5. Novembra 1990., čovjek po imenu El-Sajid Nosair ušetao je u jedan hotel na Menhetnu i ubio rabina Meira Kahane, lidera Židovske Lige Odbrane. Nosair u prvi mah proglašen nevinim za ubistvo, ali dok je služio zatvorsku kaznu zbog manjih prekršaja on i drugi ljudi počeli su planirati napade na desetak poznatih znamenitosti u Njujorku uključujući tunele, sinagoge i sjedište UN-a. Srećom, ti planovi su osujećeni od strane jednog od FBI doušnika. Nažalost, to se nije desilo sa bombardovanjem Svjetskog trgovinskog centra 1993. godine. Nosair je na kraju bio osuđen zbog učešća u zavjeri. El-Sajid Nosair je moj otac.
On November 5th, 1990, a man named El-Sayyid Nosair walked into a hotel in Manhattan and assassinated Rabbi Meir Kahane, the leader of the Jewish Defense League. Nosair was initially found not guilty of the murder, but while serving time on lesser charges, he and other men began planning attacks on a dozen New York City landmarks, including tunnels, synagogues and the United Nations headquarters. Thankfully, those plans were foiled by an FBI informant. Sadly, the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center was not. Nosair would eventually be convicted for his involvement in the plot. El-Sayyid Nosair is my father.
Rođen sam u Pitsburgu, Pensilvaniji 1983. godine, kao sin egipatskon inžinjera i brižne američke majke, učiteljice u osnovnoj školi koji su skupa davali sve od sebe da stvore sretno djetinjstvo za mene. Tek nakon što sam napunio sedam godina dinamika naše porodice počela je da se mijenja. Otac me izložio jednoj strani islama koju jako malo ljudi, uključujući većinu muslimana uspije vidjeti. Po mom iskustvu, kada ljudi izdvoje vrijeme za interakciju jedni sa drugima ne treba puno da bi se shvatilo da uglavnom svi mi želimo iste stvari u životu. Međutim, u svakoj religiji, u svakoj populaciji, naći ćete mali procenat ljudi koji se tako gorljivo drže svojih uvjerenja da osjećaju da moraju koristiti svako neophodno sredstvo kako bi natjerali druge da žive kao oni.
I was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1983 to him, an Egyptian engineer, and a loving American mother and grade school teacher, who together tried their best to create a happy childhood for me. It wasn't until I was seven years old that our family dynamic started to change. My father exposed me to a side of Islam that few people, including the majority of Muslims, get to see. It's been my experience that when people take the time to interact with one another, it doesn't take long to realize that for the most part, we all want the same things out of life. However, in every religion, in every population, you'll find a small percentage of people who hold so fervently to their beliefs that they feel they must use any means necessary to make others live as they do.
Par mjeseci prije njegovog hapšenja, posjeo me pored sebe i objasnio kako je zadnjih par vikenda, on sa nekim prijateljima išao u streljanu na Long Ajlendu kako bi vježbao gađanje. Rekao mi je da ću ići sa njim sljedeće jutro. Stigli smo u streljanu Kalverton, koja je bila pod prismotrom FBI a da naša grupa to nije znala. Kada je bio moj red da pucam, Otac mi je pomogao da držim pušku na ramenu i objasnio kako da ciljam u metu na oko 27 metara. Zadnji metak koji sam ispalio tog dana pogodio je malo narančasto svjetlo na vrhu mete i na iznenađenje svih, a posebno moje, cijela meta je prsnula u plamenovima. Moj stric se okrenuo drugim ljudima, i rekao na arapskom "ibn abduh". Kakav otac, takav sin. Svi su se dobro nasmijali tom komentaru, ali tek nekoliko godina kasnije potpuno sam razumio šta im je bilo tako smiješno. Mislili su da me vide u istom razaranju za koje je moj otac bio sposoban. Ti ljudi su na kraju osuđeni zbog kombija sa 680 kg eksploziva ostavljenog na parkingu sjevernoj tornja Svjetskog trgovinskog centra uzrokujući eksploziju koja je ubila šest ljudi i povrijedila preko 1000 drugih. To su bili ljudi na koje sam gledao sa poštovanjem. Te ljude sam zvao "ammu", što znači stric.
A few months prior to his arrest, he sat me down and explained that for the past few weekends, he and some friends had been going to a shooting range on Long Island for target practice. He told me I'd be going with him the next morning. We arrived at Calverton Shooting Range, which unbeknownst to our group was being watched by the FBI. When it was my turn to shoot, my father helped me hold the rifle to my shoulder and explained how to aim at the target about 30 yards off. That day, the last bullet I shot hit the small orange light that sat on top of the target and to everyone's surprise, especially mine, the entire target burst into flames. My uncle turned to the other men, and in Arabic said, "Ibn abuh." Like father, like son. They all seemed to get a really big laugh out of that comment, but it wasn't until a few years later that I fully understood what they thought was so funny. They thought they saw in me the same destruction my father was capable of. Those men would eventually be convicted of placing a van filled with 1,500 pounds of explosives into the sub-level parking lot of the World Trade Center's North Tower, causing an explosion that killed six people and injured over 1,000 others. These were the men I looked up to. These were the men I called ammu, which means uncle.
