A Quote by Reza Aslan
American Muslims - young American Muslims in particular - are starting to understand that unless they are willing to stand up for all the other oppressed communities in this country, including those discriminated against for their gender or sexuality, then no one will stand up for them.
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I'm not concerned about what [Donald Trump] says about me. That doesn't matter to me. I'm going to stand up for immigrants. I'm going to stand up for American Muslims who are working hard in this country that they love and consider their own. I'm going to stand up for other women. I'm going to stand up for the right to choose.
The point is [Donald] Trump goes way too far. He then demonizes Muslims - American Muslims. He wants to ban all Muslims from everywhere in the world, including the new mayor of London who has spoken about this from coming to our country.
As Western Muslims and American Muslims, we need to understand that the values and principles we promote are not only Muslim values. American Muslims live in a country where justice, dignity, freedom and equality are essential values.
There were not that many people who were willing to come out and stand up for Muslims or stand up against the abuses of the Bush administration. That was post-9/11, so I think there was a lot of fear at the time about exactly what that meant - were they unpatriotic if they stood up?
In order to change the conversation about Muslims in American media, we need a diverse, unified movement of people who are willing to take a stand against anti-Muslim bias.
If we are true small 'l' liberals, it's our job to seek out feminist Muslims, ex-Muslims, liberal Muslims, dissenting voices within Muslim communities, gay Muslims - we should promote those voices and in doing so, we demonstrate Islam is not a monolith, Muslims are not homogenous, and that Muslims are truly internally diverse.
I've always loved American stand-up. Richard Pryor is one of the main reasons I got into stand-up. After Pryor, I made my way through the other great American comics, then finally got into the British ones over here.
American Muslims are already within the system. We should stop isolating ourselves by thinking we are powerless. The youngest generations of Americans have a better opinion of Islam because they interact with Muslims. Half of young American citizens now are supporting the Palestinians rather than the Israelis. Things are moving.
There is a cottage industry of these Muslim bashers who are training law enforcement personnel, military personnel... and you are breeding a generation of leaders in our society who have this suspicion of Islam and hostility towards American Muslims and Muslims in general. The intention of these trainers is to demonise Islam and to marginalise American Muslims.
Are we willing and able to stand up to Islamophobia on days when there are not brutal terrorist attacks on Muslims in mosques?
Stand up to hypocrisy. If you don't, the hypocrites will teach. Stand up to ignorance, because if you don't, the ignorant will run free to spread ignorance like a disease. Stand up for Truth! If you don't, there is no Truth to your existence. If you don't stand up for all that is right, then understand that you are part of the reason that there is so much wrong in the world.
What we have got to do immediately is to say that racism and xenophobia is totally unacceptable and we will stand with the 1 percent of our population who are Muslims, for undocumented people in this country. Absolutely, we will stand.
I will not walk away from the people and communities whom I love deeply. I will continue to raise my voice for justice and equality for all, organize communities who want to defend the rights of black people, stand against policies that target and marginalize Muslims, and advocate for health care for all people.
I have written on numerous occasions that there is no distinction in the American Muslim community between peaceful Muslims and jihadists. While Americans prefer to imagine that the vast majority of American Muslims are civic-minded patriots who accept wholeheartedly the parameters of American pluralism, this proposition has actually never been proven.
We need someone who will stand up and speak up and speak out for the people who need help, for people who are being discriminated against. And it doesn't matter whether they are black or white, Latino, Asian or Native American, whether they are straight or gay, Muslim, Christian, or Jews.
It's important for Muslims and non-Muslims to stand together against hate in all of its forms, particularly against Islamophobia because quite often Islamophobia is almost like the forgotten '-ism' and the forgotten phobia that is always present.
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