We, undersigned members of the Tufts University faculty and staff, wish to publicly condemn the acts of violence and intimidation which have been committed against Americans of Arab and other Middle Eastern (as well as South Asian) descent, other foreign nationals, and Muslims in the US following the events of September 11, and to reject and caution against the atmosphere of mindless jingoism encouraged by some in the wake of that tragedy.
In one Chicago suburb on Sept. 13, 300 flag-waving marchers chanting "USA! USA!" attempted to attack a mosque before being turned back by police. "I'm proud to be American, one of the marchers declared. I hate Arabs and I always have."
In the same area, a firebomb was thrown into an Arab-American community center Sept. 12, and a Moroccan immigrant working at a gas station was attacked by a machete-wielding racist. In a suburb of Dallas, Texas, Sept. 13, a Molotov cocktail caused $2,500 damage to an Islamic Society building.
In Huntington, New York, a man attempted to run down a Pakistani woman in a shopping mall parking lot, complaining that people like her were "destroying my country." Another "patriot" in a ski mask fired an assault weapon at a Yemen-born gas station attendant in Gary, Indiana. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, three men beat up a Pakistani native. In Texas and Arizona, men from the Middle East or South Asia have been killed.
Locally, in Somerset, three teenagers torched a convenience store owned by an American of South Asian descent. In Quincy, windows of a Middle-Eastern food market were smashed, and another store vandalized. A fire was set at a Weymouth gas station.
These are not isolated incidents, and responsibility for them is not limited to the most backward and overtly racist civilians. An atmosphere of racist paranoia pervades official action. In Providence, Rhode Island, a network design consultant en route to Virginia from Boston, who happened to be a Sikh and wearing a turban, was pulled off an Amtrak train by police as some passengers shouted, "Let's kill him," and "Burn in hell!" He was released from police custody after six hours of detention for wearing around his neck the ceremonial knife traditionally worn by all Sikh men. Strip-searched, fingerprinted, and photographed, he was asked "Why do you look like this?" by law enforcement officials. FBI agents, INS officials, and Boston police detained and terrified two Saudi women in Copley Place last week, scratching one's face and kicking the other in the head - in a case of "mistaken identity."
Media pundits and government officials have repeatedly drawn parallels between the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks and the Japanese attack upon Pearl Harbor. We urge everyone to recall the fact that, in the aftermath of the latter, 120,000 Japanese Americans and Japanese residents in the US were scapegoated and corralled into prison camps in a climate of racist hysteria - for which the US government belatedly apologized. In this case, authorities from President Bush have issued pro forma statements against ethnic stereotyping, but limiting their defense of Muslim and Arab-Americans to those who "love the flag," while seeking Congressional action to vastly augment governmental power to monitor and repress anyone who doesn't.
CNN has repeatedly broadcast images of Palestinians, including children, joyfully celebrating in Gaza and East Jerusalem following the Sept. 11 attacks. Little objective analysis has accompanied such images; rather, the message has been: "Arabs hate Americans and rejoice in their suffering." This simplistic portrayal of Arab sentiment is dangerous. We fear that a bunker mentality - "us versus them" mentality - is being fostered, and we reject it.
We condemn, and share in the globally widespread grief at, the Sept. 11 attacks, resulting in the loss of thousands of innocent lives. At the same time, we ask our colleagues and students to reflect on the broader issues, including "race," that affect perceptions, in the Middle East and elsewhere, of US military and corporate power as symbolized by the targeted sites. If we accede to a mentality of victimization, and the corollary lust for revenge, we will inevitably advance the agenda of those most bent upon bolstering that power. There must continue to be a debate over the nature and deployment of US power - and particularly over military actions that may be fraught with peril, likely to exacerbate security threats to this and other countries.
We suggest that as the nation heals from this tragic event, we sensitize ourselves to the historical and ongoing injuries of those around the world who, often with apt reason, view the projection of US power itself as a form of terror.
Signed by Jean Wu, Steve Marrone, Ruth Hsiao, Gary Goldstein, Howard Malchow, Jerry Meldon, Pierre Laurent, Paula Aymer, Hosea Hirata, Joseph Walser, Christina Sharpe, Dale Bryan, David Locke, Charles Inouye, and Farzin Vahdat
@JUMP:PROFESSORS
