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Info: Children's Book: What Color is my Hijab? 

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Info: Children's Book: What Color is my Hijab? 

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Issue: Article: Islamophobia: Bullying in Schools

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Issue: Article: Islamophobia: Bullying in Schools

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Muslim students have been victims of high levels of Islamophobic sentiment, and Islamophobia in U.S. public schools is a prevalent and ongoing problem, according to a recent report by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

Interviews with 700 Muslim students in schools in the state of California found high levels of Islamophobic bullying, harassment and discrimination by peers and adults, including teachers.

"Muslim students of all ages have been ostracized and mistreated in the past because of their faith and perceived, yet clearly false, association with 9/11 and other acts of terrorism," said Amr Shabaik, the civil rights managing attorney for CAIR's California chapter, which conducted the study.

"Often, such events manifest in the form of bullying by other students, lack of preventative and reporting measures by school officials, and insufficient training for educators as to how to mediate or de-escalate religious, racial and ethnically charged bullying," Shabaik told Anadolu Agency (AA).

The report said nearly half of the students, 47.1%, reported being bullied for being Muslim. That is more than twice the reported national average of 20%.

"I was constantly called Osama bin Laden by the same guy who would tell me that I looked bomb with a big emphasis on the word bomb," said an 18-year-old female student from Brentwood who was interviewed for the survey, referring to the ringleader behind the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

More than half of respondents, 55.73%, reported feeling unsafe, unwelcome or uncomfortable at school due to their Muslim identity, the highest reported level since CAIR-California began doing the survey in 2013.

The report goes on to document that nearly one in three students, 30.12%, who wear a hijab or headscarf reported that it was tugged at, pulled or offensively touched.

"People have verbally abused me for being Muslim," a young woman, 18, from Redwood City told the survey. "(They) mocked me and Islam and I have had my hijab pulled off by a classmate for no reason."

The report also found approximately one-third of students experienced or witnessed some form of cyberbullying.

One of the more disturbing findings indicates that nearly one in four respondents, 23.50%, reported that a teacher, administrator or other adult at their school made offensive comments about Islam or Muslims.

"A 16-year-old female public school student from Orange County reported that her 'teacher attacked (her) in front of (her) class,'" said Shabaik. "Saying things like 'terrorist' and 'you don't belong here.'"

Islamophobia 'mainstreamed'

"Islamophobia has been in existence for centuries," said professor Zahra Jamal, the associate director of Rice University's Boniuk Institute for Religious Tolerance.

She told Anadolu Agency that discrimination against Muslims rose to more extreme levels after the 2001 attacks in the U.S.

"After 9/11 and the rise of the Islamophobia industry, negative portrayals of Islam and of Muslims became more mainstream and codified in media, law, politics, education and pop culture," said Jamal. "This has undoubtedly played a role in Muslim students' experiences with bias and discrimination."

Jamal said the survey's findings are consistent with a nationwide poll taken in 2020 that found 51% of Muslim students in kindergarten through 12th grade public schools faced religious bullying.

"Children face verbal abuse including name-calling, such as being called a raghead, sand N-word, terrorist or child of bin Laden," said Jamal. "Some deal with insults against the faith of Islam often linked to 9/11 or ISIS (Daesh) and are subject to rumors that they are bombmakers."

Psychological scars

Jamal explained that bullying and racism have far-reaching effects, including emotional, physical and even social consequences.

"Some young Muslims experience anxiety, depression, insomnia and low esteem, while others feel they must choose between being American or Muslim at school," she said, citing the survey. "Sadly, 55% feel unsafe at school because of their faith ... 32% hide their Muslim identity, and 20% skip school because they feel unsafe and unwelcome at school."

To reverse the negative trend of Islamophobia in schools, Jamal stressed that the culture of stereotyping Muslims as terrorists needs to change.

"It is factually and ethically wrong because it perpetuates a 'clash of ignorance' between Muslim and Western societies," she said. "Rather than learning from, respecting and engaging our God-given differences, people are increasingly divided over them. We desperately need to fill these knowledge deficits."

Jamal believes the only way to change the outdated stereotypes is through education, which starts in schools, where children are supposed to learn about cultural diversity and acceptance.

"As a world, we are diverse but divided," she said. "We need to recognize that discrimination against Muslim school children is part of broader national and global trends."

"We know that pluralism education promotes peace, prosperity, progress and innovation," said Jamal. "We also know that quality pluralism education is most effective on every individual and societal indicator when delivered in early childhood development years from conception to age 6."

In a perfect world, there would be no discrimination, no bullying, no hate. Jamal said the only way to move in the right direction is for all facets of society to work together to try and achieve that goal.

"It would be amazing if governments, corporations, philanthropists, grassroots organizations and civic groups could collectively work toward massive investments in quality early childhood education and holistic development programs centered on pluralism education, moral reasoning, and a cosmopolitan ethic that honors individual identities and collective collaborations," she said.

"If it takes a village to raise a child, then it takes a global village to save all our children ... and their future generations."

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Islamophobic bullying rampant in US schools: Report

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Muslim students have been victims of high levels of Islamophobic sentiment, and Islamophobia in U.S. public schools is a prevalent and ongoing problem, according to a recent report by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Interviews with 700 Muslim students in schools in the state of California found high levels of Islamophobic bullying, harassment and discrimination by peers and adults, including teachers.

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Issue: Article: What it meant to be a Muslim in America after 9/11

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Issue: Article: What it meant to be a Muslim in America after 9/11

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As we near the 20-year anniversary of the September 11th attacks, many Americans are reflecting on that moment and its fallout. For Muslim Americans, that fallout included a rise in Islamophobia.

Hate crimes against Muslims spiked 500 percent from 2000-2009, according to data from Brown University.

And on a state and federal level, surveillance programs like the Bush administration's registry of people from Muslim-majority countries led to the detention of thousands.

Our panel of experts reflects on the anti-Muslim discrimination following 9/11 and what change still needs to happen.

Asad Dandia, Rozina Ali, and Professor Deepa Kumar join us for the discussion.
Like what you hear? Find more of our programs.

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What It Meant To Be Muslim In America After 9/11 : 1A

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As we near the 20-year anniversary of the September 11th attacks, many Americans are reflecting on that moment and its fallout. For Muslim Americans, that fallout included a rise in Islamophobia. Hate crimes against Muslims spiked 500 percent from 2000-2009, according to data from Brown University.

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Issue: Map and Article: Attacks on Mosques Nation-wide 

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Issue: Map and Article: Attacks on Mosques Nation-wide 

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[Updated December 2019]

In recent years, anti-Muslim sentiment has spiked. Although these sentiments manifest themselves in many ways, attacks on mosques directly take aim at religious freedom. Existing and proposed mosque sites across the country have been targeted for vandalism and other criminal acts, and there have been efforts to block or deny necessary zoning permits for the construction and expansion of other facilities.

Below is a map highlighting anti-mosque incidents across the country since 2005. If you are aware of an anti-mosque incident not on this list, please contact us.

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Updated December 2019]In recent years, anti-Muslim sentiment has spiked. Although these sentiments manifest themselves in many ways, attacks on mosques directly take aim at religious freedom.

