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How to Combat Classroom Racism

I live in Wales, and a compulsory subject we have to study at GCSE level is Welsh Baccalaureate. The purpose of this qualification is to equip us with essential life skills and knowledge of the world outside the classroom. There are four topics you study and one of them is Global Citizenship. Within the umbrella of Global Citizenship, my school decided to focus on the extremely topical choice of extremism.

While we should be educated about extremism and such things, the lessons should not be a free pass to be as racist and prejudiced as you would like.

There are obvious connotations of Muslims with extremism, and this is something we picked up on in class. As a British Muslim, my friends and I are more than aware that not all Muslims are terrorists, and not all terrorists are Muslims – unlike the common trope. However, my classmates did not seem to be aware of this. One exercise was to look at pictures of various different people who often are judged, such as tattooed bikers, youths in hoodies and hijabi women. My classmates shared their initial thoughts, such as ‘dodgy’ or ‘rough’ but when it came to the hijabi women, their comments became significantly more racist: ‘terrorist’, ‘hiding something’, ‘bomber’.

My teacher then went on to reveal that these were all respectable people such as police officers, students and in the case of the hijabi women – doctors. A few of the more vocal boys said: “well if she doesn’t wear it then you can trust her, she looks way better without it.” This just shows that they don’t understand the point. I am a Muslim yet I choose not to cover up, and this was my choice, just as it’s any other Muslim woman’s choice. The hijab – or other forms of modesty – are not forced upon us. It is a choice.

“There is no such thing as a stereotypical Muslim – they can be anyone, from anywhere.”

The racist comments continued to come throughout all of my lessons, until one day when I snapped. I cried. I stormed out. My fury had been bubbling and boiling beneath the surface until I reached a point where I couldn’t contain it anymore. None of my classmates were aware why I stormed out, or why I had become so angry; they were blinded by their irrational fear and hatred of Muslims that society has ingrained within them. Half of the people who make Islamophobic comments probably don’t understand what they’re saying or truly believe in it, it’s just habitual for many.

A few lessons later, we were discussing whether Muslim women should be allowed to wear things like the hijab or the burqa in public in Britain. More than half of my class were of the opinion that they shouldn’t be allowed because “who knows what they’re hiding”. I raised the point that a hijab is just a form of religious dress, similar to the cross which many Catholics and Christians wear, but I was faced with a wall of racist backlash because “the cross doesn’t make you look like a terrorist”. My teacher then asked me why I felt so strongly about this, and I answered simply: I am a Muslim. Why wouldn’t I?

The racist members of my class fell silent at this, so I took the rare moment of silence to unleash the anger I had been building for weeks. I educated them on why the hijab is so important to some Muslim women, I argued that just because someone chooses to dress modestly doesn’t make them any more or less of a Muslim than me, so did they think I was a terrorist and dodgy?

I’ve never seen my class so silent, but ever since they’ve been careful about what they’ve said, and I’d like to think I’ve changed their uneducated opinions on Muslims. I hope they now realize that there is no such thing as a stereotypical Muslim – they can be anyone, from anywhere.

Finally, I hope they’ve realized that the classroom isn’t a safe space for racist, prejudiced comments – they have the same impact in the classroom as they do elsewhere.

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