Professional Muslim men are disbelieved about their American citizenship and feel alienated

Evidence

Saleem: I feel I was a bit naive, in the sense that I thought that Americans were more open-minded, more accepting of people from other cultures. And I don’t know whether it’s my experience in the Midwest—whether it’s different on the coasts. But I feel like I was naive in the sense that I was expecting people to be more open, more curious, more liberal, and they’re not. … Saleem has been stopped and searched several times at airports. He was called a fascist by a patient in the hospital. He told me that when he applied for a job he received an email saying the position was for American citizens only. When he told them he was an American citizen, the person refused to believe him. He felt this treatment was because he has a Muslim name. As a result, Saleem feels rejected from his American identity: “There are certain times where I feel extremely alienated from mainstream America, and I know that a lot of minorities do … [Even] despite the fact that I’m a professional—you know, middle-upper class.” — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 441

Categorization

Category: Factual Claims

• XREF: The disbelief that a Muslim name could belong to a citizen echoes the reader’s map of citizenship-as-ejectable status.

Related

• Citizenship status does not shield Muslim Americans from suspicion (similarity 0.86)
• Muslim American men self-silence politically out of fear of surveillance (similarity 0.82)
• Muslim Americans hold nominal but reduced substantive citizenship (similarity 0.81)
• Even Muslim civil rights organizations are surveilled and discredited by the state (similarity 0.80)
• Immigration agents presumed Middle Easterners Muslim and therefore unassimilable (similarity 0.80)
• Everyday interrogations strip Muslim Americans of felt citizenship and belonging (similarity 0.80)
• Citizenship itself is racialized, protecting some citizens while criminalizing Muslim Americans. (similarity 0.80)
• Muslim men’s invisibility as Muslims breeds fear of association with terrorism (similarity 0.79)
• Being treated as a collective denies Muslims the privileges of citizenship. (similarity 0.79)
• Muslims born and raised in America are seen as outsiders first (similarity 0.79)
• Muslim Americans are excluded from full citizenship through surveillance and monitoring (similarity 0.79)
• Muslim employees anglicize their names because employers fear losing business (similarity 0.79)
• Racialized surveillance itself strips Muslims of substantive citizenship (similarity 0.79)
• Racialized surveillance denies Muslim Americans the individuality citizenship requires. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• The surveillance gaze denies Muslim Americans the psychological privileges of citizenship #expands (0.70) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 272
• Surveillance pressure makes Muslim men erase rather than transform their identity #expands (0.60) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 438
• The overlap of legal citizenship and perceived foreignness fuels Islamophobia’s missionary zeal. #expands (0.60) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 698
• Hostile public scrutiny becomes internalized as the architecture of Muslim American identity #expands (0.55) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 709
• Muslim American men self-silence politically out of fear of surveillance #expands (0.55) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 423
• Religious identity replaced ethnicity as the marker making Muslim Americans seen as anti-American #qualifies (0.50) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 150