Not One Muslim Dime | Black Friday Without Muslims: An Open Letter from Tariq Toure

I believe this holiday season will be the usual for America. Families will travel as usual, gather as usual, and share the warmth of each other's presence as usual. Some will travel hundreds of miles in the anticipation of reminiscing on moments that only loved ones could share in euphoria together. Plenty in fact, will muster the strength to mend broken hearts and agree that solace should always supercede petty differences among kin.

People in America will say humble prayers in English, Spanish, Dutch, Malay, Korean, Arabic, French, Xhosa, Fula, Urdu, and partake in meals prepared in harmonious glory. All will explicitly or implicitly offer thanks for the things that are missed in the minutia of day to day life. Homes are to become nightclubs, temples, mental rehab facilities and four to five star restaurants. Muslims of all ethnicities will, per usual, battle with the dichotomy of enjoying their bonds, and being vigilant over the bigotry that is arresting the minds of the American people, from layman to lawyer. Every swallow of food doubles as a reminder that under the current climate, even eating among your beloveds may soon be a privilege worth memorial.

I witnessed the holiday season move calmly upon us almost undetected, mute even. I watched Anti-Muslim Bigotry, Racism, and Xenophobia mutate weekly leading up until now, with the Paris attacks being a catalyst for outright hysteria. Syrians refugees shoved to the margins of the country and their own humanity, are boxed in political fistfights— cold, hungry, no doubt weary.

And the lifelong neighbors of Muslims are being challenged to lift a skeptical gaze at the people who have brought light to their communities. As a 27 year Black man I too know this 'usual' gaze. It ebbs and flows with necessity for White America. Yet the ignorance coated in hate remains a constant variable.

Today, Muslim women of various hues are being followed by lone gunmen into masajid. Today, molotov cocktails collide upon the centers of worship. Today, Muslims are attacked and beaten to the chants of “Go back home”. To experience 21st century American racism is to acknowledge that humans who make up political parties have a future for Muslims that entails Holocaust inspired IDs, internment and third-class citizenship.

My skin ports me indefinitely to segment of our society that again, is intimate with these injustices. The heroic struggle of my people afforded all hues of mankind certain rights we are now witnessing politicians and fanatics war to take away here. Thus, our struggles intersect. We no longer have the luxury of turning a naive eye to White Supremacy. We can't afford for our children to be whole-saled hatred hourly. Specifically what vanguard to this madness can immigrant Muslim families call their own? How do we define a defense that doesn't continue to kindle the same bigoted flame that Donald Trump is using to light his path to one of the most sadistic political campaigns ever?

As usual, America expects the influx of cash into the economy from hoards of consumers almost coming to blows for the next big bargain. So many across the Black community have promised that in the wake of state sanctioned murders tipping scales likened to the Jim Crow era, that they refuse to be robbed of life and money. The #notonedime movement as well as No Black Friday is a push for economic resistance.

If our country and those who deem themselves Americans are so sure that immigrants are criminals, drug dealers and rapists than I urge the immediate economic withdrawal of “Brown Dollars” i.e. immigrant dollars this holiday season.

If our country and those who deem themselves Americans are so sure that Muslims are prototypical terrorists than I urge the immediate economic withdrawal of “Muslim Dollars” this holiday season.

If we are fully unaware that White Supremacy is not only the greatest domestic terror threat to the American people committing twice the amount of politically aimed violence then we will let those who dwell in blissful ignorance shop by themselves.

Our White Muslim brothers and sisters who are caught in the middle of this crossfire are in a pivotal position to aid one of the most critical boycotts in our history. You too have a stake in this agenda.

For everyone who has been turned a twisted eyed and guillotined with hate speech toward their Islamic faith know that you simply refusing to participate in the grazing cow show that is the holiday season, is more than enough. Remember the children who have not touched these shores, that wait on the promise of unconditional compassion at borders without parents.

Think deeply then, about the irrational hatred that waits on the tongues and gavels of politicians. Black dollars will not make an appearance in this cycle of conspicuous consumption, #notonedime  and it is my belief that Brown dollars will be absent as well. If not for yourself, do it for those who have watched the awe-inspiring propaganda that welcomes the poor and indigent but in reality hates the very people that make America whole.

Not a Muslim dime.

#notonedime

Self-care is not Optional for Black Millennials

““Verily the soul becomes accustomed to what you accustom it to. That is to say: what you at first burden the soul with becomes nature to it in the end.”

- Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad al-Ghazālī”

           In the age of the hashtag eulogy, Black Millennials have a hard time finding the space to heal.  And I don’t blame them. We’ve been able to survive off of piecemeal coping and soul food therapy for centuries. A Georgia morning full of chattel labor came despite a slave girl’s encounter with a white rapist whether she liked it or not. She, as others did all across the “birthing nation”, stitched her pride together and continued to work, thus shrouding her in a narrative of mythical strength that pervades today. This tradition trampolined through our history.

