Joshua Stanton of Religious Freedom USA in the Huffington Post: Combating E-Islamophobia

“My student just sent 500 of his closest friends and me an e-mail that says Obama is a radical Muslim only pretending to be a Christian. He wrote that if Obama becomes president, our country will be run by a terrorist. How should I respond to his e-mail?” This was the last question — the stumper — in a long and grueling interview. I hardly had an answer to the question at the time; more has become discouragingly clear since.

At the time of my interview, then-Senator Obama was running for president and engaging in online organizing as no candidate had done before. Supporters could donate to his campaign at the click of a button, after watching motivational speeches that reverberated across YouTube, and then sign up to volunteer at a local campaign office. Obama was inaugurating new online campaigning strategies — and the responses to his campaign were a similar portend for what lay ahead: hateful e-mails and blog posts and the use of social media to create rumor-mills.

READ MORE

Tags: islamophobia, joshua stanton, religious freedom usa, social media