MLK legacy ever relevant

Stacy J. Willis

Monday, Jan. 21, 2002 | 10:43 a.m.

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. may not have foreseen this.

His words are being quoted by a little Muslim girl in Las Vegas, four months after the deadliest attacks on American soil.

She's sitting in front of an American flag, lamenting the prejudices of the day, applying King's message to her own life.

"Some people judge me because of my head scarf. They judge people because of their race or religion. They think we're terrorists because the terrorists looked like that," Samantha Haikal, 11, a student at Omar Haikal Islamic Academy, said.

"Martin Luther King said to judge by content of character, not color or religion or anything else."

On this day, the national holiday honoring the slain civil rights leader, civil rights are receiving renewed attention. Reports of racial profiling -- now of Arab-Americans -- have been on the rise. But few have protested loudly. Absent is the kind of civil disobedience that King made famous in the 1960s -- marches, sit-ins and rallies aimed at ending discrimination against blacks in the United States.

Today a frightened nation is wrestling with the balance between national safety and individual rights -- and many are wondering whether King's dream, a nation without prejudices, is in jeopardy.

"It would be interesting to know how Martin Luther King would have responded to today's concerns," UNLV sociologist Matt Wray said.

Around the nation and in Las Vegas, Arab-Americans say they have been singled out as suspicious by law enforcement, and by neighbors and communities.

Local physician Dr. Raj Chanderraj was removed from an airplane and questioned, he said, because of his Middle Eastern appearance. Abdul Hadi, a casino employee, was harassed by customers because his nametag said he is from Afghanistan, prompting management to change his nametag to say he is from Las Vegas.

"We will have to learn to deal with stereotyping and profiling," Diba Hadi, an Afghan-American and Abdul's wife, said. "I am upset about it, but there is nothing we can do."

Around the nation, more serious acts of racism have cost innocent people their lives -- such as in the case of a Sikh gas station attendant in Mesa, Ariz., who was gunned down evidently because of his head scarf. And routinely, Arab Americans report being stopped by law enforcement, questioned, and even searched.

"The question today is, 'What's going to happen to civil liberties at this crucial moment in history?' " Wray said. "In the 1960s people demonstrated in the streets. Now you have to be very careful that your protests are not received as anti-American. That's a double-whammy for the Arab-American community -- first they are experiencing racial profiling, and second, they are being told that if they protest they are sympathizing with terrorists."

Since Sept. 11 many people have made an effort to decry prejudices -- innumerable interfaith meetings have taken place in which community, and national, leaders have called for tolerance.

But simultaneously, lawmakers are pushing for a broader reach in investigations aimed at catching terrorists before they attack.

"For homeland security, the U.S. Justice Department has asked for an enormous expansion of powers that would effectively make a lot of the activities that the civil rights movement was built on illegal," Wray said.

Mujahid Ramadan, who was raised a Baptist before converting to Islam, said he cannot remember a time since the 1960s when King's message was more relevant.

"Martin Luther King's words are very timely today," Ramadan said. "Because I am African American, I have already been through this type of discrimination. What's new to (Arab-Americans) is old to me. But because I've been through it, I can be here for them."

Acknowledging that the nation does have to be concerned about homeland security, Ramadan asks, "How do you do that and still protect the delicate fabric of the Constitution?"

"We have a responsibility to keep the dialogue open," he said, "to carry forward the mission of Dr. Martin Luther King."