What's in a Name?

NPR Link:"Barack Hussein Obama"

What is it about the name "Hussein" that has everyone in a confused uproar? Granted today's generation can only seem to associate that name with the one and only Iraqi Dictator, Saddam Hussein. Unfortunately for presidential candidate Senator Barack Hussein Obama, his middle name has somehow categorized him as some sort of a bad guy. What can he do? Like most us he did not have a choice in picking out his name. What if he was named "Adolf", would he be associated with Adolf Hitler? Perhaps "Josef" would be a more suitable name, as in "Josef Stalin?" Maybe "Benito", as in Benito Mussolini, or maybe something more subtle, a name that seems to be a little more trustworthy, "Fidel," as in Fidel Castro? Hold on, Barack comes from a multicultural and multiracial background, maybe a combination of names like "Barack Benito Josef Adolf Fidel Obama." That has a bit of a ring to it right? It's just name. It does not matter what person, place, or a thing, that name can or will be associated with. A person's name does do not constitute their character. Let it go, there's plenty of other quirky names in the Senate, for example; Senator Akaka and Senator Crapo and yet these two senator's names aren't getting flushed down the toilet everyday.

"Vantage Point"

I've just recently watched this movie and I thought that this movie brought up some good talking points. The plot of this movie centers around a series of several flashbacks from the different perspectives of eyewitnesses, in order to reveal the story. In the end the movies reveals itself to be another American feel good, movie where western civility and heroism traunces the brutality and terrorism of the eastern infidel. It has been several years since September 11, 2001 and still it seems that the media still hung up on projecting the image of terrorism as someone who subscribes to an extreme form of Islam, associated with an organization hailing from traditionally Arabic countries, is of Middle Eastern or closely associated to someone who is, and is hell bent on committing acts of violence in order get their message across. Why are we still focusing on stereotypes that have been proven to be more insulting than accurate, if we ever hope of opeining up the lines of communication between Western and Eastern philosophy? What makes the equally violent act of counter terrorism more acceptable? How can we ever erase the existence of hateful stereotypes, when we allow them to persist in products, however discrete or blatant they maybe, knowing full well that such a product will be mass marketed to a wide audience? Yes, it's just a movie, but one misunderstood idea, can spark a whole lot more.