By Tariq Nelson
Some American Muslim Associations have taken on a new initiative to lobby the government to allow more immigration from Muslim lands and stop harassment of Muslims when traveling.
We are all for stopping harassment of Muslims traveling, but is in America’s best interests, American Muslims’ best interests or in the best interests of the Muslim countries that this policy be pursued?
The first and general thing is that it is not permissible for the Muslims to emigrate to non-Muslim countries. I am not going to go through the litany of statements from different scholars throughout the ages regarding this subject as I am sure that many of you have already read and/or heard this before.
That aside, for American Muslims, on the surface it may seem like the best thing to increase the numbers of Muslims in America through immigration, but will continuing to import Muslims from numerous different cultures and differing interests help or impede the continuing development of a distinct American Muslim identity? Or will it simply lead to separate groups of Palestinian American Muslims, Pakistani American Muslims, Somali American Muslims etc, with their own separate interests?
I am of the controversial opinion that increased interracial/intercultural marriage is one of the ways that will lead to a meshing of a singular American Muslim identity. This would eventually lead to more of a blending in this country, culturally and genetically, of the many Muslim cultures as well as the American one. Intermarriage is one of the ways people that were once even somewhat hostile can become one group.
We are seeing native born Americans, of all religions, intermarrying in ever rising numbers, but because of mass immigration in the country the proportion of overall interracial births is still not growing at a fast rate. Why is this? It is because of the mass immigration. Immigrants are much more likely to marry someone from back home, or arrive already married, and it hinders the merging of America's ethnicities.
Now before you call me a Xenophobe (I am far from that) please read and consider all of my points.
Here in America, intermarriage played a major role in melding Anglo-Saxons, Irish, Italians, and Germans into a single white race. These groups did not intermarry before and then they started and now you see that White Americans do not think of themselves as any of those groups exclusively, but as simply American.
One of the most important factors in causing this melding into one white American race were the restrictions on immigration implemented in 1924 that impeded the inflow of potential marriage partners from their home countries, and therefore encouraging the young people to consider people from other white groups. Prior to this, Irish married Irish, Germans married Germans, Italians married Italians in much larger numbers than today and as a result they all saw themselves as different groups with competing interests, but because of intermarrying, they are now one group.
Now let’s take this example and apply it to American Muslims. On the ground, it could potentially make other groups more sensitive to more issues that affect other groups. Using a simple example, let’s take the uneasiness that often exists between Pakistanis and Arabs that even leads to the establishment of separate masjids and enclaves of each ethnic group.
Each group has stereotypes of the other group. Some may be based in truth, others myth, some something in between. In this type of situation, one group spreads one set of facts, to their relatives and friends. From there, the story sweeps rapidly via word of mouth throughout that group’s community. Meanwhile, the relatives and friends of the other group pass around a second set of myths.
Each of these highly biased tales travel along what are primarily family-centered networks. Human beings just trust what their relatives tell them.
Since there is so little intermarriage (as of yet, although I know it does happen) between Pakistanis and Arabs, each contradictory myth moves from Pakistani aunt to Pakistani uncle to Pakistani cousin, and from Arab Father to Arab son to Arab brother-in-law, unchallenged by the other group's perspective because they are wholly separate, living in separate communities, and attending different masjids, their myths remain separate.
Now, think about how a half-Pakistani/half-Arab person might think. He would no doubt find all this troubling, and probably wouldn't pass on either group’s myths to others. Not only that, but he would likely enjoy the foods of both cultures as well as American food etc, etc. And then this person marries a person of a totally different mix and so on and so forth and a melding happens and the result over generations would be people who are descended from numerous Muslim cultures, but having nationalism toward none.
If there were more American Muslim families that contained Arabs, Pakistanis, blacks, whites and other mixtures, then there would be less ethnic conflict, more understanding and strengthen our community. The almost exclusively Pakistani, Arab and African American masjids and enclaves would slowly become more integrated and eventually even a thing of the past by Allah’s permission. So we see a very good example of how a melding would happen.
Still not convinced? Consider this:
According to "Mixed Race and Ethnicity in California" by Sonya M. Tafoya of the Public Policy Institute of California, native-born Californians (where mixed marriages happen most often) are certainly doing their part to merge the races, but immigration is keeping the overall numbers down:
"Multiracial births to native-born mothers rose dramatically between 1982 and 1997--from about 14% to nearly 21% percent, a 50% change."
The problem is that multiracial births to immigrant mothers declined to 7% by 1997. Since 45% of California babies are born to foreign-born mothers, the state's overall rate of multiracial children is stagnating. Further, since much of the state's population growth comes from immigrants, the percentage of multiracial people in California might well also be declining in spite of the growing number of interracial marriages and multi-racial children.
This carries over to native born American Muslim converts, especially whites. If a study or poll were done, I wouldn’t be surprised if you found that some 95% of white American Muslim converts are interracially/inter-ethnically married. This, I think, reflects the growing acceptance of interracial marriage amongst Americans carrying over with the converts. Growing up here also causes the children of immigrants to be more open to it as well.
Many of you, I am sure, know several interracial/intercultural marriages between Muslim couples. Many of you also probably are involved in such a marriage. But I suspect that because of immigration, the numbers are actually probably growing at relatively smaller rates.
Bringing in more immigrant Muslims will only foster the formation of more enclaves that are more ethnically based than Islamic. With this being the case, the American Muslim community will start to become, like much of the Muslim world, divided into smaller and smaller sub-communities based on tribes and clans, each with its own loyalties and specific issues with little to no concern about the other Muslim groups or the Muslim community at large. This is why I don’t see the restriction (not ceasing) of immigration as a totally bad thing.
Many that have been Muslim for a long period of time have seen how things evolve as the Muslims grow in larger numbers. A single masjid with let’s say mostly Indo-Pak and Arabs splits into two masjids: One Arab…One Indo-Pak. Then at the Arab masjid, when the numbers of Palestinians are sufficient, they split from the other Arabs leaving a Palestinian Masjid and a mostly (let’s say) an Egyptian masjid. And so on and so forth. The people attending these masjids live near them and develop ethnic enclaves such as in Bridgeview, Ill, Dearborn MI or on Devon Street in Chicago. How will a distinct American Muslim identity develop from this? Would Malaysia or Indonesia have been what they are today had the Muslim traders that settled there closed themselves off into enclaves?
Is having a bunch of different groups lacking trust for those outside of their particular group our idea of an American Muslim identity? Are we trying to develop a horde of sub-cultures in which almost every sphere of interaction, including business and social relationships, is done with one from our own background to the exclusion of others? Continuing at our current rate will surely keep immigrant groups inwardly focused and closely tied to their home countries.
If immigration were restricted, we would be forced to start getting along with each other and intermarrying. And a true American Muslim identity could then be cultivated.
Tariq Nelson is a Muslim American activist from Tennessee. He recently moved to the DC area.
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