Monday we saw a failed terrorist attack take place in a busy subway station in New York City. The perpetrator, whose name I refuse to utter or write out of the principle of not giving him martyrdom thanks to his attack, apparently wrote on facebook, the morning of the attack, “Trump you failed to protect your nation.” The man has been in the process of radicalization since as far back as 2014 at least and has been inspired by ISIS to attempt this attack on the United States. At a basic level I can understand the anger that people like this could feel towards America. Our president constantly berates Islam and makes them all out to be evil, he has attempted on many occasions to ban Muslims from entering the country and as of late has succeeded in banning some. To any Muslim that already felt left out by us as a country this would only fuel the fires of hate. But killing solves nothing.
Killing innocent people or attempting to kill innocent people in this case only further spreads the divide between Islam and the rest of the world. Those who are not already radicalized should not be allowing themselves to become radicalized and we should not be assuming that all Muslims are radical just like we don't assume all Christians are in the KKK. People cannot let fear and hate divide us. No one wins when fear and hate rule the day. Trump and ISIS have that in common in that they both use fear and hatred as tools to control us. The only way we win is if we do not let people like them feed off of our hatred and fear.
We got lucky on Monday, this terrorist attack could have been devastating. All five people who were injured have since been treated and everyone is okay, there is no lasting damage in the tunnel and no one died. It could have been worse, this should be a wake up call, this should show us all that we are stronger when we stand together and letting fear divide us will only hurt us in the end. This battle cannot be won with guns, or bombs, or knives. The more we use military options against ISIS, especially those that cost civilians their lives, the more we radicalize the middle east. And, the more followers of Islam that let themselves be radicalized and carry out attacks like the one we saw in New York on Monday, the more Americans will begin to believe that Islam is a blood-thirsty religion. The only way we bridge this divide is by talking, and the only way we talk is if we stop fearing each other.
