Zemir Begić
On November 30th, 2014, Zemir Begic, a 32-year-old Bosnian American man, was brutally murdered by a group of teens in St. Louis, MO. Due to Begic’s identity as a Bosnian Muslim immigrant, the Bosnian American community in St. Louis expressed their solidarity with Black community in the city, both facing racial and ethnic discrimination. At the same time, white supremacists claimed the event as an instance of Black-on-white crime, as the culprits were Black and Hispanic teens and Begic a phenotypically white man. Begic’s story raises a crucial debate of what it means to be a white Muslim in the United States. While there are clear privileges to being seen as white in this country, groups like Bosnian Muslims, who may have the phenotype typically associated with whiteness, still face discrimination and are deprived of the privileges that white Christians have.
Whiteness in the United States has been tied to dominant culture since this country’s inception, and it is superficially understood through physical characteristics, such as white skin, blond hair and so on, and associated behaviors such as speaking English or practicing Christianity. There are privileges to being white in this country. Whiteness makes an individual not as vulnerable to state violence and other forms of premature death. It is accepted as the norm and is unmarked, as produced by white supremacists. White supremacists insist that whiteness is somehow superior to all other races. So, by claiming Begic as white, white supremacists are trying to insist that the teens racially targeted Begic because he was white.
Historically, some Muslims have tried to legally claim whiteness in order to immigrate to the United States as well as to have legal protection, due to wanting the privileges that white people have in this country. However, Muslims in America, and even white convert Muslims, still feel othered by their environment like the Bosnians in St. Louis. Some Bosnian refugees reject their whiteness in exchange for interracial solidarity, as they often feel like they better understand the injustices that non-white individuals endure.
In addition, whiteness is situational, meaning it is tied to specific times, places, and persons. White supremacists wanted to advance their own agenda and Begic could serve this purpose, so they claimed him as white after his death. However, in many other cases, they would reject someone like Begic because he or she is Muslim. There is also the notion of “becoming white” where groups that were once considered non-white, like Irish Americans, ultimately come to be commonly accepted as white. This system is also inconsistent and flawed.
While white supremacists claimed that Begic is white to promote their racist agenda, Bosnians in the St. Louis community, and all around the nation, have understood that Begic’s death exposes the discrimination that Bosnian American Muslims face both internally and abroad. Many Bosnians came to America to escape ethnic-cleansing in their home country, punished for practicing Islam. In the United States, since 9/11, Bosnian Americans are still subject to Islamophobia. They created a hashtag #JusticeForZemir that was quickly taken over by white supremacists to advance their hate. In response, Ida Sefer, a Bosnian American, created the hashtag #BiHInSolidarity which means “Bosnia i Herzegovina in solidarity” while being pronounced “be in solidarity” to remember the discrimination and struggles Bosnian Americans undergo. While both hashtags are relatively quiet now on Twitter, the struggle that Muslim Americans have with whiteness, simultaneously being accepted and rejected as white, is still a very serious issue.
Sources:
