Juno News - February 18, 2023


Is Canada an Islamophobic country？ (Ft. Raheel Raza and Rahim Mohamed) Pt. 1


Episode Stats

Length

37 minutes

Words per Minute

171.73515

Word Count

6,498

Sentence Count

1

Misogynist Sentences

5

Hate Speech Sentences

25


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 hello everyone my name is Rupa Subramania and welcome to the Rupa Subramania show today we're
00:00:23.160 talking about a very important topic that's been in the news recently Islamophobia Islamophobia
00:00:29.980 which Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and woke progressives in this country characterized as a
00:00:35.740 crisis in Canada but which in point of fact in my opinion is yet another boogeyman or of a wedge
00:00:43.660 issue that Trudeau has created much like he did with the vaccine mandates about a year and a half
00:00:49.660 ago he's even taken the extraordinary step of appointing a special representative on combating
00:00:57.280 Islamophobia her name is Amira al-Gawabi and she's popularly referred to as Canada's Islamophobia
00:01:04.840 czar her appointments kicked up quite a bit of a firestorm a ruckus because of her well-publicized
00:01:12.560 tirades against the people of Quebec for example claiming that they essentially all hate Muslims
00:01:19.080 Trudeau's spin doctors have been working overtime to try to salvage the situation understandably so
00:01:25.820 I'm thrilled to have two guests today who have a lot to say about the claims that Canada is an
00:01:31.440 Islamophobic country and who actually interrogate and challenge the term Islamophobia which has been
00:01:38.380 casually bandied around in recent years it's my pleasure to welcome Raheel Raza who is president
00:01:45.160 of the council for Muslims facing tomorrow she's an author and a human rights activist my other guest
00:01:51.760 is Raheem Mohammed who's a freelance columnist and joins us from Calgary please welcome Raheel and Raheem
00:01:59.440 to the show Raheel and Raheem welcome to the show it's great to have you both here now you've both taken a
00:02:08.560 very courageous position in what I think is an increasingly polarized public debate you're both Muslims and yet you
00:02:15.280 question the narrative that Islamophobia now whatever that that term is supposed to mean exactly is now a
00:02:22.080 major issue in Canada so let's start by like by addressing this question what is Islamophobia and
00:02:30.720 and whether you think and and and I wonder whether it's meaning it's a meaningful way to look at individual
00:02:36.960 and unconnected acts of violence and hate against Muslims in Canada and elsewhere so if we could start with Raheel
00:02:42.960 that would be wonderful well Islamophobia itself is a very contentious term and no one has actually
00:02:50.400 really identified what it means it sort of remains uh loosey-goosey so anyone who wants to stop
00:02:57.360 conversation or shut people up just picks it up and throws it at them and you know people stop in their
00:03:05.040 tracks but Islamophobia as it is being used now was a term that was created after 9-11
00:03:12.880 by the Muslim Brotherhood and its legacy groups to do exactly what is being done today which is to stop
00:03:22.000 conversation discussion any healthy critique about Islam or Muslims so uh you know when um motion 103
00:03:33.440 was being put forward some years ago I spoke in the Canadian parliament about against it saying that this
00:03:39.760 is going to create problems is going to create problems it is going to be divisive and it is going to be
00:03:44.240 used against people and we see that that is exactly what has happened you know following that the
00:03:51.040 appointment of Amira al-Ghawwabi that Islamophobia industry report they're all just um you know the ripple
00:04:00.480 effects of m103 because it opened the doors uh to people and usually it is Muslims of course uh who are
00:04:10.320 using this term uh using this term loosely uh randomly uh labeling people accusing people even Muslims
00:04:18.480 I find that so ironical and and and so you know it uh has it done any good I doubt it when you see uh
00:04:26.960 the lash back when you see how people are responding uh you realize that it is uh a term that is being
00:04:35.200 misused by people and I absolutely have no time for the term Islamophobia now if you wanted to use the
00:04:42.480 term racism bigotry xenophobia all that does exist and we can talk about it and we can deal with it
00:04:48.960 uh you know one-on-one but to paint entire communities as being Islamophobic uh to use the term Islamophobia
00:04:58.240 industry as Professor Zain has used in her report it is a generalized statement that paints all Canadians
00:05:05.520 with this racist bigotry brush and that is so unfair uh yeah no that's uh that's well said uh Raheel
