Diminishing American Pride Essay

The ledger Zeitoun basically talks active a Syrian American familys experience in the period of Hurricane Katrina. It was mainly divided into ii story lines, bingle of Abdulrahman Zeitoun, the main character, a Syrian American asseverator and one of Kathy, his wife, a white woman born-again Muslim. Zeitoun had an extraordinary animateness, also an extraordinary experience in the time of Hurricane Katrina. He was a successful long-familiar businessman in local area. When e reallyone else was fleeing their homet avouch before Katrina came, Zeitoun chose to digest to protect his house and business.Later then when the city was flooded, he travelled around with his small canoe, delivering benefactor and resources. However, he was wrong confirmationed as a loot suspect then and was sent into jail. He was handle as a terrorist and interpreted away the ripe of fair trial, forced to confine in a maximum security prison for a criminal offense he didnt commit. At the end, Zeito un was released and able to amalgamate with his family again, but he was not compensated in any(prenominal) ways for his misfortune. As this book describes, everything in the time of Hurricane Katrina had at peace(p) crazy, including the American criminal arbiter body.The main objection of this book is to criticize racial discrimi tribe phenomenon in America and the rotten criminal evaluator system. Racism is a main subject in this book. It was first mentioned in this book in Kathys story line about her foregone life experience. Years earlier, Kathy and her mother had gone to the DMV together to baffle Kathys license renewed. Kathy was wearing her hijab, and had already seeditative a healthy number of suspicious looks from DMV customers and provide by the time she sat down to fetch her picture taken.The employee behind the camera did not veil her contempt. Take that thing off, the woman said. (Zeitoun scalawag 58) From the mentioning of these kinds of past experienc e seemed irrelevant to Hurricane Katrina, we can see the origins desire to insert the topic of racialism into this book. Kathys chance shrinks small comparing to Zeitouns case in his arrest. You guys are al Qaeda, the soldier said. Todd laughed derisively, but Zeitoun was startled. He could not throw away comprehend right. Zeitoun had long attentioned this day would come.Each of the few multiplication he had been pulled over for a traffic violation, he knew the possibility existed that he would be harassed, misunders likewised, suspected of murky dealing that force bloom in the mood of any given guard officer. After 9/11, he and Kathy knew that many imaginations had run amok, that the introduction of the cerebration of sleeper cells- groups of would-be terrorists living in the U. S. and waiting, for old age or decades, to strike- put in the lead fort that everyone at their mosque, or the entire mosque itself, might be waiting for instructions from their presumed leader s in the hills of Afghanistan or Pakistan. (Zeitoun page 212)It didnt surprise me at all that Zeitoun have those thoughts that might seem over-worried in some(prenominal) hoi pollois eyes.. Indeed, another author Maysan Haydar had mentioned similar thoughts in her essay Veiled Intentions tire outt Judge a Muslim female child by Her Covering. Now some state declare their breath a bit longer, assuming Im a fundamentalist or question if Im there to cause them vituperate. I sense state studying me on the trains, recitation the cover of the book in my hand and move to gauge if I am one of us or one of them.I grapple with the thwarting that I cant reassure everyone individually that my goals have everything to do with social justice and vigour to do with holy war. But I have seen suspicious fade in the eyes of the great(predicate) woman to whom Ive given my subway back end or the Hasidic man whose elbow Ive taken to help him up the stairs. (Haydar pg 406) I retrieve ver y sorry for Haydar and Zeitouns experiences. Muslim mess are always feared to be presumed as terrorist. American frightened by the traumatic event of 9-11 unquestionable a stereotype against people from Middle East.The fear of world attack also again herd American crazy on national security. However, for any(prenominal) reason, racism has put upon so much harm on people we discriminate against. Muslim people handle Zeitoun, hard working and honest people, are forced to live under the fear of being prosecuted for his race someday, taken away from his family, locked up in somewhere nobody would know hes died or not. Those fears have made them coward under a lowly skin, live like second-class citizens. In the weeks after the attacks on the Twin Towers, Kathy saw very few Muslim women in public.She was certain they were hiding, leaving home only when necessary. In Late September, she was in Walgreens when she finally saw a woman in a hijab. She ran to her. Salaam alaikum she said , taking the womans hands. The woman, a doctor studying at Tulane, had been emotional state the homogeneous way, like an exile in her own state, and they laughed at how delirious they were to see each other. (Zeitoun page 46) Indeed, as part of international society, American allowed people to be exiled from their own country.In Edward Saids essay, States, he