Alhamdulillah. Peace be with you.
Welcome to the Dean Show. Another
exciting show. Before we get started, I
got to show you this clip. I got to show
you this clip. Watch this.
My next guest is on the forefront
combating ignorance, racism, like what
you just seen, educating people. He's
been on CNN, Fox News, and all the major
networks. My next guest from Care, the
director of Care Chicago. We'll be right
back with him here on the D show. Don't
go anywhere.
This is
the show. This is the
dean show.
This is the This is the show. This is
the show. This is the dean show.
This is the danger. This is the
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Welcome back to the show. Peace be with
you. How are you? Very well, thank you.
Peace be on to you as well. How you
been, Ahmed? Been well. Been welld. Yes.
Director of Care Chicago. Yes. Now, we
started the program. You guys are doing
some wonderful work. I I mentioned
you're on the forefront of tackling
bigotry, uh, racism, you know, helping
to defend the civil liberties of the
American citizens who live in this
country and particularly those now who
are coming under attack. We just got to
see this video. Very sad. It's very sad
reality of what's going on out there.
You know, a lot of ignorance. What What
are your What are your um We're going to
show it one more time.
[\h__\h] you. [\h__\h] you.
What's the first thing that comes to
your mind after seeing this? You know,
it's physical assault. It's illegal. But
what the mindset behind the assault is
hatred. This individual obviously looks
at this woman and thinks, you know, I
can slap her. I can punch her. there
isn't going to be major, you know, a
major reaction because she doesn't count
for much. This sort of marginalization,
this sort of, you know, hatred and
bigotry that we see many Muslims be
subjected to, unfortunately, especially
in a post 911, you know, climate is
exactly what we're trying to fight
against. And I'm one of many people who
are fighting the right fight or trying
to write fight the right fight uh in
order to bring attention to the fact
that all human beings should be treated
with respect and dignity. And in
America, under our constitution, all
citizens are entitled to the same um
rights, whether they're Muslim or
Christian or Jews, whether they're black
or white, men or women. It's the same
constitution with the same civil rights
for everybody. And that's not something
you just made off at the top of your
head. This is what Islam teaches. This
is what we learn from when we study this
way of life that we live. A way of life
of peace, of mercy, of tolerance. This
is what it's about. Absolutely. you
know, one of the most important um
elements and really cornerstones of
Sharia and again this word, you know,
it's the sh word. It's the word that
everybody's afraid of, but really all it
means is law. And we talk when we talk
about Sharia in the context of Islam, we
talk about Islamic law. And in that,
we're not talking about some kind of
repressive, you know, uh force something
on someone, but rather when you bind to
Islam as an individual. Um and it's out
of your free will and choice. You are
then bound by certain laws, the laws of
God. And the first cornerstone is
freedom. Meaning the freedom to choose.
You have free will. You know, Islam
cannot be imposed upon you. It cannot be
something that is, you know, there's no
compulsion. One of the cornerstones of
Islam. And so that's the first thing is
that you come to it by choice. The
second is dignity. Human
dignity. Allah subhana wa ta'ala has
made unique and dignified and
enlightened the face of mankind. the
face of humanity, the face of man and
woman. Now you said something in Arabic.
Now there's a lot of uh you know people
who don't understand the Arabic
language. You said this word Allah and
some people already you said Sharia and
can't we equate this to the ten
commandments. Moses came with a Sharia.
Jesus came I mean to confirm the Sharia.
This is simply like you said God's law.
Well absolutely. But we also have to be
smart enough and nuanced enough to
understand that there are Muslims out
there who are part of the problem in
that they put forth a very rigid
structure. Yes, that isn't necessarily
out of it meaning out of a consensus of
the Muslim Muslim scholars. And it used
it tends to be on the far right and that
is what scares many people and it's not
just extreme and intense in its
interpretation but it's forceful in its
implementation and that is what creates
the Sharia scare coming out of parts of
the Middle East and South Asia and
emanating into the west. You said Allah.
For the people out there, they tuning
in. They they think like Allah is some
moon god. You know what is this just a
god of the Muslims?
