A shockingly large number of e-lore responses to the terrorist attacks were blatantly racist (see links to the "Binch That Stole Tuesday" and others, below). It's unsurprising that in the post-"politically correct" era, people who feel the need to express such sentiments feel "safer" expressing them over e-mail than in a more public setting. To me, this represents a disturbing trend: racism still exists, but it's now gone underground, and as such, the possibility for public dialogue about these issues has waned.

Still, I was very surprised to receive this image, conflating Osama bin Laden and O. J. Simpson. The sender, Lisa Zimmerman (whom I presume received it from her husband, John), sent it with no commentary. Again, apparently intended to be "humorous," this image, to me, is instead deeply revealing of how racism works: by refusing to acknowledge cultural complexities, and by (in this case) making all dark-skinned people immediately "suspect." Perhaps this echoes the real-life incidents of dark-skinned persons of a variety of nationalities and ethnicities being booted off airplanes post-9/11.