All brown people with beards/headscarves are Muslim?
Mystic_Rebel (a new MMW guest contributor!)
This is sad that yet another group [insert ethnicity here] is being racialized because of fear and intolerance. So much so that Americans who can’t tell the difference from a non-Arab Sikh who wears a turban to a practicing Muslim who may or may not have a beard or a headwrap.
Have we learned nothing from our dark American past from attempted genocide of Native Americans, slavery and lynchings, Jim Crow and discrimination to African Americans, hispanics and Asians? America does not need another another group to persecute or put in an interment camp physically or psychologically. Check out this article: Typecasting Muslims as a Race
Lyonside wrote:
An Iranian-American student at my college was scared to walk around her neighborhood after 9/11 - she kept getting harassed by neighborhood punks. She didn’t even habitually wear a full Islamic dress, just dressed modestly in long sleeves and pants, with her head uncovered.
Another aquaintance, a Sikh restaurant owner, put an American flag pin in his turban (a no-no), and started greeting some customers by apologizing to all the American customers. A friend who was a lunchtime regular noticed that he seemed to apologize most to the white customers - given, there were more of them sometimes, but I wonder if he didn’t maybe fear them more than another minority? Of course my friend was like, stop apologizing, it wasn’t even your country, and even if it was, you were in the kitchen at the time.
All those ‘I am Africa’ ads? Maybe there needs to be an “I am Muslim” campaign.
Posted 06 Sep 2006 at 9:16 am ¶
John wrote:
This is nothing new. Even white Americans who are Catholic or Jewish have faced discrimination and hatred.
We didn’t elect a Catholic president until the 1960s because of fears about the Pope’s influence. Irish Catholics, in particular, were looked down upon and refused entry into “upper class society” for many years.
And speaking of the “dark American past,” do you really think the United States has a lock on religious persecution? Do you think Christians get much of a pass in countries such as China or Iran?
Posted 06 Sep 2006 at 9:20 am ¶
Lyonside wrote:
John:
Think of it this way, however. Yes, the attitudes towards Muslims are nothing new. The article itself (did you read it?) says that the same kinds of stereotypes for appearance, attire, behavior attributed to Muslims were applied to the Jews not too long ago. I.e. someone who shows up for a job interview with a head covering may face the same problems now as someone in the 1950s showing up with a yarmulke - suddenly, the job is “filled.”
And yes, other groups have been discriminated against. The difference between your examples and the articles is that the Irish Catholics, and most US Catholics in general, were able to easily pass and become “white” to mainstream America, often within 1-2 generations. Since many but not all American Muslims face both ethnic and skin-based discrimination, which then also affects non-Muslims of the same ethnic and skin color (the Palestinian Christian, the Iraqi Jew, the secular Egyptian), it really is not the same.
I also don’t think anyone is saying that the US has a “lock” on religious persecution. Thank the Lord, the lynch mob is rare and invokes horror if not felony charges. But do you really want to play the game of “well at least we’re not as bad as XXX country” when it comes to civil rights and the dignity of the individual? Funny, I always thought the US wanted to hold itself to HIGHER standards, not the lowest common denominator.
Posted 06 Sep 2006 at 9:29 am ¶
gatamala wrote:
I always thought the US wanted to hold itself to HIGHER standards, not the lowest common denominator.
AMEN Lyonside!!!!!!!!
Posted 06 Sep 2006 at 10:58 am ¶
Tariq Nelson wrote:
Becoming a Muslim in this country means essentially changing your race - especially if you are white.
A white female that dons a headcover and a white male that grows a long beard becomes an Arab. Ditto Latin Muslims who are often mistaken for either Arabs or Pakistanis.
On the flip side, an Arab woman that does not don a headscarf can instantly become a Latina
Certain Arabs, depending on how they dress can even ‘pass’ for a light skinned African-American
Posted 06 Sep 2006 at 11:18 am ¶
Leigh wrote:
Race has nothing to do with religion…
One example of this - which I run into fairly often - is how people assume (all) Indians (from India) are Muslim… India is a COUNTRY, Islam is a RELIGION. The two don’t tie in at all, apart from the fact that many Indians are Muslim. However, just as many Indians are not Muslim, and even more Muslims are not even Indian…
It is not the ignorace surrounding this subject that upsets me, but rather the unwillingness to change the mindset despite being pointed in the direction of truth…
And as for Arabs “passing” for light skinned African Americans - this isn’t surprising seeing as a large part of the Arab world is found on the African continent: http://www.arabbay.com/arabmap.htm
I wonder if I should even mention how many Arabs are in fact Jewish?
Or even how Christians in that part of the world go to church to worship “Allah”?
Once more blurring the defining line between race, ethnicity and religion…
Posted 06 Sep 2006 at 12:58 pm ¶
Tariq Nelson wrote:
Leigh:
After 9/11 there were some young Arab males also ‘passing’ for Puerto Ricans (to non-Puerto Ricans).
I heard a skit on the radio where an Indian employee told his boss “…but I am Hindu” to which the Boss responded “I don’t care what kind of Muslim you are!”
Today, ‘Arab’ is a social construct in which many different groups are tied by language. An Arab can be anything from white with blue eyes to black with brown eyes and everything in between
Posted 06 Sep 2006 at 3:19 pm ¶
Leigh wrote:
You are quite correct Tariq!
“Arab” is a social construct… Which suggests that “Arab” is a race… A race of people who can look anything from charcoal with woolly hair and chocolate drop eyes, to the fulfilment of the Aryan dream and have the blondest hair and the bluest eyes…
Confusing to some, and blurry to more than a few - strangely enough I like the way “Arab” draws “perfect 8″ loops through the straight line that supposedly divides the races…
Posted 08 Sep 2006 at 9:45 pm ¶