In this TEDtalk, poet Amal Kassir talks about the importance of names and labels. As a Muslim American, and living in a period of mass media and misinformation, she has frequently felt the prejudices that come with bigot stances and generalizations. And in spite of this, she’s aware of how easily this generalizations are made, and how difficult it is to counter argue them once they are present. Hence the need of establishing dialogues and building positive narratives.
As Amal beautifully explains, this instrumentalization of names is easily found in the treatment refugees, and Muslims in general, receive today. The term immigrant is applied to refugees to hide the difficult social contexts these people are facing. The term terrorist is applied to immigrants as an unfair response to the fears and threats the West is facing today. But as she concludes, both these prejudiced labels can only be fought if everyone, both the targeter and the targeted, stand together and try to see through bigotry.
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