Source: Global Grind

By: Rabbi Marc Schneier and Russell Simmons

On Jan. 7, exactly two weeks before we are to simultaneously celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and inaugurate Barack Obama to his second term as President of the United States, sinister advertisements went up in dozens of subway stations around New York City, making evident that despite the undoubted strides our nation has made toward achieving justice and equality, bigotry and fear-mongering remain alive and well in America.

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It goes without saying that the latest ads in New York subway stations are antithetical to the message of Dr. King, who denounced bigotry against people of all backgrounds. He repeatedly condemned anti-Semitism and would no doubt have denounced the present-day campaign against American Muslims.

We believe too that Dr. King would have been critical of recent court rulings affirming that anti-Muslim ads must be allowed because of First Amendment protections. Freedom of speech is one thing, but demonization of a particular religious, racial or ethnic community is quite another. We doubt that a judge would rule — or the MTA would accept — that it is OK to put up billboards referring to Jews, African-Americans or gay people as savages; or asserting that Judaism or Christianity seek to strike terror into the hearts of unbelievers. Yet somehow free speech trumps the right of American Muslims; members of a small and relatively defenseless community, to use transit systems in cities across America without being confronted by placards that drag their religion through the mud.

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