Oddly enough, the movie "Seige" actually dealt with this issue long before 9/11, and is worth renting if you can find it. In any free society we struggle with how to balance suspicion with freedom. In the case of "terrorism" and the Japanese, the threat was an unseen one. In the case of Japanese of course they were worried about spies, and there was some evidence that many members of the Japanese consulate in Hawaii actually scouted out Pearl Harbor in advance of attacks, as some terrorist groups have done prior to attacks.
My advice for citizens and visitors alike is to hold your head up high, help the authorities if you are able, engage your Gora friends and openly discuss the issue, and be patient with the paranoid. I think that you will find that if you calmly discuss your fears and your situation, that most Americans will be sympathetic, even protective. If in the next breath you rant about Israel, and shout "Kill the Jews", you may induce enough perspiration to cause trouble. There is a time to discuss your rights, and a time to express your political views. Both are appropriate, but discussing them in the same breath mixes messages. Stand firm, hold to your rights, do not run away, and do not hide. This will pass.
I did engage a gori who erstwhile was a friend but then couldn't be patient with her paranoid and hence here I am- single again :)
There is no reason to leave because on the streets Muslims are not being target and apprehended because of their race, color and religion. Moreover, you will not see Al-Cracka throwing rocks at you because you are a Muslim. Your job, home and life is safe and protected. Assimilation is important but it will help set examples, which is a great PR and nothing else. It will not help solve Middle East issues. Black, Natives and others also went through alienation and racism, it did cross their mind to leave but they did not.
Politicians play politics and I am not saying that the threat is not real but they have done very good job at playing scare politics. Examples are arrests in Canada, UK and in Florida. They set off false alarms to create some kind credibility for their government and minimize any attention their failures are getting.
As a rule of thumb, I think a decade is more than enough for anyone to find out where home truly is. If after living for many years in a place different than the one a person was born in, he or she still considers somewhere else as home than its definitely time to go home. Because as they say, there is no place like home. What a miserable life it must be for someone who lives for years and years away from his home.
^unkil, aap takleef na karein home define karne ki plz. I simply meant 'leaving west'. aapne baal ki khaal nikaalna shoro kardi. Canada is my home and I like my country and its polite people. :p
i aint going nowhere.
im changing my first and last name. the chinese get away with it all the time. im fixing an appointment with the hair colorist for a light brown do. and investing in lighter shades of face powder and long sleeves to hide my wheatish arms. my accent is impeccable and i can probably pass for greek then...
don't you know aj...you can never go home again? I won't be surprised if there is another wave of people investing back in pakistan..
as for those who prefer to assimilate..the jewish communuty in germany was the most well integrated in the western world in its time. Similarly the spanish muslims were expelled because they were muslims..
Smootie yar, there is nothing wrong with calling Pakistan your home if that's how you feel about it. Its very natural. You can't forcefully love someone/something just like you can't forcefully dislike something.
To give you an example, I felt a lot more sorrow when Hurricane Katrina hit the gulf coast as appose to seeing the destruction of 9/11. Mainly because having lived in the gulf coast for many years, it felt like my past home was being ruined. I had driven around the place, I have watched games in the super dome. The people, the places looked familiar and so it hurt. In comparison 9/11 seemed like a spectacular yet horrible movie experience. Same was the case with Pakistan's earthquake vs. Indian/Sri Lankan/Indonesian tsunami. There was a common humanity connection but Pakistani earthquake felt like a heart ache.
The point I was making was that I know Pakistanis who are miserable living in the west, utterly bitter about it, and its not good for their own physical and mental health to be living in exile. Its just not worth it.
That's bull crap bro, people like you are dhobi ke kuttay - na ghar ke na ghaat ke. I was the biggest wanna be myself but I've become wiser. I didn't practice Islam, I use to drink, eat bacon, all my mates were goray because I think I must have felt intimidated by Paki scallies (too badd) to hang around with them and I looked down on FOBs, I had a broad accent, I dressed like goray (not all black prada/rockport gear like pakis), I didn't like my mum picking me up but I liked it when my dad picked me up from work/mates house because he looks Caucasian and she's brown... I rejected everything that was Asian (even though inside it was beckoning me) because I wanted to be accepted but even then I was always made to feel different because of my brown, Paki, Muslim, Asian background. I'm glad they showed their true colors, it made me closer to who I am and I pray and don't do haraam anymore.
I can't trust them, Muslim in east Europe completely assimilated into dominant Christian society and even Muslim women intermarried with the Christians, they didn't even know the Kalma but even they didn't escape the wrath of their Christian neighbours who they thought were their friends and relatives when goverment turned against them because of their Arabic surnames and Muslim heritage, who are we to feel secure we;ve hardly been in this country?
