Guillermo Jimenez Presents Tom Secker
On this edition of De-Manufacturing Consent Tom Secker joins Guillermo to discuss the shooting in Garland, Texas that occurred in early May, when two men — Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi — allegedly acting under orders from the Islamic State (ISIS) attacked the Mohammed Art Exhibit and Cartoon Contest at the Curtis Culwell Center. The contest to award $10,000 to the "best drawing of the prophet Mohammed" was held by Pamela Geller's American Freedom Defense Initiative, under the auspices of "free speech," and hosted speakers such as Dutch politician and anti-Islam activist Geert Wilders.
We discuss the rather flimsy claims of ISIS responsibility for the shooting; the questionable circumstances of the shooting itself and the heightened security presence at the event (including SWAT, FBI, and ATF); the FBI's foreknowledge and its surveillance of Simpson since at least 20007; and the potential for this to have been a "Gladio-style" false flag event. We also discuss the obvious comparisons to the Charlie Hebdo shooting, why Charlie Hebdo cartoonists have attempted to distance themselves from Geller's contest, and why some — even in the alternative media — have fallen into the binary-opposition trap and wrongly defend Geller's Islamophobia on free-speech grounds.
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