Raabia Wazir - Holy Moly

 

Having a name like Raabia in eastern Kentucky means I get asked where I am from an awful lot. And not just a simple, "Hey, where you from?" but the slow, drawn-out, skin-squinty-eyed version, "Where are you from?" [audience laughter] And if I am not feeling particularly generous, I say I am from West Virginia. But if I am feeling generous, I say that I was born and raised in Charleston, but my dad is from a small mountain village in rural Pakistan, the tribal area. My mom is a coal miner’s daughter, a little white lady from Mount Hope. So, basically, I am hillbilly on both sides. [audience laughter] 

 

In college, I coined the term Pakalachian. [audience laughter] I made a Facebook group for it too, using a selfie as the profile picture. It did not take off. It was a very niche audience. But I loved growing up in West Virginia. But there was always this sense that you had to leave as soon as you turned 18, get to a big coastal city, go to college. If you could not get there, then just crossing the border to Pittsburgh or Athens or Blacksburg would be good enough, right? 

 

To stay was to accept mediocrity. It was almost like the Ohio River was this natural demarcator between shame and glory. That is probably why I was so pleased with myself when I finally got my first big girl job out of college. I was the national outreach coordinator for a Muslim American civil liberties organization in Washington, D.C. I loved how it looked on paper. I immediately updated my résumé.

 

When friends or family would ask me what I was up to, I would say, "Oh, I am the national outreach coordinator for a Muslim American organization in Washington, D.C." [audience laughter] So professional and glamorous. But in truth, the job was a lot harder than it looked. Being a Muslim activist in D.C. during the Bush years did not exactly open doors. I was stuffing envelopes. I was making fundraising phone calls. I was managing the internship department. 

 

When there was a candlelight vigil, I was the girl hitting up the craft stores trying to find candles. When a windstorm hit that night, I was the person on my hands and knees desperately trying to relight the candles. When there was a dove release ceremony, I was the person that was somehow supposed to find the doves. [audience laughter] 

 

But working there was a really awesome experience. It was a super diverse office. People from all over the country from different perspectives and backgrounds. We had Muslims and non-Muslims. We had immigrants and converts. We had hijabis and non-hijabis. We were all working for this really noble idea of embracing civil rights and encouraging civic engagement. It really felt like we were doing something good. 

 

But after about a year with the organization, I started to feel burnout, which is pretty common in the nonprofit world. I ended up taking some time off to try to figure out what my next step was. So, it is October 2009. At this point, I am basically living in bed with my laptop. [chuckles] I am on the internet. I am looking at a feminist blog, just looking for something to get riled up about, right? [audience laughter]

 

I see our organization mentioned. And I am like, “Oh great, that is awesome. Let us see what they are saying.” But I start reading, and it says the Congressional Anti-Terrorism Caucus has accused our organization of planting spies on Capitol Hill, which it sounds bad, but we are always getting accused of being terrorists. No big deal. But I keep reading. It says that a man, those allegations are based on a statement by a man who infiltrated the organization in 2008, which was when I was there as an intern. This was one of my guys. And so, my heart immediately starts pounding, adrenaline starts pumping, like, “Who is this person?” So, I google his name. And immediately up pops a picture of one of our interns. It was not just any intern. It was my intern from my department.

 

So, this is a white guy. He is from southwestern Virginia. He always seemed really mild mannered and hardworking, even though he was not particularly bright. But he said that he was a convert to Islam. I had offered to introduce him to my mom. So, the article says that not only is he making these statements, but he is putting out a book published by WorldNetDaily. If you do not know, WorldNetDaily is the same website that said Obama was a secretly gay Muslim [chuckles] terrorist who was building FEMA concentration camps. Like, that is the level of journalistic integrity that we are dealing with here. So, I am freaking out, [chuckles] because if there is a book, that means there are crazies reading the book and the harassment is going to start, right? It is happening.

 

So, I call my family and friends. I lock down social media. I start checking the doors and windows, double checking, triple checking at night. Almost immediately, it hits national news. Fox News starts promoting the book. The crazy thing is that the big reveal, these spies on Capitol Hill, was referencing a program to help Muslim students get internships on the Hill, which is perfectly normal. Everybody does that in D.C. But because we are Muslims and doing it, it was suddenly nefarious and scary. And thankfully, we had a lot of big-name, journalists and politicians that stood up for us. My parents, by the way, thought it was hilarious. [audience laughter] They were like, "If you have enemies like these, you are really somebody." They bought two copies of the book. [audience laughter] "Don’t give them money." 

 

I still felt so stupid. Like, all these weird behaviors that I did not catch or just dismissed suddenly made sense. He was wearing a body camera and constantly filming us. Somebody else had mentioned, "Oh, he really loves shredding documents," which was a really boring task [audience laughter] assigned to the interns. I was like, “Okay. He is not that bright. He just needs some time to turn off his brain.” It did not occur to me that he was just taking boxes of paper and putting them in his car. I felt so exposed and scared. I could not get his face out of my head. I remember going into just ordinary public spaces and starting to feel uneasy. 

 

Working with a Muslim American organization, it hardened me to the idea that these right-wing crazies thought I was part of a global terrorist network. But I figured if they just got to know me and got to know all of us, they would understand how silly that is. We are just ordinary people. But this guy knew me and he still thought I was the enemy. So, I was really struggling to try to just minimize this stuff and move on. But that’s the trouble with this kind of crime. Because you do not want to allow these people to have any kind of emotional sway over you. Because if they do, they win. But to ignore the harm they have caused is to let them off the hook. I had already been considering going to law school, but now being a lawyer felt like some kind of armor. I had two choices in front of me. I could stay in D.C. and study international law or I could go back home.

 

My friends were completely baffled. Like, I had just been attacked by the right-wing fringe. Why would I go back to one of the reddest parts of the country? But for me, it was not a matter of red states or blue states. It was this continued faith that if people knew me and I could make connections, I could make a difference. In Kentucky and West Virginia, I was part of these beautiful and intimate communities and I had deep and long-lasting relationships. There is strength and power in that. 

 

As a kid, I thought that in order to succeed, I had to leave. But it became increasingly apparent that in order to become the person I wanted to be and do the work I was called to do, I had to go home. That spring, I submitted my application to the University of Kentucky, and I decided to continue to have faith in people. But I still shred my own documents. [audience laughter]