Do moje 19. godine selio sam se već 20 puta, i ta nestabilnost u mom djetinjstvu nije mi dala neku priliku da se sprijateljim sa mnogo ljudi. Svaki put kad se počnem osjećati ugodno u nečijoj blizini, bilo je vrijeme pakovati se i seliti se u novi grad. Kako sam bio uvijek novo lice u razredu, često sam bio meta siledžija. Tajio sam svoj identitet od ostalih učenika kako ne bih bio meta, ali kako se pokazalo, biti tiho, bucmasto novo dijete u razredu bilo je više nego dovoljno. Tako sam uglavnom provodio vrijeme čitajući knjige i gledajući TV ili igrajući video igrice. Moje društvene se nisu razvile, u najmanju ruku, i odrastajući u bigotnom okruženju, nisam bio spreman za stvarni život. Odgajan sam da sudim ljudima na osnovu proizvoljnih parametara, kao što je rasa ili religija.
By the time I turned 19, I had already moved 20 times in my life, and that instability during my childhood didn't really provide an opportunity to make many friends. Each time I would begin to feel comfortable around someone, it was time to pack up and move to the next town. Being the perpetual new face in class, I was frequently the target of bullies. I kept my identity a secret from my classmates to avoid being targeted, but as it turns out, being the quiet, chubby new kid in class was more than enough ammunition. So for the most part, I spent my time at home reading books and watching TV or playing video games. For those reasons, my social skills were lacking, to say the least, and growing up in a bigoted household, I wasn't prepared for the real world. I'd been raised to judge people based on arbitrary measurements, like a person's race or religion.
I šta mi je otvorilo oči? Jedno od mojih prvih iskustava koje je izazvalo preispitivanje mog razmišljanja bilo je tokom predsjedničkih izbora 2000. godine. Kroz program pripreme za koledž, imao sam priliku učestvovati u Državnoj omladinskoj konvenciji održanoj u Filadelfiji. Fokus moje grupe bio je na nasilju među mladima, i s obzirom da sam veći dio svog života bio žrtva siledžija, osjećao sam posebnu strast prema ovoj temi. Članovi naše grupe bili su raznih zanimanja i profila. Dan prije završetka konvencije, saznao sam da je jedno od djece sa kojima sam se sprijateljio bio Jevrej. Trebalo je nekoliko dana da se sazna ovaj detalj, i shvatio sam da nije bilo prirodnog neprijateljstva između nas. Nisam nikad prije imao prijatelja koji je Jevrej, i iskreno imao sam osjećaj ponosa da sam sposoban prevazići barijeru za koju sam veliki dio života bio naveden da vjerujem da je nepremostiva. Druga velika prekretnica je bila kada sam našao ljetni posao u Buš Vrtovima, zabavnom parku. Tu sam bio izložen ljudima svih religija i kultura, i to iskustvo se pokazalo fundamentalno za razvoj mog karaktera. Cijelog života su me učili da je homoseksualnost grijeh, i u skladu s tim, svi homoseksualci su predstavljali negativan uticaj. Desilo se tako da sam imao priliku da radim sa nekim od izvođača koji su bili homoseksualci na jednoj izvedbi, i uskoro sam shvatio da su mnogi najljubazniji, ljudi najmanje skloni osudama koje sam ikad sreo. S obzirom da sam kao dijete bio maltretiran od strane siledžija stvorio sam osjećaj empatije prema patnji drugih, i dođe mi vrlo prirodno da se ponašam prema ljubaznim ljude onako kako bih želio da se ljudi ponašaju prema meni. Zbog tog osjećaja, mogao sam suprotstaviti stereotipe kojima su me učili kao dijete sa stvarnim životnim iskustvom i interakcijom. Ne znam kako je biti homoseksualac, ali dobro znam kako je kada me osuđuju za nešto što je izvan moje kontrole.
