Islam Misunderstood - Some Consequences

Last month we took a long drive down to Charleston spending one or two nights in four cities along the way. One of these was Wilmington, NC where we stayed at the Riverside Hilton. Wilmington was an interesting stop so we stayed two nights. Coincidentally, the NC Tea Party convention was taking place at the hotel at that time. This being a convention and not a rally, there were no banners or demonstrations and were it not for the nametags identifying the Tea Party nor for the fact that two of the speakers were from Fox News, I would have thought it to be a gathering of somber, retired, middle class Southerners.
As I mentioned the group was very reserved except for a very loud middle-aged man we noticed in the lobby. Basically he was loud not in discussing politics but talking about fishing and boating and offering to buy fellow conventioneers coffee. Later I stepped outside for a breath of fresh air and the same man, still loud was helping a group load a trailer and I overheard him repeat in disbelief that one could go to any post office and get US stamps that had “Muslim stuff” on it. Others in the group chimed in and added comments like how can you let the murderers get away with that. I started walking toward the group intending to ask if at the same post office one might not find stamps with “Christian Stuff” or Jewish Stuff” on them and if so why was it so inappropriate for Muslim, Hindu or Buddhist stuff. I stopped myself remembering the results of a pole in one of the Carolinas where more than 40% of the general population and 60% of Republicans did not realize Hawaii was a state. I also recalled a scene from a Nelson Demille book where he had a Mafiosi for a neighbor who made many very offensive bigoted remarks. The hero wanted to correct him but concluded that iT would be like trying to teach a pig to sing. You can’t do it and it just makes the pig mad. I bit my tongue, attributed these comments to ignorance and didn’t let it bother me too much.
Driving from Charleston to Ashville NC, I noticed a large professionally done (actually visually a rather attractive billboard at that) which had a head covered in black with only the eyes visible through an opening. I couldn’t tell if it was a woman or a ninja like character but the sign read “Islamic Domination be warned”. Bigotry exists and it may indeed be part of the human condition. Though feelings about African Americans, honkies, Jews, homosexuals, women, Irish, “po” whites, the rich, the poor etc., etc. exist, generally they are not openly accepted and whispered among close circle of like thinking friends. Today, in our country however, bigotry against Muslims is accepted, practiced and expressed openly without any pretext whatsoever.