An AP story about the surging Arab population in the United States had the following quote, which I found a bit surprising. To wit:
“It would be better to come to America than Europe or Canada,” said Zak Trad, 33, of Anaheim, Calif., who came from Lebanon three years ago. “It’s the largest Arab community not in an Arab country. I didn’t think I would be a stranger here.”
I understand that he is but one individual, but Monsieur Trad’s ignorance strikes me as rather remarkable. I wonder how widespread his notion of Arab populations outside of the Middle East might be? While I don’t expect people “out there” to know much about Canada, our proportional Arab population is greater than that of the U.S. Indeed, Toronto had 42,830 Arabs according to the 2001 census, second in North America only to New York City, at 69,985 (Dearborn, Michigan is third at 29,181).
But never mind Canada…surely Arab populations in Europe are huge? France? Germany? Italy? Spain? While the U.S. has 1.2 million Arabs, I know anecdotally that Germany has some 2 million Turks alone. And France? One word–Algeria.
It’s not the Arabs in the US that concern me. It’s all the Greeks, Germans, Guatemalans, French, Austrians, Brits, Bolivians, Bangladeshis, Spaniards, Slovakians, Italians, Indonesians, Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, Indians, Lithuanians, Poles, Pakistanis, Peruvians, Argentians, Mexicans, Mongolians BUT WORST OF ALL the Canadians. Who the hell do they think they are coming to my country? We were here first. . . well, except for the natives, but we took care of them didn’t we.
Ah yes, the Poles are well known as suicide bombers. The WTC was brought down by some crazy guys from Krakow. And isn’t the head of Al-Qaida, Osama Bin-Wishensky?
Ah yes, the Poles are well known as suicide bombers. The WTC was brought down by some crazy guys from Krakow. And isn’t the head of Al-Qaida, Osama Bin-Wishensky? [/quote]
Osama is an Arab; therefore, all Arabs are bad.
Did you skip logic, or didn’t they teach it back then?
Actually, I don’t see the racism in Porcelain Princess’ remarks. I think that he was just stating that there are more Muslims in other countries than in the US and that the article had reported this information incorrectly. The reporter should have verified that the person was in fact correct in their statement.
[quote=“Alleycat”]
Osama is an Arab; therefore, all Arabs are bad.
Did you skip logic, or didn’t they teach it back then?[/quote]
Osama is an Arab, many (if not most) Arabs and Arab governemnts have supported him and continue to. Therefore, while no one can say that all Arabs are bad, we can certainly say a significant number represent a threat and thus bear watching. BTW, you can still buy Osama t-shirts on the streets of Java and if you talk to the locals, they certainly DO support him.
And I did do a year in Logic in college, thank you.
While I am not suggesting that Arabs and Muslims should be rounded up and put into camps like the Japanese were during WWII, I think that any government has to be sensitive to nationals of enemy nations living within its borders. That is normal, logical and there is nothing wrong with it. For better or worse, the US has poor relations with many Arab and Muslim governments and given that all terrorism against the US and its interests has to date been Arab or Muslim, I think that close monitoring is advisable.
That said, random racism or deprival or rights (of US citizens) without cause is to be deplored. I think that we all agree on that. I think that this always boils down to a matter of perception. I sense that you are worried that such statements are indicative of a racist or insensitive view of Muslim and Arab cultures, while I would argue people like me are irritated by the excessive concern on many poster’s part that the US is somehow a nation that cannot be trusted to act in a legal and ethical manner while such posters remain silent about the actual abuses in Arab and Muslim countries that go on and on and on as opposed to potential abuses that have yet to occur in Western nations. Apologies in advance if I am misreading your point and really this has already been discussed to death in the other thread so I am getting out of this one and apologies if I have stepped on any toes.
How did we get on the topic of racism or whether Arabs are “good” or “bad?” My original query was: some guy in the U.S. says its better to go to the U.S. than Canada or Europe, as there are more Arabs in the U.S.
This seems patently ridiculous to me, and I was fishing for anecdotal feedback from geographically savvy Forumosans, as in, “This link says that the Arab population of Spain is 500,000, though upwards of 500,000 more are in the country and unaccounted for.”
