Yesterday I found myself at two baby events. With my departure from NYC imminent, I decided to go to both even though I'm supposed to be working on grad school applications. I knew these events would be reunions of sorts and so I went, saw people I haven't seen in a long time, and now won't be seeing for a long time, and took some photos.
At both events I ended up having long discussions that are pretty serious for a kid's birthday party, and then for a baby shower. I think with where my head is at these days, I can't escape from how the news affects me or with what I read/see/hear/experience. And isn't it better to have a meaningful discussion than to just sit around and talk about the weather?
At the first event I ended up chatting with a woman I've met before, and previously she vented something to me. So, I read her as being open-minded to some extent, and man was I wrong and thrown off with our conversation yesterday. We somehow got into race relations and she just could not understand why and how Black communities are disenfranchised. I attempted to break things down for her with my limited knowledge, and encouraged her to look further, do some reading, ask around, etc. Try to imagine yourself in someone's else shoes, I said. I was astonished though at her continued blatant racism and ignorance. She even did the whole "I work with Black people, have a couple of Black friends" thing too, etc. She just could not get how crippling America's history of slavery is and how it still affects millions of people today such as through incarceration and institutionalized racism. I don't want to paraphrase her words about Black families here because it was just such awful drivel, and just so damn racist. I wanted to ask her if she was a Republican because that's how bad it was, but stopped myself. I kind of wish I had asked though, heh.
This woman goes to the Islamic Center of NYU, a place that is supposedly more inclusive and open-minded than other Muslim spaces and masjids. The IC is a great place, sure, but its become dominated by desi yuppies in recent years, and that's one reason why I and many don't attend as much anymore (even though I'm desi myself, yuppieness just annoys me too much, for someone who's a working-class artist, amongst other reasons). This woman grew up upstate and is a Pakistani yuppie living in the UES. I thought, she's grown up here, gone to college, lives in New York - how can she still be so clueless, and not exposed to things? But she is. So many like her live in a bubble and I worry because us desi Muslims take up so much damn space, and so many of us are so racist. We'll be two-faced about it and hug our Black brothers and sisters on Eid, but in reality there's much ugliness with our hidden racism, that comes to light at times if you just happen to push a button.
Everyone is racist. Even anti-racists will be a bit racist. I know I'm still at least a bit racist, if not more so. But if you know you're racist, its on you to confront that and work on it. And if you're unaware that you're racist, or you claim not to be, and someone points out to you your racism, then you gotta work on it. I asked this woman if she would express the same opinions she was telling me, to a Black person. She said there would be no reason to go around and express these certain opinions, but yeah, maybe she would, even if it would make them uncomfortable.
I blocked out this conversation but am writing about it now…man, we just all feed into white supremacy so much, all the time.
My second conversation, at the second event, also happened to occur by chance. Something came in my head about Maryum (Mary) being a prophet herself, the mother of Prophet Isa (Jesus). Us Muslims believe that Prophet Isa has no father, at all, including God, and that the birth of Prophet Isa is a miracle that God made happen. I've been wondering more lately why us Muslims don't consider Maryum to be a prophet herself. She is mentioned so many times in the Quran, and there's even a chapter named after her. God made a divine miracle happen through her, we believe. And yet still, only a minority of Muslims consider her to be a prophet. Why? Why do the rest of the scholars say, that the 125,000 prophets God sent to humankind, were all men? How can we just assume and know that's the case? And that Maryum isn't a prophet, because she's a woman? Just because, she's a woman. For some reason this re-entered my head last night and I brought it up with this guy I've known for years, all the way back from 2006, but haven't seen much, but we've chatted every now and then and he's cool.
Him and his wife strongly disagreed with me. I made the case that Maryum isn't just any random person, she's one of the most revered people in Islam. Yet they went at lengths to claim that she's not a prophet. And I just kept asking, why? Some fathers of prophets are considered to be prophets themselves, why not Maryum, the mother of a prophet, actually, of a messenger? Why not this woman who's mentioned in the Quran so much? Why do we do so much work to claim that she's not a Prophet? Just because she's a woman? :-(
I'm reminded now of how some years ago, I had this co-worker who's Catholic, but like me also had interesting questions about her religion as well as of mine. I told her what I thought of Mary. And that yeah, there are all these men, all these male Prophets, and just one of her, a woman. I told her I flip it though and think of it as, she's the one woman, and all these men, are equal to just one of her. That shows her awesome power and importance. Maybe that's blasphemous of me to think of it in that way, some might argue. But then, why is she mentioned in the Quran so much, and so honoured?
Anyway, my conversation last night went off into a tangent about something else concerning Muslims, and me and Z had a more in-depth and personal conversation about that matter. Let's just say, I argued that Islam is a lot more grey, against the notion that this and that is so black and white. We didn't necessarily come to a consensus but through sharing, I think we gained a much better understanding, or at least he did, as we re-examined and questioned history.
