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What are you on, Cary Tennis? A woman who admits to having less than ten uncomfortable experiences-- no physical incidents, mind you-- and you advise this women to deepen her phobia and continue to act in a manner that has no correlation to the actual events of her life. And you are validating a terrible racial prejudice that she admits has no logic basis!
You, sir, are taking part in the most bigoted and toxic fear mongering possible. You pretend to counsel her against making generalizations against immigrants, but your response only serves to further stigmatize a race of people who have been subject to unending suspicion, discrimination and ridicule for the last five years. You've enabled an act of racism; and you're only relying on your liberal priviledge to protect your sense of self-righteousness. (I write for Salon! I can't be a bigot!)
But beyond that issue, you are contributing to a culture of constant panic and hysteria that feeds our worst instincts. You've added your voice to the constant shriek that comes from our media to be scared, scared of crime, scared of immigrants, worst bogeymen of all, Arab men. And you pretend to do it from a place of righteousness, as someone hoping to protect women from rape. But feeding an irrational will do nothing to make this woman safer, and everything to drive her deeper into a paralyzing sense of danger. You've joined FOX News in your efforts to persuade people to jump at every shadow.
Both you and she fail to back up your accusations with a shred of statistical evidence, with any actual science to back up the claim that Scandinavia has become a hive of raping Muslims. Someone here recommended she read the book The Gift of Fear. I've got a different suggestion. Read The Culture of Fear by Barry Glasner and perhaps she'll come to understand why she is so terrified of ghosts, and how damaging that irrational fear is to her life.
I've been readind Salon since its beginnings and I've seen a lot to disagree with. And I've read a lot of inane and insipid commentary from Cary Tennis. But this is the worst, the worst thing ever published in Salon. It's a disgrace. Someday, this women will meet a decent Arab man, and her prejudice will cause her to treat him in a way he doesn't deserve. And you'll have justified that impulse. Maybe it's time you stopped giving advice.
