All Arabs are the Same

By Frizell Bailey

Recently, Mhammad Abu-Shawish, local business owner and former Director of Arabian World Fest, was indicted on charges of conspiracy, visa fraud and the misappropriation of $75,000 in federal block grants. For members of Milwaukee’s Arab American community, this is most certainly another blow to their battered public image.

People of Arab/Middle Eastern descent are unfortunately learning what African Americans have known for quite some time. The acts of a few can mean big trouble for the many. It has long been the case in the United States for black folk that you are not just an individual, but also a race. Now in post-9/11 America, people of Middle Eastern descent have joined the club. I guess you could call it the “monolithic me” syndrome. All those (fill in the blank) people are the same.

It doesn’t take a black child in this country long to realize that whatever successes or failures he or she has will likely be writ large onto his or her race. If a black person does well, he is a credit to his race. If he makes a misstep, it is because black people are incompetent, lazy, violent, et cetera.

I can recall watching the evening news with my father and noticing him come under a mild panic if the anchor mentioned some horrible crime to be reported on later. I could tell what he was thinking: please don’t let it be a black person. These days I can imagine an Iranian American child watching his father wince in pain as he watches a news report of some suspected Muslim extremist under investigation for some alleged conspiracy. What he knows, as my father knew, is that these individual crimes will most likely have ramifications for everyone that looks like the suspect.

Fearing a possible backlash, the Arab American Community of Wisconsin, Inc. issued a statement in an attempt to distance itself from Abu-Shawish, who is a former member of their board of directors and founder of what is now called Arab World Fest. Joseph Makhlouf, executive director of AACW, expressed his concern in a recent article in the Journal Sentinel.

“Since we are the Arab festival and this will be in the paper, they’re going to say that all the Arabs are the same,” Makhlouf told the Journal. “That’s what we’re concerned about. That people will judge us by one person and one action.”

Mr. Makhlouf’s concerns, as most would admit, are well founded. We can all recall the acts of violence against people of Middle Eastern descent in the weeks and months after 9/11. In my hometown of Jackson, Mississippi, someone tossed a metal trash can through the front window of a Muslim museum. Never mind that most of the staff and a number of members of its board are American-born. The curious thing, of course, is that there were no such attacks on businesses or organizations owned by white men after Timothy McVeigh drove a rental truck loaded with explosives into the federal building in Oklahoma City.

Sadly, Mr. Makhlouf, all Arabs are the same in the eyes of the American public.

Welcome to the club.