00:05:14.400 Raheem what about you do you do you agree with Raheel on this point uh what do you think of the term
00:05:18.080 Islamophobia and is it a meaningful way to look at acts of uh um discrimination or violence against
00:05:25.920 or hate against Muslims in Canada and you know 100% I would echo Raheel's sentiments and you know I don't
00:05:32.320 think anyone on this call um is going to debate that we've seen sporadic acts of anti-Muslim violence
00:05:39.120 you know the the um the Quebec City mosque shooting um the attack that happened in London um a few years
00:05:44.560 ago but to suggest you know Islamophobia is a systemic issue in Canada um I think it flies in
00:05:50.320 the face of the data we have um you know we have relatively poor data um you know we still have a
00:05:54.800 relatively small number of incidents um if you're going to dress it up with you know 70% increase since
00:06:00.480 x um you know we're still talking about a few dozen incidents in a country with 2 million Muslims um
00:06:06.160 so I thought it was important um for me to be able to tell the story of my own community um so as
00:06:13.760 both of you know the smiley community um the first refugee community um to come to Canada en masse
00:06:19.760 in the thousands um we were a Muslim community um you know we have a distinctly Canadian history um we
00:06:26.000 have an uncommonly positive history in Canada you see a smiley Muslims um you know all over the
00:06:31.360 leadership and politics in the media um even in a smiley Muslim on the Supreme Court um so if Muslims
00:06:38.080 in Canada were systemically oppressed and held down um my community's history uh within Canada would be
00:06:45.360 totally impossible um so I just I think um you know we we tend to not know our own history very well
00:06:53.760 in in Canada and our default position tends to be cosplaying these kind of American uh grievance
00:07:02.000 politics or culture wars um when in fact you know Canada has a I would say overwhelmingly uh positive
00:07:09.600 history with Muslim immigrations and Muslim immigrant communities like my own smiley community
00:07:14.480 um and we should be talking more about the positive aspects of that history um instead of selling
00:07:19.680 divisions with terms like Islamophobia and calling entire provinces um Islamophobic
00:07:24.640 um so picking up on what sorry picking up on what Raheem is saying I I definitely want to agree but there
00:07:30.800 is a background story here as well and that is when a community which is not overtly violent but they have
00:07:38.800 an extremist ideology and they embrace the Muslim Brotherhood agenda now part of the Muslim Brotherhood
00:07:45.680 agenda of course is to infiltrate into the political system and affect public policy and from the way I look
00:07:53.360 at it this is exactly what we see is happening you know through um m103 through this report for which
00:08:01.520 uh uh professor zine got a generous grant uh to write plus uh the appointment of uh the so-called
00:08:10.320 Islamophobia uh you know czar as I say uh you know these are all uh part of of this agenda so we have to be
00:08:20.880 very cautious about this now the only problem is that when you speak out about these things that you
00:08:26.640 know they have this Islamophobia label they slap on you and they want to shut you up but like Raheem
00:08:32.800 I've lived my family and I have been here for 35 years I have worked in the government in the public
00:08:38.480 sector I have you know two boys who work here my husband worked at the airport I wish there was an
00:08:44.880 incident that I could remember that was racist but there hasn't been not to say that there haven't been
00:08:50.720 uh you know questions or you know challenges uh you know we are a visible uh Muslim minority you know
00:08:59.120 heritage from Pakistan but you know I don't believe that Canadians are inherently racist with the exception of
00:09:07.920 incidents which happened as Raheem said the Quebec mosque the London Ontario incident for criminal
00:09:14.320 offenses they should never have happened but we let law enforcement look after that and as a follow-up
00:09:20.960 we needed more debate and discussion within communities about why these things have happened
00:09:26.000 but none of that ever happened there is never any debate and discussion there is never any direct
00:09:31.680 challenge to uh you know Raheem or people like me it's always labels behind our back which is a cowardly way
00:09:40.080 of uh addressing issues uh yeah no Raheel I actually wanted to um um get you to talk about this uh
00:09:50.160 report that you've been referring to by professor professor Zion I believe uh and you wrote about it in
00:09:56.320 the national post uh where you argue that opposing islamic extremism is not islamophobia and you were
