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Jeh Johnson, Can You Hear Us Now? #15YearsLater Queer & Trans Muslims and South Asians Demand an End to Racial and Religious Profiling

“I’m going to need you to step aside for additional screening.”

As queer and trans Muslims and South Asians, this phrase is deeply familiar to us. We live in a time when the color of our skin is cause for suspicion, our names are reason enough to deny our civil liberties, our bodies are assaulted with impunity. Our hearts are weary and bruised. This past Sunday, on the 15th anniversary of 9/11, we collectively spoke back.

“Up up with the people, down down with Jeh Johnson!”

On that day, the National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance (NQAPIA) and KhushDC took … Read more “Jeh Johnson, Can You Hear Us Now? #15YearsLater Queer & Trans Muslims and South Asians Demand an End to Racial and Religious Profiling”

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13 Years After 9/11: A Reflection on Resilience

 I came of age in post 9/11 America like many other people around the United States. On September 11, 2001, I was working as a lawyer in the Civil Rights Division at the U.S. Department of Justice, and living close enough to the Pentagon that the smoke burning from the building was visible from my apartment balcony in Arlington, Virginia for days. It’s safe to say that I felt, as so many did around the nation, that everything changed on September 11, 2001.

For me, the months that followed were a call to action. Like others of South Asian, Arab, … Read more “13 Years After 9/11: A Reflection on Resilience”

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The UnCivilized World of Sarah Palin

On the September 13, 2012 installment of Hannity on Fox, Sarah Palin made the following comment concerning the uprisings in the Middle East:

Yes, Sean. We have to ask ourselves, and I sure wish that reporters would ask our president, how much longer can we afford to spill our blood and treasure, trying to quote/unquote, “promote democracy” in places that do not have any values for a civilized society, values like respecting minorities and women’s rights and independent judiciary and rule of law? How much longer do we now support and fund Sharia democracy?

Sarah Palin has spent the last … Read more “The UnCivilized World of Sarah Palin”