Only three weeks since Passover, and some people already need refreshers.
Over at Commentary, Jonathan Tobin argues that Islamophobia in the United States must be a myth because... look! the Muslims are breeding like rabbits. Citing newly released census data showing that the population of American Muslims more than doubled between 2000 and 2010, Tobin asks: "Is it possible or even likely that Islam would be thriving in the United States if it were not a society that is welcoming Muslims with open arms and providing a safe environment for people to openly practice this faith?"
Yes, it's very possible. Let's start with the Passover story: in particular, Exodus 1:12, in which the Egyptians discover that, "the more they afflicted [the Israelites], the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad." It looks like Tobin skipped that section of the haggadah.
And this Biblical wisdom holds up well under scrutiny: historically, discrimination and prejudice haven't done much to hinder population growth. The African American population quadrupled (from under five million to nearly twenty million) between the end of the Civil War and the 1964 Civil Rights Act: does Tobin think that a century of Jim Crow, housing discrimination and the Ku Klux Klan provided Blacks "a safe environment"? The fact is, Islam is growing everywhere: doubling over the last thirty years in Europe, and on pace to reach 2.2 billion worldwide by 2030 (it's currently 1.6 billion). Its growth in America is just one piece of this broader trend.
Here's another fact: Islamophobia is alive and well in America. Tobin claims that there are "no obstacles to Muslim advancement or systematic ill treatment." Tell it to Hani Khan, who was fired from her job at Abercrombie & Fitch when she wouldn't remove her headscarf. In 2009, Muslims filed 803 religious discrimination claims with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. That's about 25% of the total claims, even though Muslims make up, according to the Pew Research Center, less than 1% of the American population. Resumes with Muslim names get lower response rates from employment firms than resumes with names from any other ethnic or religious group. And it extends beyond employment. In a 2010 Gallup poll, 43% of Americans self-reported some prejudice against Muslims, compared to 15% for Jews and 18% for Christians.
What's sad is that we've seen all this before. Muslims aren't the first religious group to be accused of cooperating with America's international enemies. Just as Muslims today are called terrorists, American Jews were once tarred as the servants of Moscow. Similarly, attempts to outlaw Sharia recall centuries of anti-Semitic paranoia about Jewish religious law. In every generation, my haggadah teaches me, bigots rise up to discriminate against and attack minorities. If Jonathan Tobin cannot see that, if he continues to turn a blind eye to the oppression of Muslims among us, well then, I've got a couple more Bible verses he ought to read.
