Joanna Schroeder suggests that regardless of whether Shaima Alawadi’s murder was a hate crime, her death is still socially and culturally relevant.
U-T San Diego reported Wednesday that new questions are being raised in the death of Shaima Alawadi. ABC News also covers the story in the attached video clip.
I commented on Mrs. Alawadi’s murder two weeks ago, after she was beaten in her home with what is assumed to be a tire iron. She died a few days later, leaving behind a husband and children, including her eldest, Fatima, who is 17 years old.
I also reported about a note found in Alawadi’s home that implied the family were terrorists, and that they should go back where they came from. Based upon that very early information, it seemed that Alawadi’s murder was a hate crime.
Or, perhaps, framed to look like a hate crime.
The new facts emerging, according to the U-T San Diego news, involve eldest daughter Fatima’s alleged displeasure at an impeding arranged marriage, as well as Mrs. Alawadi’s alleged plan to seek a divorce from her husband and to move to Texas.
U-T San Diego reports this about her alleged interest in seeking a divorce, which raises questions about what could have been the true motive behind the crime:
During a search of the home and the couple’s vehicles in the hours after the attack, police found court paperwork to file for divorce in Alawadi’s Ford Explorer. The packet was not filled out, but a form requesting a court fee waiver was filled out in handwriting with Alawadi’s name, address and phone number.
Majhed Alhasan, secretary for the Islamic Center of Lakeside and a close friend of the family, said Wednesday he had never heard that Alawadi had been thinking about a divorce and moving.
“This is the first time I’ve heard of it,” Alhasan said. “About a month ago, her mother, non-married sister and two non-married brothers moved to Texas.”
He said a married sister of Alawadi already was living in Houston.
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What’s not in question is that a 32 year old woman, a mother of 5, was murdered. Beaten with a tire iron, in her own home.
What’s in question, and is in nearly every murder, are the words and testimony of the people near the crime. The family insists there were hate-notes. The neighbor insists they saw a young man running away from the scene of the crime: a young, thin, dark-skinned man.
To further confound matters, daughter Fatima, received a text that, according to U-T San Diego read:
“The detective will find out tell them (can’t) talk,”
To me, this could indicate anything, even just that she was mad at her mom, or that she didn’t want to go through with the arranged marriage she is reported to have been against. But without a doubt, the way it is framed in this article, it seems Fatima had a secret.
People have been rallying around this family. People (like myself) are fed up with racism. And racism does exist—even if it turns out it was not a factor in Alawadi’s death. It exists in many forms: in violence, in institutional discrimination, in systematic disenfranchisement. It takes different forms depending upon who is being perpetrated against, but it exists.
And prejudices exist within all of us. Whether our prejudices are something relatively harmless (thinking people who have cats are weird, for instance), or something more sinister (like assuming someone who is Latino and has tattoos is in a gang).
When we look at someone, what do we see? It seems to be a part of our human nature to see what is different about them, not what makes them our brother or our sister. I grew up in West Michigan, where everyone was Christian, with very few exceptions. When I first saw a woman wearing a hijab (when I was living in Ann Arbor, MI—nearby Dearborn has the largest concentration of Arabs outside of the Middle East), I first saw the head cover, not the woman. It was new to me. And I had prejudices that incorrectly informed me of what her life must be like: oppressed, afraid, cowering to a man.
Then I had the honor of going to UCLA with a very diverse group of people, and learning from them, with them. I learned about the hijab and cultural relativism. I learned about the pride with which many women choose to cover. When we expose ourselves to diversity, we grow and learn in ways we cannot otherwise learn. That’s part of why I love this job at GMP.
Lisa Hickey and I talked for a while yesterday about how challenging it can be to put yourself out there and talk about these things, knowing you’ll probably get it wrong sometimes. I’m a White Midwestern middle-class woman. I’ve never been in the trenches of racism. I might get it wrong sometimes, but I want to learn. Those of us at The Good Men Project agree that we’ve got to try to do what we can to explore the areas where racism exists, and how we can stop it.
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When it comes down to it, there is one thing I know:
The death of Mrs. Alawadi tells us something about hate, and this case is still very much about social justice.
As far as we know, as far as the U-T San Diego article tells us, this crime wasn’t about money, it wasn’t about business or politics as usual. As far as we know, it wasn’t a robbery-gone-bad. According to the theories posited in the original article, it was about either family violence, the role of a young woman in regards to the cultural tradition of arranged marriage, or about anti-Muslim/Arab racism.
More facts from this case will emerge, so we need to wait and see what it actually turns out to be, but what we know is that a woman died a brutal death. One most likely fueled by hate. How could it not be? She was hit in the head with a tire iron at least four times. She wasn’t raped, she wasn’t robbed, her children weren’t kidnapped.
Whether it was simple, rage-fuelled hate or a prosecutable hate crime, Shaima Alawadi’s death is socially relevant. Even if it turns out the only link to racism was a note implying the family were terrorists—faked or real—almost all of us believed it, because we know racism is alive and well in this country. We know notes like this one exist.
And in the case of Trayvon Martin: Whether or not it is proven that George Zimmerman is indeed a racist, what emerges from this case is a wider knowledge of the racism that black men face every single day. We are discussing the judgements made against men of color because of a way they may choose dress, in full knowledge of the fact that a white person in the same clothes wouldn’t face those same judgements. We are talking about the national disenfranchisement of black men, about the massive gap in education relating to gender and race. The general population cares, even if just for a moment, about the lives of young black men.
