Agencies
WASHINGTON, JANUARY 5
Donald Trump, the US presidential candidate and multi billionaire dominates the news cycle for all the wrong reasons. Unabashed in expressing his racism towards and dislike for Muslims, major portions of Trump’s presidential campaign ran on making absurd statements about the Muslim community. He has even coined the phrase, “Muslim problem” — one that he uses often when talking about terrorism.
More recently, Donald Trump also announced his strategy to ban all Muslims from entering the US to prevent terror attacks.
Trump, perhaps, does not weigh his words before he speaks. On multiple occasions he has managed to offend various communities. About Mexican immigrants he had said that they were “bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists” and made sexist remarks against Hillary, “She’s playing the woman card up, that’s all she has. Honestly, outside of the woman card, she’s got nothing going, believe me,” he said.
On Monday, Donald Trump’s first television spot for the campaign went on air. It is nothing but a quick (and might we say cheap) recap of all the nasty things he has said during his campaign rallies. Narrated by an authoritative voice, the video features grainy images of his rival Hillary Clinton along with Barack Obama, a democrat (therefore, ‘naturally’ a nemesis).
The 30-second spot also includes pictures of the San Bernardino attackers, buildings that look like they are under seige and, of course, the Mexican border — a visual showing swarming crowds approaching a border fence that PolitiFact claims is in fact the border between Spain and Morocco. Phrases such as “Islamic terrorism”, “cut off ISIS head and take their oil”, “building a wall” feature in the video — with a tenor and tenacity meant to cause panic and paranoia. And then Trump says, “We will make America great again”.
The video stands in testimony to the misplaced concept of “American exceptionalism”. The video creates a terror of its own — among the less aware individuals in the US who truly believe in Donald Trump’s (inappropriate) ideas, othering the overall concept of Islam (and therefore anyone who identifies himself/herself as Muslim) as ‘pure evil’, the only evil that America needs to get rid off to be “great again”.
We suggest that you don’t watch this video, but then again, that is entirely up to you.