           Never heal, never reflect, only push on. The texture of black suffering and black triumph is changing dramatically still. Billie Holliday’s fruit doesn’t dangle from southern trees anymore,  but rather, cuffed in the back of police cars, with well-grafted fables of suicide.  Perhaps, if it moves you, one can put a new “bullet lynching” on repeat with a few search terms. As our civilization “progresses” much like those before us, documentation improves, communication sprints, information explodes, caste blossoms, and subjugation repetitiously becomes the soup of the day . Technology mutates these advances and places their powers in our palms. But Black youth must careful with the triple-headed demon of direct trauma, intergenerational trauma, and vicarious trauma. All three are dizzying barriers to mental stability. And if you’ve lived long enough in America, especially now, you could experience a sinister mix of all three in one day.

           There’s nothing more powerful and inspiring than the rising consciousness of my cohort. We’ve merged the energy of porch folklore, bodega tales, and black-fisted war stories to begin our own revolution. Every day, solidarity strengthens. Every hour, the youth are seeing their struggle as a latitudinal one. For the most part, we’ve come to this vignette in history because of trauma. Trauma being the contemporary overflow of videoed assaults, executions, white supremacist rhetoric, and the unraveling of America’s dark twisted past. It leaves scars. Few can honestly say they can escape it. Every hyperlink to an abusive act by the state corners even the most naive of black people into digesting this reality. But the trauma exists whether we choose to accept it or not. It maneuvers its way into our everyday life. I say this now to encourage everyone invested in fighting the battle for Black and Brown bodies to be regarded as human, because like in any war, the survivors will not only wear stories on their skin but tattooed in the valleys of their minds. Psychologist and author Joy DeGruy Leary writes in her book Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome: America’s Legacy of Enduring and Healing, “The nature of this work is such that each group first must see to their own healing, because no group can do another’s work”

             Consider ourselves in a 500 year deficit for therapy. With that in mind it is important to be conscious about what we consume, or, more germane, what happens after intake. A mistake of the embattled is to never take pause. Before Black Millennials go steamrolling into the new year - which will undoubtedly mean a new cadre of injustices and more sophisticated repression - let them take a step back from the theater. Let some of the success fester and the pain dissipate. This may mean sitting in silence for hours on end, a re-dedication to spirituality, or the warm human company of loved ones, all useful mediums for self-reconciliation. And we must not foolishly assume that we truly know what healing looks like. Our road to recovery stretches far past what our generation will see.

            5 years ago, a child in Sanford Florida was stalked and executed. His murder, and the nationally-televised acquittal of his murderer, opened Black American youth’s Pandora’s Box. It bound them to the fateful question, “Where are we now?” Since then, the masses of Black America have marched, protested, founded institutions, lobbied, shouted, sat in, walked out, and re-invigorated the callings of the Civil Rights era. The labor deserves dedication, spirit, sweat, grit and resilience. However, the laborers of the movement will no doubt need to take time for healing, soul, body if necessary, and absolutely our minds.

“Pain is important: how we evade it, how we succumb to it, how we deal with it, how we transcend it.”

― Audre Lorde

From Clocks to Collaboration: Lessons from Ahmed

Teachable Moments

“So you telling me they got all the way to the semifinals and had the STEM competition judged by volunteers?” I interrogated my friend Dajuan Patterson. “Yes bro, it blew my mind. It was nothing I could do though to challenge it. We just put our best foot forth and lost with our heads held high,” he replied. My eyes welled up in frustration and I said the only thing that made sense at that time, “They're too young to know they can be shorted like that.”

My friend Dajuan has been a full-time community servant ever since he could tie his shoelaces. Last year he headed up a robotics program in Baltimore where middle-schoolers were able to showcase their STEM skills in a city to statewide competition. No more than 12 of them spent countless evenings refining their inventions over a course of months. As each weekend passed, they succeeded at outdoing teams from around the Baltimore area.

In the culmination of the competition, high ranked teams were invited to face-off head to head, best invention winning the first place prize. What appeared to be a life changing atmosphere and opportunity, ended up being an emotional disaster. The judges for the competition were not engineers, STEM students, or even robotics enthusiasts. They were regular students who earnestly wanted to contribute their time on a random Saturday. Worst of all, they were all from that county. Needless to say, the Baltimore team lost. Dajuan was reminded and his team informed of an age old lesson; at no point in time can African American children afford not to be two even three times as good as their counterparts. 

There's a significant amount of emphasis being placed on STEM programs in urban communities, but we've been so far from the race for innovation it's overwhelming to think about the ground black and brown children have to cover. According to www.census.gov, “Blacks and Hispanics have been consistently underrepresented in STEM employment. In 2011,11 percent of the workforce was Black (up from 2 percent in 1970).” This number becomes more germane to improving disparities when we look at business insider's recent ranking of software developers as the number one fastest growing professionals in the world. IT and all its subcategories take a front running stance in the race for job and income equality. Moreover, skills such as software development don't need the rigidity of university courses and can be learned with the help of a teacher, which makes IT a prime target.