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Issue: Article: Conflict in Myanmar, a Majority Buddhist Country

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Issue: Article: Conflict in Myanmar, a Majority Buddhist Country

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Buddhism is one of the world’s largest religions and originated 2,500 years ago in India. Buddhists believe that the human life is one of suffering, and that meditation, spiritual and physical labor, and good behavior are the ways to achieve enlightenment, or nirvana.

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The Evolution of Buddhism in Japan | PBS LearningMedia

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Learn how Buddhism, founded in India, evolved to a more populist form in Japan in this video adapted from Sacred Journeys with Bruce Feiler. The monk Kobo Daishi, who studied the Buddhist path to enlightenment in China, brought a new form of the religion, known as Shingon Buddhism, to Japan about 1,200 years ago.

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Pew Research Center's Religion & Public Life Project

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There are about 488 million Buddhists worldwide, representing 7% of the world's total population as of 2010. The three major branches of Buddhism in the modern world are Mahayana Buddhism, Theravada Buddhism and Vajrayana (sometimes described as Tibetan) Buddhism. While affiliation with particular branches of Buddhism is not measured in most censuses and surveys, Mahayana Buddhism is widely believed to be the largest, because it is prevalent in several countries with very large Buddhist populations, particularly China, Japan, South Korea and Vietnam. Theravada Buddhism, the second-largest branch, is concentrated in such countries as Thailand, Burma (Myanmar), Sri Lanka, Laos and Cambodia. Vajrayana Buddhism, the smallest of the three major branches, is concentrated in Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan and Mongolia. The Buddhist population figures in this study also include members of other groups that identify as Buddhist, such as Soka Gakkai and Hoa Hao.

Buddhism began in Asia, and the vast majority of all Buddhists (nearly 99%) still live in the Asia- Pacific region. Only two other regions - North America (3.9 million) and Europe (1.3 million) - have more than 1 million Buddhists.

Although the majority of Buddhists live in Asia and the Pacific, only about one-in-eight people (12%) in that region are Buddhists. About 1% of North Americans are Buddhists. In each of the other four regions, Buddhists make up less than 1% of the population.

All 10 countries with the largest Buddhist populations are in the Asia-Pacific region, and these countries collectively are home to the lion's share (95%) of all Buddhists. Half (50%) of the world's Buddhists live in one country, China. The largest Buddhist populations outside China are in Thailand (13%), Japan (9%), Burma (Myanmar) (8%), Sri Lanka (3%), Vietnam (3%), Cambodia (3%), South Korea (2%), India (2%) and Malaysia (1%).

Seven countries have Buddhist majorities: Cambodia, Thailand, Burma (Myanmar), Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Laos and Mongolia.

Globally, Buddhists are older (median age of 34) than the overall population (median age of 28). Of the three regions for which data are available, sub-Saharan Africa has the youngest Buddhist population (median age of 29), followed by North America (33). The Asia-Pacific region has the oldest Buddhist population, with a median age of 34.
Footnotes:
Buddhists are older than the general population in two of the three major regions for which data are available: sub-Saharan Africa (where Buddhists have a median age of 29 and the general population has a median age of 18) and Asia and the Pacific (34 vs. 29). In North America, the median age of Buddhists is 33, four years younger than the general population (37).

12 Alternatively, some scholars consider there to be two main Buddhist branches - Mahayana and Theravada - and classify Vajrayana as part of the Mahayana branch. Other schools within the Mahayana tradition include Zen, Nichiren and Pure Land. See, for example, Williams, Paul. 2008. "Mahayana Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations." Routledge. (return to text)

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There are about 488 million Buddhists worldwide, representing 7% of the world's total population as of 2010. The three major branches of Buddhism in the modern world are Mahayana Buddhism, Theravada Buddhism and Vajrayana (sometimes described as Tibetan) Buddhism.

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Silicon Valley, a region of central California, is a major economic center and home to many companies that specialize in technology like the internet, computers, social media, and more.

Over the last decade, many of these companies have heavily invested in trainings in "mindfulness," which is the English name for a diverse set of Buddhist religious practices that have a history going back thousands of years. In particular, the forms of mindfulness promoted by these companies are influenced by 20th century Theravada Buddhists in Myanmar and Zen Buddhists in Korea. Because of Silicon Valley's economic, political, and social power, this approach to mindfulness has spread rapidly. The mindfulness industry is now worth over $1 billion in the US, and corporations like Monsanto, Goldman Sachs, General Mills, and Aetna have joined Silicon Valley in offering mindfulness training. Some estimate that 20% of US companies now teach mindfulness, and many of them fund mindfulness training in public schools. Even the US military has used mindfulness to calm soldiers before they are sent into combat.

In Silicon Valley, major companies including Google, Facebook, and Twitter have adopted mindfulness practices. Companies have claimed meditation is a "technology," and they market this technology to tech-savvy consumers under trendy names. Jon Kabat-Zinn offers "mindfulness-based stress reduction," Kenneth Folk promotes "open-source enlightement," Google talks about "neural self-hacking," and Soren Gordhamer developed "Wisdom 2.0." In 2010, Gordhamer started an annual event to discuss mindfulness in tech companies, also called Wisdom 2.0, which has drawn thousands of high-powered CEOs and tech workers. In 2011, Google invited celebrated Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh to Google's headquarters to lead mindfulness practice. Many companies claim mindfulness trainings have reduced employee stress and increased productivity and profits. However, studies with control groups are inconclusive in proving these claimed benefits.

While many trainers in Silicon Valley acknowledge that mindfulness is a Buddhist practice, they also claim to remove religion from it. They often characterize their programs "Buddhist-inspired," making the connection to Buddhism while reassuring their largely non-religious audience that they are not promoting religion. For example, Kenneth Folk described Wisdom 2.0 as "a networking opportunity with a light dressing of Buddhism." Some question if corporate mindfulness is Buddhist at all; companies usually claim that these trainings are "secular," even when they bring in well-known Buddhist leaders for trainings. However, some Buddhists claim that "secular" mindfulness is "stealth Buddhism," which allows Buddhism to be exported to businesses, schools, and hospitals without accusations of proselytizing.

Despite support from some prominent Buddhists, other Buddhists are concerned by the proliferation of these mindfulness practices. At the 2014 Wisdom 2.0 conference, Buddhist practitioner Amanda Ream and other members of a local meditation center protested the event. They called attention to the hypocrisy of the nation's richest CEOs discussing an escape from suffering for themselves while they were causing suffering for poorer Americans through gentrification in central California. Security removed the protestors without their concerns being addressed. Ream later wrote that true dharma "directs us to feel the suffering of others."

