Amaanah Othman, Period 8, 11/3/20, Day C

 Amaanah Othman, period 8, 10/ /20, Day C

What are your thoughts and feelings about issues of inequity, oppression, and/or power?

I have very strong beliefs and opinions about issues such as inequity and oppression. Growing

up as a tan skinned Muslim, I experiences a lot of discrimination on Staten Island. One time,

when I was younger, my sisters, her friends, and I went to eat brunch at a restaurant. My sister

and I were a lot darker at the time, and one of her friends wore a hijab. As we started eating, we

were met with verbal assaults by multiple people. They commented about our skin color, the

friend's head scarf, and said extremely racist statements. The workers and the manager

watched on the sidelines and did absolutely nothing. Instead, actually, we were the ones that

were forced to leave the restaurant, though we did absolutely nothing. I can write an entire

essay on the racism and islamophobia I experienced and witnessed all around me, however, I

use them as an opportunity to learn and grow. I don’t let people like that get to my head, and I

know that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with being darker, or a Muslim. I grew up in very

diverse settings, such as my schools and my community, and a pretty diverse family. My

elementary school and middle school were filled with people of all kinds. It was an amazing

experience, I learned about different cultures and the different struggles that other minorities

face. My family is also made up of Hispanics, Europeans, Asians and south East Asians. Along

with very close family friends that were African American or Caribbean. I was introduced to just

about everything and could never see why someone would hate another just because they’re

different. As cheesy as it sounds, I found these differences fascinating and interesting.

Thankfully, these opportunities allowed me to have an extremely open mindset. I have become

a devout person who stands against any form of oppression, anywhere. I’ve attended countless

BLM protests, I’ve shown my support to LGBTQ+ people, and I try my best to educate and raise

awareness. What is going on currently, regarding black people in America is disgusting to me.

Something that was brought to light during these times was that the civil rights movement was

not too long ago, and not much critical progress has been made since. When I think of the civil

rights movement, even knowing it occurred in the 60, I think of a very long time ago. Realizing

how close it was, and realizing that were lacking in improvement made me extremely

disappointed. I believe equity should be used to help people climb up, and progress, to make up

for all the years that these people were shut down or limited. I believe our government does limit

and maybe even inhibit the progress of civil rights and opportunities in this country. They

continue to offer no significant changes or aid to black Americans, especially in lower income

neighborhoods. I’m my opinion, their approach to black Americans in low income

neighborhoods, is to keep them as they are. We should focus on providing resources to help

people out of their situation that generations of systemic racism forced them in. The government

should distribute resources based on the needs of these recipients if we want to see any

change happening. In addition, there seems to be some type of privilege or power that is given

to the police over citizens. These past few months I’ve seen countless videos and articles about

cops murdering unarmed or innocent people, most of them being black Americans (and other

poc), disabled people, or someone with a mental illness. If a cop, someone who swears to

protect citizens and calls for justice, murders an unarmed or innocent person, they should

immediately be investigated and prosecuted. There’s absolutely no reason for cops to be not

receiving any consequences. Cops who are responding to a mental episode should be

accompanied by social workers. Cops are not trained to deal with these types of episodes,

which we can see with the many cases of cops responding to episodes with bullets in

someone's chest. Though it is not every single cop, the police force is extremely corrupted and

has been given too much power.

How do you reflect critically on your own beliefs, assumptions, values, and experiences and

how these can influence your perception of self and others?

I reflect on my values, beliefs, and experiences by letting it shape who I am. I use it to help me

grow as a person, and I use it to learn about the struggle of many. Though I experienced racism

myself, and saw my friends and family experience it, I have learned that being “different” or a

minority is not bad. I never ever hated being a bit darker as a child, because darker skin is as

beautiful and lighter or white skin, and it does not correlate with anything “bad”, as racist people

love to claim it does. However, the islamophobia did hit me pretty hard. A lot of the time it had

me wanting to either convert or just denounce religion as a whole. Growing up, I’ve accepted

the fact that I’m Muslim and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it. Since then, I plan to fight

for the rights of all oppressed and struggling people, and I won’t let anyone tell me otherwise.

Furthermore, I would never let the color, religion, background, sexuality, or gender of a person

determine whether they are a “bad” or “threatening” person. You have bad and good people in

EVERY group, it is not limited to just a few. I would like to continue raising awareness, showing

my support, and fighting for the people.