So what opened my eyes? One of my first experiences that challenged this way of thinking was during the 2000 presidential elections. Through a college prep program, I was able to take part in the National Youth Convention in Philadelphia. My particular group's focus was on youth violence, and having been the victim of bullying for most of my life, this was a subject in which I felt particularly passionate. The members of our group came from many different walks of life. One day toward the end of the convention, I found out that one of the kids I had befriended was Jewish. Now, it had taken several days for this detail to come to light, and I realized that there was no natural animosity between the two of us. I had never had a Jewish friend before, and frankly I felt a sense of pride in having been able to overcome a barrier that for most of my life I had been led to believe was insurmountable. Another major turning point came when I found a summer job at Busch Gardens, an amusement park. There, I was exposed to people from all sorts of faiths and cultures, and that experience proved to be fundamental to the development of my character. Most of my life, I'd been taught that homosexuality was a sin, and by extension, that all gay people were a negative influence. As chance would have it, I had the opportunity to work with some of the gay performers at a show there, and soon found that many were the kindest, least judgmental people I had ever met. Being bullied as a kid created a sense of empathy in me toward the suffering of others, and it comes very unnaturally to me to treat people who are kind in any other way than how I would want to be treated. Because of that feeling, I was able to contrast the stereotypes I'd been taught as a child with real life experience and interaction. I don't know what it's like to be gay, but I'm well acquainted with being judged for something that's beyond my control.
Zatim, tu je bio "Dnevni šou". Svake noći, Džon Stjuart me natjerao da budem intelektualno iskren prema sebi apropo svoje netrpeljivosti i pomogao mi je da shvatim da nečija rasa, religija ili seksualna orjentacija nema ništa sa kvalitetom njihova karaktera. Na mnoge načine, on je za mene bio očinska figura onda kad mi je očajno trebala. Inspiracija može često doći iz neočekivanog mjesta, i činjenica da je jedan Jevrej komičar uradio više da pozitivno utiče na moj pogled na život od mog oca ekstremiste nije mi promakla.
Then there was "The Daily Show." On a nightly basis, Jon Stewart forced me to be intellectually honest with myself about my own bigotry and helped me to realize that a person's race, religion or sexual orientation had nothing to do with the quality of one's character. He was in many ways a father figure to me when I was in desperate need of one. Inspiration can often come from an unexpected place, and the fact that a Jewish comedian had done more to positively influence my worldview than my own extremist father is not lost on me.
Jednog dana, razgovarao sam sa mojom majkom o tome kako se moj pogled na svijet počeo mijenjati, i ona mi je rekla nešto što će mom srcu biti drago dok sam živ. Pogledala me svojim umornim očima očima nekoga ko je iskusio dovoljno dogmatizma za cijeli život, i rekla, "Umorna sam od toga da mrzim ljude." U tom momentu, shvatio sam koliko negativne energije treba da držite toliku mržnju u sebi.
One day, I had a conversation with my mother about how my worldview was starting to change, and she said something to me that I will hold dear to my heart for as long as I live. She looked at me with the weary eyes of someone who had experienced enough dogmatism to last a lifetime, and said, "I'm tired of hating people." In that instant, I realized how much negative energy it takes to hold that hatred inside of you.
Zak Ebrahim nije moje pravo ime. Promijenio sam ga kad je moja porodica odlučila da okonča vezu sa mojim ocem i počne novi život. Zašto onda da se izlažem i potencijalno stavljam u opasnost? Jednostavno je. Radim to u nadi da će možda neko jednog dana ko se osjeća prisiljenim da koristi nasilje čuti moju priču i shvatiti da postoji bolji put, da iako sam bio podvrgnut toj nasilnoj, netolerantnoj ideologiji, nisam postao fanatičan. Umjesto toga izabrao sam svoje iskustvo da se borim protiv terorizma, protiv netrpeljivosti. Radim to za žrtve terorizma i njihove najbliže, za užasan bol i gubitak koje im je terorizam uzrokovao. Govorit ću glasno, za žrtve terorizma protiv svih bemislenih djela i osuditi djela moga oca. I sa tom činjenicom, stojim ovdje kao dokaz da nasilje nije ukorijenjeno ni u jednoj religiji ili rasi, i da sin ne mora slijediti svoga oca. Ja nisam moj otac.
Zak Ebrahim is not my real name. I changed it when my family decided to end our connection with my father and start a new life. So why would I out myself and potentially put myself in danger? Well, that's simple. I do it in the hopes that perhaps someone someday who is compelled to use violence may hear my story and realize that there is a better way, that although I had been subjected to this violent, intolerant ideology, that I did not become fanaticized. Instead, I choose to use my experience to fight back against terrorism, against the bigotry. I do it for the victims of terrorism and their loved ones, for the terrible pain and loss that terrorism has forced upon their lives. For the victims of terrorism, I will speak out against these senseless acts and condemn my father's actions. And with that simple fact, I stand here as proof that violence isn't inherent in one's religion or race, and the son does not have to follow the ways of his father. I am not my father.
Hvala vam.
Thank you. (Applause)
Hvala vam, svima.
Thank you, everybody. (Applause)
Hvala vam svima.
Thank you all. (Applause)
Hvala puno.
Thanks a lot. (Applause)