mg, I agree with a lot of what you say, but I don't think it bears directly on the legitimacy of NPR's firing Juan Williams -- who, as they say, had previously been admonished about saying things on other outlets (e.g., Fox) that didn't comport with his role as an NPR analysist.

""People who would have benefited from an open dialogue about other ethnic groups and our rational and irrational fears about them do not win. The truth will remain unspoken, and I don't think saying someone is afraid of someone else is hate speech, inflammatory or anything else. I think it is necessary for security reasons to be able to say who we are afraid of. We will be surprised who is afraid of whom - and we might not ever find out who is bothering whom and who is being just a bit paranoid and could be calmed down with statistics about how safe this particular group really is. Or if the particular group is really engaging in thuglike behavior, then that behavior needs to be corrected. In this case, the person, Williams, needs to be reassured that he is going to be OK. Probably. Usually. No guarantees in this life."

Yes, this is a worth and important discussion to have. I think Obama helped move that dialogue along by his speech on race relations a few months ago.    But I don't think that was happening in Juan Williams's conversation with Bill O'Reilly.   And sometimes to give very public vent to an irrational emotional reaction, belief or stereotype is to dignify or legitimize it -- as though to say, "Hey, if you get scared every time you see a woman wearing an abiyah on a plane, you're not paranoid. Maybe they really are out to get you."


"THere are situations I am afraid of. I want to be able to say so without fear of losing my job, my library card, my bus pass or whatever, and I want other people to have whatever rights I want for myself."

I fully agree, Mary. But you and I are not paid news analysists or employees of NPR.

"Hiding emotions like fear under the rug is not going to help racial relations, international relations, etc." Totally agree.   But let's address these issues in a forum where the open dialogue and analysis will follow. Tossing such statements of fear out casually in a discussion on another topic, especially in a venue such as Fox, which is hardly known for its objectivity, is another matter.