Jesus being a Semite, Moses being a
Semite, both of them being from the
Middle East. Chances are they refer to
to God using the word Allah or a
derivative of Allah, linguistic
derivative, something like that. Allah
and probably not God, which is actually
a word out of Northern Europe. Yeah. So,
uh Allah again just means God. the one
God that's the same God that Jesus
worshiped Abraham Moses the one God who
created this whole universe and
everything in it in Aramaic you
mentioned that you know Jesus didn't
speak English and I've I've looked this
up you can look this up he would say
aloha exactly and you know it's funny
because just taking on the Jesus uh
example moving forward when we have
issues and instances of racial profiling
and there are many people in America
today that actually argue for racial
profiling saying that look it's the
Middle Eastern guys who commit all the
trouble why would we go after the, you
know, Swedish grandma. And, you know,
one of the things that comes to mind and
usually an argument I give back is that
if Jesus himself was to try to get into
JFK airport or hair airport, per your
own standards, you'd probably detain him
for hours because he'd like he'd likely
be olives skinned, you know, with bushy
black hair, probably wearing a Jillbab,
you know, a long we're showing a picture
right now of what is betrayed of Jesus.
Obviously, it's not him, but what people
betray of him. Exactly what you're
saying, right? And we all know Jesus is
not and was not a terrorist. And
likewise, so are most Muslims, not
terrorists. So it's not, you cannot
profile, you know, racially or
phenotypically, you know, the outside
appearance of someone and say that
that's the only thing we need to look at
or the main thing we need to look at uh
to identify this person as a potential
problem. Rather, it is behavior, it is
track record, it is hard intelligence.
And really, you know, law enforcement
cannot escape the fact that their job is
to look for raw data, you know, hard
intelligence and then go after the
trail. Where there's smoke, there's fire
potentially, but not just after
somebody's looks or somebody's religion
or somebody's skin color. We know that
Jesus I mean, no Muslim is a Muslim
unless you believe and love Jesus. You
can't be a Muslim, one who submits to
the will of God. That's what a Muslim
is, unless you love Jesus. And we love
Jesus and Jesus promoted love. So
where's all this hate? You know, because
if you read the Bible, it says love your
love your enemies, you know, love your
neighbor. So where the Muslim is your
neighbor, your doctor, your dentist. So
where's all this I mean this is not
coming from Jesus. All this hate,
where's it coming from? You know, it's
coming from the inner darkness of
humanity. Um the same place where
goodness comes out of, you know, the
inside of humanity, you know, the soul.
Allah subhana wa ta'ala, God be blessed
and almighty um you know explained to us
through his dean through Islam that he
created mankind with a soul. This soul
has been given the capacity to do good
and the capacity to do evil. It was not
ordained as evil or ordained as good. It
had the capacity for both. Now which one
you end up being depends on what you
choose for yourself in this duny in this
life. And those who purify their souls
end up committing acts of good, being
good. And those who contaminate their
souls end up being, you know, evil and
committing evil. So it's your choice.
And God gives you the the the the
freedom to choose which direction you
take. And that's what life is all about.
So it's the same place, evil and
goodness. It's not, you know, the brown
or good, the white are bad, the black
are good, the this. It's not by race.
It's not by nation. It's not even by
religion. It's by the human soul the
goodness and evil um is decided. And you
know the major war, it's not World War I
or World War II. It's not the Iraq war,
it's not World War II, God forbid it
ever happens. It's the war inside each
and every one of us. And if that war is
won with the right victor, and that is
the good soul, the goodness of the soul,
then there will be peace on earth. Now,
we know that the um Jews were persecuted
at one point, the Japanese, you had the
African-Americans. Is this just the
Muslim's turn now? You know, that
argument has been made and there's truth
to that. Uh, you know, the growing pains
of being a new immigrant population in
America. And I'd have to pause here and
say that Muslims are very diverse.
