The Fresno City College Muslim Student Association is holding an outreach event every Monday from 11 a.m. until 1 p.m. inside the Senate Chambers of the Student Center.
The meetings are meant to show the truth inside of Islam.
“The reason we even have a club, called MSA is so that we can clear up some common misconceptions about Islam,” said MSA President Afrah Hauter.
According to the group’s vice president Ashwaq Mohamed they do have misconceptions to clear, from the meaning of hijab or jihad to the difference between Islam, Muslim, arab and Arabic.
“We are here for you, we aren’t here to push our religion on you only to help you understand it,” said MSA member Lena Hauter. “The media doesn’t do a good job, they only show it in the most negative way.”
And the way it is shown has affected the way that people are viewed, even as they walk through the streets. According to both Hauter and Mohamed, many club members are born and raised here and only a small percentage have actually been to Arab countries.
“Some people even tend to think that we don’t even speak the language,” said Mohamed. “Just because we dress like this people, tend to think that we aren’t even from here, but I was born and raised here and have never even seen any Middle Eastern country.”
The group plans to educate the college through a series of small lectures on topics such as the different cultures of the many Arab countries as well as the reasons behind and the process of Muslim prayers.
“There are a lot of things that we talk about that we do in Islam, people will say ‘we do that too,’” Muhamed said. “We always look for the differences instead of the similarities, and we have so many similarities that I hope this brings it out to people.”
The members of this club are also attempting to be flag-bearers for Islam on the FCC campus.
“We want people to ask us questions,” said Hauter. “We would much rather people ask us these questions, than ask other people and maybe get wrong information.”
MSA is also in the process of planning an event for April that will, according to both the president and vice-president, bring some togetherness between Muslims and non-Muslims.
“Hopefully this event will bring all students a little bit closer to Arabs and Muslims,” said Hauter. “We would love to introduce people to some culture dances or fashion, so that people can realize that its just not all about religion there is some other things there too.”
In past semesters members of the MSA would speak at sociology classes and take questions. These questions would cover a wide array of topics from why Muslim women cover to how they felt after 9/11.
“A lot of people were surprised to hear that we felt the same way [after 9/11],” said Mohamed. “We were angry, we were so upset that that’s what they did and that they tried to portray it as ‘this is the religion and that is why we did it’, but no it is not the religion. That’s not what Muslims do.”
And many Muslims have had different experiences since 9/11.
“My family came here about four or five months after 9/11 and it was bad,” said Hauter. “We stayed almost a whole year just inside the house and really didn’t leave because we were all scared.”
Although not every post 9/11 experience was negative.
“There were some people that gave us some support,” said Mohamed. “I was in a grocery store and there were a lot of people who were mumbling ‘look at the terrorist.’”
He continued, “But there was one older lady who came over and told us ‘ignore what they’re saying they’re just ignorant don’t worry things will get better’ and they have.”
But the purpose of the MSA is to attempt to give people a new face of Islam and Muslims, other than the one shown in the mainstream media.
“There are all kinds of different stories, which is why we are here with the MSA,” said Hauter. ”But we want people to know who we really are. I could be your best friend or your sister, we could be really close as long as we don’t let that one thing get in the way”
The club is going through a process of changing as its current leaders are all preparing to either transfer or graduate.
“What I hope to see is that there is still some desire to carry on the MSA,” said Hauter “There will be freshman who will come in and they may need the help of this club to understand what the religion is all about.”
