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#religion Few readers will challenge Butler’s scathing account of evangelical support for slavery, the Lost Cause, Jim Crow, and lynching. Where her argument may get hard for her audience is when she begins to build a pathway from the past to the present, refusing to allow evangelicalism’s old sins to remain old. Her choice to make Billy Graham the link between past sins and new bigotries seems intentionally provocative, but Butler defends her choice: “The creation of twentieth-century evangelicalism—and its relation to racial politics—are best interpreted through the story of its great representative, Billy Graham, ‘America’s White Jesus’”.

#religion The Nation follows many of the practices of traditional Islam and is an advocate of black nationalism. The Southern Poverty Law Center has labelled the organization a hate group. “The Nation of Islam sort of combined what we would call religious black nationalism with some of the traditional teachings of Islam globally. So the combination often confounded people because many people weren’t accustomed to a kind of nationalist dialogue rhetoric mixed with religion. And so they always have to sort of unpack that idea that they’re Muslims, but they’re also addressing a black condition of suffering.”

#religion Religion and racism are topics often discussed together. Newspapers regularly make headlines based on misrepresented data, most recently regarding British Muslims – a religious group that is often the target of both blatant racism and of more subtle forms of racial profiling. But Stefanie Doebler explains that rigorous use of surveys shows that religion does not facilitate racist attitudes; poverty and low education are some of the factors that do.

#justicesystem The Americ Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is challenging the practice of excluding Black jurors from death penalty cases, which is known as death qualification. This practice dictates that to serve on a death penalty jury, a prospective juror must be willing to impose the death penalty. Source Black people are more likely to oppose the death penalty, and as a result, are disproportionately excluded from death penalty juries. This exclusion is a manifestation of the racial bias embedded in our criminal legal system and goes hand in hand with mass incarceration. Leo Jones, a Black man, was convicted and sentenced to death by an all-white Florida jury in 1982 for the killing of a white police officer. Despite the serious doubts around Mr. Jones’ conviction, the state of Florida executed him in 1998 by electric chair. Mr. Jones’ case is emblematic of pervasive issues in death penalty cases. Juries are an integral part of our justice system. One of the first lines of defense against miscarriages of justice is a diverse, representative jury which is much more capable of fairly weighing evidence, holding the government to its high burden, and protecting the rights of those accused of crimes than an all-white jury. Juries are meant to represent the community’s conscience. However, in death penalty cases, juries are rigged to be more conviction-prone, friendlier to the prosecution, and to exclude Black community members. Source Death qualification goes hand in hand with mass incarceration and the racial bias embedded in our criminal legal system. But in death penalty cases, juries are rigged to be more conviction-prone, friendlier to the prosecution, and to exclude Black community members.

#immigration The United States is a nation of immigrants. Ever since colonial times, immigrants from around the world have come to the country in waves. However, the history of U.S. treatment of immigrants is one rife with inhumane tragedies such as discrimination, exclusion, arrest, detention, expulsion, and a litany of human rights abuses. Worse still, the recent years have witnessed one humanitarian disaster after another caused by the U.S. government on refugees and immigrants going to the country. This report gives a truthful account of the United States' egregious record on the issue of refugees and immigrants by reviewing events in the past and present within the United States and beyond. Using facts and figures, this report lays bare the lies and double standards on the issue of refugees and immigrants of the United States, a self-proclaimed "beacon of democracy."

#hategroup A.I. mode is only available when you have access to the new Bing. Hate groups in law enforcement are a serious issue that has been reported on by various sources. According to a report by The Guardian, white supremacist groups have infiltrated US law enforcement agencies in every region of the country over the last two decades1. The U.S. Department of Justice warn s that hate crimes, more than any other crime, can trigger community conflict, civil disturbances, and even riots2. Explicit racism in law enforcement takes many forms, from membership or affiliation with violent white supremacist or far-right militant groups, to engaging in racially discriminatory behavior toward the public or law enforcement colleagues, to making racist remarks and sharing them on social media.

#religion In the past few days, I’ve seen all kinds of statements from Christian leaders trying to distance themselves from the violent mob at the Capitol. Christian writers known for their thoughtfulness lament that “somehow” white supremacy has crept into our churches, and the faculty of a major evangelical institution put out a manifesto saying that the events at the Capitol “bear absolutely no resemblance to” the Christianity they teach. That mob, they’re telling us, is a fringe element. They’ve radically misunderstood the real message of American Christianity.

