Friday, April 12, 2013

The Terrorist




There are many facets of social identities at work in the myth of the terrorist constructed in George W. Bush's address and Dick Cheney's interview. The two most noticeable social identities were race and class.
The terrorists are from Al-Queda. They are extremists which is an Islamic practice.

Class was heavily talked about in Dick Cheney's interview with Tim Russert. Dick Cheney states that Osama Bin Laden's hatred against the United States and his taking illegal actions to destroy and force the United States to withdraw from that part of the world, must have something to do with his background, his own upbringing. Osama Bin Laden is from an upperclass family.He is the son of one of the wealthiest Saudi families. The power that his family had probably influenced him in many ways. Since Osama Bin Laden has a lot of money and wealth, it can purchase power along with it. He can pay people to do evil in parts of the world he doesn't like, such in this case, the United States. The fact that his family is rich because they are business people would have stereotyped their parents as neglecting individuals who only focused their attention on their business and wealth.


Sexuality as a social identity also comes in play. George W. Bush claims in his speech, "The terrorists practice a fringe form of Islamic extremism that had been rejected by Muslim scholars and the bast majority of Muslim cleric, a fringe movement that perverts the peaceful teachings of  Islam." He calls their teachings as being perverted which is a very sexual word. The word alone means an altering of something from its original state and it is usually something bad. The word perverted from the google dictionary means "characterized by sexually abnormal and unacceptable practices or tendencies." This is just basically saying that the terrorists are practicing something illegal and that it is very bad. Calling someone perverted can be very offensive in many ways and this does not do any better than in Al-Queda's practices. The terrorists hate the freedom the United States offers and wants to destroy it. 

In George W. Bush's speech, he also calls the Al-Queda and their supporters barbarians. This is an indicator of race which is "Arabness" as a social identity. They are called barbarians because they don't like freedom being offered in different countries in the world in the newer centuries. They are thinking in the old ways that everybody should be controlled by the government. Osama Bin Laden wants to be the head of the government and own his country so he prevents freedom in his people for them to obey him and listen to his orders.



One of the blogs that talk heavily about terrorism is 

http://universalcritique.blogspot.com/2012/12/constitutional-rights-terrorists.html

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