On Failed Democracies

I’d Rather Go Back to Yemen than Face NYPD | Religion Dispatches. A coalition of civil rights organizations just released “Mapping Muslims: NYPD Spying and its Impact on American Muslims” which pulls together what we know of the NYPD surveillance of Muslim communities throughout the Northeast, places the surveillance in a legal context, and more importantly, interviews Muslims to understand the real world impact of the surveillance.

Since Haroon asked: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/news/05/09/columbia_katrina.html Columbia Extends Sympathy and Assistance to Hurricane Katrina Victims The Columbia community is deeply saddened by the magnitude of the pain and suffering that has resulted from Hurricane Katrina. We join the rest of the nation in seeking ways to aid those in need. The University would also like to express its deep appreciation of the extraordinary response efforts by volunteers, state and local government agencies and relief organizations. We in New York City know deeply and personally how difficult and painful a disaster of this magnitude is for the individuals and families experiencing it. As…

I just finished re-reading an interesting article by Kathleen Moore, “Representation of Islam in the Language of Law: Some Recent U.S. Cases,” in Muslims in the West: From Sojourners to Citizens edited by Yvonne Yazbeck Haddad. I quite like this article because it talks about the works of the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) in preserving the civil rights of Muslims. CAIR launches lawsuits on the behalf of Muslims who have faced some sort of discrimination because of their beliefs. This particular article focuses on a few cases of men who were fired/not hired because they had beards, and these…