They're not monolithic. And a good
percentage of Muslims in America are not
immigrants, at least new immigrants. You
know, they've been here for hundreds of
years. African-Americans and other
communities that have come hundreds of
years ago. But the majority of the
Muslim community in America is a young
transnational immigrant community. And
yes, it is growing pains. We've seen
this sort of bigotry and discrimination
that targets a group happen with
Italians, with Jews, uh with Germans in
the past, with Dutch, with the Japanese,
with Latinos, you know, extending into
now. Um, and Muslims unfortunately, like
everybody else, is going through this.
And it's high time that we learn from
our history and stop repeating the same
mistakes. And you know, we're going
through this now. We're going to come
out on top like everybody else did. And
I hope that we as Muslims stand against
this happening to anybody else even if
they're not Muslim whether it be the
Buddhists or Hindus or any other people.
Um we as Muslims stand for equality um
you know goodness civil rights for all
not just for Muslims. Have you seen I
mean you are at the forefront and we
know people we've discussed this on the
dean show so many times we've had
scholars come on and condemn such acts
as 9/11 the Boston bombing you know
horrific acts against innocent civilians
that have happened so now why is it that
usually you know the the laymen they're
like why don't Muslims speak out against
these acts is the media being fair and
bringing on people you know they'll
bring on people who have voiced their
opinion you know strongly not only
against Muslims, Islam, but now on the
other hand, you know, our our is our
voice strong enough because I can
testify we've had dozens of people come
on and condemn such evil acts. What what
is your opinion being on the forefront?
Well, I think condemnations have been
plenty and they've been wide and deep
and many who say that they don't hear
them simply don't go to the places where
they need to hear them. And you know,
I've I've been asked before in speeches
um in conferences on TV, you know, why
don't Muslims condemn this and that? And
I asked the person, "I'm a Muslim
sitting in front of you. I've actually
condemned the very thing of which you
speak now." Now, my question to you, did
you go to my website? No. Did you read
any of my articles? No. Well, then how
do you expect me to let you know that
I'm condemning this? Do you expect a
personal email, a leaflet that I should
drop off in your mailbox at home? I mean
if you don't do the effort you can't
really come and complain and say Muslims
are not doing but having said that my
concern as a Muslim is not so much about
doing the condemnation dance but rather
fixing our own house. We need to do more
as an ummah. We may be doing all right
in the United States relatively speaking
but as an ummah around the world of
Muslims together there are many many
things we need to work on. We are not in
a good place. We need to be in a much
better place in terms of our
understanding of our own dean, our
application of this dean and keeping out
the extremes on both sides. The extreme
far liberal and the extreme far you know
right uh wing groups that contaminate
not just the image of this dean but the
way we live it on a daily basis.
Beautiful. We're going to take a break
and for many people you know this is pro
probably the only exposure they have to
Islam to the prophet Muhammad peace be
upon him. So we're going to end with
this. We're going to come back. But you
know, God, the prophet peace be upon him
said, "Show mercy to those on earth and
God will show you mercy." So this is not
again what I said, something that we're
making up. Islam is deed a merciful way
of life. And we'll be back
to have some more time here spent with
our guest Ahmed here on the Dean Show.
When I read through the Old Testament,
the New Testament, it didn't make any
sense.
Feels like I've walked a thousand miles.
When I looked into the Eastern faith
such as Hinduism and and then Buddhism
and Taoism and whatnot,
uninspired me on my knees.
I agree with a lot of their principles
and ideas, the same with Christianity
and Judaism, but they just didn't strike
a chord. They didn't make sense with me.
But thankfully I've got Islam.
And as a result of such, I I was not a
fan of religion. Was not a fan of
organized religion. And and I took a
very atheist approach towards belief. It
gets me through
trying. Oh,
I could leave work, go have a bottle of
vodka, smoke a pack of cigarettes, have
a double bacon and double cheese
sandwich, and go to sleep drunk and
happy. come to work the next day and I
was miserable. And when I read the Noel
Quran, oh, what do you think about
Christ? What do you think about God? Who
is Allah? Who is Muhammad?
