what was I thinking?
I decided to take on the Christmas program....I agreed before I knew all of the stipulations though. I have been given strict parameters as to how I am allowed to do this and I should have asked before I agreed. I have thought of my own ways to subvert the parameters but that isn't the point... I guess that teaches my to agree to do something before I know all of the details. My sister and my cousins Sherri and Stefani and Chelsea have all agreed to help me but it was clear from the beginning that I am the one taking the helm on this one. Which would be fine if I didn't have some many expectations about how it should be done put on me by the ones I took it over from. I just feel like saying, " you didn't want to do it anymore. I am more than willing to take it over but it is going to be on my terms, not yours and if you don't like that then you can get someone else to do it!" But I didn't. I am sucking it up and doing it mostly how they want me to. What a good little follower I am.
In other news, I am still looking for a good job and still working at Target, which is a fine place to work but I can already tell after two weeks that it isn't something I want to do long-term. but it is a great job for the in between, if you will.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Friday, November 7, 2008
I'm proud of the United States Postal Service
I received a very disturbing email today. Inside this email was a whole list of terrible things that "Muslims" had done to the U.S. The point of it was to say that these horrific things perpetrated against the U.S. by "Muslims" was a good reason for people to boycott the United States Postal Service because they have a stamp celebrating the Muslim holiday of Eid.
I had to read it twice to fully grasp what this email was trying to tell me. It was informing me that because an extremist sect of Islam has attacked the U.S. in the past, that is a good reason for the USPS to neglect that there are anywhere from 5 to 8 million Muslims living in the U.S.
The reason this email hit me so hard I believe is because it assumes that just because there is an outspoken minority of Muslims who hate the United States and will do anything to harm Americans and the American way of life, that doesn't mean that all Muslims feel that way. Maybe because I have actually been places that are predominately Muslim and encountered the lack of hostility toward me, a very clearly American woman that I feel frustrated with the prevailing feeling in the U.S. that all Muslims are bad and that they should all be removed from the face of the earth.
It would be simple to counter the arguments made in the email I received and come up with very plausible reasons why Christmas stamps should be boycotted because Christians who celebrate Christmas have done terrible and horrific things to people throughout history (the crusades, the justifications for slavery, I could go on, but I won't).
I guess I say all of this to say, Why must we as Americans and often as Christians feel the need to be hostile toward an entire religion because of the actions of a small if outspoken minority? Does anyone else think that emails like this just give Americans a worse name and if anything perpetuate the problem and do nothing to solve it? What happened to the peace and acceptance and love preached by Jesus? when I see things like this it makes me ashamed to be a Christian and ashamed to be American. America is so great because it is a place where people with differing opinions are listened to and where religiously oppressed people have come for refuge for generations. what happened to those ideals?
I had to read it twice to fully grasp what this email was trying to tell me. It was informing me that because an extremist sect of Islam has attacked the U.S. in the past, that is a good reason for the USPS to neglect that there are anywhere from 5 to 8 million Muslims living in the U.S.
The reason this email hit me so hard I believe is because it assumes that just because there is an outspoken minority of Muslims who hate the United States and will do anything to harm Americans and the American way of life, that doesn't mean that all Muslims feel that way. Maybe because I have actually been places that are predominately Muslim and encountered the lack of hostility toward me, a very clearly American woman that I feel frustrated with the prevailing feeling in the U.S. that all Muslims are bad and that they should all be removed from the face of the earth.
It would be simple to counter the arguments made in the email I received and come up with very plausible reasons why Christmas stamps should be boycotted because Christians who celebrate Christmas have done terrible and horrific things to people throughout history (the crusades, the justifications for slavery, I could go on, but I won't).
I guess I say all of this to say, Why must we as Americans and often as Christians feel the need to be hostile toward an entire religion because of the actions of a small if outspoken minority? Does anyone else think that emails like this just give Americans a worse name and if anything perpetuate the problem and do nothing to solve it? What happened to the peace and acceptance and love preached by Jesus? when I see things like this it makes me ashamed to be a Christian and ashamed to be American. America is so great because it is a place where people with differing opinions are listened to and where religiously oppressed people have come for refuge for generations. what happened to those ideals?
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