00:10:02.800 critical of this report that actually calls you anti-muslim for your views do you want to tell us a bit
00:10:08.800 about this yes well first of all you know that's an oxymoron for anyone to stand on judgment or for
00:10:15.280 another person you know my uh personal worship and my belief is something which is very personal to me
00:10:22.080 it's between me and my god it's not for public consumption but how I behave in the public
00:10:26.560 definitely is so the first thing that really bothered me about this was this way that this
00:10:31.680 was painted with a white brush as we showed that there is you know an industry you know there are
00:10:37.040 Canadians sitting around the table in a room discussing how they're going to be racist and
00:10:41.760 bigots I mean come on uh you know if you only look at our government and the number of muslims that are
00:10:48.800 there in our government if you you know muslims who are businessmen doctors engineers lawyers they
00:10:55.200 are in prestigious positions of power how does that relate to any kind of racism or bigotry or this
00:11:02.880 so-called islamophobia so uh you know this generalized statement and then the labeling I believe my name
00:11:09.760 is mentioned at least 30 times in this report and uh you would think that uh somebody who was a
00:11:16.720 professional would at least have taken the time to call me and discuss with me and say that look
00:11:21.840 I'm doing this report this is what I'm saying what do you have to say about it but no you know it was
00:11:26.640 just there along with the other people who were named in it but then uh you know there have been so
00:11:33.040 many rebuttals of that report the fact that it is statistically inaccurate that uh you know it is not
00:11:40.000 factual there is a lot of uh labeling and accusing in it so um I did not ever do not ever feel that I
00:11:49.200 need to offer a defense of what I do but I did need to explain it in context my quotes in that report
00:11:55.440 were taken entirely out of context for example uh you know she uh professor zine quoted me as saying that
00:12:02.400 I had written that mosques should be closed for three months well she didn't give the context of that
00:12:07.120 that was a time which was after these two or whatever incidents uh of radicalization and we
00:12:13.200 had also found that you know the question came up at least the question came up to me where are these
00:12:18.880 Canadians being radicalized so it turned out that there were some mosques that were radicalizing
00:12:24.560 the youth I mean this is not something I'm saying it's open knowledge and so I said okay let's clean
00:12:29.920 up house you know I'm a Muslim I don't necessarily have to go to a mosque to pray I can pray at home
00:12:36.560 but in the meantime if the mosque is not being used purely for worship purposes and is using political
00:12:42.720 statements and you know doing and saying things that are not in uh favor of our Canadian uh culture
00:12:50.160 and citizenship so let's check it out let's close them and clean up house and I didn't think that there
00:12:56.720 was anything wrong in that but you know that was turned into anti-islam yeah uh Rahim in your recent
00:13:04.160 national post column um you tell a very personal story as an ismaili Canadian um you you know you
00:13:10.800 you describe uh you're part of what you describe a as a model minority uh group in Canada and and
00:13:17.600 indeed these smileys are a very successful community in Canada and in India where I was born um could you
00:13:23.520 uh and you referred to this earlier you pointed to specific examples of why um you think that Canada is
00:13:29.760 not an Islamophobic country but can you tell me um um you know could you elaborate a bit on uh on your
00:13:35.760 own upbringing as a ismaili Muslim in Canada did you face any uh issues um um you know directed towards
00:13:43.840 you know the fact that you have Muhammad as your last name um you know uh did that that was that ever
00:13:49.920 a problem for you oh I mean I think as any you know Canadian of color you know you're gonna get the name
00:13:55.360 calling you're gonna get the bigotry um when I was growing up the Simpsons was big so I'd get the
00:13:59.760 apu kind of welcome to quickie mart type thing but but I think you know those types of you know
00:14:05.360 instances of bullying uh they shouldn't happen um but you know I don't think they're indicative of any
00:14:12.400 kind of systemic um you know we're deeply rooted um nationwide and society-wide prejudice I think
00:14:19.680 it's just unfortunate that you know kids tend to rip on other kids uh particularly if they look
00:14:24.720 different particularly if their names are different I don't know if there's any government in the
