Pork Spray! Keep Muslims at Bay!

September 23, 2007 2:05 PM

Should U.S. Muslims Carry a Special ID? Charles Firth of the Australian TV program Chasers War on Everything asks Americans whether Muslims should have to carry special ID cards, have "security numbers" tattooed on them, and be incarcerated for the rest of the war. (previously, previously)
posted by desjardins (68 comments total)

Should U.S. Muslims Carry a Special ID? ... have "security numbers" tattooed on them, and be incarcerated for the rest of the war. [?]

I'm going to take a wild guess and say 75% of the interviewees who made the final cut say "Yes" on all three counts, while the remaining 25% don't know what a Muslim is and don't care because they think we're at war with France.
posted by Avenger at 2:08 PM on September 23, 2007 [3 favorites]

Wow, those Americans sure are bunch of racist assholes. I'll bet if we cherry picked a bunch of Australian interviewees they'd never sound that stupid. Thank the pierced God we have Charles Firth of the Australian TV program Chasers War on Everything to show us how stupid Americans are. Otherwise, we'd never have known.
posted by felix betachat at 2:12 PM on September 23, 2007

I'm going to take a wild guess and say 75% of the interviewees who made the final cut say "Yes" on all three counts, while the remaining 25% don't know what a Muslim is and don't care because they think we're at war with France.

Close, but it was 100%. The Pork Spray part made me laugh.
posted by Mr_Zero at 2:13 PM on September 23, 2007

Bacon Salt? Pork Spray? What took so long?
posted by jsavimbi at 2:14 PM on September 23, 2007

What do you mean we're not at war with France? We've always been at war with France.

Pork spray!?
posted by loquacious at 2:16 PM on September 23, 2007

Muslim is a type of woven cotton cloth. Do I qualify to fight the French now?*

In other news, stupid American stereotypes make for giggles on Aussie TV.

*By "fight" I mean drink their wine, enjoy their cream- and butter-based sauces, marvel at the beauty of their cathedrals, and make sexy romance with their women.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 2:19 PM on September 23, 2007 [1 favorite]

Once Aussies get TV (and electricity) they'll have a good laugh at the stereotypical 'mericans represented here.
posted by hal9k at 2:22 PM on September 23, 2007

Every time anyone Australian says or does something stupid, it's fun to remind them of the whole 'every one of you are descended from prisoners' thing.
posted by Item at 2:25 PM on September 23, 2007

Every time anyone Australian says or does something stupid, it's fun to remind them of the whole 'every one of you are descended from prisoners' thing.

What would you say if they asked you where the English sent their convicts before Australia?
posted by Slothrup at 2:30 PM on September 23, 2007 [5 favorites]

Which direction do civil rights go down the drain in Australia?
posted by Poolio at 2:31 PM on September 23, 2007 [2 favorites]

To be fair, they do mock themselves as well.
posted by papakwanz at 2:33 PM on September 23, 2007

Given that Oz targetted the rest of the world with Yahoo Serious, I'm in favour of tagging all Australians with warning tattoos.
posted by meehawl at 2:35 PM on September 23, 2007

Times like this make me glad for MeFi german vocabulary: fremdshäm.
posted by a robot made out of meat at 2:36 PM on September 23, 2007

Australian make fun of the Americans so they don't have to think about their own prejudices. Or are they allowing boats full of refugees to land now?
posted by smackfu at 2:41 PM on September 23, 2007

Those wacky Australians. They don't know how to use bidets properly. He washed his boots in it! hah! They all live in the outback and eat bloomin' onions! They wrestle crocodiles! That's not a knife!
posted by stavrogin at 2:41 PM on September 23, 2007 [2 favorites]

I'm going to assume, as I'm sure many do, that these five or six folks were the five or six who gave the "best" answers out of everyone this guy talked to, and that most of the rest (if not all of the rest) immediately drew the parallels.

I'm also guessing that all of them, when the obvious parallel is pointed out, would re-think their stance. It's amazing what you get when someone asks you a question with little context.

