The View From Flyover Country: Essays by Sarah Kendzior

by Sarah Kendzior

  Ethnicity is often used to justify violent behavior. But no ethnicity is inherently violent. Even if the Tsarnaevs aligned themselves with violent Chechen movements - and as of now, there is no evidence they did - treating Chechen ethnicity as the cause of the Boston violence is irresponsible.

  One hundred years ago, the violent act of one Polish-American caused a country to treat all Polish-Americans with suspicion. Now, the Poles have become "white" - which is to say they are largely safe from the accusations of treason and murderous intent that ethnic groups deemed non-white routinely face. When a Polish-American commits a crime, his ethnicity does not go on trial with him.

  But this change is not a triumph for America. It is a tragedy that it happened to Poles then, and a greater tragedy that we have not learned our lesson and it happens still - to Hispanics, to Arabs, to Chechens, to any immigrant who comes here seeking refuge and finds prejudice instead.

  "I respect this country, I love this country," the suspects' uncle, Ruslan Tsarni, said in an emotional condemnation of his nephews. "This country which gives chance to everyone else to be treated as a human being."

  Chechens and other Muslim immigrants from the former Soviet Union are human beings. They are not walking symbols of violent conflict. Do not look to a foreign country to explain a domestic crime. Look to the two men who did it - and judge them by what they have done, not from where their ancestors came.

  Originally published April 21, 2013

  The fallacy of the phrase ‘The Muslim world’

  On September 12, the day after the attacks on the US diplomatic missions in Egypt and Libya, the New York Times set out to explain what it called the "anguished relationship between the United States and the Muslim world". According to the Times, the "Muslim world" was prone to outbursts of violence, and the reaction to the 14-minute anti-Islam movie trailer The Innocence of Muslims was both baffling and predictable. "Once again, Muslims were furious," wrote reporter Robert F Worth, "and many in the West found themselves asking why Islam seems to routinely answer such desecrations with violence."

  Other media outlets echoed the claim that "the Muslim world" was consumed by anger, and had long been so. The Associated Press offered a look back at "Five other incidents that inspired rage in the Muslim world", crediting over a billion people for the actions of a few thousand in their search for historical continuity. Others took a psychoanalytic approach. "Why is the Muslim world so easily offended?" asked Washington Post columnist Fouad Ajami. "Madness in the Muslim World: Help Me Understand," pleaded a blogger for the Houston Chronicle.

  It is time to retire the phrase "the Muslim world" from the Western media. Using the phrase in the manner above disregards not only history and politics, but accurate reporting of contemporary events. The protests that took place around the world ranged in scale and intensity, in the participants' willingness to use violence, and in their rationales. The majority of the "Muslim world" did not participate in these protests, nor did all of the Muslims who protested the video advocate the bloodshed that took place in Libya.

  By reducing a complex set of causes and conflicts to the rage of an amorphous mass, the Western media reinforce the very stereotype of a united, violent "Muslim world" that both the makers of the anti-Islam video and the Islamist instigators of the violence perpetuate.

  Misleading generalizations

  Essentialist views of Islam and Muslims are nothing new. In Western media, Islam is often presented as a contagion, with Muslims as the afflicted, helpless to their own hostile impulses. What is different about the current crisis is that it comes in the aftermath of the "Arab Spring" - another series of intricate events depicted as interconnected and inevitable. Democracy would "spread" from one Muslim country to another, analysts argued, regardless of the unique historical trajectories of individual states. Some analysts went so far as to suggest it would spread to Central Asia, a region of largely isolationist dictatorships uninfluenced by Middle Eastern politics. The current protests are being portrayed as an "Arab Winter" - a simplistic reversal of a simplistic perception of success, with Muslims, undifferentiated, receiving the blame.

  There is, of course, cohesion among Muslims, in the sense that there is cohesion among followers of any faith. The notion of the ummah is an essential part of Islamic doctrine. But the way the idea of "the Muslim world" is expressed within Islamic communities is different from the way it is expressed outside them. It is rare to hear the phrase "the Christian world" used in the English-language media, because doing so would generalize about the motives of over 2 billion people. No such respect applies to the world's 1.5 billion Muslims. Googling the phrase "the Christian world" yields 5.8 million results, while the phrase "the Muslim world" gives over 87 million results, many of them wondering what is "wrong" with the queried target. When the phrase "the Muslim world" is invoked, it is usually to reduce, denigrate or impugn.

  The Western media's broad-stroke regionalism means that conflicts within individual Muslim-majority states become marginalized. Syrians posting on Twitter wondered how the world could give so much attention to a conflict that killed seven people while dozens of Syrians are killed by state security forces every day - documenting, as one commenter noted, their own demise in videos that receive far less attention than the bigoted pseudo-cinema of one American. Similarly, the violence at the diplomatic missions in Cairo and Benghazi was initially conflated, with "Muslim rage" being presented as a root cause for two distinct conflicts. The tendency to see "the Muslim world" as a problem in general means that specific problems within Muslim countries go unseen.