Ream's protest was one example of some Buddhists' concerns about mindfulness in the tech world. Several prominent Buddhists have accused companies of promoting "McMindfulness," meaning the values of neoliberalism instead of Buddhism's call to end suffering. Neoliberalism is a dominant economic philosophy in modern American industry that promotes profit-driven, free market capitalism in which workers are responsible for their own well-being. From this perspective, individuals can "choose" between being stressed and sad or being happy and healthy. McMindfulness enables this view by offering a technology workers can ostensibly use to choose health and happiness. However, Buddhist critics claim that this use of mindfulness only shifts the blame for stress onto the employees and discourages them from questioning stressful working conditions. Plus, Buddhist critics note, Silicon Valley profits from mindfulness as a solution to problems it is partially responsible for creating. These Buddhists worry that Silicon Valley is funding McMindfulness because it teaches workers to be "unquestioning consumers" and "compliant" workers. Buddhist monk Bhikku Bodhi noted, "Absent a sharp social critique, Buddhist practices could easily be used to justify and stablize... consumer capitalism." In his view, mindfulness has become a "handy buzzword" to sell products.

With billions of dollars in funding from Silicon Valley and American consumers, mindfulness has impacted Buddhism worldwide. Historically, many Asian Buddhists have focused on ending suffering, destroying the self, and escaping from samsara, but American Buddhists have increasingly focused on mindfulness for personal, inner healing rather than future liberation. Asian Buddhists have begun to similarly emphasize mindfulness in new ways, reflecting the growth of Buddhism in the West and transforming the tradition as it encounters new cultures.
Buddhism Case Study - Technology 2019

Additional Resources

Primary Sources:

* Google video on well-known Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh's visit to their corporate headquarters in 2011: https://bit.ly/1yKInY1.
* CNBC video of Google's chief mindfulness expert teaching corporate mindfulness on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (2013): https://cnb.cx/2VG9yT0
* Huffington Post article by company founder Arianna Huffington on the money to be made from promoting mindfulness (2013): https://bit.ly/2RaKUeH
* Editorial by Zen Buddhist teacher David Loy on the dangers of "McMindfulness" (2013): https://bit.ly/2kI9vHO
* Amanda Ream on disrupting Wisdom 2.0 (2014): https://bit.ly/2RhyBxe.
* Editorial by journalist Kevin Williamson critical of corporate mindfulness (2018): https://bit.ly/2GYjx2G
* Editorial by Buddhist scholars Ronald Purser and Edwin Ng critical of corporate mindfulness (2015): https://bit.ly/2C2GyvJ

Secondary Sources:

* RLP video explaining the concept of neoliberalism (2018): https://bit.ly/2TuwYZx
* NPR radio program on Wisdom 2.0 and the 2014 protests: https://n.pr/2GVF4Jj
* Wired article on the importance of mindfulness to Silicon Valley CEOs and employees (2013): https://bit.ly/2d0Eiek

Discussion Questions

* Why might Buddhists have such diverse views on the spread of mindfulness in corporations?
* What is neoliberalism? Why do some Buddhists see corporate mindfulness as a neoliberal tool?
* Why might corporate mindfulness trainers continue to teach the Buddhist origins of their trainings, while still claiming to be "secular"?
* Is corporate mindfulness Buddhist? Who gets to decide what is Buddhist and what is not?
* Watch the CNBC video of a corporate mindfulness training. How might you imagine different Buddhists would responds to this video? What about their cultural context might cause them to respond differently?
* Compare the two Huffington Post articles by Arianna Huffington and David Loy. Where do they agree and where do they diverge?
* Why has mindfulness become common in public schools? Why are some people concerned about this trend?

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Over the last decade, many of these companies have heavily invested in trainings in "mindfulness," which is the English name for a diverse set of Buddhist religious practices that have a history going back thousands of years. In particular, the forms of mindfulness promoted by these companies are influenced by 20th century Theravada Buddhists in Myanmar and Zen Buddhists in Korea.

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Issue: Article: Responding to Anti-Asian Hate 

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Issue: Article: Responding to Anti-Asian Hate 

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One by one, the Buddhist priests bowed before the altar at the Higashi Honganji Buddhist Temple in Little Tokyo, wearing robes of yellow, orange and black.

Accompanied by the chanting of the Heart Sutra in Korean, they dipped a paintbrush into a bowl of golden lacquer to gently fill in the cracks of a white ceramic lotus that had been handmade for the occasion.

The ritual, which took place last May, was drenched in meaning. The lotus flower represented the purity and potential of the Buddha's awakening. The repairing of the cracked ceramic lotus, a Japanese art known as kintsugi, was a symbol of the collective effort to heal the wounds of religious bigotry.

Here, just 49 days after the March 16, 2021, killing of eight people in an Atlanta-area shooting rampage, including six women of Asian descent, was a symbolic effort to turn brokenness into beauty.

The timing was also significant: The 49th day after death represents the end of the bardo, an intermediate stage between life and rebirth in some Buddhist traditions.

For the record:

An earlier version of this story suggested May We Gather was the first event to draw together followers of every major school of Buddhism for the first time since the tradition was founded. It was not.

The ceremony was part of May We Gather, a historic event that drew together followers from all schools of Buddhism.

"I had never seen anything like it before, and I don't think there has been anything like it before," said Indigo Som, co-director of the Asian American Buddhist Working Group, which formed a year ago. "It was a specific response to an attack on our community that was multi-lineage, pan-Asian and pan-Buddhist."

May We Gather served another purpose: helping to jump-start a conversation among a diverse population of Buddhists about how leaders and institutions can respond to the anti-Asian violence that has long been part of American history, and which has been exacerbated by the pandemic over the last two years.

"So much of what has happened after the event is the acknowledgment that there is this shared experience, and that we have all, in different ways, confronted racism and white supremacy in America," said Nalika Gajaweera, a research anthropologist at the Center for Religion and Civic Culture at USC. "We may not respond in a coherent voice, but we're having a conversation."

Scholars say the history of anti-Asian violence in the United States has long been intertwined with anti-Buddhist sentiment. As a non-Christian faith, it was considered heathen, pagan and anti-American when it was introduced to the United States by Chinese laborers in the 1850s.

In the years after the Civil War, Asian Americans were denied voting rights in part because they were seen as too different - including their spiritual traditions - to be assimilated into American culture. In the 1940s, Japanese Buddhist priests were classified as a threat to national security in the prelude to America's entry into World War II.

Funie Hsu, a professor of American Studies at San Jose State University, said that another type of anti-Asian violence occurred during the 1960s and subsequent decades, as counterculture Westerners, rejecting a society they viewed as corrupted by materialism and militarism, turned to Eastern religions to seek enlightenment. As Buddhist books, magazines and retreat centers began to highlight the work of white converts, and spiritual rebels such as Jack Kerouac popularized the ideal of the wandering, truth-seeking "dharma bum," some Asian Americans felt marginalized in their own hereditary religion.

"In my experience, the way that Asian Americans have suffered racism the most in the United States is not only through hate and exclusionary laws, but by erasure and invisibilization," said Mushim Patricia Ikeda, a teacher at the East Bay Meditation Center in Oakland who spent 25 years trying to build bridges between hereditary Buddhist communities and largely white convert groups. It was an effort that she said largely failed.

Asian and Asian American Buddhists have been victims of religious hate in recent years as well. Buddhist temples were vandalized, including six in Santa Ana and Westminster and one in Little Tokyo, after the start of the pandemic. At one temple in Santa Ana, a person spray-painted the word "Jesus" on a stone statue of the Buddha.