[Music]
With just a little bit of intelligence
and a little bit of investigation, you
can see that Islam is not the boogeyman
that it's been made out to be. My Allah
is the one, the one, the one, one, the
one. I didn't believe in organized
religion at all. So to read the Quran, I
thought to myself, here's another book I
can put on the shelf of fictitious
makebelieve.
[Music]
Took me three nights to read the Quran.
And when I was done reading it, I
remember thinking that it was the first
and to this date the only religious book
I've ever read that makes sense. the one
from beginning to end. It doesn't
contradict itself. It's an instruction
manual for living.
Back here on the Dean Show with the
director of Care Chicago and tell us
Ahmed that you've been on almost all the
major networks CNN, Fox News, which
one's your favorite? I personally enjoy
doing the right-wing shows because
there's more intensity to them. uh it's
more interesting for me. I also like
doing NPR and you know some of the more
reasonable media but there's not much of
a challenge there and I enjoy being
challenged. So I really like doing Fox
News for example. You enjoy I'm really
surprised that they even have you on Fox
News. I mean usually they bring somebody
who has some twisted views about Islam
who's actually doesn't speak any English
and doesn't really uh portray Islam in
the right way as far as you know being a
voice and can't answer the questions
properly. So, you know, when they bring
you on, it's it's also really a shock.
And why don't they bring on credible,
you know, also along with you scholars,
people who've dedicated their life who
are Americans here from I know they
bring on Ibrahim occasionally, but why
do you think they do? Is this
intentionally? I think part of it is, I
mean, Fox News is not exactly an
unbiased source of news. It does have an
agenda. It does have a world view. and
the way they choose their guests for the
most part, the segments that they cover,
uh, the kind of things that they say,
the angle in the show is pretty much
informed and fed by that world view. Um,
you know, I don't feel that they bring
me on by choice most of the time. I
don't feel I'm the first choice. I feel
that, you know, when they run out of
options and I'm readily available, you
know, waving my hand, I'm ready to come
on, um, you know, then they bring me on
or if it's something very much up my
alley and they have really no choice.
But I would wish that, you know, we
could do this more often because it's an
opportunity for me to reach out across
the aisle. And I'm not really addressing
the anchor, whether it's O'Reilly or
Hannity or somebody else. I'm really
reaching out to the audiences at home,
people who don't hear from Muslims too
often, people who watch Fox News in the
red states, who don't have Muslim
neighbors, possibly who may have biased
views of Islam. You know, it's an
opportunity for us to show our humanity,
our intellect, and make our arguments.
Even if you don't agree, then at least
we're breaking stereotypes in the way
we're speaking and in what we're
speaking about and how we're speaking. I
want to go to another clip and I want to
get your thoughts on this. John
Jameson's actions are under evaluation
by County Administrator Robert Weisman
today who told us he is pursuing the
possibility of disciplinary action for
the comments that Jameson made on his
personal Facebook page. There is no such
thing as radical Islam. All Islam is
radical. The Quran is a book that
preaches hate. Now, you got to see this
clip. Now, he didn't just say, you know,
Islam, you know, they've some have
separated so there's radical Islam. He
said, "No, no, no, no." He was like,
"All Islam is radical and this Quran is,
you know, preaching hate and violence
and this is someone who's in public
office. Do you deal a lot with people
like this?" Yes. Because what we're
facing is a cottage industry. What that
means is there's a niche industry that
has developed again mostly after 911 but
going as far back in its origins as the
medieval times as the crusades um in
that and today they're becoming more
sophisticated in their organizing and
disseminating of information but they
remain very primitive in their talking
points and their narratives. One of the
narratives is Islam itself is violent.
