Learn How to Support Your Muslim American Neighbors via @MuslimAdvocates

In his farewell address to the nation, President Obama said, "We have to be consistent in condemning hateful rhetoric ... none of us can be bystanders to bigotry.”

With horrifying talk of registries and the revival of something akin to McCarthy’s House Un-American Activities Committee, and even attempts at justification for camps, it feels like the roller coaster we’ve been on as a country is rapidly free-falling backwards.

The Muslim American community has been strong, creative and resolved in the face of increasing hate and Islamaphobia over the years, but with the radical, white-nationalist right entering the White House in a week, it is more important than ever to show our Muslim friends and neighbors that we have their backs.

So today our activism is about educating yourself so that you can be a valuable teammate and advocate for your fellow citizens as Trump, the Republicans and their supporters make good on their promises to un-justly target them.

Muslim Advocates is a national legal advocacy and educational organization that works on the frontline of civil rights to guarantee freedom and justice for Americans of all faiths. Think “ACLU” with a Muslim American rights and religious freedom focus.

Their website is a rich resource of information, like a “how to” page on reporting hate crimes that is organized by state, tips and examples of effective tactics to use when responding to Islamaphobia and harassment of Muslims online, updates on their current litigation and Muslim voices and perspectives on their blog.

Head over to MuslimAdvocates.org and start educating yourself on how to be a better teammate. If you’re Muslim, this is a resource you can share with your non-Muslim friends when they start asking you how they can help so you don’t have to explain everything yourself. And a note on that, the farther away you are from being personally affected by Trumpian policies, the more you should make sure to do as much of your own homework as you possibly can before you even think about asking a muslim person or person of color how you can help.

To give just one perspective on this and another useful resource, here’s a real life muslim woman and co-host of the podcast Good Muslim Bad Muslim: Going through the traumatic experience of Trump’s election - #GoodMuslimBadMuslim - Air Date 12-25-16

If you have a business or work for one that is actively supportive and welcoming of all people, we found a great “Hate Has No Business Here” poster for you to download and print.

So, if actively fighting hate is important to you, be sure to hit the share buttons to spread the word about Learning How to Support Your Muslim American Neighbors via social media so that others in your network can spread the word too.

Because we all could use some hope right now, I’ll end with a few more words from our outgoing president...

“For every two steps forward, it often feels we take one step back…But the long sweep of America has been defined by forward motion, a constant widening of our founding creed to embrace all, and not just some.”