Clock Conspiracies

Ahmed Mohamed from Irving,Texas was an anomaly to the above narrative. On September 14, 2015, in a high school known for embracing STEM training, he took his scholarship into his own hands, much like Al-Khwarizmi who fathered algebra without the dazzling instruments available today. He spent the weekend inspecting, prodding, testing and eventually making a clock out of assorted parts. Like any visionary, Ahmed flew into school the very next Monday to show those whose opinion he valued the most his ingenuity – teachers. Ahmed held out his new clock anticipating congratulatory remarks and instead was asked flatly, “Is that a bomb?” Ahmed attempted several more times to present the gadget he labored over and, within an hour, was accosted by Irving police, subsequently sitting through hours of interrogation.

The 24 hour news cycle embraced the story, and in a peculiar fashion, Muslims all over America engaged in a lobby for rights to Ahmed's race and ethnicity. He went from a brown boy, African, Sudanese immigrant to finally becoming black in the “racial draft” that took place. A frenzy for what community would claim him exposed a well-known but unspoken rift in the current state of Islam.

Racial, ethnic and tribal lines polarize and paralyze Muslims. Unfortunately these divisions invite non-introspective proclamations through a narrowed lens on the effects of things such as racism. All the banter back and forth left out key points in the 15 second media free-for-all. Ahmed in any other setting in America would be seen for his blackness first. Second, his religion added to the perception of his alleged criminality. Lastly, Ahmed's crisis exposed the intersection of racism, Islamophobia, and disparities in STEM development. Not too many times in today's America will black children be accused of terrorist acts outside of their already blanketing stereotype. Usually they are apprehended for suspicions other than bomb engineering.

After being wrongfully accused, almost every major tech company sent warm affirmations to Ahmed via Twitter and any other medium available. President Barack Obama hosted him and his family at the White House and now, after all of the Google campus tours and speaking engagements, Ahmed's family has left the U.S. altogether. They will be residing in Qatar as of last week.

A Case for Collaboration

But what about the individuals, households, and communities that rallied for the identity of Ahmed? Is there a tangible repercussion that can be deduced? Rafee Al-Mansor, a student from John Hopkins University, released a stellar documentary two years ago, that attempted to identify why immigrant masjids and African American masjids are so separated. Among many probing questions, they asked if the stereotypes attributed to African Americans make the division persist. Many answered in the affirmative.

What the Ahmed Mohamed fiasco uncovered was that stereotyped or not, both communities value education and identity. So in the midst of trying to repair perceptions and dilute imprisoning ideologies carried on from histories of colonization, Muslims in America have the opportunity to collaborate on one segment of STEM education, IT. Just as being able to use the internet fluidly, coding, programming, and software development will become standard all across the globe in years to come. Without a shadow of doubt many communities are stocked with professionals in these fields. In urban neighborhoods access to hands on knowledge and equipment to develop those emerging skills are few and far between at times. So service based relationships under-girded by volunteering expertise in these areas would not only be an unprecedented theory to test, but also a landmark for bridge building.

Under Construction

I sat in an almost empty musallah, only filled with the faint murmurs of two elderly brothers practicing Qur'an with Abdul-Hakim Lucky, Amir (president) of masjid-Ul-Haqq in West Baltimore. He spoke optimistically about the IT program he has been working to develop for some time now, “So many people want to discuss the plight of African American Muslims but it's always on the peripheral. Nobody wants to address the root causes.” Sitting up on one knee he continued, “A significant amount of men have been excluded from bread-winning roles because they lack a marketable trade.”

Throughout the past year he has finalized what will be one of the first IT certification courses offered by a predominantly African American masjid. “What is your first main goal of the program?” I asked. “We were blessed enough to receive 15 fully operational computers recently so that puts us in the position to initiate the first phase of training 50 people. It won't happen all at once but I believe having a pool of 50-60 IT professionals as well as other tradesmen and women puts our community in a much more empowered position,” he proclaimed.

When asked about the benefit of cross community collaboration Lucky remarked, “The essence of Islam is helping one another in areas of deficiency. I don't have all the answers and our community welcomes anybody who will contribute wholeheartedly.” Lucky's program is projected to launch within the next few months following much needed construction. He currently collaborates with Muslims of all origins on sustaining this cooperative effort

Thomas Friedman wrote in his critically acclaimed book, The World is Flat, “Nobody works harder at learning than a curious kid.” With the investment of time, Muslim communities across the U.S. may be able to begin nurturing this curiosity and creating bonds that will bind them forever. After all, it was that same curiosity that played a part in Ahmed Mohamed sitting face to face with police for an hour, being questioned as to whether or not he had intended to blow MacArthur High school up, elevated him to instant stardom, and exposed one of Muslim America's greatest cases for collaboration.