Fame Day: Abdul Haji, WWII Vets, and These Other Guys

For everything that’s going on in the world, this actually hasn’t been such a bad week. The tragic murder of an anti-racist singer in Greece has, at long last, resulted in the hammer being brought down on upon the Neo-Nazi “Golden Dawn” party responsible for both his death and attacks on leftists, immigrants, and a 12-year-old girl. It’s been a long time coming, but at long last the Greek government is actually heeding calls from the public to respond to this fascist menace; other European countries, ya mind taking a hint?

Speaking of racists, did you know that the rally the Klu Klux Klan was planning on holding at Gettysburg was cancelled as a result of the shut-down of the US government?

Well it was.

If you can’t take joy at the collapse of a racist rally, what can you?

The same shutdown of a number of national parks and monuments as a result of congressional stupidity also didn’t keep WWII vets from just visiting memorials anyway. These guys, most all of whom are in their early to mid 80s, simply knocked aside the barriers that had been put up and defiantly shuffled in.

I’d like to imagine each and every one of them was an older, meaner Walt Kowalski…

And while we applaud the old folks who managed to give a wrinkled, arthritic finger to both the KKK and the federal government in one deft move, let’s tip our hats to some young people as well. These young people specifically:

I’d be lying if I said that the content of this video was somehow new or groundbreaking. Truth is, this has all been said before, and it’s been said for years now. Still, with a million and a half views you gotta appreciate how neatly the grievances of a generation are articulated in less than three minutes. Eloquence, if not originality, deserves its share of recognition.

And last, but certainly not least, we have Kenyan citizen Abdul Haji.

That’s him in the Westgate Shopping Mall in Nairobi. In case you didn’t read the news, the shopping center was attacked by “El Shabbab,” a Somali militant group. The attack, which lasted three days, claimed the lives of 72 people, the vast majority of them bystanders. With many civilians held hostage inside the shopping center, Abdul Haji, son of a former defense minister, rushed to the mall and proceeded in, alongside other civilian rescue workers. Abdul personally rescued a mother and her three children and continued to cover other rescuers as the Kenyan military retook the mall.

Oh, did I mention Abdul is a Muslim?

Once again we’re seeing the media conveniently gloss over religion when it’s Muslims rescuing people. Well, we here at Culture War Reporters are not going to be following along with the general trend of bringing up Islam or Muslims exclusively in a negative light. Not for Malala Yousefzai, not for Abdul Haji. To both him and every civilian rescuer, Muslim, Christian, or Hindu, we are deeply grateful.