Given the first assumption (these responses were cherry picked), I find it ironic that they have to find Americans beholden to the "Muslims are terrorists" stereotype to prove the "Americans are ignorant racists " stereotype. Having them all have a vaguely southern accent was a nice touch (with the interview in front of Wal Mart being the cherry on top).

I really would like to see all that were left on the cutting room floor. As I mentioned, I got a vague "small town Red state" feel from the interviewies. Go to a larger metropolitan area (regardless of geography), and take an honest survey, then you can consider looking down your nose!
posted by MrGuilt at 2:42 PM on September 23, 2007

[A nationwide poll of Americans, taken in 2004] found 44 percent favored at least some restrictions on the civil liberties of Muslim Americans. Forty-eight percent said liberties should not be restricted in any way.

The survey showed that 27 percent of respondents supported requiring all Muslim-Americans to register where they lived with the federal government.

posted by orthogonality at 2:47 PM on September 23, 2007

Huh? I didn't take this as a condemnation of all Americans. What horrified me is that people like this actually exist. And apparently, one of them has even been issued a drivers license. Terrifying.
posted by [expletive deleted] at 2:48 PM on September 23, 2007

MrGuilt: Go to a larger metropolitan area (regardless of geography)

The backdrop for at least some of the interviews looked like Times Square in New York City to me.

Anyway, no one is claiming that this is a scientific survey or that it represents all Americans. I find the defensive tone in this thread amusing (and I'm American, with no Aussie ties).
posted by desjardins at 2:49 PM on September 23, 2007

The backdrop for at least some of the interviews looked like Times Square in New York City to me.

So they were all midwestern tourists then?
posted by hermitosis at 2:54 PM on September 23, 2007 [1 favorite]

[In 2005] 17 percent agreed that “It’s okay to lock up Muslims, just in case they are planning terrorist acts.” [pdf]
posted by desjardins at 2:59 PM on September 23, 2007

While I'm sure there are oodles of jackasses out there, wild-ass surveys always slay me. I'm convinced you can find statistically significant samples of people that would say yes to anything, if only you pointed a microphone at them and asked. According to this, 30 percent of Americans believe in witches.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 3:01 PM on September 23, 2007

How sad. Are they unaware of the horror of the internment of Japanese during WWII while those of German extraction who "looked like us" were never interned?
posted by Cranberry at 3:04 PM on September 23, 2007

It's a scientific fact that stupid people in Australia are stupider than stupid people in America. USA! USA!
posted by facetious at 3:09 PM on September 23, 2007

Well, I think most people are weak-willed enough to generally go along with whatever they think an interviewer wants them to say. That doesn't mean they aren't fucktard assholes though.
posted by Citizen Premier at 3:09 PM on September 23, 2007 [1 favorite]

desjardins writes "I find the defensive tone in this thread amusing"

For the record, I'm not being defensive. To the contrary, I'm pretty sure that, in some places in the US, you could get near 100% agreement with the Aussie's tngue-in-cheek suggestions.
posted by orthogonality at 3:27 PM on September 23, 2007

I have believed that Australians in the U.S. should have to carry special ID cards ever since dingoes ate my baby.
posted by tepidmonkey at 3:31 PM on September 23, 2007 [4 favorites]

Cranberry writes "How sad. Are they unaware of the horror of the internment of Japanese during WWII while those of German extraction who 'looked like us' were never interned?"

Don't worry, German-Americans were harassed during WWI (and immediately after, for Socialist associations). Read up on Mitchell Palmer, Woodrow Wilson's AG. Palmer makes Abu Gonzales look not quite so bad.
posted by orthogonality at 3:31 PM on September 23, 2007

It's quite easy looking through their archives on the ABC website that I don't think they take anything too seriously, and I highly doubt that there are too many people going that believe that all Americans believe the same thing.

The Chaser do love pointing out how racist Aussies are too; see their street survey asking people in a well-to-do neighbourhood whether they want a mosque built there.
posted by chronic sublime at 4:05 PM on September 23, 2007

So they were all midwestern tourists then?

Because New Yorkers, and the mayors they elect to run the place, are clearly above such midwestern foolishness.
posted by washburn at 4:09 PM on September 23, 2007 [1 favorite]

The survey showed that 27 percent of respondents supported requiring all Muslim-Americans to register where they lived with the federal government.