You can try assimilating as much as you want but you'll never be one of them, once I was having an argument with this Brit nationalist chick and she thought all Pakis should go back home so I told her nobody has monopolay over being British as Britian is racially heterogeneous anyway, it's always been a mixture of different people you know with all them different Vikings, Celts, Normans and all that settling in Britian yrs ago and you know whta she says? "They were all of the white race, just different tribes, you Pakis are brown, Britian is a country for white people." They'll accept people of European origin, despite being secular they'll be welcoming of anyone from a Chrsitian culture like Latinos and Blacks, they don't mind Chinese type people but (south) Asians and especially Muslim have no chance. My mate who is of german origin, his grandfather could have been a Nazi killing Brits in the war whilst my forefathers could have served the crown and fought for Britian all over the world from against the Africans to against the Portugese (because we Pathans are good fighters) but I'll never be considered British because my skin is tanned and my hair and eyes dark yet that guy of Nazi descent will be considered as British as they come..
So don't kid yourself dude, you're not a gora (Italian, Irish, German or Scott) so you'll never be American or British in their eyes.
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Dont have to buddy
America was born out of neccessity out of pursecution of folks in Europe
you can be what you want as long as you dont think and do any thing to
harm to US Interest …
Secondly …
Its ok 2 create your little community of Pakiz or Indianz or Arabz
So long as you take an oath of allegiance and dont harm your
neighbours and live with double standards. … No one will come
under harm. US of A is a country that exercises freedom to the
Max and there is no need to panic .
Japan had attacked US and there was clear n present danger to
US from japanese folks. If i was da president then I would have
done da same thing.
Enjoy your Paki heritage and folks..
dont ever forget da pakland where we all came from…
Not really…nothing is safe…someday you will be sleeping and swat team will bust down your door, frame and arrest you… i know this happened in toronto last month to couple people who were born and raised in canada…and u were not even… and you probably read the news about the UK incident today. …And More arrest incidents are yet to come up …so no matter who assimiliate you are in the system, you just never know whats coming at you and itsjust cuz your a muslim and you goto that mosque where those others hang out.
Its quite simple, there is not enough Unity in the community, take the example of Mel Gibson and his statement all the media and hollywood lashed out on him, and our community(most of them) are a make shift of Mcdonald and taxi driving (not that anything is bad with that) but how can you make a difference especially in land of opportunity, when all you do is work 12+ hours just to make the ends meet up!
its a long shot, and there is no harm in going back, (not talking about the born here ppl)
Don't every desi leave at once now!...:) , but there are some cases it was a blessing in disguise, This Pakistani who had married here with children raised here right after 9/11, FBI broke his door down and took his computer on suspicion that he had sent $100K to Lahore, so he explained it was for building a house. Any ways he was clean, but pissed off took his wife and children and his remaining million dollars in yr 2002 and purchased realestate in Lahore for the million. **Saw him return few weeks ago with a big smile now that he is worth a cool 2 million....:D **
This is the problem. We're way too afraid to be who we are. I met a turkish girl today, and when I asked her what her religion is, she said muslim, but added hastily that she's not a fundamentalist like all other muslim countries, since we were in company of some non-muslim American girls.
I mean, its like we're ashamed of our background.
I had to correct her and explain that most muslims are not extreme in their thought and do not advocate violence, and that its a pity the world is the way it is today.
I have some journal entries on this, but I really am sick of the way muslims are behaving these days. We need to be more involved in our communities, more educated, more critical of extremist factors in our community, and we need to outright denounce things like suicide bombings, etc.
But its hard, because the US foreign policy right now is not all kosher either. And if we criticize that, we're asking to be put into concentration camps.
I personally do think that the time is not far where muslims in the US are going to face LOTS of trials and tribulations, like concentration camps. If not that, they're going to strip us of our citizenship and send us back to the motherland.
This one guy told my family that if there is another 9/11 attack in the United States, then the US government will probably resort to such tactics. Don't know how much he is in the know-how though.
Finally, a post in touch with reality and not with a Hollywood movie.
Those 21 arrested suspects were referred to has Pakistani origin Muslims despite the fact that they are all British nationals. Heck, for all we know they could 2nd generation British nationals. Yet, if they were a bit more active in their local community, i.e. plant a few trees, have a few drinks at the pub, maybe they would have been spared, right? Not.
Maybe governments should try to issue “assmilation certificates” to differentiate between good citizens and bad citizens. Prove your patriotism otherwise you might end up on the news someday. Give me a break.
I personally do think that the time is not far where muslims in the US are going to face LOTS of trials and tribulations, like concentration camps. If not that, they're going to strip us of our citizenship and send us back to the motherland.
At Times like these when all seems gloomy and morose, and one feels litrally in the dumps, Allama Iqbal comes to mind:
Naheen tera nasheman Qsr-i-Sultani kay Ghumbad Par **To Shaheen hai basera kar Paharoun ki chataanoun par..:D **
