What is blood libel?

The Sarah Palin blood libel statement comes in the middle of Sarah Palin’s response to the Tucson shootings in this video. More below…

After the Tucson shootings in Arizona that wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and killed 9-year-old girl Christina Taylor Green, Sarah Palin received criticism for a graphic on her Web site that shows a “crosshairs” over Giffords’ district.

Some have called it a gun sight, while Palin defends it as a surveyors mark on a map. See for yourself:

On January 12, Palin released a 7-minute video response. In the Sarah Palin YouTube video she claims she is the victim of “blood libel” manufactured by the mainstream media to smear her during a time of grief and loss.

This may be well and good, but the actual meaning of “blood libel” is not exactly in context with what Palin is trying to articulate.

“Blood libel” refers to the anti-Semitic claim from the middle ages that Jews murder the children of Christians and use their blood in their religious rituals. “Blood libel” is a fabrication of the worst and most incendiary kind used to spread hatred toward Jews, and was often used to justify the persecution and killing of Jews.

In the midst of the debate about overheated political rhetoric, Palin chooses an emotionally-charged term. Giffords, incidentally, is Jewish.

There’s no question the media has had a field day with Palin’s crosshairs graphic, and now with this “blood libel” video.

But on a deeper level, we’ve lost the ability to listen, to extend the benefit of the doubt, to debate in a civil manner, and to respect the patriotism of those who are our political opponents–not our enemies.

When my children play soccer, they challenge themselves on the playing field. They play by agreed-upon rules that promote sportsmanship, performance, and achievement. When youth sports goes off the rails, it’s ugly for everyone and obvious to see.

Today in our political discourse, it’s a race to the bottom to see who can score the lowest blow and still remain standing. There’s less sportsmanship and camaraderie in DC than there is on my 9-year-old’s soccer team.

I would never let my children refer to opposing players as “enemies.” I would never allow them to speak in such extreme language. But we tolerate that every day in our politics. And I don’t care if you vote Republican, Democratic, Green, or not at all. We’re losing civility. We’re dumbing down our discourse in the name of grabbing headlines.

And yes, we are using emotionally charged rhetoric to capture more airtime, and to pick fights with those who think differently than us.

From a red letters perspective, it is time we as Christians did more to practice what we preach. Gandhi was attributed with the quote that he liked Christ, but not Christians because we were so unlike Christ.

What would political discourse look like if our rule book were the Gospels and we treated our political opponents with such grace, deference, and respect? That would be an America worth living in and dying for, I think. What about you?