escribed how they, Palestinian people was exiled from their own country and forced to scatter around the world, be denied of individualised identity everywhere. Some Israeli toughenedtlers on the due west Bank say The Palestinians can stay here, with no rights, as resident aliens. Other Israelis are less(prenominal) kind. (Said pg 546) The fact is that today I can incomplete return to the places of my youth, nor voyage freely in the countries and places that mean the most to me, nor feel safe from arrest or violence even in the countries I utilise to frequent but whose organisations and policies have changed radical ly in recent times. (Said pg 547)In a documentary I have watched, in some cases, if a Palestinian wants to travel from points to points, they have to go through checkpoints set up by local military. They would be asked to immortalise their prove of identity and relevant documents which sources were mostly denied. cipher tell them what to do then, no laws protect them, some of them cant even go to hospitals and schools like every other human being in the line of achievement that they dont have a legal identity. We as adults, teach our kids not to hoodlum in school, that its wrong to do so.In contrast, as a human, we allow our country, ourselves to bully on people with a different skin tone. Isnt this hilarious? Another main subject stick on in this book is the criminal justice system in America. Zeitoun was initially arrested in his house, then taken to the bus station, naked searched and put in jail. end-to-end the whole process, he had never been told of his charges, no cal l off calls granted, no one had ever given him a chance to defend himself or to find a lawyer. He was treated as terrorist. In the course of his Middle-Eastern accent, everything about him seemed suspicious to the guards.He was kept in inhumane confinement, was given pork for food despite his religion. He had a deep wound in his feet but was never treated nor given any medical attention. There were basically no laws in effect, Zeitoun was treated as if he wasnt an American citizen anymore, constitutions and laws dont protect him. Watching the picture on the table mount, Zeitouns shoulders slackened. Most municipal systems were not functioning. There were no lawyers in the station, no judges. They would not talk their way out of this. The police and soldiers in the room were too worked up, and the evidence was too intriguing. (Zeitoun 215) But the most disappointing fact about this is what t I found out later in the book, that all of this happened to Zeitoun was not special cases happened at one time or twice, it was somehow permitted.But knowing that Zeitouns ordeal was caused instead by systemic ignorance and malfunction- and mayhap long-festering paranoia on the part of the subject Guard and any(prenominal) other agencies were involved-was unsettling. It said, quite clearly, that this wasnt a case of a bad apple or two in the barrel. The barrel itself was rotten. (Zeitoun 307) This is totally different from what I learnt from my administration of justice class. The whole process is wrong. How could an bleak person be justified this way? non even a sound call allowed. It is nothing better than abduction. Who gave government the right to treat people like this? I guess under the wee of National Security, theres nothing government cant do, all laws and constitutions could be undermined. mob Bamford, author of essay Wired pointed out the same point, says in his essay, They violated the Constitution setting it up. He says bluntly. But they didnt care.The y were outlet to do it anyway, and they were going to crucify anyone who stood in the way. Basically all rules were impel out the window, and they would use any excuse to pardon a waiver to spy on Americans. (Wired pg 0843,, 084) National Security, initially served the principle of protecting Americans has become a tool to against Americans. The NSA has turned its surveillance apparatus on the US and its citizens. It has established listening posts throughout the nation to collect and sift through billions of email messages and phone calls, whether they originate within the country or overseas.It has created a supercomputer of almost unimaginable speed to look for patterns and ravel out codes. Finally, the agency has begun building a place to stack away all the trillions of words and thoughts and whispers captured in its electronic net. (Wired pg 81) Isnt it scary to know our government has already gone this far for National Security? Anyone is a purport of NSA. But who is more prone to be canvass on? I believe this could be united again to the topic of racism.Look back to Zeitoun and his fellows arrest I believe they would never have been presumed as terrorists, despite the same context and evidence, if all cardinal of them are white. The book Zeitoun serves more than a journalism. Dave egger cleverly brought out these two important topics to us through the book. Could we still call our country States of exemption and equality after learning all these antecedently unknown facts? Its time for people to stand up to protect the prides of America, fix our criminal justice system, drive racism into history and look forward to a better, true States of freedom and equality.