00:14:29.040 country or any um you know government officer or or sort of anti-bigotry um czar that could do
00:14:36.000 anything about that that's part and parcel of growing up um but one thing I will say about my community
00:14:41.280 um so my community as you know is is led by Molata Hasriman um who you you as you may know is is as the
00:14:47.600 African um we are not a we are not a majority population anywhere where we live um so anywhere
00:14:54.240 where there are ismiley's we're a minority um so because of that a strategy for integration that
00:15:00.000 we've pursued is a high level of community engagement um so virtually any major Canadian
00:15:07.120 city you go to um you will see ismiley Canadians um involved in highly visible uh community activities
00:15:15.440 and highly visible forms of public engagement um so the world partnership walk um over in Vancouver
00:15:21.520 is an example of that um here in Calgary um the ismiley community holds a pancake breakfast um each
00:15:28.400 um each stampede um so we um I think have been quite strategic in the way we've done community outreach
00:15:34.640 um I think um you know you go to any major Canadian city um people are going to be aware of the ismiley
00:15:40.800 community uh people are going to be aware of our myriad uh contributions to the country and um you
00:15:46.720 know we have a uniquely Canadian history and I think one um that's an important part of both my
00:15:51.520 community's history um and the country's history as well well that's that's a great point actually and
00:15:57.440 so a follow-up question to that so uh do you do you think that the other uh communities like the sunnis
00:16:03.200 and the shiites don't uh are not are not uh integrating in the same way as the smiley community
00:16:10.560 um so I don't want to make too many blanket statements but um I another community I would
00:16:17.120 single out um for doing a lot in terms of community outreach is the Ahmadiyya community and I think
00:16:22.240 there's something about sort of oppression within Islam um and specifically um having an awareness of
00:16:28.800 you know just how uh just how important it is um and just how unique it is uh to have the level of
00:16:36.480 freedom of worship and religious freedoms that we have in Canada um I think communities that are
00:16:41.440 oppressed um elsewhere and that have been curtailed in their ability to worship elsewhere um maybe have
00:16:47.840 a better sense of how unique that uh you know that that religious freedom is in a country like Canada
00:16:53.280 um and another um community that I would I would highlight even though they're not a Muslim
00:16:58.480 community they're a Middle Eastern community is the Coptic Christian community um you know many of whom
00:17:03.200 are quite oppressed in in their home country of Egypt um they've come to Canada um they've made an
00:17:08.240 effort to um forge these um forge these positive civil society links with with mainstream societies I mean I
00:17:16.640 can't um I can't um evaluate every single Muslim diaspora um in Canada but but I will say it does
00:17:23.920 seem like there is a um relationship between communities whose freedom to worship is suppressed
00:17:31.040 in their own countries um and how well they've integrated in Canada and another community I would
00:17:35.360 throw in there are um the most recent wave of Ismailies who've arrived in Canada have arrived largely from
00:17:42.080 Afghanistan um or under the Taliban um there were strict restrictions on um their ability to worship
00:17:48.400 and their religion uh their ability to practice the faith in in um in uh in a way that was authentic
00:17:55.120 to our sect wow I I had no idea that there were still Ismaili Muslims who were living in Afghanistan
00:18:01.440 until recently I mean I that's that's that's good to know uh so this leads me to my next question uh why
00:18:07.600 do you and this is for the two of you uh and maybe Rahim you could you could start by answering this
00:18:13.440 why is it important to distinguish between uh you know so-called Islamophobia and legitimate criticism of
00:18:20.080 Islamist extremism well I think um you know criticizing religious practices um I think it's a foundational
00:18:29.200 form of free speech in any liberal society um if we can criticize Mormonism uh if we can criticize
00:18:36.080 Scientology um we should be able to criticize Islam as it's worshiped in in various sects we should be
00:18:43.040 able to criticize things like female genital mutilation um from a liberal humanistic framework um
00:18:49.360 you know we should be able to criticize things um like like the burqa you know from a liberal feminist
00:18:55.760 orientation and I think um one of the most important types of free speech in any democratic society
