Embassy Bombing in Afghanistan

I was sad to hear about the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Afghanistan today, or did it happen yesterday? I met a couple more women from Afghanistan yesterday and they are such sweet women. They asked for the name of the taxi driver, whose card I have, who is from Afghanistan, so they have someone who knows they're language able to drive them for errands.

I don't think it's foolish to be open to dialogue with some of these people. Sometimes one positive interrelationship can bring people together.

I have also talked with a guy whose brother is a Pakistan diplomat and he's a really great guy.

I think I could be persuasive and understanding of these cultures, because I too know how people can be abused by Americans, even as an American, and because I know they are more knowledgeable about religious prejudices and damages caused inbetween muslims and catholics. Most muslims have no problem believing what happened to me is real. And I, in turn, have firsthand experience with prejudice.

I've been prejudiced against, and then I've had to use prejudice, or "pre-judgement" in order to stay safer and avoid problems caused by a minority sect which doesn't wear any other label except "catholic" in general, and brings the rest down with them in their deeds.

Some prejudice, is based on ignorance, to think a certain group possesses certain traits inherently. But where there is prejudice because of conflict and war, this is different. People go on the defense, in order to survive and protect their families, and sometimes this creates an attitude of distrust against a whole group, because it becomes difficult to separate the good individuals in the group, from the bad.

Prejudice of this sort, isn't irrational or evil. It's developed by people, all over the world, no matter what race, culture, or religion, for self-preservation and the preservation of people they love.

There's a fine line between prejudice, profiling, and bigotry. Bigotry is just prejudice without reason or cause, in my opinion. Prejudice, can be developed for good reasons, based on a series of events which occur over and over again and is natural. Profiling, can be either reasonable or unreasonable.

What I don't understand, is why, in our country, we think it's okay to profile against certain classes and races and religions, but not others.

I think it would be very unwise to keep antagonizing Pakistan, for one thing. It is not all of Pakistan that the U.S. is after--it's Al-Queda, and that's supposedly in a remote, mountainous region, so why are there threats in places where there are civilians?

It's too bad about the embassy because a lot of the people working in any embassy, are not usually "spies" but people who have, first and foremost, a primary interest in peacemaking and they usually grow to like the people they work with in the country where they are stationed.

Embassies are primarily targeted, I think, because of the symbolism they retain, of being representative for their country.