Since September 11th Arab Americans have been treated differently. We as a
community have fallen to inferior to the rest of the American population. It forces you to
think if history will repeat itself. It forces you to think if the events of the 1940's will
soon become a present reality. What are Arab-Americans supposed to do in a situation
like this? We are also in a situation in which we have been affected as well. Americans
don't realize that we are in a state of shock and hope to bring the people that did this to
In the 1940's the Japanese-Americans were put into concentration camps for fear
of them being spies for the Japanese government. A lot of the people being put into
camps were born in America and only spoke English. Still they were not trusted and put
(children and all) in the middle of nowhere for a few years. The Arab community fears
that this will re-occur in today's society. My family in particular has been affected by the
tragedy already. As part of my uncle's job he has to market offers on the telephone. His
English is ok, but ever since the tragedy its as if no one is interested in what he has to say
because its as if they don't want to deal with an Arab.
The real injustice is that we as a people through our different languages and looks
are being suppressed from the rest of the society. I watching CNN not to long ago and a
man on there said something that bothered me a lot. This man was a literate and well-
spoken African-American man. He said, " Now they will get a feeling of how it feels
like to be us." I was bothered that in America today we are still being put into categories
and judged upon the nature of our skin, language and religion. That the barriers of racism
and religious discrimination are still being built in our society rather than
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