00:19:01.920 is free speech targeting any source of power uh be it spiritual be it political um so I think that
00:19:08.480 is a non-negotiable um of any civil society um if you can criticize any other religion and any other set
00:19:15.920 of religious practices um I don't understand how Islam is the exception particularly um when it's a threat of
00:19:23.440 violence that's dissuading genuine and honest critiques of Islam again as it's practiced uh by a number of
00:19:31.280 sex as well as um as Raheel pointed out kind of the political dimensions of certain Islamist movements
00:19:40.240 yeah um absolutely uh um Raheel do you want to take a yes yes I would thank you um you know in my work
00:19:47.840 as a Muslim I differentiate very clearly between Islam as a spiritual practice which is what the
00:19:53.760 Ismailis and the Ahmadiyyas pursue and Islam political Islam which I called Islamism which
00:20:02.000 for my perspective has to be critiqued because it's making a mockery out of my faith now every faith has
00:20:08.400 been open to criticism at one point or the other but here we have Muslims who will not allow leave
00:20:14.480 alone criticism they don't even indulge in debate and discussion you know any time that something has
00:20:20.800 happened you would think that there would be these our communities would be coming together and I will
00:20:25.760 pick up on what you were asking about the Sunni community uh why many have integrated there are still
00:20:32.720 large swaths of the community that have not integrated you know they have come here but they're
00:20:38.240 still living by the laws they still believe that you know they need to follow sharia they feel that
00:20:45.040 they must uh you know they must not accept uh Canadian values so and then some of that is being
00:20:51.840 taught to them so we have always had this problem of the radicalization of the minds of young Muslims
00:21:00.080 and if we don't speak about it and you do you again will be immediately slapped with a label of bigot
00:21:06.400 racist Islamophobe everything else so this is what the reform is the internal reform that needs to be done
00:21:13.360 which is to bring Muslims into the 21st century to help them understand that we have come here by choice
00:21:20.480 and we need to embrace those values that you know it's an exchange of values you know we work with our
00:21:26.960 values and then we accept those values that appeal to us in you know must by following the law of cause
00:21:33.840 because none of us are being forced to do anything against our will this is the beauty of the freedoms
00:21:39.280 we have here and the freedom to critique religion is something that everyone should have because
00:21:44.800 religion is an idea and you know it can be critiqued and should be critiqued when we relate that to human
00:21:53.040 beings then of course we're talking about uh something different so this um you know idea that you cannot
00:22:00.320 critique Muslims or Islam uh is just a shut up call uh to people and this totally stops uh debate and
00:22:08.640 discussion and that is a very dangerous trajectory because our young people don't know how to deal
00:22:16.000 with this situation you know they are being uh they're being forced to accept that uh you know
00:22:21.440 everything that is happening around them is somehow kosher or that is acceptable but we have to question
00:22:26.560 our faith actually asks us the question so since you're you're uh closely um tied to the Muslim community
00:22:36.240 uh in Toronto and in Canada in general uh what do you what do you make of the current generation of
00:22:42.320 young Muslims uh you know uh when it when it comes to uh questioning uh Islam or uh you know or Islamophobia
00:22:51.040 do they have this knee-jerk reaction as their parents did or their grandparents did that any criticism
00:22:57.120 of Islam would be seen as Islamophobic or do you see the current generation uh you know uh changing their
00:23:03.520 um you know open to open to criticism and uh and and open to discussion and dialogue the younger
00:23:10.720 generation is definitely much more open to discussion and dialogue they need it because you know they are
00:23:16.720 not going to abide by centuries-old rules and regulations you know many of the much of the
00:23:22.480 leadership is talking about seventh seventh century laws and regulations which are not applicable in the 21st
00:23:28.400 century these young people want to live their lives as free human beings the only problem is that there
00:23:35.040 are not many safe spaces where they can go and have these debates and discussions so we in our
00:23:40.080 organization try and create those safe spaces where we can bring them and let them ask whatever they want
00:23:46.480 you know we're living in a time where they're interfaith marriages they have questions about sex and drugs
