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They need to come over here and check it out for themselves. It's easy for someone to point his or her finger. I can point at a city full of white people and be like, "This city over there, all these citizens walk into schools and shoot at people."
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So [Islamophobic pastor] Terry Jones had come up to Dearborn around 2011 and 2012, and he had organized one of those Qur'an burning protests. And at the time this protest was taking place, a rally in the largest mosque in North America—located in Dearborn—was also taking place. The rally at the mosque was an interfaith gathering, and no attention was paid to it.There were quite a few anti-Muslim protests in Dearborn, but those protestors weren't from Dearborn. They had nothing to do with Dearborn. They would come out here and protest against Islam.When these people come up here, they would make it look like these gatherings were going to have hundreds, if not thousands, of people at them. By the time they'd all get here, it'd only be about 15 or 20 people.
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When 9/11 happened, I was a freshman in high school. Up until then, I was a Muslim living in America with parents who had immigrated from Lebanon, and I always knew that. I never really understood the difference between what it meant to be Arab, what it meant to be Lebanese, and what it meant to be Muslim. I just knew how to answer when someone asked where did your parents come from? "Oh, they came from Lebanon." What are you? "I'm a Muslim." What religion do you follow? "I follow Islam. And I was born in America."After 9/11, that changed. In my neighborhood, and in the city, I wouldn't say it changed that much. In Dearborn, one thing that was lucky for the Arabs and Muslims living here was that there was a good number of us. Thirty percent of the city is made up of Arabs and Muslims. So when you have about 30 percent Arabs living with 70 percent non-Arabs, and that 70 percent has probably come across a Muslim or an Arab before, they knew we weren't people who were going to blow everyone up. So I never had a problem over there.
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Yes, on 9/11 my older sister and my mother were at a supermarket in the area shopping. A gentleman—I don't know if we can even call him a gentleman—walked up to my sister who was pregnant at the time with my niece, she was 15 days away from giving birth—and he shoved them and told them, "Get the fuck out of our country, and go back to yours." So there was that. I can almost guarantee that gentleman wasn't from our community, but it did happened in Dearborn. That's when I started realizing and thinking maybe we are all different, unfortunately.
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I mean, I personally don't think I'm different than anyone. A Jewish-American shouldn't get treated differently than a Christian. A Muslim-American shouldn't be treated any differently than a Christian. I don't think there's any difference between me and other Americans. I live my life just the way everyone else does. But as far as I can tell, people started looking at me a little differently.Was I going to let the way people look at me affect the way I live my life? No. Am I any different? I'm not. I'm just as American as anyone else.Personally, I feel pressured all the time to prove our American identity. I was once asked, "Are you Muslim or American?" That question alone served as an indicator of a bigger problem: Arab-Americans and Muslims are still perceived as un-American. We're viewed as alien and as foreigners. As a result, we're pressured and cornered to prove how American we really are, and we follow through with it by saying, "You know, look at how all-American our families are." Do you feel that way too?
When I'm in Dearborn, I don't feel that way. When I leave Dearborn, at times, I do feel that way.I've heard that question: "Are you a Muslim, or are you American?" If that was asked to me, I would turn right back, and I would ask that person, "Are you a Christian, or are you American?" It's a stupid question.
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I don't think Donald Trump is racist in any way. I'm going to be honest with you. I think that he makes racist remarks, but I don't think he's actually racist. Donald Trump is a genius. Donald Trump has been able to make business deals in multiple countries at the same time, without actually living in these countries. He's got businesses all over the world. Donald Trump knows how to talk.Donald Trump knows how to get the crowd going. Donald Trump isn't who scares me. His supporters are who scare me. How does someone that says what Donald Trump says have that many supporters? That's what's scary.
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Every religious group and every group of people goes through their ups and downs. It gets bad. What had happened to the Jews during the Holocaust, I think that's as bad as it's ever going to get, at least in the last few hundred years.But what happened after? People opened up their eyes and realized that over 6 million Jews were killed. They thought, We can never ever let this happen again. And things got better for them. It didn't get better quickly, but it did get better.Am I optimistic Muslims in America and around the world? I'm very optimistic. I think it's on our generation to build a foundation, to build a stage that our children can one day stand on and pretty much scream, "I'm Muslim, and I'm proud."
Honestly, in my eyes, Dearborn is the greatest city in the world. Dearborn is a city where it's been proven that people from many different backgrounds, whether they're from the Middle East, from Europe, from Africa, from South America, can still live among one another in peace.If you look at the way our city is run, our city services, what our city provides for us, it's all amazing. The way we interact with one another is amazing.I welcome anyone in the world—and I'll be his or her tour guide of the city—to come over here and prove me wrong.Follow Sarah Harvard on Twitter.To find out more about what life is like in Dearborn, Michigan, check out "Ramadan," the third episode of BALLS DEEP airing tomorrow on VICELAND at 11:30 AM EST. Watch all the latest episodes of our new shows now at VICELAND.com