#hategroup Domestic terrorism is on the rise. Several attacks have been widely reported in the last few years. For example, in May 2022, a racially-motivated individual shot and killed 10 people in Buffalo, New York. A 2018 attack on a Pittsburgh synagogue left 11 people dead. All but eight states across the U.S. experienced at least one incident of domestic terrorism between 2010 and 2021. And over the last 10 years, domestic terrorism-related investigations have grown by 357%.

#socialmedia Racist rhetoric is distributed through computer-mediated means and includes some or all of the following characteristics: ideas of racial uniqueness, racist attitudes towards specific social categories, racist stereotypes, hate-speech, nationalism and common destiny, racial supremacy, superiority and separation, conceptions of racial otherness, and anti-establishment world-view. Racism online can have the same effects as offensive remarks made face-to-face.

#socialmedia What You’ll Learn Is racism illegal? Is racism a crime? How does racism manifest itself on social media? How Social Media Influences Hate Crimes Racism on Social Media Particularly Affects Children How Bystanders Can Intervene Help for Children Affected by Racism on Social Media

#socialmedia Research sponsored by the National Institute of Justice has found that study samples of individuals in the United States who have engaged in violent and non-violent hate crime and other forms of extremist crime were influenced by social media. A key finding was that extremists in the study group may mirror the general population in their use of various social media platforms, particularly in terms of reliance on Facebook. Although the sample size was relatively small, and less than 20% of the study sample said they used Facebook, use of Facebook was found to be significantly higher than that of any other social media platform.

#socialmedia Actual intent to carry out viol­ence can be diffi­cult to discern from the angry, hyper­bolic — and consti­tu­tion­ally protec­ted — speech and inform­a­tion commonly found on social media. When the police pounded the door before dawn at a home in northwest Germany, a bleary-eyed young man in his boxer shorts answered. The officers asked for his father, who was at work. They told him that his 51-year-old father was accused of violating laws against online hate speech, insults and misinformation. He had shared an image on Facebook with an inflammatory statement about immigration falsely attributed to a German politician. “Just because someone rapes, robs or is a serious criminal is not a reason for deportation,” the fake remark said. The police then scoured the home for about 30 minutes, seizing a laptop and tablet as evidence, prosecutors said. At that exact moment in March, a similar scene was playing out at about 100 other homes across Germany, part of a coordinated nationwide crackdown that continues to this day. After sharing images circulating on Facebook that carried a fake statement, the perpetrators had devices confiscated and some were fined. Hate speech, extremism, misogyny and misinformation are well-known byproducts of the internet. But the people behind the most toxic online behavior typically avoid any personal major real-world consequences. Most Western democracies like the United States have avoided policing the internet because of free speech rights, leaving a sea of slurs, targeted harassment and tweets telling public figures they’d be better off dead. At most, Facebook, YouTube or Twitter remove a post or suspend their account. German authorities have brought charges for insults, threats and harassment. The police have raided homes, confiscated electronics and brought people in for questioning. Judges have enforced fines worth thousands of dollars each and, in some cases, sent offenders to jail. The threat of prosecution, they believe, will not eradicate hate online, but push some of the worst behavior back into the shadows. In doing so, they have flipped inside out what, to American ears, it means to protect free speech. The authorities in Germany argue that they are encouraging and defending free speech by providing a space where people can share opinions without fear of being attacked or abused. That was in Germany. In the U.S., however. Authorities can only monitor your account and make an arrest on probable cause (threats) or ask the platform for your account information (which they will give up voluntarily, then can be used against you in court). But with such action from law enforcement, you have to be on their radar. Government surveillance of the social media accounts of private citizens has skyrocket since the unrest on January 6, 2021. In the name of fighting terrorism, the FBI and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) routinely review the social media accounts of people with no prior criminal activity. These investigations can be initiated even when there is no factual basis for believing someone has committed a crime (not to mention A.I. surveillance). Due to the first amendment, 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances'. And other than Copyright, Decency or Defamation and privacy lawsuits. Social networking sites often have greater protection under the law than their users. So. In America, hate speech is not against the law. But it can get you in trouble... eventually...somehow...which is a good thing...I think.