00:23:51.920 and politics and uh you know just how to live their lives and in many of the families you see the
00:23:58.080 generation gap because the parents are living in you know the olden times they're not willing to change
00:24:03.920 but the younger generation has moved away and as a result i see many young muslims leaving the faith
00:24:09.520 as well which is very sad because they become frustrated and they haven't been able to find answers
00:24:14.560 so they feel that it's safer to be secular it's safer safer to be an atheist and not have any religion at all
00:24:20.880 the the sad part is that if they were able to embrace islam in its most spiritual beautiful form
00:24:27.920 it would be something so energizing for them uh you know it would be something that would give them so
00:24:33.840 much hope and it would give them you know there's art and culture which i have to say that the ismaili
00:24:39.200 community is fully endorsing and you know working with you look at the agha khan center in toronto uh you
00:24:46.480 know they promote music and art and center while at the same time some of the clergy and the mullahs
00:24:52.000 are telling young children that uh you know music is a sin playing chess is a sin drawing pictures is a
00:24:58.640 sin for them everything is a sin so the kids get frustrated you know so obviously there has to be a
00:25:05.920 change but a change can only come when muslims themselves begin to realize that there is a need for
00:25:12.000 reform in the way we practice and understand our faith and so we need to talk about it
00:25:18.880 so uh raheel do you think this change is happening you think there's this internal reform taking place
00:25:25.040 yes at some level it is taking place but it is you know it is a challenge uh when you are talking
00:25:30.960 about very small minority communities like the ismaili and named amadia these are small communities
00:25:36.880 they're able to work with them when you're looking at very large swaths of muslims like the sunnis and
00:25:42.560 the shias among the shias there is more reform than there is among the sunnis i am from the sunni
00:25:49.440 perspective of islam my husband is actually from from the shia side so our children are sushis so we
00:25:58.640 you know we have uh very very challenging debates and discussions in our house but uh yes there is a
00:26:06.400 change taking place it's slow i don't know whether i'm going to see any results in our generation but
00:26:11.360 the seeds have been sown i'm also part of movement called the muslim reform movement which as i said
00:26:16.800 is a way to bring muslims into the 21st century and to look at uh reforming the way in which we
00:26:22.880 practice the faith uh you know in in a more modernistic way in a more smaller and liberal way but
00:26:29.600 uh you know it's it's a long haul and i'll tell you why because the mullahs have control of the large
00:26:37.680 amount a number of muslims uh it's very fortunate that according to a report i recently read only 20
00:26:44.960 of muslims are muslims but you know the other 80 percent have to uh look around and see where they
00:26:52.160 can get their incentives from we're hoping that we can reach them and help them understand that you
00:26:57.200 can live by canadian values and still be a very good muslim in fact i think a good canadian is a
00:27:02.640 good muslim and so uh you know we need to be able to debate and discuss this and unfortunately those
00:27:09.280 spaces for safe space and discussion are few and far between people are afraid they've been told you
00:27:16.400 can't talk about it so when when this concept comes in that no you can't talk about it this is how
00:27:22.080 it is it's never going to change then of course people are scared to speak out yeah here's a
00:27:28.560 question for both of you uh what do you make of the appointment of an islamophobia czar and the choice
00:27:34.000 of a candidate for this position whose views about quebecers uh have created such a firestorm uh raheem do
00:27:40.880 you want to go first sure and i think it was a self-inflicted wound for for the trudeau government i
00:27:45.920 mean my first response is um you know where are the adults in the room in the prime minister's office
00:27:50.880 and i think i wrote my article is you know does anyone in the pmo have access to google um you
00:27:56.240 know i think a quick google search would have um you know raised you know myriad red flags but but i
00:28:00.960 think um unfortunately the new islamophobia czar um i think she reflects a a set of postmodern views
00:28:09.360 um that is becoming more and more widespread uh within the activist class um where there is
00:28:17.840 this sort of this type of politics of grievance um that's baked in to how a number of muslims and
