The brilliant Layla Qoran has done an excellent, critical piece on RIT’s ‘It’s Time: #Exout Extremism’ which has received a grant of $149,000 from the US Department of Homeland Security. I found the project deeply disturbing in how it reiterates the War on Terror worldview and reifies the connection between terrorism and Muslimness. I talked to Layla while she was researching this piece and some of my thoughts are included:
Mara Ahmed, a Muslim activist living in Rochester said the ‘It’s Time: #Exout Extremism’ campaign further promoted the idea that Muslims are “waiting to be radicalized, just waiting to be triggered by violence”, unless someone de-escalated the situation. “It creates this very paradoxical situation of Muslims always being connected to terrorism, and yet at the same time Muslims being the primary target of hate crimes and violence in America,” Ahmed said.
More here.