ARAB AMERICAN VOICES SHOULD BE INCLUDED
The San Diego Union-Tribune Community Advisory Board bolsters democracy by nourishing dialogue among the U-T and San Diego communities. Journalists and editors are not elected representatives yet we expect them to reflect the collective “us.”
I read various news sources and find unique perspectives, joy and tragedy. I also see misguided contexts and omissions that dramatically skew perceptions, so much so that victims may be cast as perpetrators. Arab Americans are repeatedly asked to defend the transgressions of other Arab and Muslim Americans or foreign agents, such as what happened with 9-11. By contrast, Americans of European descent are rarely, if ever, asked to defend themselves for the crimes of other European Americans.
How those perceptions shift over time are exampled by the Chabad of Poway synagogue shootings of April 27, 2019 resulting in the death of a beloved congregant and attempts at other congregants’ lives. White supremacist John T. Earnest was caught and also named as setting fire to an Escondido mosque a month prior on March 24, 2019.
John T. Earnest was a student at California State University San Marcos when I taught there. The administrators, professors, students and staff at Cal State San Marcos were horrified, but a side blame game was spurred. On social media, opportunists called Justice for Palestine on campus for creating the conditions for the shooting. Arab and Muslim students were ostracized though they were victims of the same criminal.
The former president of Cal State San Marcos asked me to attend a campus support session for Cal State San Marcos’ Jewish students. Having two sons who are Jewish and Arab made me think I could be helpful. It was not easy to navigate, but the administrator there was fantastic as were the counselors who were from every denomination. However, my introduction to several students was met with confusion, dismissal and sneering. Did being Arab unfavorably mark me?
The synagogue tragedy placed an unfounded cast of guilt on the Arab and Muslim American community. Follow-up reports of the shooting overshadowed the Escondido mosque arson and the connection between them began to fade. We wrote a press release from the San Diego chapter of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee to remind all that the Poway synagogue shooting revealed John T.
Earnest to be the arsonist responsible for the Escondido mosque fire, too. It was about hate, not about the ArabIsraeli conflict.
I was not yet on the UnionTribune Community Advisory Board, but I know The San Diego Union-Tribune and other news outlets were attentive and connected the two hate crimes thereafter. Arab and Muslim American safety depends on repeated reminders to offset the use of tragedies that blame and silence us like after 9-11, when it took over 20 years to shed the weight of blame.
Cal State San Marcos acted appropriately to holistically support the Jewish students. However, cascading events showed that Arab and Muslim students received no support for their trauma, not after the arson, not after the synagogue shooting when the arson-murderer was caught, and not after they were unfairly blamed.
Is the tide turning?
Speaking personally as an Arab American artist, we were habitually excluded from dozens of mainstream and influential art exhibitions after 9-11. Now, Arab American artists are in major exhibits like LACMA’s Women Defining Women in Los Angeles. Bread & Salt art complex in Barrio Logan heralded American Egyptian artist Yasmine Kasem with a residency and a major solo review by the Union-Tribune! Last summer I was chosen to create a 60foot-long mural in front of the Live Well Center on Euclid Avenue and Market Street in San Diego, and recently I won an Artist’s Legacy Award from the California Arts Council honoring my accomplishments and my mentoring of Arab American artists.
I cried when I received the award. I also felt vindicated — not necessarily the best feeling for creating art. I admit to thinking about those who erased us and misrepresented us for decades. Our voices are now audible. It’s about time!
The Community Advisory Board strengthens our collective safety by making room for all voices, contexts and perspectives. More knowledge and discussion is usually better than less. By anchoring the paper’s unspoken responsibility to engage in exercises of democracy, it heals and advances our ideals for a just society.