US acclaims Pakistan as a frontline state in the US-led war against ‘terrorism.’
However, this has been rewarded by President Bush’s use of the word ‘Pakis’, a racial slur coined and used by British Skinheads. The word drips with racial bias.
Bush probably learned this derogatory term from his friend Tony Blair or the Indian-Hindus who use it every day to express their hatred, bigotry and racism against all Pakistanis. The word has the same impact in the Pakistani community as the term nigger has for American blacks.
Its use is particularly unfortunate, and that too by the leader of a country whose law enforcing agencies have launched a campaign of racial profiling of Pakistanis and other Muslim communities, in the wake of September 11.
We would love to believe White House spokesman that like infamous “Crusade”, it was also a slip of the tongue.
I have started believing that decision of five members of the U.S. Supreme Court to put him in office was also a “slip of the tongue”.
But alas, no retraction.