Skip to main content

Stage 3 : New York Times commentary

 
Ariel Davis
   On July 18 2017, the New York Times published an opinion piece written by Farhana Khera and Jonathan J.Smith. The title of this piece is How Trump is stealthily carrying out his Muslim Ban. The writers' argument was that while Trump has not explicitly enacted a Muslim ban, he is trying to do so subtly by issuing orders that targeted Muslims. These orders, as pointed out by the writers,include increasing administrative hurdles and cementing or even expanding the current travel restrictions that are not under review in court.

The writes of this piece are members of Muslim Advocates, a civil rights organization group. As the organization name indicates, it most likely focuses on the welfare of Muslims. Therefore the writers are probably trying to draw attention to the plight of Muslims trying to travel to the United States. By writing this article on the huge platform like the New York Times,  I feel that the writers also want readers to be aware of what policies are being passed and to take action to prevent further discriminatory policies from being enacted. I believe the writers are pretty credible, as it highly likely that they have people going to their organization to seek help if they face any problems with the travel restrictions. Hence the writers are likely to be well aware about the problems that Muslims travelling to the US faced.

While I do agree with the writers' general opinion that there have been a rise in restrictions that have seems to specifically target Muslims, I will say that it is a bit of an exaggeration for these orders to be considered a  "Muslim ban". This is because, it seems that not all Muslim - majority countries are affected with the strict travel restriction. From PolitiFact, it mentions that the travel restrictions apply to 12 percent of the entire Muslim population, hence it may be a stretch to equate these restrictions to a Muslim ban. However I do feel that it is still important for the general public to take note about policies that are being passed, even if they seem insignificant. A few travel restrictions here and there may lead to an actual Muslim ban, if left unchecked.





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Stage 5: Should the government continue to fund Planned Parenthood

                                           On April 13 2017, the New York Times reported that President Trump signed legislation aimed at cutting of federal funding to Planned Parenthood and other organizations that performed abortions. This move was welcomed by several conservatives who wanted to impose curbs on reproductive rights. I do not agree with this move as I believe defunding such organizations will bring about more problems. Planned Parenthood is a non-profit organization that provides reproductive health services in the United States and internationally. In 2014, federal and state governments provided the organization with $528 million in funding (40% of its annual budget). The majority of this funding comes from Medicaid which subsidizes reproductive healthcare for low-income women. Abortions account for about 3 percent of the services ...
1 comment
Read more

Stage 7 : Trump's proposed transgender military ban is hurtful to the American society

   On July 26, President Trump caught everyone by surprise, when he tweeted his intentions of banning transgender people from serving the military. Trump's reasoning for his decision was that it was too expensive to pay for transgender troops' healthcare and the potential disruptions it might cause. While I do understand the President's concern, I feel that his actions will bring about greater harm compared to the benefit of reducing the cost of the military spending. President Trump reasoned that the cost of  transition related treatment will be "tremendous." A study done by the Rand Corporation shows that the costs of such treatment will add between 2.4 million and 8.4 million dollars to the military's annual budget. While the number may seem high, this will only increase the military spending by 0.017% .  This cost is pretty insignificant compared to the potential cost of retraining troops to replace transgender troops. Furthermore, some trans gende...
Post a Comment
Read more