Sunday, August 5

Arab Americans should not enlist in the US Army

Now here's another example of how not to make friends and influence people. Arab Americans are looked at very suspiciously. Agreed. There is massive discrimination! Agreed! But that's for Asian Americans as well, and for Hispanic Americans, Black Americans, Native Americans, etc. Then this blessed lady says that Arabs shouldn't join the US Army because that will be "helping the US government tear our homelands and our people apart". Here are few pointers for you, young lady:

1. Your people, assuming that you are in possession of an American passport, are Americans. The US Army is for ALL Americans.
2. Your homeland, assuming again that you have an American passport, is the United States of America. The US army is tearing apart USA? Americans? Very confusing.

As an American, I wonder what your homeland is and who your people are? Or are you Arab and just visiting Detroit, and will be going back, and thus are telling your American friends not to join the US Army?

Here are couple of links for you to study, one relating to African Americans and the second relating to the Japanese Americans. Very sad indeed! "People who forget the past are condemned to repeat it"






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Nadia Abou-Karr


Arab Americans: Resist, Don't Enlist

July 27, 2007 01:01 AM

Arab Americans: Resist, Don't Enlist
By Nadia Abou-Karr

DETROIT, 27 July 2007, (Arabisto.com):

I'm disturbed by the gratuitous National Guard solicitation targeted to Arab Americans that I have been seeing in places like The Arab American News and Dearborn's Arab International Festival. I am bombarded with these misleading, exploitative ads on TV, in the movie theater, and now in my Arab American media? Am I the only one who thinks it's abusive and unfair for Arabs to advocate service in the American military to other Arabs? Are our lives worth so little that we should sacrifice them in service of a government that has institutionalized discrimination against us, in order to perpetuate the same type of war and imperialism that brought many of our families here?

More importantly, are there so few rich Arab Americans setting up endowments and scholarship funds for low income Arab American youth that our youth feel they have no other choice but to enlist if they want to have any chance at the trifecta (doctor, lawyer, engineer) of Arab American success? With all the pressure put on young Arab Americans, regardless of economic status, to achieve high educational goals, enlisting in the military might seem incredibly appealing to those of us with few other financing options. Why not increase the options? I'm reminded of this quote, from Eduardo Bonilla-Silva's book Racism Without Racists (via UBUNTU):

We all must participate in the new movement and contribute in whatever way we can. Some will provide expertise, others money, others time, and others will craft and participate in the actions required to advance the new politics of change. We all need to regain the energy we seem to have lost, drop the pessimism that has filled our souls, and get over the individualism and materialism that has eaten so many of us from within. Our participation in this movement is a must. We cannot remain as spectators of the racial game being played before our own eyes in America.

We must do all we can to increase our options for survival beyond total assimilation and acceptance of American patriotic values that demand our subordinance. We are all different, with different values and lifestyle, but one thing I am certain of is that helping the US government tear our homelands and our people apart will not make any of us free.



1 comment:

Anonymous said...

i'd like to refer you here: http://www.mideastyouth.com/2007/07/28/being-arab-american/