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Food

Woman Arrested for Hate Crime After Vandalising an Islamic Centre with Bacon

This isn't the first time pork has been used in a hate crime against Muslims.

Food can be a weapon. Not only for dominatrixes, scorned lovers, and governments, but also, sadly, racists.

Because of Islam's dietary restrictions on pork, it doesn't take much creativity for a racist asshole to buy an affordable piece of meat and use it to desecrate a place of Muslim worship.

For instance, last year, a hooded man in London threw "rotten" pork meat at a mosque at 4 AM, presumably as a way to protest a growing Muslim population in Britain. Well, it seems that an equally unoriginal and racist woman has used bacon to desecrate an Islamic centre in Yolo County, California.

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READ MORE: Man Throws Rotten Pork Meat at Mosque in Hate Crime

In a massive lack of respect to both smoked, cured meat and an entire religious community, Lauren Kirk-Coehlo, a UC Berkeley grad, has been arrested for "allegedly felony vandalism to a church for the purpose of intimidating worshippers" and "using fear to prevent them from freely exercising their religious beliefs," according to the Sacramento Bee.

Her arrest is the result of a joint local and FBI investigation and bail has been set at $1 million. Kirk-Coehlo is also looking at a maximum of six years in prison, if convicted. Both state and federal prosecutors are calling it a hate crime. In other words, do not fuck with Islamic centres in Yolo County, where authorities were tipped off by the public after surveillance footage was released.

But her alleged crimes go beyond wrapping bacon around the handle of the entrance to the Davis Islamic Center. She has also been charged with doing more than $7,000 in damage, smashing six window panes, and destroying two bicycles.

The pork-on-the-mosque bit is also used outside of Europe and the US. In January, a pig's head was found at a Quebec City Islamic centre, the same mosque that ended up being the target of a lone wolf terrorist attack weeks later, where six members were shot and killed.

Clearly, these acts of hatred are about way more than food.