How Sikh community is wooing fellow Americans, ad for ad
WASHINGTON: Theirs is a typical family of four, living normal lives, dining, playing, spending time together.
That they follow the world’s fifth largest religion — Sikhism, which originated in India — doesn’t make them different, they say, for they are proud Americans, sharing the same American values as others.
This is the message delivered in a 30-second ad, which tries to clear the air over their identities, as they have been mistaken for people from other ethnicity — but especially as terrorists, because of their beards and turbans.
Simply called “Proud”, the ad is among two that began airing in April, at the end of a long drawnout process that started at President Barack Obama’s second inaugural ball in 2013, just a few months after the massacre of six Sikh men and women at a gurdwara in Oak Creek, Wisconsin.
The tragedy was a turning point for the community of 500,000 that has battled ignorance about its religion and paid for it with their blood — they were the victims of the backlash over the September 11, 2001, World Trade Centre attacks, mistaken for a west Asian. “We were the only two men in turban at the ball that
THAT THEY FOLLOW THE WORLD’S FIFTH LARGEST RELIGION — SIKHISM, WHICH ORIGINATED IN INDIA — DOESN’T MAKE THEM DIFFERENT, THEY SAY, FOR THEY ARE PROUD AMERICANS, SHARING THE SAME AMERICAN VALUES AS OTHERS
night,” said Rajwant Singh, recounting the start of the “We are Sikhs” campaign that he co-founded with the other Sikh then, Gurwin Singh Ahuja.
They got talking, with the memory of the Oak Creek massacre fresh in their minds. “It didn’t have to be,” Singh recalled saying to each other. And thus was born a national campaign.
The first ads aired in April on CNN, and on MSNBC subsequently, following months of polling Americans on what they knew of Sikhs, scripting the message based on the findings, which were then tested on a larger cohort of Americans.
All of it was done by some of the biggest names in the world of consultancy, marketing and communication. Hart Research Associates, pollsters for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential bid, did the initial polling.
AKPD, founded by President Obama’s adviser and chief strategist David Axelrod, did the strategising, and FP1, a firm that had worked with President George W Bush in 2000 and 2004, did the marketing.
They were paid, Singh said, but each of them went much beyond the limits of their contracts, especially Hart and AKPD.
Content for their website came from Bill Clinton’s speechwriter, free of cost.
The messaging, Singh said, was focussed on introducing Americans to a religion and a community that coexisted among them but without their understanding and empathy.
And it worked, to a considerable extent. A poll conducted in California’s Central Valley before and after a poll conducted earlier in 2014, captured the contrast — 59% said they know at least something about Sikhs in America, 68% saw Sikhs as good neighbours and 64% saw them as generous and kind. That’s progress but organisers are not giving up, and acknowledge the immensity of the challenge ahead as discrimination continues.