Every morning on the way to work this summer, I would go to the 7/11 on my block. The coffee was cheap, the cashier was friendly, and I guess it was just efficient, so it became routine. There was a man named Ahmed who worked there every morning, rain or shine, and his smile would always brighten my day. Ahmed is many things, including an Arab and a practicing Muslim, but neither characteristic ever struck me as unusual during the small talk we’d sometimes make. After just a few days, he had learned my name and my daily order. Five days a week I was greeted with his good nature, saw pictures of his children and grandchildren behind the cash register, and was told to “have a wonderful day!” with an authentic smile and a receipt.
Today was different, though. Another man standing in front of me in line wrongly decided that Ahmed was the poster child for ISIS, a group that is currently wreaking havoc in the Middle East. The man who profiled Ahmed, in such an absurd way, was absolutely incorrect for so many reasons, but first let’s backtrack into what (and who) exactly this ISIS group that you’ve probably been seeing a lot in the media is.
ISIS, or Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, is an important unit to note because they are unlike any other terrorist group that we’ve ever dealt with. It would appear, to political analysts and journalists, that their goal is to unite Islamic people under one regime that follows strict sharia law. ISIS is killing and raping women and children, eliminating entire towns, and torturing civilians to make their points more threatening. Recently, ISIS gained a lot of attention- on August 20th, 2014- when they decapitated American journalist, James Foley, after the American government refused to pay for his release and failed to rescue him. ISIS uploaded a video of Foley’s murder to YouTube, flaunting their other prisoners, essentially stating their pure hatred towards the United States (and western cultures in general).
Today I witnessed a similar type of hatred that was much more mild, but still pretty heinous.
“We’re gonna have to stick ya in Guantanamo Bay” the man in front of me said to Ahmed, while having his items bagged. It was 5:30 in the morning, but that statement totally woke me up. For those who don’t know, Guantanamo Bay is where terror suspects can be held by the American government, without trial, and are often denied basic human rights, as well as a fair legal process. Ahmed did not look up, nor did he retaliate. “It’s the people like you who are attacking our country. Go back to Al Qaeda.” added another man, to which Ahmed responded only with silence. This harassment boiled my blood, particularly because, if these men knew anything about ISIS as a group, they would have known better than to torment innocent people like Ahmed.
ISIS is a terrible group, villains in the global sphere. They are slaughtering people and openly admitting to the fact that they intend to commit mass genocide. However, anyone who automatically associates ISIS with the Muslim faith in general, is painfully uneducated. First of all, ISIS has killed thousands and thousands of Muslims themselves. The word extremist is a very important one to grasp here, because the version of the religion they practice is very different than the intended ways, and from the norm. At its core, the only thing that the ISIS members share is a fundamental lack of common morality, and a sick outlook on the world that justifies the monstrous human rights violations that they carry out. That is what people need to be honing in on.
“ISIS is an extremist group; it’s condemned by the majority of the Muslim population because their values do not align with the religion’s values as a whole,” said John Smith*, an International Relations major with a focus on Arabic linguistics at the University of Pennsylvania, “not distinguishing between ISIS and Islam is analogous to not distinguishing between the Westboro Baptist Church and Christianity. Both are groups that have bastardized the teachings and values of a religion.”
So, no, Ahmed does not deserve this kind of condemnation, nor do the millions of other Muslims that will be wrongly profiled by those who are afraid of the unfamiliar. James Foley’s death was cruel, sick, and inhumane; having it captured on videotape and paraded around on YouTube was something beyond the realm of a normally functioning human psyche and surpassed the average capacity for evil. However, retaliating against those who some (wrongly) identify with ISIS (Muslims, and Arabs in general) is not an acceptable way to cope. We need to be better than that. It’s okay to be mad; I’m mad. How could one not be? An American was murdered to make a statement that, in ISIS’s ideal world, our entire nation would reach the same fate as Foley. But I cannot emphasize this enough: do not, do not, DO NOT, misdirect your anger.
Get the facts, figure things out. If I see one more tweet featuring a picture of a Muslim woman wearing a headscarf with some kind of attempt at a funny caption alluding to bombings, I will vomit. It is ignorant and disgusting to capitalize on war to make a joke, particularly if one is doing so at the expense of an entire religion. Likewise, if I see someone else being chastised like Ahmed again, I will intervene.
The roots of a lot of problems in the world are misunderstandings. Just like nations, ethnic groups, religions and genders sometimes misunderstand one another, so do we as individuals. That is just a result of the inevitable pluralism that surrounds us. Let us dig a little deeper, for the sake of Ahmed, the millions just like him, and for ourselves, so that we can get back that karmic luxury of being judged as a person as opposed to a false stereotype.
