1990-07-22 The Burden of Misconception Part 7
 Imam W. Deen Mohammed
 (1990-07-22)
 Location: Video Lectures – Page 1



00:01 Imam W. Deen Mohammed: So they know that you know... If they had a 90th class. If they had a plane so long a second, first class... And there was a 90th class, many of our people would walk by 89th sections to the most inferior seats on that plane to sit by a white person rather than sit by one of their own kind. They'll think that most inferior seat by the white man was superior to the best seat by one of their own kind. [chuckle] I'm telling you, I've experienced this. I experienced this. Not just what I hear, I experienced this myself. I mean what they do, what our folks do. So, I'm working on it. And believe me, I travel a lot and I'm working on it, and I see change. You be surprised how powerful, a thing with powerful effect can just catch on so fast and spread. Oh, it's fast.

00:57 IWDM: So I... Just over the few years I've been doing this, conditions have improved a lot. Oh yes. Two of my most recent trips over the last month... We looked so beautiful and natural on this plane. We were together. African-American, most of us were sitting together. And we've sat by each other, we had the choice. There were other seats; we could've sat by them. We sat by each other. Now this is in a town that's a little better off than most towns, okay? When it comes to racism and the consciousness or that problem of race. That area much better. So maybe that has something to do with it. But I know even for that town, that area, progress is being made.

01:48 IWDM: And maybe a lot of the people I'm traveling with, they travel regularly like I do, and maybe there's a small circle for this particular airline. I'm talking about a particular airline, a particular points of connection. So maybe it's the closeness of us and the few of us that are realizing the benefits of this and just changing so fast. But I'm feeling pretty good, and it's making everybody feel better. Oh yes, it makes everybody feel better. In fact, when they see you doing that, the first thing they wanna do is invite you to sit by them. Yeah. And they want to get next to you and let you know, "I like you too. I like you too." Yeah, yeah they see you like to sit by each other. "Hey, how you doin'? How you doing?"

[laughter]

02:38 IWDM: "Hey, are you going to Memphis?" Or, "next stop Chicago or Memphis?" They wanna open a conversation. They like you. "Hey, hey this is a different fella here." They're ready to socialize with you. Yeah. Now, I knew a boy that... He was kind of a devilish boy. He liked to experiment with things. We had chickens. We raised chickens in the yard in those days when I was a boy. My mother had chickens; she raised chickens. This boy... Roosters, you know, roosters like to challenge each other for superiority, for dominance in the harem or whatever. So, this boy, he was devilish and he came up with the idea to put lime on one of the roosters who had become peaceful. He had stopped fighting. So he took lime and put all over that rooster's colorful feathers and made him look white. And the other roosters, when they saw that, he looked different, so he became a stranger and they started fighting.

[laughter]

03:56 IWDM: And I imagine those other roosters said, "Red is a natural... He's not a member of our society. He doesn't belong in our society." So, when you put color all over you with your mind... When you color yourself white and you sit by a European-American, don't be surprised if they want to beat you up or tell you to get off the seat. Because they see the rooster with lime all over it.

[laughter]

04:30 IWDM: Lime colored all then changed the color. Got them all looking different. "Where this stranger come from?" And don't feel bad when we reject you, 'cause a lot of us reject each other because we recognize that that person is alienated from us. Either because of intellectual arrogance, or social esteem, some grounds for that arrogance in him. He's alienated from us. So we see a foreigner. We around... Come around... We feel irritated too. Frenchman? You ain't French.

[laughter]

05:11 IWDM: Leonardo. You're not Leonardo.

[laughter]

05:16 IWDM: MacMillan, you're no MacMillan, where the hell you get that idea? Suddenly make us feel uncomfortable, right? Make us feel very uncomfortable. We have to return to the excellence of the natural person. The excellence of the natural person. We have to return to that, appreciate that and get the concept that is given by the established people in the fields of knowledge. And for us, we know where to get the concept from. The Quran. Muslims are to get the concept of man from the Quran. The definition of race, if there's any term... I don't know of any term 'race' for Muslims. Groups, yes. Groups, but not... I don't know of a term for race. "Jinns" but not "jinns." The word "jinns" doesn't carry it. It means it has to be used when we want to say race, we say jinns. But it doesn't carry the connotations. It's a different word. It doesn't carry any connotations of race as we understand race.

06:20 IWDM: Now, let's look at something else in the naming. And I'm gonna look at how our time, how our time is going. Yes, I'm gonna try to quickly go to the last topic, the third topic. But before going to that last topic, let us look at something in naming. There's something in naming that we must understand, especially as Muslims. Allah says he taught Adam the names. He created Adam. He created Adam with a capacity to learn the truth. And since Adam had that capacity, he taught Adam the names. So Adam was able to give the correct names. He taught... Now we know there's a lot of philosophy in this, a lot of wisdom in this, etcetera. But we're not dealing with that. We're just addressing it directly and very simply. He taught Adam the names. So we have to understand by that that God created the natural man, natural person, with the naturally based and rooted mind and intelligence, to have authority for naming and giving identity. That man wouldn't give us names that would be against or injurious to our nature.