"The damage to property is not what keeps us up at night or what bothers us the most. It's the hate crime in itself and the negative impact to interfaith relations in our community," the Venerable Vien Hay of the Dieu Ngu Temple, one of the vandalized temples in Westminster, told The Times at the time.

"The history of Buddhism in America is confronting anti-Asian violence," Hsu said.

As Asian American Buddhist leaders grapple with the current wave of violence in the wake of the pandemic, many are turning to lessons from their history and religion to inspire resilience in their sanghas, or communities.

"Policy and political solutions are important, but in the face of the suffering people are experiencing, tending to their spirit and giving them fortitude is probably the most important thing religion can do," said the Rev. Cristina Moon of Daihonzan Chozen-Ji International Zen Dojo in Honolulu.

One way to do that is to help individual Buddhist communities remember the courage and drive that it took for their predecessors to come to America and make a better future for themselves in the face of discrimination and violence, she said.

"Just reminding people that we've been through tough times before and we persevered by holding on to who we are and staying true to that faith," she said.

Som, who co-facilitates the Asian American Deep Refuge Sangha at the East Bay Meditation Center, agreed.

"Asian Americans and Asian American Buddhists specifically have been under attack the whole time we've been in this country, and there's a whole story about people being pressured to convert to Christianity to be 'more American,'" she said. Maintaining the dharma - Buddhist teachings - maintaining the faith, and maintaining a temple is "already pushing against the violence, the erasure and the racism."

Gajaweera, the anthropologist and co-director of the Asian American Buddhist Working Group along with Som, Louije Kim and Dorothy Imagire, elaborated: "It might not seem like activism, but it is the day-to-day activism of keeping your doors open and supporting your community."

Brother Phap Dung, a dharma teacher at Deer Park Monastery in Escondido, said between 200 and 300 members of the public come to the mountain monastery each Sunday to take refuge from the discrimination, loneliness and the basic fear and anxiety that is pervading society.

"We don't just look out for Buddhists," he said. "We try to take care of all the people who are facing discrimination - African Americans, Latinos, gay and lesbian, LGBTQ."

Monastics offer support by just being there, listening, taking visitors on hikes, showing them a sunset and reminding them of the wonders of life.

"That can also be good medicine for taking care of the mental toxins and discrimination we have received from others," he said. "Finding ways to joy and wonder helps us not be overwhelmed and monopolized by the hate in society."

Hsu said she has also found solace in the Buddhist idea of Indra's net: an infinite web of connection with a single, shining jewel at each point of connection. Each jewel reflects every other jewel in the web, and whatever affects one jewel affects them all.

"That was one of the ideas we were trying to emphasize with May We Gather," she said. "That we are not separate from each other."

For the one-year anniversary of the Georgia shooting rampage, the organizers of May We Gather published reflections from Buddhist leaders and practitioners inspired by the dharma. Contributions came in from Buddhists in California, Washington, Oregon, Maine, Illinois, New York, Massachusetts, Canada and elsewhere.

They expressed sorrow for those lost - and gratitude for the opportunity to grieve together.

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Buddhists confront anti-Asian violence with peaceful perseverance

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One by one, the Buddhist priests bowed before the altar at the Higashi Honganji Buddhist Temple in Little Tokyo, wearing robes of yellow, orange and black. Accompanied by the chanting of the Heart Sutra in Korean, they dipped a paintbrush into a bowl of golden lacquer to gently fill in the cracks of a white ceramic lotus that had been handmade for the occasion.

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Issue: Article: Buddhist Temple Vandalism and Anti-Asian Hate following Covid-19 

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Issue: Article: Buddhist Temple Vandalism and Anti-Asian Hate following Covid-19 

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Incidents have included vandalism of temples and Buddhist statues outside private homes, as well as verbal harassment of Asian Americans at their houses of worship.

(RNS) - A few weeks after Thai Viet Phan was elected the first Vietnamese American City Council member in Santa Ana, a town south of Los Angeles, she discovered that the Huong Tich Temple, in the city's Little Saigon neighborhood, had been vandalized. As a child she had spent her weekends at the Buddhist temple, learning prayers, traditional dances and how to read and write in Vietnamese.

Last month, 15 of the temple's Buddha and bodhisattva statues had been spray-painted. The word "Jesus" in black letters had been emblazoned down one statue's back.

"Throughout COVID, I know that there has been an increase in anti-Asian Pacific Islander sentiment and hate crimes, and I see that on social media, but I personally haven't experienced it," Phan said.

When she found out what happened at Huong Tich Temple, she said, "I was shocked that anyone would do that. ... It was really abhorrent."

Phan reached out to other local elected officials and discovered that Huong Tich wasn't alone: Five other Buddhist temples in Little Saigon had been defaced in November.

"This is a hate crime, not just vandalism," she said.

Diedre Thu-Ha Nguyen, a City Council member in Garden Grove, a neighboring city that serves as home to parts of Little Saigon, said the attacks, coming when worshippers typically visit temples often to pray for prosperity in the new year, have increased anxiety in the Vietnamese American Buddhist community

The attacks also come as the pandemic - especially President Donald Trump's rhetoric about COVID-19's origin in China - has unleashed a wave of anti-Asian hate and xenophobia in the U.S.

This year there have been 17 reports of hate incidents at Asian American Buddhist sites, according to Russell Jeung, professor of Asian American studies at San Francisco State University.

Jeung, who runs the group Stop Asian American Pacific Islander Hate, a self-reporting center that's been tracking cases of anti-Asian racism and xenophobia in the U.S. since March, said the incidents included vandalism of temples and Buddhist statues outside private homes, as well as verbal harassment of Asian Americans at their houses of worship.

Funie Hsu, an assistant professor of American studies at San Jose State University, said this year's attacks were "not a surprise." Asian Americans have historically been perceived as foreign or unable to assimilate. Religion, said Hsu, has been considered a barrier to their acceptance since the Chinese immigrants who first came to the U.S. in the 19th century were called "heathen Chinese."

Temple vandalism is a common expression of hate toward Asian Americans in general. In Massachusetts in 1984, three Vietnam War veterans burned down a Tibetan Buddhist temple after expressing dissatisfaction with the services they received through Veterans Affairs.

But vandalism against Buddha statues, she said, is common since many consider them an affront to Christianity. "A lot of times they serve as a punching bag for any form of animosity people are feeling against Asians," Hsu said, which is why so many attacks have occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic.

No hate incidents at Asian American churches were reported this year, Jeung said.

In April at Wat Lao Santitham, a temple in Fort Smith, Arkansas, a man walked onto the grounds with a hammer and smashed three statues of the Buddha, causing $20,000 damage. The police were called, and as they arrested the suspect, according to body camera footage, he told them, "It's a false idol, it's a false monument."

Richard Saisomorn, a board member for Wat Lao Santitham, said the damage goes far beyond the attack. Until the statues are replaced, the mostly Southeast Asian immigrants and second- and third-generation Americans who attend the temple are without a place where they can pray for their ancestors.

Despite the installation of cameras and other security measures, the temple's community now fears for the safety of the monks who live inside the building.

"Everybody feels very sad - it's something that should not happen," Saisomorn said. "We've already survived a very tough time from COVID-19, which is hard enough."