It isn't the extreme. It isn't the
fringe. It's the mainstream. It's the
Quran itself. It's their prophet
Muhammad who was a pedophile, who was a
murderer, who was a rapist, who was
crazy, a lunatic, blah blah blah blah
blah. They go to the core of the
religion and start to vilify and
demonize the religion and as such by
extension essentially vilifying the two
billion Muslims around the world. And
that's obviously something that we stand
very much against. We dissect
intellectually to show the problems with
the logic, the the the falsehood in the
allegations historically and in
contemporary terms. but more more
importantly to be as omniresent as the
other side on TV, in newspapers, on the
radio to bring our message out as strong
if not stronger to be able to defeat the
lies that are being spread by these
people. And it usually starts on the
internet. So we have a strong internet
presence to uh you know address this at
its core. I want to shift the blame on
us a little bit because I feel confident
I feel confident. I mean, God Almighty,
the creator is the one who changes the
hearts. But I feel confident if I was to
sit with someone like this, someone who
had these views and I had some lunch
with them, maybe brought him down to my
academy dojo and I did some jiu-jitsu
with him, threw him around, you know,
wrapped him up a little like a pretzel,
all in a matter of fun at the end, had a
really civilized conversation. You know,
maybe he'd even accept Islam because
it's all about worshiping the creator,
not the creation. Doing good, being
good, and being the best that you c can
be so you can obtain paradise in the
next life. and and and and then or he
would walk away being a friend because
he'd understand that all these crazy
beliefs were just based on lies and
ignorance and I think if many of us were
out there sharing the purpose of life,
sharing truly what Islam is about that a
lot of these walls would be knocked
down. What are your views on that? I
agree. I mean a big part of it is
representation and the most important
part is self-representation and where we
fail to do that others fill in the
vacuum with their own um you know very
warped views of who we are and that's
why we're in media that's why we're in
schools that's why we're dealing with
neighbors and with communities and
churches and with government. We're
coming out of what used to be um you
know the shadows for us as a community
and becoming more civically engaged. You
hear this word a lot, civic engagement,
to bring out our voices and our our
humanity to the four so people can know
what we're about and what our religion
is about. Let me just be clear that for
from K Chicago's perspective and care's
perspective, we're not trying to have
people accept Islam. That's not our job.
We're not a da organization. We're
simply trying to fight what we consider
to be very backward uh very um
unsophisticated and very primitive views
on who Muslims are, which we believe is
not just hurtful to Muslims but very
hurtful to America and to the person who
holds these views. You know, I always
say this, hatred is a self-addressed
envelope. You put it in the mailbox,
it's going to come right back to your
home. It's going to hurt you more.
Definitely. It hurts you more than it
hurts me. Yes. It's like holding a
weapon in a war and before you can fire
at your opponent, the weight of the of
the of the weapon, you know, buries you.
That's what hate is all about. And so
hatred is not just something that
threatens us, but it's really a threat
to society as a whole. Definitely. It's
like drinking poison and waiting for
your enemy to die. Exactly. Look at this
quote from the last and final messenger
sent to mankind, peace be upon him. Get
your thoughts on. He said, "Be kind for
whenever kindness becomes a part of
something, it beautifies it. And
whenever it is taken away from sun, it
leaves it tarnished. And and I mentioned
another quote, you know, show mercy if
you want mercy from the creator before
we left out. Again, you know, there are
I mean, so someone is probably like,
look, you're showing all of this now for
good PR. But we know how do you tackle
when we show this? The people get a
different perspective that Islam is
about love. It's about mercy. Islam is
SLM Islam says love all mankind. And we
truly love all mankind. That's why we're
trying to share this message of peace
with the world. Purpose. So now you just
read this. Do people get to see this? Do
they get do they get to see, you know,
these beautiful statements from the last
messenger sent to mankind prophet
Muhammad peace be upon him? No, they
don't. Uh we recently met with a German
delegation of of from law enforcement,
the police in Germany. And they talked
about how they have these outreach
campaigns with Muslims in their cities
where they play basketball and they try
to be their friends in hopes to prevent
them from becoming terrorists or
extremists or radicals. And the question
I posed to them was, you know, that's
not the job of law enforcement. You're
supposed to look for crime. you're not
supposed to deal with the entire
community as a potential criminal. This
is like, you know, the FBI or the
Chicago police going to make friends
with Fabio and Alonso and, you know,
Demetrius and thinking, you know, this
way they're not going to join the mob
one day. Um, so the problem is before
you understand what is wrong with a
community, you have to understand what's
right. and law enforcement, the media,
many other um sources or or many other
consumers of information about Islam
fail to know the normative Islam, fail
to know you and your wife and your
family and me and my family and how we
live as Muslims. They only are looking
at unfortunately most of the time the
underwear bomber um you know the 19 guys
from 911 uh the guys they see on TV
waving weapons and you know yelling into
the camera and they start there and from
there they begin to try to understand
Islam as a religion that's like having
biology 101 be about cancer cells before
you understand that there's a skeleton
there's a muscular you know uh uh system
to the body there's a digestive system
you know the normative body before you
understand all of that which all kids
study in biology you know early biology,
you go straight into the cancer cells in
hopes to understand the full human body.
