While driving the Muslim Student Union (MSU) board members back from a retreat in Northampton, Mass. this past weekend, a student asked me from the backseat why I chose to remain in the United States after finishing my bachelor’s degree. I told the student that my primary reason was equitable access to mosques for women, unlike in my country of origin, Pakistan. Looking back, perhaps I was myopic, having only been to three countries outside of Pakistan. But I had the privilege to choose to remain in the United States as someone who had a pathway to citizenship lined up through family chain migration.
The decision to stay in the United States came with a lot of hardship — from the indignity of not being able to obtain my visa until I submitted a passport photo without my hijab, to the sacrifices my father has had to make, laboring in minimum wage jobs and working as an Uber driver for the last 10 years. This is just the tip of the iceberg of my story as an immigrant.
My story is not unique. It has common threads with the stories that international students shared at the Global Circle organized by International Student Services (ISS) last Wednesday. Students voiced their fears of not finding a path to meaningful employment in the United States after graduation due to the changes to the H-1B visa — a temporary, non-immigrant U.S. visa — that would have allowed them to work at U.S. companies. At the Minority Coalition Steering Committee meeting held to discuss the half-staff flag, students shared similar fears about a lack of safety on campus.
Yet mainstream media and the rhetoric of the current federal administration rarely make space for stories like these. They distort the truth by presenting opinions as facts and ignoring the voices of marginalized groups. For example, the presidential proclamation restricting non-immigrant workers lists numbers and statistics that cannot be traced to verifiable sources. From the same source of information, one media outlet highlights the need to put “American workers first,” while another reports that top tech leaders such as Elon Musk and Satya Nadella were once H-1B recipients. On a global scale — such as the issue of war in Gaza that will soon have been going on for two years if a peace agreement is not reached — people believe one way or the other about the conflict based on the news they consume without ever considering the stories of those on the ground, both in Palestine and Israel.
While we seek to “discover broadly and deeply, expand the bounds of knowledge, and converse across differences of thought, experience, and perspective,” as the College’s revised mission states, “dialogue across difference” rarely happens on this college campus.
Day after day, students confess to me that people don’t want to share their ideas, values, and beliefs with true vulnerability in conversations because they are too afraid to “say the wrong thing” or be canceled.
Rather, we keep our thoughts to ourselves and assume the worst of another person or group of people based on the information we have heard about them without verifying it from all perspectives and angles. While it seems that polarization in the United States and the world is perpetuated by an unreachable “oppressor,” it is only a matter of time before we may be the policy-makers and changemakers of tomorrow, and we, too, would have to contend with the biases and assumptions we carry. The work of unlearning and learning has to begin right here on our campus before we step into the world to make a difference.
To begin this deep work, I offer us a Quranic remedy in Surah al-Hujurat where God says, “Believers, if a troublemaker brings you any news, verify [it] so you do not harm people unknowingly, becoming regretful for what you have done” (Quran 49:6). A few lines down, the text commands the believers to “make peace between two groups that may be fighting” (49:9), “to not speak ill of another” (49:11), and to “avoid suspicion and backbiting” (Quran 49:12).
This work begins by hearing stories directly from one another, rather than believing in what was said about someone or a group of people. This work of undoing and unlearning begins with deep listening and dialogue, not through avoidance of conflict. As a chaplain who considers herself a weaver of people’s stories, I have hope that we can create an alternative narrative on this campus through verifying the information we receive about one another instead of jumping to conclusions.
This past weekend, the MSU board and I did some of this difficult work of engaging in dialogue and encouraging vulnerability.
We brainstormed agreements for our community built on inclusivity and welcoming the “other.” The Chaplains’ Office also hopes to bring a student-led and student-facilitated dialogue based on the Barefoot Dialogue model at Oberlin College that seeks to increase students’ connection to one another through stories over a home-cooked meal. However, while we as staff and faculty can provide these different avenues for us to learn about and engage with one another, the ultimate onus of the action of learning and unlearning rests on you as students. If there’s someone in your class with whom you vehemently disagree, ask them to have a meal with you or go out on a walk with them. Listen to them and their story, no matter what the “facts” are.
Sidra Mahmood is one of the College Chaplains and the Director of Muslim Life.