This 'statistic' doesn't mean anything. I'll bet if you took out the implicit discrimination by omitting the word Muslim from the poll question, the percentage in favour would be much higher. They might as well ask, "Do you think Muslim-Americans should be forced to pay income tax, you racist bastard?"
posted by Reggie Digest at 4:27 PM on September 23, 2007

The Chasers are at war with everything... they point out stupid stuff / people in their own country all the time. They are also very funny. At times they rise to the sublime...

Terrorist security response

The Secret

Trojan Horse

I thank the day my Aussie mate put me on to them.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 4:43 PM on September 23, 2007

Canada did it first. See "This Hour has 22 Minutes" and the offshoot, "Talking to Americans."

Mind you, first != better, so YMMV.
posted by LMGM at 4:52 PM on September 23, 2007

I still feel like John Safran got it right.
posted by dw at 5:06 PM on September 23, 2007

Just a little defensive, kids? The APEC pranks in our own country where far more hilarious. The stupid American thing is old shtick. Gosh, we make fun of you, ourselves and everyone in between! We must be trying to gloss over our own prejudices against evil foreigners. Psh.
posted by liquorice at 5:13 PM on September 23, 2007 [1 favorite]

The fact that there are even a handful of people who believe these things makes me really question the effectiveness of the education system and the media. How can somebody come out of a lifetime of schooling, be surrounded by liquid information in their daily lives, and yet still hold such illogical and fascist ideas?
posted by tehloki at 5:24 PM on September 23, 2007

You actaully have to pay a little attention to the liquid information tehloki.
posted by Mitheral at 5:52 PM on September 23, 2007

The fact that there are even a handful of people who believe these things makes me really question the effectiveness of the education system and the media.

You can bring a horse to water...
posted by Kadin2048 at 6:08 PM on September 23, 2007

Why of course they should, and when my people are in power everyone who scares me, right wing nut jobs, politically active evangelicals, etc., should also be branded, marched off to detention centers where it is unlikely that they will ever attempt again to blow up a government building in Oklahoma, or anywhere else. These people are other, dangerous, irrational, radical, they must be stopped, they are a danger to our American way of life and no restriction is too much if it is needed to protect America.
posted by caddis at 6:20 PM on September 23, 2007 [1 favorite]

Just think of this as revenge for that Simpsons episode.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 7:41 PM on September 23, 2007

You know who else has "security numbers" tattooed on them?

Hipsters.
posted by ryoshu at 7:45 PM on September 23, 2007

I'm outraged. Nobody makes Americans look stupid in America.

Oh, wait.
posted by miss lynnster at 7:56 PM on September 23, 2007

How sad. Are they unaware of the horror of the internment of Japanese during WWII while those of German extraction who "looked like us" were never interned?

This seems to be a well-established myth.
posted by Slithy_Tove at 8:09 PM on September 23, 2007

I'm outraged that Jay Leno is not funny.

Oh, wait.
posted by stavrogin at 8:22 PM on September 23, 2007 [1 favorite]

Would've been funnier if Jay Leno was driving the car.
posted by miss lynnster at 8:39 PM on September 23, 2007

It makes good TV, most Australian's who watch the ABC are pretty well educated and know that a proportion of American's aren't really that dumb.

Sorry USA, the world's TV has been doing it to you for years, it's because we love.
posted by mattoxic at 8:51 PM on September 23, 2007

Well, aren't we all a sensitive bunch of beotches.

papakwanz got it right. Self depreciating humour is in our constitution.

And if this was a Michael Moore interviews dumb Rebulblikkkan voters skit the cum wouldn't be flying all over the place?

Feer my strawman argument!
posted by uncanny hengeman at 9:13 PM on September 23, 2007

Dear World,

Sorry about all the stupid people. If it's any consolation, guys like Rick Mercer and Jay Leno can really get a laugh out of how stupid some of my countrymen can be.