It doesn't work that way. And so, yes,
there is an impetus and an imperative on
the mainstream. And we have to help
them. It's our role to do so to know the
normative Islam, the mainstream Islam,
the daily Islam, not just in America,
but around the world. And it's peaceful,
it's loving, it's family oriented. It's
not much different from what they would
want for their own families. And then
from there to know what's wrong with,
you know, those who are doing bad
things, which we're more than happy to
admit that we have bad apples, you know,
like anybody else. And we're dealing
with that. And we're not ashamed or not
embarrassed or not in denial of the fact
that there are problems, much like any
other community. But you got to begin
from understanding the mainstream and
separating that and your perception of
that from dealing with the problem. I
showed we showed the uh the individual
who made these statements. We got to go
to break. Before before we go to break,
we showed a statement from the last
foundation prophet Muhammad about
kindness, about mercy. Let's go to the
verbatim word of God before we go to
break. This is so deep. Listen to this.
Worship no one other than God. Be good
to your parents and relatives and to
those and to the orphans and the poor.
Speak kindly to everyone. Establish
prayer and give in charity. I mean, how
can you object to that? It's something
beautiful. It's something wonderful. And
we take strong perception when you call
this book, you know, a book of evil.
It's a book from the creator of the
heavens and earth that calls people to
goodness, nothing but good. There's so
much love in it. Read it. Read it. Read
it. We'll be right back with more with
our brother Ahmed here on the Dean Show.
I started asking deeper questions. The
question I want people to really ask
themselves is when you come back from a
night on the town, you've been drinking,
you've been boozing, you've been
dancing, you've been hanging out with
girls, guys, whatever. Number
one, did you improve yourself as a human
being? Number two, did you contribute
anything to the betterment of humanity?
The amazing thing is is that the most
advanced studies in psychology about
human happiness
show that these are the two key factors
in making people profoundly happy. I
take 5 minutes out of my day and pray to
the creator and none of the creations
and I feel deep internal peace and I
still have my normal life.
conviction.
Somehow the idea got into their minds
that to kill other people is a great
thing to do and that they would be
rewarded in the hereafter. But but
Christians do that every single day in
this country. Do they blow people up in
Yes. No. Christians every day people
walk into post office. I mean people
walk into post offices. They walk into
schools. That's what Coline is. I mean I
could do this all day long. There's so
there are so many more examples of
Christians and I happen to be a
Christian. That's back to this notion of
your idealizing Christianity in my mind
to my read. There's so many more
examples I of Christians who do that
than you could ever give me examples of
Muslims who have done that inside this
country where you live and work. Islam
prohibits killing of innocent human
beings. Human life is precious.
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Hypnotized by a thorn. You ain't
watching for shayan. You watch the
weight you put on. Good. Go do it. Got
my head on the ground and my knees on
the floor and the devil in my ear. Eddie
telling me to trade it for the world. Do
it right now. Don't Don't say tomorrow.