Now, back to listening to New Order and continuing these MFA applications...
At both events I ended up having long discussions that are pretty serious for a kid's birthday party, and then for a baby shower. I think with where my head is at these days, I can't escape from how the news affects me or with what I read/see/hear/experience. And isn't it better to have a meaningful discussion than to just sit around and talk about the weather?
At the first event I ended up chatting with a woman I've met before, and previously she vented something to me. So, I read her as being open-minded to some extent, and man was I wrong and thrown off with our conversation yesterday. We somehow got into race relations and she just could not understand why and how Black communities are disenfranchised. I attempted to break things down for her with my limited knowledge, and encouraged her to look further, do some reading, ask around, etc. Try to imagine yourself in someone's else shoes, I said. I was astonished though at her continued blatant racism and ignorance. She even did the whole "I work with Black people, have a couple of Black friends" thing too, etc. She just could not get how crippling America's history of slavery is and how it still affects millions of people today such as through incarceration and institutionalized racism. I don't want to paraphrase her words about Black families here because it was just such awful drivel, and just so damn racist. I wanted to ask her if she was a Republican because that's how bad it was, but stopped myself. I kind of wish I had asked though, heh.
This woman goes to the Islamic Center of NYU, a place that is supposedly more inclusive and open-minded than other Muslim spaces and masjids. The IC is a great place, sure, but its become dominated by desi yuppies in recent years, and that's one reason why I and many don't attend as much anymore (even though I'm desi myself, yuppieness just annoys me too much, for someone who's a working-class artist, amongst other reasons). This woman grew up upstate and is a Pakistani yuppie living in the UES. I thought, she's grown up here, gone to college, lives in New York - how can she still be so clueless, and not exposed to things? But she is. So many like her live in a bubble and I worry because us desi Muslims take up so much damn space, and so many of us are so racist. We'll be two-faced about it and hug our Black brothers and sisters on Eid, but in reality there's much ugliness with our hidden racism, that comes to light at times if you just happen to push a button.
Everyone is racist. Even anti-racists will be a bit racist. I know I'm still at least a bit racist, if not more so. But if you know you're racist, its on you to confront that and work on it. And if you're unaware that you're racist, or you claim not to be, and someone points out to you your racism, then you gotta work on it. I asked this woman if she would express the same opinions she was telling me, to a Black person. She said there would be no reason to go around and express these certain opinions, but yeah, maybe she would, even if it would make them uncomfortable.
I blocked out this conversation but am writing about it now…man, we just all feed into white supremacy so much, all the time.
My second conversation, at the second event, also happened to occur by chance. Something came in my head about Maryum (Mary) being a prophet herself, the mother of Prophet Isa (Jesus). Us Muslims believe that Prophet Isa has no father, at all, including God, and that the birth of Prophet Isa is a miracle that God made happen. I've been wondering more lately why us Muslims don't consider Maryum to be a prophet herself. She is mentioned so many times in the Quran, and there's even a chapter named after her. God made a divine miracle happen through her, we believe. And yet still, only a minority of Muslims consider her to be a prophet. Why? Why do the rest of the scholars say, that the 125,000 prophets God sent to humankind, were all men? How can we just assume and know that's the case? And that Maryum isn't a prophet, because she's a woman? Just because, she's a woman. For some reason this re-entered my head last night and I brought it up with this guy I've known for years, all the way back from 2006, but haven't seen much, but we've chatted every now and then and he's cool.
Him and his wife strongly disagreed with me. I made the case that Maryum isn't just any random person, she's one of the most revered people in Islam. Yet they went at lengths to claim that she's not a prophet. And I just kept asking, why? Some fathers of prophets are considered to be prophets themselves, why not Maryum, the mother of a prophet, actually, of a messenger? Why not this woman who's mentioned in the Quran so much? Why do we do so much work to claim that she's not a Prophet? Just because she's a woman? :-(
I'm reminded now of how some years ago, I had this co-worker who's Catholic, but like me also had interesting questions about her religion as well as of mine. I told her what I thought of Mary. And that yeah, there are all these men, all these male Prophets, and just one of her, a woman. I told her I flip it though and think of it as, she's the one woman, and all these men, are equal to just one of her. That shows her awesome power and importance. Maybe that's blasphemous of me to think of it in that way, some might argue. But then, why is she mentioned in the Quran so much, and so honoured?
Anyway, my conversation last night went off into a tangent about something else concerning Muslims, and me and Z had a more in-depth and personal conversation about that matter. Let's just say, I argued that Islam is a lot more grey, against the notion that this and that is so black and white. We didn't necessarily come to a consensus but through sharing, I think we gained a much better understanding, or at least he did, as we re-examined and questioned history.
Now, back to listening to New Order and continuing these MFA applications...