I try talking sense to as many of them as I can, but one person can only do so much. What really gets me is when I hear supposedly well-educated people say stupid stuff like "but if I turn the thermostat way up the hot air will come out faster" or "Maybe monkeys are your ancestors but they aren't mine!" Again, sorry.

Sincerely,
ilsa
posted by ilsa at 9:16 PM on September 23, 2007

Look, the Chaser is funny, but this "Americans are stupid!" "No! Australians are stupid!" conversation happens every time someone posts it to Metafilter.
posted by Lucie at 10:34 PM on September 23, 2007

Can't we just agree that we're all idiots?
posted by Lucie at 10:34 PM on September 23, 2007

Can't we just agree that we're all idiots?

I know you are, but what am I?

Oh.
posted by pompomtom at 10:54 PM on September 23, 2007

If you love equanimity so much, why don't you marry it?!?!
posted by stavrogin at 11:06 PM on September 23, 2007

Wasn't there a comedy game show in syndication where the contestants won money by predicting how ignorant other people were?
posted by moonbiter at 11:21 PM on September 23, 2007

most Australian's who watch the ABC are pretty well educated and know that a proportion of Americans aren't really that dumb.

Nicely worded.
posted by pracowity at 11:58 PM on September 23, 2007

It failed to make it past pilot.

Everybody put all their money on the Americans.
posted by UbuRoivas at 12:00 AM on September 24, 2007

and nicely timed, here.

also, pracowity: i hope your not making fun of australian's idiosyncratic usage of apostrophe's? its just one of the grammatical way's that australian english differs from american english.
posted by UbuRoivas at 12:02 AM on September 24, 2007

No, everyone makes mistakes with apostrophes now and then. It's embarrassing, but it happens. What made me laugh was the carefully worded "a proportion [it could be some very small proportion] of Americans aren't really that dumb [no, perhaps not that dumb, but perhaps somewhat dumb]" -- and all the rest, presumably, are really that dumb.
posted by pracowity at 1:08 AM on September 24, 2007

Dear Metafilter,

Please make the Brits appear stupid too. I feel left out.

kthxbye.
posted by seanyboy at 1:15 AM on September 24, 2007

Here you go seanyboy. It's not political, but you weren't specific.
posted by miss lynnster at 1:42 AM on September 24, 2007

What do you mean we're not at war with France? We've always been at war with France.

If ti wasn't for the French, you'd all be speaking English.
posted by The Ultimate Olympian at 4:24 AM on September 24, 2007

I just love how so many USians (including a fair few here) just can't join in when people are taking the piss. Fine to be laughing at smelly French, bad-teeth Brits & backwards Aussies but when it comes to dumb Yanks...well that's just not right.

So we take the piss even more until you get all angry and go and invade another can't-fight-back-country' just to show us all how great you really are.
posted by i_cola at 6:13 AM on September 24, 2007

Wait, wait-- turning the thermostat way up doesn't make the hot air come out faster?
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:39 AM on September 24, 2007

I think we should make Australian "journalists" carry special ID cards.
posted by Pollomacho at 8:40 AM on September 24, 2007

I just love how so many USians (including a fair few here) just can't join in when people are taking the piss. Fine to be laughing at smelly French, bad-teeth Brits & backwards Aussies but when it comes to dumb Yanks...well that's just not right.

I'll tell you what's not right. You forgot to mention us igloo-living, husky-whipping Canadians. How dare you! Some Commonwealth-ian YOU are.
posted by illiad at 10:28 AM on September 24, 2007

Americans are stupid, Australians are stupid, Brits are stupid. The French are stupid.

Israel Sucks
Iraq Sucks
Palestine Sucks.

Now, can we get on with our lives?
posted by Cyclopsis Raptor at 11:43 AM on September 24, 2007

The French are in the Commonwealth now?!?
posted by i_cola at 2:06 PM on September 24, 2007

Wow, they must have surrendered to someone without even having war declared. That may be a new record.

I think we should make Australian "journalists" carry special ID cards.
They do.
posted by dg at 3:41 AM on September 25, 2007

Whats after special id cards ? Tag them in the forhead ? lol
posted by marcellot at 6:48 PM on September 25, 2007