As the world reels from the murder of at least 49 people in a horrific attack against Muslims at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, conservatives across the world—many of whom have helped stoke hatred of Muslims—have wasted little time offering the absolute worst, most mealy-mouthed and hypocritical lip service to gently condemn the attack.
Leading the effort was none other than President Donald Trump, perhaps the most prominent Islamophobe in the world, who shared a lukewarm, bizarrely worded tweet offering “best wishes” to the victims of the Christchurch attack.
Then, after a wholly reverential 20 minute wait, Trump immediately dove into hyping the discredited “Jexodus” effort as a means to whip up religious divisiveness.
“Cool kid’s philosopher” Ben Shapiro, a man who has spent his career spewing vile anti-Muslim hatred, urged followers not to share the alleged shooter’s name or writings, in which he allegedly made his white supremacist, anti-Islam views very clear.
Perhaps Shapiro forgot how he gleefully named shooters Omar Mateen and Tashfeen Malik, following their respective attacks. I wonder why he felt it was necessary to share their names publicly?
Joining Shapiro in the “just ignore the guy” effort was none other than the president’s firstborn son and namesake, Donald Trump Jr, who took things a step farther, using the Christchurch attack as an opportunity to go after the real villains here: The media.
National Rifle Association spokeswoman Dana Loesch, a woman who seemingly exists solely to advocate for weapons designed to kill people, also jumped on the bandwagon—although at least she had the good grace to correctly label the attack “pure evil” before urging followers not to pay attention to the horrific right-wing ideology which is apparently behind the attack.
Turning Points USA leader, Hitler defender, and Trump family favorite Candace Owens also got in on the action, responding to the attack with a hearty “LOL” after it was reported that the shooter cited her as an influence on his hateful ideology.
Meanwhile, Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger used his Fox & Friends appearance Friday morning to vociferously defend the tried and true “thoughts and prayers” cliche as a reasonable and effective response to attacks such as this.
Incidentally, Kinzinger received an “A” rating, and $2,000 from the NRA in the past 2018 midterm election.
Some people dispensed with even the vaguest pretense of sadness about what happened. Anti-Muslim hatemonger Laura Loomer, for instance, responded to the attacks by...talking about Israel.
But of all the ghoulish responses to the shooting, perhaps the most nauseating was the one from Australian Senator Fraser Anning, who wrote on Friday that “the real cause of bloodshed on New Zealand streets today is the immigration program which allowed Muslim fanatics to migrate to New Zealand in the first place.”
Today is a bad day. And these people are making it so much worse.