Mohamed Hassan's new book How to be a bad Muslim and other essays is the latest offering by this multi-talented award-winning poet / journalist / podcaster. His interviewer Dr Hafsa Ahmed (a lecturer at Lincoln University) begins with a most sensible starter question "Why this book?". Mohamed wanted to document the experience of growing up Muslim in New Zealand through a personal lens. His family moved here from Cairo when he was 8. There is a lot to unpack - how the Muslim experience was altered by the September 11 attacks in 2001, and the impacts of the March 15 terrorist attack in Christchurch. The whole Muslim world felt the reverberations of what happened here, and it made people question what it means to be a citizen, what it means to belong.
If belonging is a state of being, it is a verb.
Mohamed looked at how the War on Terror was initially a very Western construct, but it is now being carried out in India, China, Myanmar, and even in Egypt. The same rhetoric is used about "cracking down on extremism". 9/11 is "a baggage we as Muslims carry" and even now random searches in airports don't seem so random to a Muslim person. One on his essays tells about working as a journalist at the time of the Sydney Lindt Cafe siege, and how he felt an air of deep discomfort when he entered his workplace. People seems to panic at his presence as a young Muslim man. In a monocultural news media, where everyone is in the same socio-economic bracket - how does it feel to be in a minority group?
There is a sense that as an immigrant and a Muslim, there is a double burden - and you have to continually prove yourself as a "good Muslim" in order to not be considered a "bad Muslim". Hijab, beards, and religious observance are seen as "Bad Muslim", but a "Good Muslim" is almost unrecognisable as a Muslim, and there's nothing in between. Hafsa had a great analogy. If there's a bad driver on the road, do we blame the car company or the driver. Of course, we blame the driver. Yet Islam is continually being blamed and held to account.
Mohamed's book contains an imagined letter from a Customs Officer (based on a real life "random search and questioning" encounter) which shows how everyone in New Zealand had to process grief and shock after the March 15 attacks. "It was like a glitch in time, a rupture" and all of his conversations inevitably turn to Christchurch. "This is a story that belongs to this community. People really had to deeply contemplate their place in New Zealand. People felt safe, then they had to question that. I don't think this is a conversation that has ended. I feel like we are still all processing what happened."
Hafsa asked Mohamed "Where do you think we are now?" He reckons journalists are naturally sceptical optimists, and he was heartened by seeing people come together and try and create a sense of safety for the Muslim community. Every time he returns to New Zealand, he sees our bicultural identity and the use of te reo Māori strengthening and that gives a hopeful example of what our future could look like.
Mohamed talks about the Muslim community in New Zealand. Islam is anything but a monolith culture. Our own Muslim community is made up of people from over 40 different countries. It's a young community for the most part.
A young woman in the crowd asked how to cope when you are being discriminated against. He says "It's not your responsibility to have to defend your right to exist. That's on society around you".
In the context of discrimination seen in viral videos etc, kindness is all very well but "How do we have the bravery that goes along with that kindness."
Society needs to be a place where you know someone will step in.
Photos of Mohamed Hassan event
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Books by Mohamed Hassan
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