Prejudice Bones in My Body
“Good,” she said so matter-of-factly that I was momentarily confused. Blinking, I held the phone’s receiver as I processed this simple response that held little connection to what I had just said.
It was months after the 9-11 attacks, and I had just shared with my friend my distress over Muslims being unjustly detained and imprisoned on charges of “terrorism,” an injustice that affected mostly immigrant Muslims.
“Now they’ll know how it feels.”
I felt weak as the cruelty of her words took meaning. Like myself, my friend had repeatedly encountered the sober reality that dulled any lingering dreams of the “universality of Islam.” Muslims worldwide were “brothers and sisters” in Islam, we had been taught, joined by a bond that transcended color, race, and ethnicity. And we’d believed it — until we met those “brothers and sisters.”
But my friend’s hurt was deeper than mine…