  Dispelling stereotypes

  Soon after the destruction of the US embassy in Benghazi and the deaths of four Americans, a protest was held against the men who murdered them. Libyan citizens held English-language signs declaring "Benghazi is against terrorism" and "Sorry Americans this is not the behavior of our Islam and Profit [sic]". Photos of the protest, distributed by Libya Alhurra Livestream, went viral on Facebook and Twitter.

  The Libyans protesting were aware that not only Libyans, but Muslims in general, would be blamed for the violence that took place, because the small group of Muslims who stormed the embassy would be seen as representative of all. They gave the rare apology that Western commentators often encourage Muslims to make on behalf of others who commit violence in the name of Islam. But while the sentiment of the protestors is appreciated by many Americans - and the photos likely assuaged some prejudices - such explanations should not be necessary. Ordinary people should not be assumed to share the beliefs of violent criminals who share their faith.

  The Innocence of Muslims was made by Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, an Egyptian-American who hates Muslims. It was found on YouTube and put on Egyptian television by Sheikh Khaled Abdullah, a man trying to convince the world that Americans hate Muslims. This was a perfect storm of gross and deceitful parties depicting each other in the most vile terms, and then living up to each others' worst expectations.

  The answer to such invective is not to reinforce it through media portrayals of "Muslims" as a collective. The media should instead pay more attention to individual states, conflicts and leaders, since dictatorship and factionalism have been as essential in shaping politics in Muslim-majority regions as has religion. The current crisis demonstrates how corrupt parties use religion as an incitement to violence and a means to political gain. The Western media should not play party to their prejudices.

  --Originally published September 16, 2012

  In the trial of Trayvon, the U.S. is guilty

  When I was a child I watched policemen beat a man nearly to death, and I watched my country acquit them. I was shocked that police would attack a man instead of defending him. I was shocked that someone would record the attack on video and that this video would mean nothing. I was shocked that people could watch things and not really see them. I was shocked because I was a child. I was shocked because I am white.

  Twenty-one years after the Rodney King v
erdict, Americans have proven again that in a court of law, perception matters more than proof. Perception is rooted in power, a power bestowed upon birth, reified through experience, and verified through discrimination masked as fairness and fact.

  Trayvon Martin is dead and the man who killed him walks free. Americans are afraid there will be riots, like there were after the King verdict in 1992. But we should not fear riots. We should fear a society that puts people on trial the day they are born. And after they die.

  Recession-fueled racism

  The Trayvon Martin trial was not supposed to happen. This is true in two respects. The Trayvon Martin trial only took place because public outrage prompted Florida police to arrest George Zimmerman, the man who killed him, over a month after Martin's death. The Trayvon Martin trial took place because that same public went on to try Martin in his own murder, assessing his morality like it precluded his right to live. It was never a trial of George Zimmerman. It was always a trial of Trayvon Martin, always a character assassination of the dead.

  Over the past few decades, the US has turned into a country where the circumstances into which you are born increasingly determine who you can become. Social mobility has stalled as wages stagnate and the cost of living soars. Exponential increases in university tuition have erased the possibility of education as a path out of poverty. These are not revelations - these are hard limitations faced by most Americans. But when confronted with systematic social and economic discrimination, even on a massive scale, the individual is often blamed. The poor, the unemployed, the lacking are vilified for the things they lack.

  One might assume that rising privation would increase public empathy toward minorities long denied a semblance of a fair shot. But instead, overt racism and racial barriers in America have increased since the recession. Denied by the Supreme Court, invalidated in the eyes of many by the election of a black president, racism erases the individual until the individual is dead, where he is then recast as the enemy.

  Trayvon Martin was vilified for being "Trayvon Martin". If he were considered a fully human being, a person of inherent worth, it would be the US on trial. For its denial of opportunity, for its ceaseless condemnation of the suffering, for its demonization of the people it abandons, for its shifting gaze from the burden of proof. The Trayvon Martin case only sanctioned what was once tacit and disavowed. A young black man can be murdered on perception. A young black man becomes the criminal so that the real criminal can go free.

  Americans should not fear riots. They should fear a society that ranks the death of children. They should fear a society that shrugs, carries on, and lets them go.

  A tragedy

  A friend of mine on Facebook posts updates from a website called "Black and Missing but Not Forgotten ". The site exists because the default assumption is that a black and missing child will be forgotten. It exists because the disappearance of a black child is considered less important than the disappearance of a white child. It exists because a large number of Americans has to be reminded that black children are human beings.

  In June, the Supreme Court invalidated part of the Voting Rights Act , stating that "our country has changed", implying that discrimination against African-Americans was a thing of the past. In May, the city of Chicago shut down majority black public schools. In April, a black high school student, Kiera Wilmont, was prosecuted as an adult after her science project exploded. In February, The Onion called nine-year-old black actress Quvenzhane Wallis an extremely vulgar name. The US that proclaims racism a thing of the past abandons and vilifies black children.