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Buddhist temple attacks rise as COVID-19 amplifies anti-Asian American bias

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(RNS) - A few weeks after Thai Viet Phan was elected the first Vietnamese American City Council member in Santa Ana, a town south of Los Angeles, she discovered that the Huong Tich Temple, in the city's Little Saigon neighborhood, had been vandalized.

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Issue: Article: HOW A QUEER CHRISTIAN STUDENT HELPED DEFEAT A PROPOSED BOOK BAN

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Issue: Article: HOW A QUEER CHRISTIAN STUDENT HELPED DEFEAT A PROPOSED BOOK BAN

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Three months ago, Josiah Kemp, a transgender teenager living in Hunterdon County, N.J., made the decision to leave his home church. Kemp didn't leave Christianity, he said, but he needed to stop attending services at a church that was openly opposed to LGBTQ people like him.

"The thing that I kind of came to realize is that my church and my God are not the same," Kemp told Sojourners. "They're connected, but leaving the church does not affect leaving God behind."

Soon after, Kemp was faced with another challenge as he considered organizing his peers to resist - and ultimately defeat - the proposed banning of LGBTQ books in his high school's library.

At a September meeting of the North Hunterdon-Voorhees Regional High School District Board of Education, residents had turned out to demand that numerous books be removed from the district's high school libraries. The list of books they wanted banned included This Book is Gay; Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic; Gender Queer; All Boys Aren't Blue; and Lawn Boy .

Over the course of three school board meetings in the months that followed, parents argued that the books' sexual content constituted "pornographic" material that didn't belong in schools.

Many parents cited their Christian values and rights as reasons why they spoke out against the books. One resident claimed the books went against the "founding fathers'" intent of the public education system and said schools were instead teaching children "hate God, hate their country, and hate themselves."

Kemp is not surprised that people turn out en masse to speak against LGBTQ people; his childhood experience has taught him to expect that opposition.

"People feel this need to become these saviors and make other people Christian," Kemp said.

In addition to attempting to ban books with LGBTQ themes, residents at these meetings also complained about anti-racism books and authors, such as Ibram X. Kendi's Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. Parents opposing books with references to sexuality, gender, and race isn't unique to Hunterdon County. The evangelical Family Research Council regularly uses social media to remind parents to speak out at local school board meetings and hosts School Board Boot Camps to teach people how to run for office on their own local school boards. My Faith Votes, a Christian organization chaired by former Republican Governor of Arkansas and Baptist minister Mike Huckabee, posts similar articles on their website, urging people of faith to raise their voices at school board meetings or serve on boards themselves.

Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, executive director of GLSEN, an organization dedicated to making K-12 schools safe for LGBTQ youth, said that said banning books that represent the LGBTQ community is harmful to all students; it "forecloses on a future that includes us all."

Willingham-Jaggers' mother - a former nun - taught them a "social justice view of faith," one that emphasized people coming together to understand each other. Though they no longer identify as a person of faith, Willingham-Jaggers believes faith should support a "liberatory vision of society" that asks, "How do we love and support children? How do we make justice, love, and people having enough the center of our practice?"

Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, executive director of GLSEN, an organization dedicated to making K-12 schools safe for LGBTQ youth. Their mother is a former nun, they attended a Catholic high school, and got their degree from the University of San Francisco - a Jesuit university.

"I am deeply connected to, and in touch with, the way in which faith supports a liberatory vision of a society," they told Sojourners. Though Willingham-Jaggers no longer identifies as a person of faith, they said that liberatory vision asks, "How do we love and support children? How do we make justice, love, and people having enough the center of our practice?"

Willingham-Jagger said banning books that represent the LGBTQ community is harmful to all students; it "forecloses on a future that includes us all."

Willingham-Jagger's mother taught them a "social justice view of faith," one that emphasized people coming together to understand each other.

"I never think that God doesn't love me," Willingham-Jagger said. "No matter who I am, as a Black person, as a nonbinary person, Black woman, I'm clear [God loves me] because of the love of my family and also because of the way my mom raised me."

Casey Pick, senior fellow for advocacy and government affairs for the Trevor Project, a nonprofit focused on suicide prevention for LGBTQ youth, said denying students access to information can harm their mental health. A 2020 study by the Trevor Project found that when students learned about LGBTQ issues in schools, their odds of attempting suicide decreased by 23 percent. The study also found that when an LGBTQ student has at least one supportive person in their life, their chances of committing suicide lowers by 40 percent.

Pick said schools and libraries should provide "free-flowing discussion of ideas where all can feel safe to be who they are."

"Silence really doesn't help anybody, and it has never worked to silence ideas or to remove books. That's only ever done harm," Pick said.

The Trevor Project works with Q Christian Fellowship, a ministry serving the LGBTQ community, on The Good Fruit Project, a faith-based guide on the harms of conversion therapy. Q Christian provides resources to help Christian families unconditionally accept their children, regardless of sexual or gender identity. Nathanial Green, communications director for Q Christian, said positive LGBTQ representation is essential for the healthy and unimpeded growth of queer children.

Some proposals would ban "sexually explicit" content in books like Gender Queer: A Memoir - which include depictions of masturbation and first experiences with sex. Green asks what the long-term effect would be if libraries banned LGBTQ sexual content.

"Is removing this worth the loss to children who might be otherwise made aware of their own experiences [and have their] feelings validated?" Green said.

When Kemp learned about the book bans, he debated if he should put another project on his busy classmates' plates. But, as the president of his high school's Gay Straight Alliance, a club that LGBTQ and straight students join to support each other, "provide a safe place to socialize, and create a platform to fight for racial, gender, LGBTQ, and economic justice," he decided he had to do something. He sent out an email to GSA members and their allies, and the group set up an emergency meeting, practicing speeches they later gave to the school board in its October, November, and January meetings.

Alex Ford, a sophomore at North Hunterdon High School, was one of the students to prepare a speech for a school board meeting in favor of keeping the books. His experience as a transgender teen initially soured his view of religion.

"[Family members] would constantly try to pray with me [so] that I wasn't trans, I wasn't gay, which really hurt my ideas towards religion," Ford said. "And for a very long time, I was anti-religion. [I thought] all religions must be like this."

Ford changed his perspective on religion after learning that some of his close friends were religious.

"I'm glad I'm no longer like that," he said. "I'm more open-minded. I tell myself, 'They act like that, but that does not encompass all religions.'"

On Jan. 25, after four months of testimony from students, parents, and a local group named the NH-V Intellectual Freedom Fighters, the North Hunterdon-Voorhees Regional High School District Board of Education voted to not ban any of the books in question.

Jude Gepp, sophomore at North Hunterdon, was one of the students to speak in defense of This Book is Gay at the Jan. 25 board meeting.

"I don't think taking the Lord's name in vain is supposed to mean saying, 'Oh my God,'" Gepp told Sojourners. "I think it's supposed to advise against using the Lord's name to justify unwarranted hate."

Published in conjunction with

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How a Queer Christian student helped defeat a proposed book ban - Medill News Service

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Three months ago, Josiah Kemp, a transgender teenager living in Hunterdon County, N.J., made the decision to leave his home church. Kemp didn't leave Christianity, he said, but he needed to stop attending services at a church that was openly opposed to LGBTQ people like him.

