As we all know by this point, there was a bombing at the Ariana Grande concert in Manchester last night. Twenty-two people are confirmed dead, dozens for injured and the perpetrator has been identified.
Yes...the perpetrator has been identified - as a British-born person of Libyan origin; however, long before details of the perpetrator emerged, the ugly voice of the far-right took to the Internet to immediately blame all Muslims and "people of Muslim origin" (the Middle East, North Africa, etc.) for the incident. Rather than offer support to the victims and their families or to rescue efforts in the area, the trolls instead called for all Muslims in the West to be deported and/or killed. The usual hateful nonsense.
Violent acts like those seen in Manchester are not the fault of Muslims in general, the same way that all the white males who go on mass shooting sprees are not the fault of all white men. In fact, when a traditional Westerner commits an atrocity, we never blame the whole West or the whole of an element of it - we only hold the actions of the individual responsible. So why are Muslims held to a difference standard?
The way to address hateful people - who can be from any demographic group - is to encourage dialogue, love, kindness, understanding...responding with more hate will never bring the victims back and is more likely to cause others to be killed, too. Don't get sucked into more hate.
Hate certainly doesn't defeat hate.
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