A study in perspectives

So Ramadan came to an end.  And Ramadan was a violent one.  But what do we mean by that?  It depends.  Here are two examples from partisan media and what they chose to focus on:

At Breitbart, the focus is on the approx. 3500 killed or wounded by various Muslim extremists.

At Huffpost, the focus is on the anti-Muslim hate crimes aimed at Muslims here in the US.

I can’t imagine anything illustrating so plainly the split in our modern society.  If I’m keeping score, I’ll give this one to the Breitbart article.  As bad as physical assaults, vandalism, bomb threats and hateful graffiti are, they pale in comparison to thousands killed and wounded worldwide.

Especially when the three cases of murder mentioned are two who were not killed for being Muslim, but for defending a Muslim who was being harassed, and a young Muslim woman who may or may not have been killed by an immigrant over a road rage incident.  Given that antisemitism still reigns supreme in the hate crime categories in the US, including crimes involving Muslims, and given that other groups are also targets of hate crimes (my wife’s Orthodox Church has had two cases of graffiti and vandalism), the ‘Muslims killed and wounded thousands’ focus should win every day.

Nonetheless, the two points of focus are an interesting contrast.  It shows the different emphasis between the left and right in the US.  To the left, you can bet your bottom dollar that, as often as not, the main villain is the white, Conservative, European or American heterosexual Christian man.  With the right, the baddie will often be someone who isn’t in that category (though white liberals are as good as any).

Of course the truth isn’t that simple.  But nonetheless, as snippets go, I thought the contrast between these two articles was telling.