Sometimes you just shake your head....
BALTIMORE, August 13 - A protester staked out the home of a Muslim candidate for the Maryland House of Delegates, holding a sign and wearing a T-shirt that mocked Islam.
Timothy Truett sat in a folding chair Saturday on the cul-de-sac outside Saqib Ali's home in Gaithersburg with a sign reading "Islam sucks," and a shirt with the slogan, "This mind is an Allah-free zone."
Montgomery County police sent a trespass notification form to Truett warning that he would be subject to arrest on trespassing charges if he steps onto Ali's property within the next year.
Truett called his protest "an experiment," explaining: "I had heard that Muslims were generally intolerant of views other than their own, and so I thought I would put it to the test."
Ali took several photographs of Truett but refused to speak to him, saying he did not get the impression that Truett wanted to start a constructive dialogue.
"We don't waste our time talking to people who hate us," Ali said Sunday.
Truett said he did not think the sign or the T-shirt expressed a message of hate.
"It's an opinion," he said. "I don't think there's anything intrinsically hateful about it."
Ali, a Democrat, would become the first Muslim member of the House of Delegates if elected, but has not made his religion a major tenet of his campaign.
Read the full story on Beliefnet.com.
Want to do something nice today? Send a note of support to Ali (or leave a comment on his campaign blog). Tell him that you appreciate his willingness to run for public office and reject the hate that he encountered.
