Dear Next President,

The stereotype that “all Muslim are terrorists” occurred after the 9/11 incident, that was said to be caused by Muslims. As a result, many Muslims were afraid of even identifying themselves as Muslim. Women took off their scarf and men shaved their beard afraid they will be called a terrorist. Today, after 15 years, many Muslims are being accused of things that they are not even responsible for. Many view Islam as a religion of terror, but what they don’t know is that it is a religion of peace. As the leader of the United States, can you please work to end discrimination against Islam? Muslim people are Americans too.

A 14-year-old student who is full of talent that many others lack, was charged as criminal for a clock that he invented himself and took to school. The student's name is Ahmed Mohamed, and he is Muslim. One day Mohamed made a clock using a circuit board and took it to school to show his engineering teacher what he had built. To Ahmed’s disappointment, his teacher told him to keep the clock in his backpack. During another class the clock was beeping and he was called to the school office. The school suspected that he had a bomb and was handcuffed by police to be questioned about what he had. After more questioning by the police, they found out the Mohamed was a talented boy and not a “bomber.” He was even taken to President Obama to apologize to him and Obama said, “kids should be inspired like him to enjoy science, because 'it's what makes America great.'" Mohamed was mistreated because of his name. After 9/11, many Muslims named Mohamed was treated unfairly.

Many women are discriminated against at the workplace and outside for wearing a headscarf. Samantha Elauf was turned away from a job interview in 2008 in Oklahoma because she had a scarf on. The “managers thought her scarf would clash with the retailer’s image.” When the manager saw 17-year-old Elauf with a scarf on her he viewed her as not being fit for the job she is looking for. The manager is basically viewing the idea that if he has a woman who wears a headscarf working at his store he will sell less product than with the one who doesn’t, or it means that people would just leave if they see that the store has a Muslim working there. Also, in the state of Texas, a woman named Abdennabi was attacked by a white man from a cafe while she was parking. The man said to her that she didn’t know how to drive and told her to go back to Saudi Arabia. He also said, “Do you have a gun? You should just shoot me.” Al-Nahi, a friend of Abdennabi, spoke to the restaurant manager and the manager said that there nothing they could do. There were many people at the cafe but nobody said anything about the racist things that were said to Abdennabi. From the crowd, someone shouted that nobody cared about them, Abdennabi told the Los Angeles Times.

Dear President, I personally know someone who was attacked because she was wearing hijab. A man grabbed my sister’s friend by the collar and said, “Why are you wearing all this? I will kill you, stop wearing all this stuff,” and he hit her in the back of her neck. After that incident, my sister got so scared that she’s afraid to even just go on the street we live in. These Muslims were discriminated against because of the faith they are practicing, but America is supposed to be a country where people have the right to practice the religion they wish to.

Some Muslims misinterpret the meaning of the Quran in a different way than it was meant to be and some become extremist because of the society they are raised in, also who they are learning the religion from. When an Arabic word is translated into a different language, the meaning could be twisted and end up being something very extreme. Islam said if a human is capable of killing another human being, then he is not a decent human because killing an innocent person is like slaughtering humanity as a whole. It is the people that misunderstand Islam and go on to commit many things that are not even in the religion. Moreover, some Muslims misunderstand the word jihad. People think jihad is when you go kill a bunch of people for no reason but that’s not what Jihad really means. Jihad actually means to commit yourself to someone who is in need. For instance, even just earning for your family and feeding them is part of Jihad.

Did you know in Islam even killing an insect is a sin? There is something I and other Muslims that I know don’t understand is how did ISIS come up with the idea of Islam is telling them to kill all those innocent people? Due to what ISIS is doing to many innocent people, all Muslims are being blamed for things that they didn’t do. There are many Muslims in U.S.A. who consider themselves as a true citizens. However, if all this discrimination is going on, how can they possibly feel like they are at home? My dear President, is there any way that you could end the stereotype “all Muslim are terrorist”? Ending the stereotype would mean giving hope to many Muslims, who are hopeless of whether to follow the religion or not. Islamophobia is not the only problem in the U.S.A but ending many another stereotype of many other groups is an issue. I hope that you, the leader of the greatest country, would consider and do something about it.

Sincerely,

Mukta Ahmad

References:

Washington Bureau, B. (2015, June 4). Court sides with Muslim job seeker rejected after wearing headscarf. Retrieved November 43, 2016, from

https://newsela.com/articles/scotus-hijab/id/10446/

Warren, D(2015, September 21). No charges for Muslim student after clock mistaken for bomb. Retrieved October 27, 2016, from

https://newsela.com/articles/student-clock/id/12016/

Hennessy-Fiske, M. (2015, December 12). Muslim women say headscarves are targets for harassment after attacks. Retrieved November 03, 2016, from

https://newsela.com/articles/headscarves-harassment/id/13623/