misunderstand. You can’t expect people ignorant of their own religion to understand someone elses.
Michael Heath
August 9, 2012 at 11:54 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
After taking a comparative religion course at a secular university, I concluded religions don’t want to authentically understand each other. That’s since such comparisons make it obvious they’re all bullshit when it comes to discerning objective truth where their obviously human-derived attributes aren’t really all that much different between each of them.
That doesn’t mean I think religion has never brought any benefit in the past when we were more primitive. I’m not sure an argument can made now given other avenues which provide the same benefits without all the suffering towards humans and other life on this planet.
The Lorax
August 9, 2012 at 12:03 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I think it’s a symptom of a greater problem in America; lack of cultural awareness. At least, for cultures that aren’t our own. We really need to start teaching kids from a young age that the world doesn’t stop at the borders to our countries.
coragyps
August 9, 2012 at 12:11 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Soon after 9/11/01 an Israeli family that owned a convenience store here in Fundyland caught some shit, and lost a little business, over being possible “terrists” and “ragheads.” Slightly observant Jews with a German last name.
It isn’t just being ignorant – it’s all the way to IGNURNT.
reverendrodney
August 9, 2012 at 12:14 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Fox must have all job applicants take IQ tests, to make sure nobody is TOO smart.
John Hinkle
August 9, 2012 at 12:15 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
To which the surprised member replied, “No. Have you ever been accused of being intelligent? Shit.”
snoeman
August 9, 2012 at 12:21 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
There’s a graphic floating around the web now making the point that it really doesn’t matter if people are ignorant of the religious differences between Islam and Sikhism. You don’t have to be a scholar of either, both or neither to not kill people.
Gregory in Seattle
August 9, 2012 at 1:24 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
The ignorance is shameful, but not at all surprising.
It is an interesting religion, one that starts with Hinduism (it is dharmic and believes in a cycle of death and rebirth), adds a touch of Buddhism (material goods are a distraction, and the cycle of rebirth can be broken through physical and mental discipline), then stirs in some Islam (a monotheistic deity, Wāhegurū (Punjabi for “Wonderful Teacher”), created the universe without ever being a part of it, and spiritual reunion with Wāhegurū is how the cycle of death and rebirth is broken.) Like many religions, Sikh doctrine emphasizes social justice and personal choice; unlike those religions, it actually puts those doctrines into action. Their central act of worship is a communal meal, which is open to everyone regardless of caste, race, belief or the lack thereof (they generally just tsk if you say you are an atheist; you’ll come around in your next life, or maybe the one after that, but in the mean time please take some bread.) Their militarism evolved out of the practical need for self-defense against Hindu and Muslim persecution, and was enshrined by an early religious leader as having symbolic spiritual meaning. As religious groups go, they are one of the better ones.
thisisaturingtest
August 9, 2012 at 1:27 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I wonder sometimes if our technological development hasn’t reached a point where it’s outstripped our rationality- where it has insulated us from reality, and the necessity to think rationally about it, instead of helping us do so- and thus just opened the door wider to religion as a necessity for dealing with the reality (and the technology itself) that folks don’t understand, rather than closing it as a hindrance. I don’t think folks in the far past were any less able to deal rationally with reality than we are today; in fact, arguably better able, since they were closer to it, and had to deal with it on its own terms rather than being insulated from it, to a degree, as we are by technology like TV, the Internet, etc. Religion was their science; it was their effort, in the absence of the technology to achieve testability, to explain what they saw. Science, as a method of thought, is obviously far superior to religion as a method of testing reality; but is our technology (as distinct from science) superior as a means of dealing with it, on a personal basis? Technology like the Internet and TV allow us to disconnect from the reality that our far ancestors had to deal with on its own terms, by viewing it at a remove; and that disconnect, perhaps, opens the door for religion to creep back in.
That’s my meaningless meander for the day.
JustaTech
August 9, 2012 at 2:55 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
In the newspaper coverage of the shooting in my liberal, West-coast city, there was a whole sidebar in the article that was essentially “Who are Sikhs?” that gave a very basic description of the main tenets of the faith, where it’s from (geographically) and why they wear turbans, followed up with a pointed “Not Muslims!”
I thought it was very nice that they decided to include that, as I doubt most people in this city would have had the vaguest idea who Sikhs are.
Abby Normal
August 9, 2012 at 2:58 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I must admit my own knowledge of Sikhism is fairly limited. But they do have my favorite holy symbol. It looks to me like a tribal tattoo of a vagina and anus, which, if you’re going to worship something, seems like one of the better choices available.
cjcolucci
August 9, 2012 at 5:05 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
There used to be a small repair shop in a subway tunnel near my work, run by a pair of Sikhs. Right after 9/11, they put a sign up that, roughly translated from the more polite prose, said “Sikhs aren’t Muslims; please don’t kill us.”
During the GOP primary race in South Carolina, which pitted former Sikh Nikki Haley against a Catholic, a big-city paper ran a sidebar on Sikhs. OK, but the paper also thought it necessary to explain to the peckerwoods what a Catholic is, and what they believe, and how it differs from regular Christianity.
bmiller
August 9, 2012 at 6:44 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
turingtest:
I think our technology also helps isolate us and give us delusions of power, grandeur, and control.
I am think especially about automobiles here. You are enscocnced in two tons of steel and plastic, isolated from other people. No body language, subverbal clues, or even verbal clues. You have the power of 200 horses at your command. Antisocial behavior seems to be encouraged….
iangould
August 9, 2012 at 7:51 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
AtJarrett gto the name right.
In his response, Romney refered to the “Sheik people” and to the temple as a “Sheik” temple.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/07/in-slip-romney-refers-to-sheik-temple-tragedy/
You’d think a Moron would be more sensitive to sutff like that.
“I was in Chicago earlier today. We had a moment of silence in honor of the people who lost their lives at that sheik temple. I noted that it was a tragedy for many, many reasons. Among them are the fact that people, the sheik people are among the most peaceable and loving individuals you can imagine, as is their faith.’’
I love how he knows that Sikhs are “among the most peaceable and loving individuals you can imagine” when he can’t even get their name right.
My guess: he had been prepped for how to respond if there was an anti-Muslim act of domestic terrorism and he just recycled those meaningless cliches.
thisisaturingtest
August 10, 2012 at 9:41 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@#14, bmiller: Well, automobiles are more of a short-term and individual disconnect, rather than the kind of systemic, long-term, collective disconnect I’m talking about; but I suppose the end effect could be the same.
I should probably say, too, that I’m not bashing science or technology here. I’m really only talking about technology, as a use, separated from science, as a method of thought. To me, religion is an impulse, and science is an effort; so while religion was the first, instinctive resort in the absence of science and technology, it may also be the last, equally instinctive resort in the presence of technology divorced from the thought.
I also make no value judgement; to me, “good” or “bad” are like lines of longitude on a map that everyone has agreed to use- useful in determining where you are in relation to everybody else, but still, really only degrees on a continuum (like “hot” or “cold”) on which an artificial context that everyone accepts has been imposed by agreement.
(In case anybody is wondering what the fuck got me going on this tangent, it was this, from Michael Heath:
Heath always makes me think; and isn’t that the purpose of this site and the comments on it?)
dcsohl
August 10, 2012 at 11:24 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I have to wonder if the “anti-semitism” question was a knee-jerk sort of question, or from somebody who has no idea what “Semitic” means. “Hey, it’s a non-Christian religion that worships in a temple! Haters must be anti-semitic.”
Whoops, there I go, trying to defend the idiots again.