Donald Trump’s controversial accusations against the Muslim community have only increased since the deadly mass shooting at Pulse Night Club in Orlando, Fla., earlier this month. He even went as far as to accept congratulations via social media for “being right” about “radical Islamic terrorism.” In an op-ed piece for The New York Times, actor and comedian Aziz Ansari chose to speak about how Trump’s rhetoric promotes violence against Muslim Americans and perpetuates ignorant stereotypes.
“Today, with presidential candidate Donald J. Trump and others like him spewing hate speech, prejudice is reaching new levels,” Ansari writes. ” It’s visceral, and scary, and it affects how people live, work and pray. It makes me afraid for my family. It also makes no sense.”
The Parks And Recreation star went on to demonstrate how illogical Trump’s statements are. Ansari points out that when a tragedy occurs at the hands of a white male, in such instances as school and movie theater shootings, no one suggests that white male freedoms be restricted.
Following the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center, Trump made statements such as Muslim Americans “know who the bad ones are” and “were dancing in the streets.” Ansari says unfounded statements such as these “imply that millions of innocent people are somehow complicit in awful attacks.”
Ansari recalls 9/11 very well, and he says there was definitely no cheering. At the time he was in class at NYU and remembers that the building he was in was so close to the World Trade Center that he could feel the ground shake and his heart drop when the planes crashed. He, just like every other American, was trying to contact family, trying to navigate the chaos.
Ansari doesn’t consider himself a religious man, but as a Muslim American man, as a brown man, he identifies with the feeling of having to prove his right to be just as scared by tragedies like what happened in Orlando as any other American. His skin color should not be a factor.