We aren’t meant to be pushed down, Mount Holyoke

I am abroad this semester, and for the first time ever, missing Mount Holyoke. That is, until I checked my Facebook yesterday.

Currently, an article is swamping your feed regarding an encounter between Mount Holyoke’s own campus police and Maya.

Throughout the article, Maya recounts an imposition of campus police on her get together with her friends and boyfriend in (what the reader assumes to be) an unassigned dorm room, a room for which we are never informed how she gained access to. When a classmate reports her to the police, she is unceremoniously arrested and charged (though the specifics of her charge are never revealed).

In this article, Maya notes that campus police arrested her for no reason other than being black:

“It seems as a black person [at Mount Holyoke] your only option is to allow yourself to be mistreated. To be wrongly accused and harassed.”

The discrimination Maya experienced saddened me at first, yet upon reflecting more upon it, there seems that there is more to be revealed.

Why is it, then, that she jumps so quickly to racism?

In Mount Holyoke, there is much discourse surrounding discrimination, yet not much action has been taken towards solving this issue — that is, unless it is in certain contexts.

As an Arab whose ethnicity is not listed on the application for Mount Holyoke and who practices Islam, I am not oblivious to the daily encounters of intolerance on campus.

I wear the hijab, the Islamic headscarf. You’ve probably seen me around campus; my scarf choice is usually quite bold and can be spotted across Skinner Green. I have always felt comfortable with my choice to wear the hijab — that is, until I came to Mount Holyoke. At Mount Holyoke, I was exposed to a whole other level of judgment that I had never encountered before — judgment from ‘feminists’ who placed me in a conservative, unintelligent box based simply on my religious marker. From piercing stares as I walked to Reese for class, to awkward eye contact — these encounters were unfamiliar to me, an individual who has had plenty of life experience prior to Mount Holyoke.

One of the most prominent encounters occurred during my third year, when I was sitting in my dorm with my good friend and a fellow resident (self-identified feminist who felt most womanly when she first had sex). The conversation turned to religion, specifically to headscarf, when I mentioned that I wore headscarf when I wasn’t in my room.

Upon hearing this, the dorm-mate turned her entire back to me, blatantly asking my friend if she wore the headscarf. When my friend shook her head, the fellow resident sighed in relief and told my friend that she “should never wear a headscarf, because then we wouldn’t be able to see your beautiful hair!”

I sat astounded, unsure how to respond. On the one hand, I was insulted — was she saying that my hair was so ugly that I should cover it? On the other hand, I was hurt — here was a girl — an international relations major, for crying out loud — who was blatantly disrespecting my choice — by physically shutting me out from a conversation that was so normal just moments before, nonetheless .

Mount Holyoke, if you are trying to create women who will create change, you are failing.

If I could go back to that moment, I wish I had the courage to say something, to inform her that her actions were unacceptable. At the time, I was just mentally tired of the community; I was tired of feeling like I had to constantly represent a whole faith in the campus I called home; I was tired of repeatedly explaining the same thing over and over again: No, I am not oppressed. No, I was not forced to wear this. Yes, I swear I am like you.

I have never experienced such explicit discrimination from my peers without being defended by those around me. I worked at a coffee shop for four years — in lower-middle/lower- class towns — and only once did I encounter racism when a customer told a coworker that he “didn’t want the terrorist to make my drink.” In response, my co-worker told him off, and then proceeded to mark the cup decaf in solidarity.

Why have I only encountered individuals willing to defend me at a coffee shop but not at the school to which I dedicate my academic career?

Why is it at Mount Holyoke we are so scared to stand up for others? Why is it we are so resistant to actually taking action?

Maya, while I might be critical of your article (why did your friends all leave? How did you gain access to the room?), I applaud your action of actually spreading the word.

I’m going to warn you, though, that this will not be enough.

After my umpteenth encounter, I went to a dean to talk to her about how to improve the Muslim community and create bridges between Muslims and the rest of Mount Holyoke. Upon recounting the millions of epigraphs my classmates had entrusted me in (women feeling stared at for wearing hijab, individuals lacking support in the community that had only recently promised to support them), my pleas fell on deaf ears.

“I understand what you are trying to say, thank you for coming to me.”

That was it.

No condolences, no attempt to organize a campus-wide discussion.

Faculty support surrounding this issue is at an all-time low — and as a full-time student working off-campus 20 hours a week to pay for college, what’s a woman to do?

Though Mount Holyoke is a diverse environment, it is far from inclusive. I’m sure many students have entered college, made friends from many different backgrounds, only to find in their second year that the students have deviated from the once-diverse friend group to groups more culturally similar. While it is great for students to feel at home, should we not also learn from others?

At Mount Holyoke, we are women taught to critically think and discuss. When does the talk turn to action? How many individuals in high places do we need to talk to before our issues are recognized?

I only just hope that students will continue to speak up about their experiences, thereby pushing Mount Holyoke to the full potential that it can be.

We are women that never fear change.

As Mary Lyon would have it, through consistent efforts, change Mount Holyoke for the better we will.