If the case of Trayvon Martin were an isolated incident, were there no other innocent young black men slain by police or neighborhood watches, this case wouldn’t have the cultural impact it has had. It impacted us because somewhere inside, we’ve always known that racism is still very much alive. Regardless of what we learn about George Zimmerman, Trayvon Martin must continue to live within each of us, just as Shaima Alawadi must live within us (because nobody deserves to die like that, regardless of motive), and cause us to fight for real change.
Because we know the hate is real.
Exactly Tom, and that’s exactly why the “manosphere” has erupted over the last few years- it’s a specific reaction to this type of overt media and cultural bias. So, in a case like this accusations are made, and discussions take place about how racist we are as a country and how we’ve got to change our ways, but when it’s determined that the case might not have been racially motivated there is no retreat from the original position, and no apology for jumping to conclusions.
So when the facts turn out to say something other than what “we know” that “racism is alive and well in this country,” we can throw out the facts and place in their stead what “we know.” In the same week, we had three examples of spurious or highly questionable accusations of racially or religiously motivated attacks that were claimed to be committed by whites against non-whites: the Trayvon Martin case (which has given us the curious and novel neologism “white hispanic”), the Shaima Alawadi case (which is starting to look more and more like a garden-variety honor killing, yet… Read more »
With all due respect- Islamophobia is NOT racism- as Muslims are a religious group and not a racial one!
Terry
Well looks like my thug walk idea wasnt bad. Anyway semantics; muslims arent a race, they are people who follow a religion. One thing i have been able to do with people is talk to them. Depending on how much they integrate, it can be hard for a man to talk to a Muslim woman. One woman who I met was uncomfortable with me. One thing that makes it easier is interest. People are impressed when a foreigner does show some kind of interest you can introduce yourself with this: “Marhaba, asmi Ju’ana/Yuwanna”.
No, you’re 100% right that Muslim isn’t a race, it’s a religion and culture. There really are only three “races” but we classify many different ethnicities as races in practical use, including Middle-Eastern, Arab, etc. There’s an intersectionality to hate/prejudice against Muslims… Of course the races and ethnicities within the Muslim and Islamic religion is incredibly diverse, so you can’t say it’s simply anti-Islam, or anti-Arab, or anti-North African or anti-South Asian, etc… They’re so interconnected that I made the choice to say “Racism” when in fact it is something more complex and dynamic than that. When you think that… Read more »
Also, of course I know this is obvious, but for anyone who doesn’t know, race is 100% a social construct and not a biological distinction. Genetically, I can be closer to a dark-skinned woman whose family originates in Africa than I would be with a blonde who looks like she could be my sister but whose family originated in rural Finland. I mean, just as an example.
I feel sick.
I just spent nearly half an hour typing a response here. Then suddenly this page just auto-refreshed, out of nowhere. My long, thoughtful comment is gone. Completely wiped away.
Why does Good Men Project have an auto-refresh coded into its pages? It is one of the most reader-unfriendly (and certainly commenter-unfriendly) “features” a site can foist onto its guests. Most sites learned years ago to eliminate it from pages with comment forms.
I’m irritated as hell right now. I was about to bookmark the site; now, I won’t be coming back.
TD, I’m so very sorry that happened to you. I know it’s no consolation now, but many of our readers have found that if they scroll to the bottom of the page, their comment is still there, just no longer in the “reply”. I had that happen to me when I first started reading here too (well before I became a Senior Editor), and honestly I think I stomped my feet and screamed. I was SO pissed. I feel your pain. Please trust me that we’re actively working on a way to prevent the auto refresh from deleting comments. I… Read more »
Good points…How is it to live in someone else’s skin? Do you remember that movie “Watermelon Man”? It’s about a white man who suddenly wakes up black and his whole life has turned upside down…one unexpected response was from the Swedish bombshell in the office who ignored him before and now suddenly is intrigued by him….! What would happen if we all put on a hijab and spoke Arabic and tried to live our lives obeying those cultural dictates? Would we be rejected from people in our lives: at work, at home, or at school?
“And racism does exist—even if it turns out it was not a factor in Alawadi’s death. It exists in many forms: in violence.” Sure, racism and hate crimes are something that most people would like to see eradicated and it is sad a person has been killed, but you are speaking on one hand as if the link is established in Alwadi’s case and then admitting it isn’t established. There is a tenuous link due to the note but you concede it may be faked. Someone of an ethnic minority being murdered doesn’t make it a hate crime nor culturally… Read more »
It may not be race-based, but it is culturally relevant for all of the reasons I listed above. Even if it turns out she was murdered by a serial killer who chose her home at random (as opposed to being linked to her wanting a divorce, her race, or her daughter not wanting to go along with an alleged arranged marriage), it’s still culturally relevant because we all know that there is anti-Muslim sentiment in this country right now. Because that sentiment does exist, the idea of the note is incredibly plausible. The people of her community, women who wear… Read more »
Here’s someone fighting for real change:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A–dNCkr8co
If it ever becomes morally acceptable to use violence to force people to “go back where they came from,” then all European Americans are in big, big trouble. This gives Native Americans the green light to do likewise to all white folks. Hawai’i could then go back to being a Polynesian kingdom. Don’t anyone think this is really about “Americans” versus “immigrants.” Take a long view back to 1492 and it looks even more idiotic than it is already.