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Issue: Article: Sexuality and the United Methodists 

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Issue: Article: Sexuality and the United Methodists 

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In recent years, Christian churches have taken strikingly divergent views on sexuality. Some, such as the Catholic, Orthodox, and many Evangelical churches, have taken explicit institutional stances against LGBTQ inclusion.

Others, like the Episcopals, Presbyterians (PCUSA), and Lutherans (ELCA) have taken explicit stances in support of LGBTQ inclusion. Of course, individual members of these institutions will have diverse views on the topic, and the stance of an institution does not always reflect the stance of an individual member; The United Method Church (UMC) is a perfect example of this complexity.

The UMC is a global Protestant denomination which has significant membership in North America, Africa, Europe, and Asia. While historically originating in the United Kingdom, the largest population of Methodists now lives in the United States, where it is the third largest religious group after Catholics and Baptists.

Every four years, the UMC meets at what they call the Methodist General Conference-a democratic body of representatives from across the world which gathers to make church decisions. In 1972, the Conference voted to add language to the church's law, stating "the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching," and that gay ministers and marriages are not allowed in their churches.

Even then, this stance was controversial, and the issue has been taken up again by every General Conference since. While the UMC position against LGBTQ inclusion has not changed, significant numbers of clergy and lay people have protested these church policies. UMC pastor Sanford Brown of Seattle called the church's anti-gay position "wrong, stupid, and evil." In 1999, minister Jimmy Creech performed the first Methodist same-sex marriage ceremony and was subsequently defrocked by the UMC-or deprived of his status as a member of the clergy. Many other pastors followed Creech's lead, including Franklyn Schaefer, who was famously defrocked by the church in 2013 after he presided over the marriage of his gay son. Schaefer was reinstated in 2014 after being disciplined.

In addition to speaking out and performing gay marriage ceremonies, many ministers of the UMC have come out as LGBTQ in recent decades. In the lead-up to the 2016 General Conference, over 150 American Methodist ministers had come out as gay. Also in 2016, the UMC elected its first openly gay bishop when Karen Oliveto was elected bishop in the Western Jurisdiction. In June of 2017, the UMC appointed its first transgender deacon in Illinois.

However, many in the UMC continue to support the church's current policies and have demanded that the church crack down on members who resist the denomination's anti-LGBTQ stance. For example, Rob Renfroe, head of the conservative "Good News" group of the UMC, stated that the election of Bishop Oliveto was a "crisis" and called on Methodists to "denounce this schismatic action," and force her resignation. In the spring of 2017, the UMC's Judicial Council-the supreme court of the UMC-ruled that Bishop Oliveto's election violated church law, though a final sentence was yet to be set pending further proceedings.

Changes to the church's policies have consistently been voted down by the global General Conference, with the delegates largely split along geographic and cultural lines. While a majority of American Methodists prefer to recognize same-sex clergy and marriages, conservative American Methodists have been joined by African and Asian Methodists who generally oppose LGBTQ recognition. The growing population of Methodists in Africa and Asia, coupled with the declining population of Methodists in the United States, have caused some to predict that church policies will be difficult if not impossible to change.

Issues of sexuality came to a head at the UMC General Conference of 2016, when some of the representatives to the Conference-nearly all of whom were American-presented over 100 proposed changes to the rules on sexuality. However, when leaks on social media exposed that bishops at the highest level were discussing splitting the church for good over these issues, an emergency measure was narrowly passed 428-405, to table all discussion of sexuality in 2016, and empower the bishops of the UMC to appoint a commission to explore LGBTQ church policies. Conservatives were angered by the vote which LGBTQ Methodists and their allies cheered as a means to buy more time since it seemed clear that the proposed changes would have been voted down again. The commission has been scheduled to present its recommendation at a special session of the UMC General Conference in 2019. Still, few expect the church's many disagreements over sexuality to be resolved by this commission.

Additional Resources

Primary Sources:

* UMC pastor excluded from worship over LGBTQ issues (2016): http://bit.ly/2sEiBYN
* The Western Jurisdiction of the UMC explains why they voted for an openly gay bishop (2017): http://bit.ly/2rvGRNf
* Conservative leader of the "Good News" organization in the UMC speaks out against openly gay bishop (2016): http://bit.ly/2rAQOnq
* Pro-LGBTQ inclusion group Reconciling Ministries Network on reaching out to African Methodists in the UMC (2017): http://bit.ly/2rB5lj6

Secondary Sources:

* PBS video news story on "Methodist Gay Marriage": http://to.pbs.org/1dYdWCc
* PBS Documentary on sexuality in the UMC: http://to.pbs.org/2sEgggE
* NYT on the UMC's defrocking of Franklyn Schaefer: http://nyti.ms/2rpi9tw
* NYT on the Judicial Council's ruling against Bishop Oliveto: http://nyti.ms/2qn18jM
* WP on the UMC's first transgender deacon: http://wapo.st/2tbCRhK

Discussion Questions

* How would you respond to a friend who told you, "Christianity is anti-gay" or "Christianity is pro-gay," based on this case study?
* What does this case study say about the idea that religions are "internally diverse" in terms of Christianity as a whole, and in terms of specific denominations or sects within Christianity?
* Watch the primary source videos above, particularly the videos from the Western Jurisdiction and the Good News organization.How do these people of faith justify their divergent views? What about their context and faith may lead them to hold these views?
* While church policies have remained consistent, how do you see religion changing over time in this case study?
* How do you see religion being embedded in culture in this case study?
* Why might African and Asian Methodists largely vote against LGBTQ inclusion? Why might American Methodists be so divided?
* Watch the Reconciling Ministries Network video above. How do the Africans in this video complicate the idea that African Methodists generally vote against LGBTQ inclusion?

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Others, like the Episcopals, Presbyterians (PCUSA), and Lutherans (ELCA) have taken explicit stances in support of LGBTQ inclusion. Of course, individual members of these institutions will have diverse views on the topic, and the stance of an institution does not always reflect the stance of an individual member; The United Method Church (UMC) is a perfect example of this complexity.

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Issue: Video and Article: Christianity and Indigenous Boarding Schools--Healing the Trauma 

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Issue: Video and Article: Christianity and Indigenous Boarding Schools--Healing the Trauma 

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Native American children were forcibly abducted from their homes and put into Christian and government run boarding schools beginning in the mid 1800's and continuing into the 1950's. This was done pursuant to a federal policy designed to "civilize" Indians and to stamp out Native cultures; a deliberate policy of ethnocide and cultural genocide.

Cut off from their families and culture, the children were punished for speaking their Native languages, banned from conducting traditional or cultural practices, shorn of traditional clothing and identity of their Native cultures, taught that their cultures and traditions were evil and sinful, and that they should be ashamed of being Native American.

Beginning to create the circumstances in which healing can occur will require the Native American Rights Fund, along with many others working in the area, to turn back institutionalized ignorance of what happened, to dismantle legal blockades constructed long ago and being constructed anew to protect individuals and institutions from legal and financial responsibility, and to simply begin to uncover the truth of what has happened. NARF is proud and excited to have supported efforts to create the space for our Native nations to begin to heal from the boarding school policy. As an integral part of the healing process, this will also allow the United States and others involved in implementation of the policy over the decades the chance to heal from the damages they caused and that they suffer from as well.

