Three years ago I, along with a group of British people, went on a short visit to Denver, Colorado. We were received by custom and health officials who were waiting near a bathtub placed in front of the plane’s door. They asked all passengers to dip their shoes in the tub. We were all surprised, but did as we were told.
At that time, the prevailing fear was not of Osama Bin Laden, but of the mad cow disease that was widespread in Britain. The custom officials searched the passengers’ luggage carefully, fearing that some of them might have brought a pound of meat or a packet of cheese.
Today, the Chinese and their neighbors are undergoing the same experience because of the SARS virus. Restaurants have become empty, flights into and out of China have been banned, and the job applications of Chinese nationals have been thrown out. In a fit of hysteria, they have been ostracized as individuals in societies across the world, including our own, treating them as contaminated society that needs to be kept away.
This is the reality of the world today: Targeting an entire people on the basis of suspicion, not limiting the accusation to a specific person or group. We have seen how fear spreads when there is racist tension. What makes Americans fear Arabs and Muslims today is the same logic that made them fear the British in the days of the mad cow disease. They have very good arguments to justify their fear: They have arrested a large number of suspects, some of them closely connected with armed organizations. The number of such incidents is very high; no other group’s involvement is even half as much.
However, this does not justify the racist hate that spreads at such times making it easy to target specific groups of people, such as the Chinese, Filipinos, Indonesians, or others from Southeast Asia.
My observation is that the world responds to situations in the same manner. When people anywhere meet anger, they believe that it is because of their nationality, background or appearance.
A guest at a hotel that I stayed at, in Riyadh, refused to submit himself to a security check. At the end he yielded, but with great outrage. The check was not targeting him as a person; but that was the way he took it.
However, all situations are not without blame. An American lady, a teacher, tells of such a case. After the events of Sept. 11, she was subjected to a lot of insult. She was cursed and spat on by the girl students she used to teach. As a person who shared the feelings of the students about Arab causes, she was surprised by the change in the way people treated her. She had nothing to do with what the actions of her government or its police force.
Keeping away the Chinese because of fear that they might carry the fatal disease or subjecting Arabs to intense personal search because of fear of terrorism is justified. What is not justified is people targeting others because of their race — because they are Arab, Chinese or foreigners.
Arab News Opinion 31 May 2003