  Many Americans, of many races, will be outraged that George Zimmerman has gone free. They will advocate for tolerance and peace. This is a noble sentiment, but what the US needs is a cold, hard look at social structure. We need to examine and eliminate barriers to opportunity, some of which are racially biased in an overt way, but many of which are downplayed because they are considered ambiguous social issues - social issues, like decaying public schools, low-wage labor and unemployment, that affect African-Americans at disproportionate rates.

  Trayvon Martin was murdered before we could see what kind of person he would become. But the truth is, he had a hard road ahead of him no matter what he did. He would have confronted an America of racial and class barriers that even the most ambitious young man cannot override without a good deal of luck.

  In a US of diminished opportunities, luck is nothing to bank on. Neither is hope, or dreams, or the idea, espoused by President Obama, that for young black men, "there's no longer any room for excuses". Trayvon Martin shows that there is plenty of room for excuses. There is even more room for social and economic reform, for accountability, and for change.

  Above all, there is room for responsibility. The death of Trayvon Martin is a US tragedy. He was part of a broken system we all experience, but that black Americans experience in ways white Americans cannot fathom. The children who grow up like Trayvon Martin, discriminated against and denied opportunity, are everyone's responsibility. Providing them a fairer, safer future should be a public priority.

  Americans should not fear riots. They should fear apathy. They should fear acquiescence. They should not fear each other. But it is understandable, now, that they do.

  Originally published July 14, 2013

  St. Louis’s sons, taken too soon

  There is a park near my house in St Louis, Missouri, where I walk every day. To get there I walk past empty stores and vacant lots, past a brick whitewashed church onto which the proprietor painted decorative windows to make it look like the kind of place it could be if anyone around here had money.

  The park is always busy. Families hold barbecues, children climb trees, young men shoot baskets, fathers coach sports. Almost everyone who goes to this park is black. When I walk through the park, white policemen ask me if anyone is bothering me. When I walk through the park, black men preface inquiries for directions with the phrase "Don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you."

  Those are the assumptions living in St Louis. Sometimes they are spoken, but usually they are just felt.

  At the far end of the park there is a teddy bear and a balloon tied to a tree. They were left there to commemorate a 20-year-old man who was shot and killed in July. Makeshift memorials like this line the landscape of St Louis. They remind passersby that the person who died was someone's son: not an archetype or a statistic or a threat, but a son.

  Those the public are taught to fear are often the ones in danger.

  The shooting happened near a high school reunion in late July. It had nothing to do with the reunion, an annual park affair attended by enthusiastic graduates of a 90 percent black public school system. The shooting, which took place in another part of the park, seems to have been the violent outcome of a private feud.

  But around St Louis, on the internet, the chatter began. On websites, white St Louisans speculated on the inherent danger of such a large gathering of black citizens. They stated again and again that they were not surprised.

  A shooting in St Louis is never surprising, but it will always be shocking: that the cruelty of the act is complimented by the callousness of the reaction; that when a community cries, someone always finds a way to give it more to grieve.

  Decades of violence

  When Michael Brown was shot, many of us in St Louis heard about it on the internet before we saw it in the news. I saw it on the Instagram account of Tef Poe, a rapper and writer who has emerged as one of St Louis' many black activist leaders. He posted a picture of a man, Brown's stepfather, holding a cardboard sign that read: "Ferguson police just executed my unarmed son."

  It took hours for the media to report on the story. Initial reports from the local paper referred to the crowd, gathered outside where Brown's body lay in the street for four hours, as a "mob reaction". They retracted that description as momentum grew, as a casualty so horrifyingly common became recognized as the crisis it was.

  If you had asked whether the killin
g of Brown would become an international cause, or be swept silently aside, most would have bet on the latter. It is a testament to black St Louis activists, and their ceaseless documentation and calls to action, that it was not.

  No one will forget the killing of Michael Brown. But that killing was preceded by decades of police brutality, of violence, of losses, of teddy bears tied to trees. During the 2013-2014 school year, 17 St Louis public school children died, a record number. The second largest number, in 2010, was eight.

  "At some schools, kids don't come back to school for several days when a young person has died in the kind of violent death that occurred last night because they think there may be repercussions," a St Louis school superintendent told local media in March, after an eleven-year-old black boy was shot through the window of his home.

  By spring, trauma counsellors were working overtime. Now, after the death of Brown and the tear gassing of the local population, including children, they work around the clock.

  St Louis was grieving long before the tragedy of Ferguson - or, at least, parts of it were. Like everything else in St Louis, grief is unequally allocated. This is a city where people live their whole lives seeing certain neighborhoods only on TV.

  St Louis is a city where black communities are watched - by police, by spectators - more than they are seen, more than they are heard.

  Healing St Louis

  At my daughter's bus stop in St Louis, the children would play games. They would chase each other and run, laughing and screaming, through neighbors' yards. "You better watch it," one child called to another. "I'm going to call the police. And it doesn't matter what you do. They'll put you in jail for nothing."