I'm a little freaked out by some things I experienced this week. I live in a really hard-core republican area and I'm used to being an exotic species here, politics-wise. Long ago I learned it's better to just keep one's mouth shut most of the time.
But on Wednesday I was attending a "Safety Training" day at my office (a Federal agency) and among the driving safety and CPR videos, my boss presented a shocker of a movie. It was that video called "Obsession" that's a hate movie about the mythical "Islamo-fascism". My boss is typical of our area here, fundie to the bone, though mostly a soft-spoken and undemonstrative person. Yet he and I almost had an arguement in front of our entire assembled office because before the movie started I saw what it was and challenged him that it was a "political" topic. Politics are prohibited in the Federal workplace of course. He insisted that it was a film about "safety", saying that it had been shown to him by our headquarters safety officer in Salt Lake City. He said we need to learn to be safe, and that includes knowing the threats that are out there.
It was a chilling movie, just the 27 minute abbreviated version we saw. It literally demonized people of the Islamic faith. I had a coughing fit in the middle of it and had to leave, that's how much it upset me. My co-workers told me they were all aware of it. The DVD was delivered to their homes in our local (gossipy) newspaper. I looked online and saw that all over the US it had been distributed this way, even the NY Times. It was paid for by a McCain supporter. While most decent folks would see through this sort of propaganda, here where I live it's somewhat different.
People here tend to be viciously xenophobic, race-haters even though there are almost no African Americans living anywhere near. Republicanism took over here starting with Nixon's "Southern Strategy", though we're not near the South. The veiled racism of that time was red meat to these folk's mean-spirited political instincts. In the 1920's the KKK was big here, again with no minorities to speak of other than farm workers.
These folks have been riding high during the Bush years. Now they are hurting and have been confused that their world-view didn't work and everything's falling apart for them economically. They have seized on fear and loathing as an antidote for their disillusionment. Obama and "Islamo-fascism" are one and the same to them. Palin is their heroine and viciousness is their style.
I've lived here for 20 years because of my good Federal job and the politics was never more than just an annoyance and something to quietly work to change. Now, I check many times each day to make sure my Obama yard sign is still in place and almost fought with my boss over a stupid ignorant DVD that he chooses to want to believe in. Seeing the anger and hate at the Palin events on TV showed me that this is happening all over the place. It's freaky-bad in that it's starting to look like extremeism that I've not seen since fire-hose days of the early '60s.