NARF's 2019 report, Trigger Points: Current State of Research on History, Impacts, and Healing Related to the United States' Indian Industrial/Boarding School Policy, gathers existing research about the purposes and human rights abuses of US American Indian boarding school policies, why they matter still today, and-most importantly-how recovery can and is being accomplished. Special thanks the Tzó-Nah Fund for supporting this project and NARF over the years.

Let All That is Indian Within You Die! Native American Rights Fund's Legal Review, Summer/Fall 2013. This 11-page article details the history of the boarding school policy in the United States and the ongoing efforts of the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition.

Learn more about what is being done by visiting the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition website.

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Boarding School Healing - Native American Rights Fund

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Native American children were forcibly abducted from their homes and put into Christian and government run boarding schools beginning in the mid 1800's and continuing into the 1950's. This was done pursuant to a federal policy designed to "civilize" Indians and to stamp out Native cultures; a deliberate policy of ethnocide and cultural genocide.

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Article: Racial Identity of Jewish-Americans

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Article: Racial Identity of Jewish-Americans

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For many Jews, America has been a land of both opportunity and persecution. This ambiguity is reflected in Jewish racial identity. On average, Jews are better educated and more wealthy than other Americans, and there are more Jewish members of Congress than their share of the population. However, F…

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Article: Report on the Education of Orthodox Jewish Girls in NYC 

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Article: Report on the Education of Orthodox Jewish Girls in NYC 

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Consider the words of Shulem Deen, who left Haredi society, about his discovery of the very existence of the local public library:

I returned several times to that set of encyclopedias, and the children's librarian, a pleasant middle-aged woman, began to notice me and smile when I entered. Suddenly, I felt self-conscious: a grown Hasidic man sitting each day on the tiny orange chair at the green-and-yellow tables. So I moved on, hesitantly, to the adult sections upstairs, where the encyclopedias were heavier and denser, with fewer illustrations, the different sections like a maze in which the purpose was not to find the way out but to linger and stroll into each dead end and to gather as many treasures as possible along the way.

For Shulem, the very exposure to secular knowledge was like an eye-opening trip to a foreign country.

You will be quick to say: "Rabbi Salkin is just a Reform rabbi. He is opposed to traditional Judaism."

You would be wrong. Anyone who knows me, and has read my writings and has heard my sermons, knows of my deep respect, and even admiration, for traditional Judaism. I count Orthodox rabbis and scholars, both men and women, among my most honored teachers. Those who know me would know my deep, pervasive commitment to klal Yisrael. They would know my love of all Jews.

Neither is this a critique of Hasidism. I have massive respect for Hasidism - as a religious system. I frequently pepper my sermons and educational programs with Hasidic teachings.

No, this is about Hasidim - or, some Hasidim, or to be even more precise, their leaders.

This is not about how they practice their Judaism, which is their sole concern.

Rather, it is about how they function in the public realm. It is about how they intersect with, and interact with, the modern world. Those schools are receiving public monies. Because of that, they are accountable to secular authorities and to the public itself.

The other day, Tablet published an article by Liel Leibovitz, defending the Hasidic community and its values.

He writes:
The community that runs these schools produces individuals who grow up in multigenerational homes, live close to and support each other throughout life, raise children, live according to their virtues, and spend their days doing things they love and believe are of the utmost importance. As a result, they are happier.
I support those values. I admire how those communities take care of their own. I like happy people.

But, Liel (whom I respect and whose other writings I admire) titled the article "The Plot Against Jewish Education."

No. The New York Times article is not a plot against Jewish education. There is no pernicious plot against Jewish education - the idea of which is just another example of pervasive conspiracy theories.

Let us be clear: What we are seeing in those Haredi communities is not a sweet, romanticized view of traditional Judaism. This is not "Fiddler on the Roof." This is not even "Shtisel."

This is something dark. This is the willful perpetuation of social pathology at the hands of Jewish leaders.

Some of you will say: "Well, that's The New York Times for you. A bunch of Jew haters and Israel bashers. What else would you expect from them?"

No, not quite.

To be sure: Numerous observers, over decades, have sensed that The New York Times has long reflected an ambivalence about Jewish issues, especially Israel.

But, this isn't it.

Consider that The New York Times also published this article in Yiddish. That is both unprecedented and heroic. It is a shofar blast to to the Yiddish-speaking Hasidic community.

The Yiddish version is saying to that community: Wake up. Your educational system is cheating your children. It might be preparing them to be Talmudic geniuses. It might be preparing them to debate RASHI and Ibn Ezra and other commentators. As Seinfeld would have put it, in a different context: "Not that there's anything wrong with that."

But, it is not preparing them for life in the modern world.

Some of you will say: "There you go - imposing your modern, Western values on these people!"

I am sensitive to the diversity critique. I embrace the fact that the various tribes that constitute America have different values and emphases.

And yes, the Hasidim are free to reject the modern world and its many temptations. (I, too, have been a critic of many elements of modernity, though living squarely within it and reaping its many rewards.)

But the utter rejection of the best parts of modernity; the rejection of education; the insistence of living not in America, but in an imagined, reconstructed shtetl out of the 1600s - which, again, is their right - these actions come with a price.

The price is that they are condemning their children to poverty.

Worse than that: they are showing the world an image of Judaism that is distorted and inaccurate. They are feeding the real antisemites - not The New York TImes reporters, not the Jewish critics - a plate of raw, unkosher meat.

Finally, the way this Jewish community is handling education is contrary to classical Judaism.

The sages of the Mishnah, the ancient code of Jewish law, put it this way (Avot 2:2):

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The scandal of Hasidic education - a cry from the heart

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Consider the words of Shulem Deen, who left Haredi society, about his discovery of the very existence of the local public library: I returned several times to that set of encyclopedias, and the children's librarian, a pleasant middle-aged woman, began to notice me and smile when I entered.

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Video: Kanye West and the Rise of Anti-Semitism in America 

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Video: Kanye West and the Rise of Anti-Semitism in America 

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Video: Anti-Semitic incidents hit a record high in 2021. What’s behind the rise in hate? 

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Video: Anti-Semitic incidents hit a record high in 2021. What’s behind the rise in hate? 

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Judy, the Anti-Defamation League, which tracks antisemitic behavior nationwide, found 2,717 incidents in 2021. That's a 34 percent increase from the year before. That averages to more than seven antisemitic incidents per day.

Jonathan Greenblatt is the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League and author of the recent book "It Could Happen Here: Why America Is Tipping from Hate to the Unthinkable and How We Can Stop It."

Jonathan Greenblatt, good to have you back on the "NewsHour."

This report documents the most antisemitic attacks in the U.S. since the ADL started recording these events back in the 1970s. Can you help us understand, how should we interpret what you have found?

Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO and National Director, Anti-Defamation League: Well, I think the data, unfortunately, speaks for itself in some ways.

