It wasn't long after the reports of the murders in Paris this past weekend broke that my daughters started hearing other reports: rumors about American retaliation against Muslims here in America and cries to shut the borders and keep Syrian refugees out lest a radicalized Islamic State supporter come in as well.
They see things through a different lens than many of the older adults they know because they have grown up in a racially and religiously diverse neighborhood by our design. We want our children to have a broad worldview and deep empathy for people who are not exactly like them.
Their lives have been spent learning and playing and sometimes disagreeing with people of all faiths. We are Christian, but as a family we have close friends from many faiths. Several of the children we love the most in the entire world are Muslim.
To believe that those kids or their very decent and loving parents, siblings and extended families are simply because of their faith responsible for the atrocities perpetrated by Islamic State would be no different than to believe that all whites would shoot black worshippers because some white person did.
It would be to repeat what happened in World War II, when Japanese-American citizens were rounded up and forced into camps because they "might" consort with the enemy. Who cares that they were as willing to protect this country as anyone else? We are still trying to get past the shame of that damaging decision.
We decry Germany and the Holocaust, which singled out a people and scapegoated them before murdering as many as possible. We clamored for Saddam Hussein's capture in part because he committed genocide.
But when we get scared and these are scary times, to be sure there's a tendency to want to divide the world into us and them, whoever "them" might be.
Among the most sickened and angered about the despicable and cowardly murders in Paris and Beirut are decent Muslims. Back in September many began participating in the #NotInMyName campaign, disavowing radical Islamic factions. They have put out a video.
Yesterday, one of my daughter's friends wrote this post, which I share with her permission, though I am omitting her surname because people can be so hateful: "This video exists because there are people that still believe that these extremist organizations are representative of an entire religion. There is nothing more frustrating than a white person telling me about MY religion. A religion I grew up with and spent my whole life believing in. 'The Koran says this *inserts quote from the Internet'; 'Your religion forces you to do this ...'; 'Your religion forces you to do that ...' My name is Siamoee; I am a Muslim, but I am not a terrorist. My entire life is a defiance of the Talibans, and I will continue to fight against ISIS's attempt to cause hate and bigotry against my religion. #NotInMyName"
You don't have to be a different nationality or color or religion to commit atrocious acts. Innocent children were slain at Sandy Hook, moviegoers in Aurora, and black worshippers in South Carolina by people who look a lot like me. The youths who shot up Columbine and the men who were responsible for the Oklahoma bombing were homegrown and unremarkable. But we are often willing to be suspicious of what we can see, often nothing more than dress or skin color.
This weekend, my family heard rumors that a friend's relative was beaten up because of the killings in Paris. I don't know if it's true. We heard talk of retribution and a few calls to blow up the entire region where the Islamic State group is headquartered. In our efforts to kill the snake, lets not take out all the creatures of the forest too.
I hope we don't really want to kill other innocents because they did.
They see things through a different lens than many of the older adults they know because they have grown up in a racially and religiously diverse neighborhood by our design. We want our children to have a broad worldview and deep empathy for people who are not exactly like them.
Their lives have been spent learning and playing and sometimes disagreeing with people of all faiths. We are Christian, but as a family we have close friends from many faiths. Several of the children we love the most in the entire world are Muslim.
To believe that those kids or their very decent and loving parents, siblings and extended families are simply because of their faith responsible for the atrocities perpetrated by Islamic State would be no different than to believe that all whites would shoot black worshippers because some white person did.
It would be to repeat what happened in World War II, when Japanese-American citizens were rounded up and forced into camps because they "might" consort with the enemy. Who cares that they were as willing to protect this country as anyone else? We are still trying to get past the shame of that damaging decision.
We decry Germany and the Holocaust, which singled out a people and scapegoated them before murdering as many as possible. We clamored for Saddam Hussein's capture in part because he committed genocide.
But when we get scared and these are scary times, to be sure there's a tendency to want to divide the world into us and them, whoever "them" might be.
Among the most sickened and angered about the despicable and cowardly murders in Paris and Beirut are decent Muslims. Back in September many began participating in the #NotInMyName campaign, disavowing radical Islamic factions. They have put out a video.
Yesterday, one of my daughter's friends wrote this post, which I share with her permission, though I am omitting her surname because people can be so hateful: "This video exists because there are people that still believe that these extremist organizations are representative of an entire religion. There is nothing more frustrating than a white person telling me about MY religion. A religion I grew up with and spent my whole life believing in. 'The Koran says this *inserts quote from the Internet'; 'Your religion forces you to do this ...'; 'Your religion forces you to do that ...' My name is Siamoee; I am a Muslim, but I am not a terrorist. My entire life is a defiance of the Talibans, and I will continue to fight against ISIS's attempt to cause hate and bigotry against my religion. #NotInMyName"
You don't have to be a different nationality or color or religion to commit atrocious acts. Innocent children were slain at Sandy Hook, moviegoers in Aurora, and black worshippers in South Carolina by people who look a lot like me. The youths who shot up Columbine and the men who were responsible for the Oklahoma bombing were homegrown and unremarkable. But we are often willing to be suspicious of what we can see, often nothing more than dress or skin color.
This weekend, my family heard rumors that a friend's relative was beaten up because of the killings in Paris. I don't know if it's true. We heard talk of retribution and a few calls to blow up the entire region where the Islamic State group is headquartered. In our efforts to kill the snake, lets not take out all the creatures of the forest too.
I hope we don't really want to kill other innocents because they did.