00:28:24.720 other minorities um are are trained to view the world and and trained to view their place in it
00:28:30.160 and i think you see um just not not only in her writings about quebec but her writings about things
00:28:36.480 like canada day um you know things like queen elizabeth the second i think she wrote um stephen harper
00:28:42.320 did more to harm the muslim community um than the 911 did i mean i think you're you're really seeing
00:28:48.000 um this sort of self-victimization in this grievance culture um that's been baked into our view of dei
00:28:54.320 and i you know i for one you know want to reject this victimization erif um you know have i heard
00:28:59.360 racial slurs yes um do i see myself as a victim no do i see my community as a victim um no i mean i think
00:29:05.280 my community has you know on the whole um had a level of success in canada um that most minority
00:29:12.000 communities can only envy and why are we not telling those stories i mean why are we focusing
00:29:15.680 on the grievances and the victimhood cultures and not um not celebrating the successes that i
00:29:21.920 think are far more plentiful um when you look at a country like canada i absolutely agree with you
00:29:27.600 rahim this idea of the victimhood ideology has been the downfall of so many communities because
00:29:33.840 you can't revel in that uh but you know it's so ironic and hypocritical that the prime minister said
00:29:40.160 that uh the islamophobia czar was appointed to build bridges uh but how do you build bridges when
00:29:48.640 you're already destroying them by making these really derogatory remarks and yes of course she has
00:29:54.400 apologized but words are important and again you know as rahim said if there had been a google search
00:30:00.320 uh so many things would have come out uh the least one of them being the fact that her previous employer
00:30:06.880 was the nccm the national canadian council of muslims who originally if you remember uh went under the
00:30:14.480 name of care can and care can sister concern in in the united states uh care usa were unindicted co-conspirators
00:30:23.600 in the texas terrorism trial so these are things that uh you know which need to be checked hey uh you
00:30:31.600 know in the in the islamophobia industry report they went back uh 30 years into my background and
00:30:38.640 everything i said or did or wrote or uh you know who i met so couldn't they have done this search for
00:30:44.240 somebody who was being appointed to this position which i think is absolutely useless in the sense that
00:30:50.240 the amount of money that is going to be spent on this uh you know the this position uh my question
00:30:57.760 would be uh is this person who is appointed going to be discussing issues of the persecution of the
00:31:04.800 uyghur muslims in china is she going to be talking about the persecution of christians and ahmadiyahs
00:31:10.240 in pakistan and the fact that an ahmadiyah mosque not the first was burned down just a week ago um the
00:31:18.000 fact that young christian girls are being forcibly converted and uh married to as young as 12 years
00:31:25.680 old uh are they going to address the real issues that are being faced not just by muslims but by
00:31:31.840 non-muslims or is this focus only that i'm the victim and you know there is racism against me so as
00:31:38.640 raheem said who hasn't faced racism in bigotry every single immigrant community that has come into canada
00:31:44.720 has at some point faced uh discrimination racism bigotry but there are ways of dealing on with it
00:31:53.440 one-on-one and i'll tell you a very interesting example i used to work in the government one of
00:31:58.480 my managers was this young man who had come from a small white town where he had never ever met a
00:32:03.360 person of color or a minority and every time he read something in the newspaper he would come in
00:32:08.640 south asian he would come and say raheel your people are in the news again
00:32:12.960 so one day i said to him john your people and my people need to talk and uh i took him for coffee
00:32:18.640 and i told him because my colleagues were saying you know report him to human rights and he's being
00:32:24.320 racist and i said no i don't think he is he's just ignorant so when i explained to him how he was
00:32:29.840 coming across he was apoplectic with apologies that i had no idea that this is how it sounds so this uh
00:32:37.120 conversation this dialogue taking on these issues you know i've been a public speaker for 20 years
00:32:43.120 and some of my presentations some of the most challenging questions have been put to me like
00:32:48.000 a young student asking me so um how many wives does your husband have now i could have said oh my god
00:32:55.200 this is islamophobia but you know you laugh and you deal with it it gave me an opportunity to explain why