07:45 IWDM: Alright. I was reading a paper and saw where a man was waiting for execution. He was condemned to be executed, and his last name was Swindler. His circumstances were bad, similar to the circumstances of misfortunate minorities. The poor among the unfortunate minorities. His circumstances were bad. He was a victim of these circumstances, I believe. Maybe he had some other problem I'm not aware of, I don't know, that he inherited. But I believe he was a victim of circumstance and he became a wild, crazy murderer. He murdered more than one person. He was up for execution and hoping to get a stay. They didn't give a stay for his execution. His last name was Swindler. And when I read and got some knowledge of him, of his life, I said, "He was put under a heavy burden by the circumstances and also by the name he was given." Swindler. That's a burden to be walking around called Mr. Swindler. That's a burden.

[laughter]

09:09 IWDM: Now to close this second section of this address, I wanna now just mention how Allah gives us the idea or the picture or the identity of ourselves by addressing us indirectly. Alright. In fair, I must finish the... He did not make you... Or made you nations and tribes that you may acknowledge each other not that you despise each other or stand over each other as superiors. And the most excellent of you if you have superiority, your superiority is because of your regardfulness. Isn't that wonderful? So Allah tells us he made us one common type and the good possibilities for us depend on us respecting the common type and the common essence that he made us and if we have a superiority, that superiority will be established because of us being regardful and more regardful of those that have inferior status to us.

10:24 IWDM: Now we know that regardfulness in our religion first mean that we regard our Lord creator, that we regard him with the regard that is due him. But he also tells us to regard the family ties. He says... And regard, the same word that he used for regard him. It's called a very important, powerful concept in our religion, called Taqwa. It's consciousness for Muslims. Taqwa means consciousness for Muslims. And the same regardfulness he says and be regardful of the family ties. Someone translated, "Of the wombs that bore you." That's how he translates it. Another translates the family ties. It means more of both. Be regardful of how you got here through your mother and also be regardful of the family relations. It means the same. Family relations. And he also tells us to be regardful of the fire, of the fire. We're to have a regard for riskful situations, for danger. There's a lot to be said about that, but let's go on. Let's go on and see if we can get... 'Cause we have the time is short. Yes.

11:51 IWDM: If you be regardful of those things that the common intelligence of people and the common excellence of people respect. You are going to be accepted by them. Yes. You want to overcome social alienation, social rejection, you wanna get acceptance in society? Follow that. Follow that, believe in that, accept that, and live accordingly. You will overcome that. Now because of groups having certain... We have been stereotyped. We have been typed, typed. So right away when they see your color, you fit in that type. So the first reaction may be bad. But if they get to know you, ain't no problem for men of this mind and women of this mind. And when I say men, I mean both, practically all of the time. And no problem for us. I say that because we have another heavy burden of sexism and sex, the concept of sex in there, from sex problems, sex balance and all that kind of stuff. Sex rights and all that. Homosexual rights and everything. It's just so confusing.

[laughter]

13:04 IWDM: So confusing. So if you have that, you can move among any people. Now if they allow you to get there, if you stay there... At first, they may bother your house, maybe a while. Don't know. But if they don't bother your house for a month, you're there, and you're welcome. They'll be proud of you and they'll tell you, say, "Look, I really appreciate you as a neighbor." I've had him tell me that. That's how come I know. They really appreciate you as a neighbor. So we can overcome that with the guidance that Allah has given us in this religion. We can overcome these problems. But why should I want to? There should be a justifiable reason for me preferring to live in a neighborhood of other racial or ethnic groups. There should be a justification for it. My profession orders me to go there, or a better school there. Maybe. But that's a temporary, I would say, justification. That justification shouldn't last long. 'Cause soon as we find that we have to send our children out of one neighborhood into a neighborhood of another people, to a better school, we should at the same time start working on getting a school at home to equal that school.

[applause]

14:51 IWDM: And we shouldn't, we shouldn't wait until we get help from the federal government. We should start working with the means that we got right away to see that we get a school equal to that school that we have to send our child to or the son has to go to or the daughter. We have crossed there among other people that's gonna create many problems. Yes. But we need a common sense human excellence founded, common sense attitude toward these problems in order to succeed, be successful and accepted and respected by many people that are rejecting us now. I do believe that with Islam as our religion, with the Quran, and with the life of the Prophet, following it and perceiving priorities in this religion. That's another problem for us. We have to be able to perceive priorities in this religion 'cause many of us just take on this religion without any perception of priorities in this religion, and we make those things that are really trivial first things, and the things that are major, we make them trivial by ignoring them or being not aware of them. Yes. So I do believe that we can overcome the problem of racism for ourselves, first. Let us overcome the problem of racism for African-American people first. And I think the problem as a real issue will disappear altogether. That's what I believe. I believe if we overcome racism within our own group, the effects of racism within our own group, that the problem of racism externally will disappear automatically.
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	1990-07-22 The Burden of Misconception Part 7	

05/25/15 		Page 1 of 4





