Vox's Amanda Taub: Reax to Canada Attack Shows 'We' Are Biased Against Islam

October 23rd, 2014 5:45 PM

Taking the web site even further down the path of useless, pretentious collection of hackery than it already is — and that's quite far — Vox.com has tweeted (HT Twitchy) that "Our obsession with the Ottawa shooter's religion reveals more about us than about him." It must be a shock to their system to learn that a lot of "us" would rather not be cut down by a member of the alleged "Religion of Peace."

The site's underlying writeup by Amanda Taub accuses "us" of jumping to conclusions, when there was plenty of evidence from the get-go that the attack was jihadist in nature:

Our obsession with the Ottawa shooter's religion reveals more about us than about him

Yesterday, the media reported that Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, the man allegedly responsible for a horrifying shooting spree in and around the Canadian parliament, was a convert to Islam. News reports on the shooting then spent much of the day fixated on that unconfirmed fact — even though there is as yet no evidence that his religion was a motivation for his actions. More sensational coverage discussed dubious social-media connections to ISIS.

... On some level, of course, this feels like an obvious connection to make.

I don't suppose the fact that ISIS proudly posted the guy's picture as early as mid-afternoon Eastern Time yesterday should have influenced us, eh, Amanda?

Continuing:

But those assumptions start to break down upon a little closer examination. Is the theory that the only reason a Muslim would kill is in the name of Jihad? Muslims are just like anyone else, for better or worse, which means that just as an act of generosity by a person who is Muslim does not mean that act was motivated by Islam, a murder committed by a Muslim was not necessarily driven by Islamist extremism.

Still, with examples of Islamist terrorism sitting prominently in our minds, it's an easy jump to the conclusion that Zehaf-Bibeau's religion must be at the heart of all this. But that does not make that conclusion correct.

... speculation, in itself, reveals more about our own biases than it does about what happened yesterday on Parliament Hill.

Nobody said that the conclusion is correct. But it's incredibly dense to not observe that the evidence points strongly in that direction.

Taub then went on to cite a shooting incident from 30 years ago as a reason we should suspend our judgment. You can't make this stuff up.

Despite Taub's admonishment, the larger point is that there's not a darned thing wrong when people forming preliminary conclusions based on what they hear and read, as long as they remain subject to change should opposing facts come out.

What's really galling is when people like Amanda Taub insist that we act like unthinking automatons and avoid trying to further inform ourselves until the authorities give us their version, which apparently no one is then allowed to question.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.