00:33:01.440 in the quran uh for marriages are allowed and what was the context and what was the history this is
00:33:08.560 what we as individuals have to do is to take on these uh challenging contentions and talk to people
00:33:18.080 and and explain to them you know i've never ever believed that canadians are by nature racist i
00:33:24.080 think they are a very tolerant community but there are individuals and that nothing is going to no
00:33:30.800 office of islamophobia is going to stop them from their racist thinking if that is who they are
00:33:37.440 we have to work with the rest as raheem said let's talk about the positives let's talk about the
00:33:42.240 wonderful contributions of muslims to this country let's talk about what they have done and let's talk
00:33:48.320 about uh you know the the community at large and how well placed they are that's so i'm gonna jump in
00:33:56.160 there um raheel made a very interesting point about these ethnic lobby organizations and i don't know if
00:34:01.840 you both saw but earlier in the year i wrote an article in the line um about how you know governments
00:34:08.960 who are kind of too lazy to vet um diversity hires or diversity candidates um will go into these
00:34:15.600 lobby organizations so another one is the canadian arab federation um which um omar al-agra currently
00:34:22.400 the transportation minister he came up as the president of that organization um but that organization
00:34:28.160 um you know has expressed such vehemently anti-semitic views um the harper government in 2009 um pulled its
00:34:35.440 funding um another really interesting example is the somali uh ethnic lobby um so i'm um it's uh the
00:34:42.240 um ahmed hussein um got his start as the president of that lobby in canada and um the american arm of
00:34:49.040 that lobby um i think it it um gives us a worrying look of about where where things might go so i'm sure
00:34:57.120 um a lot of you both of you are familiar with the situation minnesota and you know the university
00:35:02.000 professor um who as part of a course on islamic art you know showed a sunni image of prophet muhammad
00:35:09.680 uh the context there is um showing an image of prophet muhammad it's sanctioned in a number of
00:35:15.760 sorry i said i said sunni but it's sanctioned in a number of shia sex um so just by virtue of showing
00:35:22.000 that image um which was totally respectful from the perspective of that sect and and completely
00:35:28.560 sanctioned within that sect um a university professor was a subject of a witch hunt and i
00:35:34.080 think we have to be very careful uh with the influence that these lobby groups not only in
00:35:39.360 terms of the people they're sending to ottawa um to fill these kind of positions and check these boxes
00:35:44.560 um but also what's going on within uh these lobby organizations that i think
00:35:49.120 trend towards the extremes um trend award more hardline positions
00:35:52.480 yes you're absolutely right and very rarely do any of these organizations reached out to reach
00:35:59.520 out to people like you and me to say let's sit down and have a conversation they feel so much
00:36:03.840 more comfortable being cowards and speaking behind our backs but coming back to this whole islamophobia
00:36:09.680 bogeyman uh it's not only the critique but it's also when certain valid inquiries are termed as
00:36:16.080 islamophobia you know that the crra was uh making some inquiries into muslim charities because it's
00:36:22.080 their job not just them they do this for everyone but immediately they were called islamophobic and and
00:36:28.880 and our prime minister picked up on this and and you know said that uh this is not something they
00:36:34.320 shouldn't be singled out so we have to understand that we are living in a country which is a democracy
00:36:40.800 and we need to be able to live by the laws that this land in fact islam tells us live by the laws of
00:36:46.640 the land in which you are unless it goes against your faith but unfortunately many muslims have
00:36:53.840 forgotten this all these rules uh you know they are following an ideology uh which is based on a cult
00:37:01.440 they're following an ideology uh that is a victimhood ideology which is you know extremist
00:37:07.600 and uh if anyone uh happens to ask a question they are in they immediately are labeled an islamophobe
00:37:15.120 so uh this is not going to go well in the long run because uh you know it's not uh something that
00:37:22.160 canadians read need right now along with political correctness and the work culture if you also have
00:37:28.800 uh you know the islamophobia bogeyman hanging over people's hands canadians by nature are a very
00:37:34.320 peace-loving naive trusting community they're not going to speak out and this will then faster