As you pointed out, this is the highest total we have ever tracked in more than 40 years of doing this work. And we should keep in mind that antisemitic acts were going down in the United States for almost 15 years, and then ,in 2016, they started to move up. And we're now at the point where we have nearly triple the number of incidents today that we did in 2015.

I mean, in the past year alone, assaults increased 167 percent. And we saw examples of vandalism on the rise, harassment on the rise. So I think antisemitism really isn't just, I would suggest, a Jewish problem. It's an American problem. It's typically the canary in the coal mine. And so, as things are beginning to unravel more broadly, the Jewish community is often the target of scapegoating and victimized in that way.

And that's exactly what's happening here.

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Antisemitic incidents hit a record high in 2021. What's behind the rise in hate?

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The Anti-Defamation League, which tracks anti-Semitic behavior nationwide, found 2,717 incidents in 2021. That's a 34 percent rise from the year before and averages out to more than seven anti-Semitic incidents per day. Jonathan Greenblatt is the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League and author of the recent book "It Could Happen Here."

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Hinduism in Brief HarvardXHDS3221 5x V001600 DTH

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Article: Hindus Fight Discrimination in American Textbooks

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Article: Hindus Fight Discrimination in American Textbooks

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There are around 2.5 million Hindus in the US, most of whom are relatively recent immigrants. Few Hindus lived in the US until national quotas on immigrants were removed in 1965, beginning successive waves of Hindu immigration, largely from India.

Partially because Hindus are only recently common in the US, their beliefs are often misunderstood by other Americans. American Hindus have often been deeply concerned by the disrespect that businesses and the entertainment industry have shown to their faith; Hinduism has often been commercialized or misused in public discourse. Many have also been concerned about a lack of recognition as part of the American fabric in the political sphere. However, while religious and cultural discrimination against the American Hindu community is real, Indian immigrants-most of whom are Hindu-are the wealthiest immigrant group in the US and are generally highly educated.

In the early 2000s, some American Hindus organized to stop perceived discrimination against them in American public school books. Protests against these textbooks were lodged in Virginia, California, and Texas. The situation in California became particularly contentious, as different Hindus-while generally agreeing that the textbooks must change-disagreed on how to represent their diverse tradition. In addition, due to California's large population, textbooks approved by the state are often used in many other states, meaning that changes to California's textbooks affect a much larger population.

There was little disagreement that California's textbooks contained serious errors, falsehoods, and a lack of respect for Hinduism. For example, a textbook incorrectly claimed that the Hindi language is written in Arabic script-it is written in Sanskrit Devnagari script. A photo caption misidentified an Indian Muslim as a Brahman priest. A section on Hindu vegetarian beliefs was disrespectfully titled, "Where's the Beef?" and other sections made light of important figures in Hindu scriptures. Addressing these problems was uncontroversial. However, the Vedic Foundation (VF) and Hindu Education Foundation (HEF)-the Hindu groups who proposed these changes-also asked the California Board of Education (CBE) to remove or rewrite other significant sections. These changes included rewriting widely accepted scholarship about Indian history and eliminating references to polytheism, Hindu patriarchy, Hindu connections to the caste system, and Dalits-also known as "Untouchables." Members of these organizations claimed the textbooks were focusing only on negative aspects of Hinduism while not doing the same for other religions. Believing in the expertise of these Hindu groups, after hearing these recommendations the CBE approved all of the VF and HEF requests.

Soon however, many American Hindus and academics complained that this was unacceptable. Some Hindus pointed out that the VF and HEF were promoting a representation of Hinduism specific to upper caste North Indians which they did not share. For example, many Hindu Dalits claimed the edits would erase their own history; some testified to the CBE that Dalits still suffer due to their low caste today. Similarly, critics accused the VF and HEF of attempting to erase real patriarchal history in Hinduism. Opponents also pointed out VF and HEF ties to Hindutva-conservative Hindu nationalist organizations in India which have tried and failed to make similar textbook changes there. Hindutva, they argued, have a biased political agenda to represent Hinduism in a way that undermines established scholarship and presents the religion in a solely positive light. They were concerned that Hindutva groups wanted to silence minority voices and present an idealized, false representation of Hinduism.

After thousands of often contradictory testimonies from different Hindus and academics of Hinduism, the CBE made their decision in 2006. While many of the VF and HEF edits were accepted, most requests to rewrite sections and delete references to patriarchy, caste, and polytheism were rejected. However, the debate raged on, as the Hindu American Foundation (HAF), another group with Hindutva ties, promptly sued the state to force the changes. The HAF lost, but debates on the portrayal of Hinduism in textbooks continue. In 2016, the VF, HEF, and HAF renewed their fight, arguing Hinduism was still being unfairly treated in textbooks. This time, the HAF worked to stop wording changes which involved changing "ancient India" to "ancient South Asia" which some argued should be done to reflect the fact that ancient India includes the modern nations of Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal. The HAF successfully enlisted Tulsi Gabbard, the first Hindu member of Congress to support this point. They also continued to try to remove caste from the books, sparking the same fight with Dalit groups. The results of 2016 debates were similarly mixed. While caste remained, so did references to "ancient India." And like 2006, shortly after the decision, Hindu groups sued the state in 2017 to continue the debate. There is thus no end in sight as Hindus, school officials, and religious studies scholars debate how to respectfully and accurately represent a diverse, complex tradition in US schools.

Additional Resources

Primary Sources:

Editorial from Hindu American Foundation's Murali Balaji on teaching Hinduism in public schools (2015): http://bit.ly/2vuMV78

Editorial from Hinduism professors Romila Thapar and Michael Witzel on teaching Hinduism in public schools (2006): http://bit.ly/2hSJ7K0

Editorial from professor Rohit Chopra on complexity of Hinduism in textbook debates (2016): http://bbc.in/2uAoggj

Secondary Sources:

Discussion Questions

How do different perspectives on the representation of Hindus in American textbooks illustrate the internal diversity of Hinduism?

How does the immigrant context of American Hindus play a role in these debates?

How do the disagreements around the influence of caste in Hinduism show how Hinduism is internally diverse? Or how Hinduism changes over time?

Among other issues, those who oppose Hindutva changes to textbooks often charge that they are trying to teach a solely positive, devotional representation of Hinduism. What is the difference between devotional representations and an academic, religious studies approach? How can you tell which approach is which?

Read the editorials in the primary sources. While written years apart, these editorials illustrate American Hindu views that are still common today. How might you explain these strikingly different views of Hinduism to someone? How do the authors use Hinduism to prove their points?

Textbooks that discuss Hinduism are controversial across the entire country, but Hindu organizations have focused on changing textbooks in Virginia, Texas, and especially California. Why do you think this is the case? What about the context of these states makes them points of conflict?

Listen to the PRI podcast on these issues. Why does the reporter find common ground with all of the Hindu positions she encounters? What does this tell you about the controversy and about Hinduism?

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There are around 2.5 million Hindus in the US, most of whom are relatively recent immigrants. Few Hindus lived in the US until national quotas on immigrants were removed in 1965, beginning successive waves of Hindu immigration, largely from India.

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India's Third Gender Movement | The Zainab Salbi Project Ep. 2