Following the recent shootings in San Bernardino, Calif., Muslims throughout America received death threats and vandalism — a caliber of backlash that hasn’t circulated since the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, reports the New York Times.
“I think there's a fine line between hating all Muslims, and hating terrorists,” said California native Nathan Zick, a freshman studying business management. “I also don't feel like categorizing all Muslims as awful people will work either. I've met great Muslims.”
According to the New York Times, following every terrorist attack attributed to Muslim extremists, leaders of American Muslim organizations throughout the U.S. release a slew of statements to condemn the acts as “un-Islamic,” but many have recognized that despite all this, their mosques are vandalized and they receive threats.
Women wearing their head scarves were accosted, their children bullied, and one man in Dallas said he was approached by a man who flashed a gun and expressed his ability to kill him, reported the New York Times.
“All this is pretty typical of American culture: someone hurts us so we lash back and get even,” said Zick, who compared the acts to the hate that the LDS Church received during Proposition 8 in California. “Sure, people weren't killing us, but the Los Angeles Temple was a huge meeting place for protesters and haters.”
In response to the remarks made by candidate Donald Trump using the California shooting to justify his travel ban on Muslim majority countries, the LDS Church issued a statement, according to Fox 13 News, that quoted Joseph Smith in saying he is willing to die for a person of any faith, and other religions similarly expressed their feelings on the subject.
Trump’s statements sparked a lot of buzz, according to CNN, and his supporters clung to the notions, while others, particularly Republican candidates, condemned him for his remarks. Trump further explained said ban would only affect those coming into the country and not Muslims already living in America.
“I do feel that our borders need to do a better job of screening immigrants from the Middle East and Northern Africa,” said Zick.
“If that means we put a temporary ban on all immigration from that part of the world for a couple years then so be it. But I don't feel like banning all Muslims from entering the U.S. is right. Either the screening needs to get more strict, or we ban entrance from that part of the world until we can develop more secure practices.”
More recently, a school system in Virginia decided to shut down schools on Friday, reported the Washington Post, due to a high school lesson on world religions that included an exercise in calligraphy where students had to copy the Islamic statement of faith in Arabic.
According to the Washington Post, the school administration received enraged feedback from parents, voicing their fears that the teacher was “indoctrinating” students to Islam.