Racially motivated crimes must be treated severely by the courts because they damage community relations and “tear apart the fabric of society”, a conference in Limerick has heard.
Speaking at the European Network Against Racism (ENAR) seminar exploring Islamophobia in Ireland, Shane O’Curry, ENAR director, said the event was organised to highlight the increasing number of racist incidents its reporting system has recorded, in particular against members of the Muslim community.
“It’s vitally important that An Garda Síochána, the courts and the whole criminal justice system be given the full range of tools to deal adequately with the threat of bias-motivated crimes; that is crimes that are targeted at particular communities because of their backgrounds, whether religious or otherwise,” he said.
ENAR representatives were among those who attended a rally in Dublin earlier this week to show their solidarity with two men and a boy from Afghanistan who were attacked in Rathfarnham.
“Hate crimes need to be treated more severely, because they damage community relations they can really tear apart the fabric of our society,” Mr O’Curry said.
Another speaker, Dr James Carr, a sociologist at the University of Limerick, has written a number of books on the experience of Muslim communities living in Ireland.
Anti-Muslim hostility
His most recently published research - the largest study undertaken with Muslim communities in Ireland - found one in three Muslim men and women experience anti-Muslim hostility and discrimination, including verbal abuse and assaults.
A comparison between men and women found women experienced twice the rate of anti-Muslim hostility.
“We have the legislation there, we need to enact it. As it is, if someone is racially assaulted on the street, at best they will be prosecuted as a public order offence. We need legislation that challenges hate crime specifically and that engages with hate crimes.”
Irish Muslim Iesha Moustafa (19), from Drogheda, spoke about how two years ago her twin sister was told by a school principal that she could not wear her headscarf to school.
“She was told that nobody would accept her and her friends would stop talking to her. She explained that her friends already knew she wore the scarf and they were fine with it, but she was told that if it matters that much to her she could just leave and that if she wanted to wear the scarf she wasn’t allowed go to the school any more,” she said.
“It completely knocked her confidence and she didn’t have the confidence to wear the headscarf any more, outside of school either,” added Ms Moustafa.
The Trinity College Dublin science student told the seminar how she became an activist in transition year when she did a lot of voluntary work.
Hijabs and Hat-tricks
She later became involved in a programme aimed at empowering young people through football, called Hijabs and Hat-tricks.
“In the process I ended up empowering myself and learning more about activism and it just opened up so many doors for me. I learned more about myself and then I wanted to create opportunities for other young girls.”
“Activism amplifies the voice of the too-often unheard, and I didn’t really realise the extent of that until I became involved in activism because when you experience racism and prejudice on a daily basis it’s really hard,” she added.
Ms Moustafa described how she is still subjected to anti-Muslim remarks at university.
“Around the time the Isis attacks were happening I had made a group of friends, and it was all fine until one guy found out I was Muslim. He would come over and say why did ‘ye’ do that, and I would say what do you mean?
“I’m not connected to Isis, this isn’t Islam - and then he would always try to make me apologise for the acts of Isis.
“He knew that I couldn’t apologise, and sometimes he would ask me questions because he always wanted me to retaliate with a negative comment, so I just avoided it.”
Nonetheless, the activist encourages people to ask questions.
“It all just depends on your intention: are you asking the question out of genuine curiosity?Or are you asking the question to humiliate somebody?
“Some people just want a reaction so they can feel justified, they want you to say something really mean to them so they can say all Muslim people are mean, but I believe genuine questions help create better understanding, so discourse is so important.”