Do it now. Islam is the truth and that's
no ands, ifs, buts, and may. Back here
on the Dean Show with the director of
Care
Chicago and we're talking about some of
the things that you guys are involved in
and defending the civil civil liberties
of the American Muslims living here. And
we talked about, you know, I mentioned
that we need to be proactive in helping
people to understand really what Muslims
are about in Islam, not to be sheltered
somewhere away. and and not to be
ashamed. We're we're many of us now are
not, you know, immigrants. We've been
here, born here. I'm an American Muslim
and my next question is when you see I I
mentioned that you've been on CNN, Fox
News, and all the major networks out
there, but how do you feel when they
bring on so-called experts of Islam that
don't really represent Islam, some
extreme elements, and they'll end up,
you know, having some ignorant Muslims
out there, you know, really extreme.
They'll have these pictures out there
saying behead those that don't accept
Islam. Really ignorant statements, doing
ignorant things, but they take them.
They don't bring on guests that we've
had on the Dean show who've truly, you
know, express what Islam is about, you
know, showing the facts, not the
fiction, but they bring on someone like
for instance, what do you think about
that? Well, that's what we call bias and
it's what we call selectivity and it's
what we call self-fulfilling fulfilling
prophecy. In other words, if you um go
with the scientific method, which is the
way truth is searched in this dunya, um
you basically start with a question. You
don't have any preconceived notions of
the answer. You scour your subject
matter, you research it, and you're
ready for any answer to know the truth.
But in the method that you described, I
already know what I want. I already know
the answer. So now I'm just
cherrypicking evidence to support my
perspective. It doesn't mean the
evidence isn't there. It doesn't mean
they're making up these extremists
because they always tell us, "Am I
making this up? It's true. It's there.
It's right there. Am I lying? No, I'm
not lying. Kalas, it's it's it's true."
Right? But then we say, "Look, you're
cherrypicking this evidence. You're not
lying about it. But by omitting the
other evidence that points in the other
direction, which is in fact the majority
evidence, you are lying by omission. By
being selective, you're denying the
realities out there." Mhm. So people
like these extremists that you know we
just saw in the video and others,
they're rejected by the mainstream. You
saw the uncles and the uncles are not
even as progressive as some of the
younger people. We're going to show this
clip now so people can see what actually
you're talking about. They're going to
show the Muslims are actually chasing
these extremists out. Extremists are
telling them to go.
[Music]
Swear I never make it before my life.
Come here.
I'm taking Do you know anything about
me? Do you know anything about me? We
don't know. Do you know anything about
me? We don't We don't want you. Excuse
me, uncle. You're my
uncle. Get up. Get up. So, as we saw,
you know, these uncles who are often
accused of being regressive and old
country and fabish, fresh off the boat,
you know, they have the presence of mind
and the understanding of the religion.
And I don't mean to sound condescending.
I actually think very highly of them,
but unfortunately, that's the
stereotype, right? But even there they
are actually pushing this guy out and
saying we don't want you. They saying
get the hell out of here. We don't agree
with you. We don't believe in what you
have to offer us and we believe that you
are not following the true path of
Islam. Yeah. So that's something very
important for Americans and other others
to understand is that mainstream
Muslims, mainstream Islamic society
rejects fundamentalism that is
extremist, that is radical, that is
violent, that is basically against the
grain of the prophetic tradition of
Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam.
peace and bre blessings be upon him
which preached love and kindness and
mercy and compassion and justice. No
doubt about it. Justice is a big part of
it but within the bounds of how to
pursue justice. You can't commit
injustice in order to bring about
justice. You can't kill innocent people
in order to avenge or to bring about
justice for other innocent people. It
doesn't work that way. That's not an
Islamic way. That's just uh ven being
vengeful. And Islam is not a vengeful
religion. It's a religion of mercy and
compassion and thoughtfulness. Yeah.
