It’s distressing to see the Religious Right’s complete and utter lack of critical thinking skills.
There is nothing the fringe of the Religious Right loves more than a good conspiracy theory – the wilder and more unsubstantiated it is, the more they like it.
Recently, a letter purporting to implicate Muslims in the Virginia Tech massacre has been making the rounds on Religious Right Web sites, most notably on a “news service” promoted by Worldview Weekend.
In the letter, a man identified as “Rabbi Eric S. Carlson” writes that a police officer in Virginia told him that Seung-Hui Cho, who gunned down 32 people at Virginia Tech April 16, was really an Islamic terrorist. Supposedly, Cho is shown quoting from the Quran on the videos he mailed to NBC News. The letter charges that this is being covered up by the media.
“It appears that he did not randomly pick his targets but rather chose classes that had high concentrations of Christians and Jews in them – he was targeting Christians and Jews!!!!!” reads the letter.
The letter goes on to assert, “What adds to this is that the press is not mentioning that a very high percentage of the victims were believers. The names of the victims can be misleading and don’t indicate who they really are!”
It’s distressing to see the Religious Right’s complete and utter lack of critical thinking skills. This letter provides no specific information – only unnamed sources and wild innuendo. (”Rabbi” Carlson is a real person. He leads a “Messianic” congregation in Newport News, Va. – in other words, Jewish converts to Christianity.)
Here are some other factors to consider: About 80 percent of Americans belong to Christian denominations; another 2 percent are Jewish, and Muslims account for less than 1 percent. A madman like Cho, firing a steady stream at a crowd of people, would not have to “target” Christians and Jews. Mere probability guarantees that most of his victims would belong to those faiths.
No evidence has come to light that Cho quoted the Quran on those tapes. Even if he did, that does not make him a Muslim terrorist. On one tape, Cho compared himself to Jesus. Does that make him a “Christian terrorist”?
Finally, you would have to be very foolish or gullible to believe for one moment that if the media had any evidence Cho was tied to Islamic extremists they would not trumpet that on network and cable news around the clock. It would be an incredible story – and the media would be all over it like a hungry dog on a piece of steak.
The sad truth is, Cho was a mentally disturbed young man who had access to dangerous weapons that he used to murder innocent people. We may never understand his motives because they are probably unfathomable creations of his damaged mind. The rambling video statements Cho mailed to NBC are evidence not of a religious or political ideologue, but of a deranged and very sick young man.
It’s disgraceful that some who claim to speak in the name of Christ – the Prince of Peace – are so eager to stir up hate and rage against Muslims that they will recklessly blame them for tragedies they had nothing to do with.
© 1947 - 2009