Tell us uh we've seen many horrific acts
against Muslims. You know, the cab
driver got his his throat slit. We see
ma mo m mo m mo m mo mo m mo mo m mo mo
m mo mo mo m mo mo mo m mo mo mo mo m mo
mo mo mo mo mo mo mo mo mo mo moss being
vandalized. People who want to open up
places of worship. They just want to
worship like Jesus worship. They want to
put their head on the ground and pray
only to God to the creator. Those are
that's what a masid is. And people are
having high, you know, they're they're
putting together meetings come coming
down and, you know, hard on people who
are trying to do this. You know, what
are what are what can we do now also for
to protect our ci civil liberties to get
involved, you know, to make a a positive
change and to protect ourselves from
being the victims. Well, we've
identified the problem and what you just
described now is the consequence of the
problem which is selectivity. So when
people only see the negative, when they
only see this guy that we just saw and
others like him, when they only see the
terrorists, that's how they react. Those
with a violent tendency unfortunately,
you know, they attack people, they
commit assault and if not that, they may
just, you know, utter words of bigotry
or hatred um or commit acts of
discrimination. That's a consequence of
the selectivity of only seeing the
negative and reacting to it. So part of
the solution then is to expand the
horizons of the information that's out
there and present the mainstream, you
know, the other information, the
evidence that goes against, you know,
this minority se, you know, selection
that they're only looking at. And we're
talking again about our own lives. We
don't need to engage in a PR campaign in
which we invent something. We just need
to be able to showcase our own
communities, our own history, our own
legacy, our own reality, our own modern,
you know, times and communities today to
show the wealth, the depth, the breadth,
you know, the richness, the vastness,
the the diversity of this community that
isn't monolithic, that isn't just one
big blob of the same thing, that has
much more good than it has bad. And
that's why Islam is so prevalent in the
world today. Unless you want to believe
that human beings by nature are stupid,
it would be hard for you to believe that
two billion of them can choose a
religion that is a work of violence or
preaching violence and hatred. I mean
two two billion people this isn't 200
people. Yeah. you know how did these
people from China to Meritania to, you
know, Spain to America, Canada,
Australia, Brazil, all over the world,
Middle East, Africa, you know, how did
all these people with all their diverse
experiences, you know, their genetic,
you know, differences, etc., arrive at
the same conclusion that this religion
is a good religion for them. It's not
because they're violent and hateful and
because they, you know, they're
psychologically disturbed. To the
contrary, it's because they're seeking
peace and they found peace in Islam.
That's my story. That's your story,
Eddie. That's probably the story of many
Muslims watching today who follow Islam.
They found peace in this religion. So,
that's the message we need to to bring
out is what is Islam and why do we
follow Islam? Because it brings us inner
peace. Brings us inner peace.
Definitely. And I'd like to uh have a
gift for you. Thank you. It's our film
Dunya Taden. And so we we um thank you
for you know all the the audience. I'm
sure really um it was exciting having
you with us. We have so much that was so
we only scratched the surface.
Hopefully, God willing, we can have you
back again in the future. Yeah, we're
not far. We can always pop in.
Definitely. Thank you very much. Thanks,
Eddie. Peace be with you. Thank you. And
that was the director of Care Chicago,
Ahmed, here on the Dean Show. Thank you
for tuning in. Let me just one more
time. This is what we deal. This is what
we're doing in the community. Supporter
of terrorist. I never met before in my
life. Don't come here.
Now, you saw that. We're kicking them
out. We're kicking them out. Islam is
not about extremism. And if you want to
learn more on the subjects of jihad or
terrorism, go to the
deansenshow.com and open your mind. Open
your mind and read and study. We've done
plenty of shows on these topics. But now
you got to get beyond that. Really look
at the basic teachings, fundamental
teachings of what this way of life, this
way of life that was brought by Jesus,
Moses, Abraham. They all came with this
message of peace. Peace acquired by
submission to the will of the creator.
Doing the beautiful things that God
Almighty, the creator has told us to do.
And we're gonna have a a program called
Faces of Terrorism that will go a little
more deep for the people who are still
stuck on this. And really to get our
perspective, we're going to post it on
Facebook. You can like us there. Also
follow us on Twitter and visit us here
at the deanshow.com every week. We're
here with another exciting episode.
Until next time, peace be with you. I am
not afraid to stand alone.
I am not afraid to stand alone if Allah
is by my side. I am not afraid to stand
alone. I am not afraid to stand alone.
If Allah is by my side, I am not afraid
to stand
alone. I am not afraid to stand alone.
If Allah is by my side, I am not afraid
to stand alone.