Posted on 12/24/2015 11:17:11 PM PST by Impala64ssa
Dear Mr. Abrams,
When you were younger, did your elders ask you questions like, "If you could have lunch with anyone in the world, who would it be?" I have a hunch your answers were a lot like mine: Jean-Luc Picard, or rather Data. Possibly Q. Definitely Princess Leia. Maybe Darth Vader. (On second thought, maybe not Vader. I feel like he’d be distinctly unimpressed with me.) Star Trek gave me hope. Star Wars was my happy place.
Which makes you my hero. And a lot of other people's, too.
You’ve rebooted both sacred franchises. You not only get paid to live in some of the greatest worlds ever conceived, but to extend them into our age. What an honor and a privilege it is to re-imagine our most cherished tales. But with great power, as Ben Parker would say, comes great responsibility.
This should be a joyous week for me, with the release of both the new Star Trek Beyond trailer, and Star Wars:The Force Awakens. Had you asked me about this a few months ago, I would’ve told you so much happiness in so few days should be banned.
But that was before Paris, San Bernardino, before leading presidential candidates began actually talking about people like me being banned. The national climate for Muslims is uglier than I can recall. I'm legitimately afraid folks dressed up as Jedis at the premiere might be confused for Muslims, and attacked.
That’s where we are right now.
When it comes to Islam, a fair proportion of Americans seem to go nuts. We’ve had Ben Carson saying Muslims aren't loyal enough to be be president, Jeb Bush claiming Muslim refugees shouldn't be let in, Donald Trump talking about special IDs, databases, surveillance techniques, killing family members of the San Bernardino shooters, and Klu Klux Klan members are recruiting anew on the fear of Islam.
I think you can see where I'm going with this. Many Americans fear Islam and think our faith is incompatible with U.S. values. We cannot possibly change these narratives on our own. Whether or not someone likes Muslims is dependent on whether or not she even knows a Muslim. It’s unlikely, even if every Muslim had a transporter device, that we could meet everyone, and change minds single-handedly.
As Muslim American parents, we’re struggling to keep our kids faith innocent
There are a few million American Muslims. There are over 300 million Americans.
Movies and music, art and popular culture — your purview — they can make the introductions we need. At light speed. I know there will be many other projects and films with your name, your vision and your lens flares inside them. (I'm hoping someone gives you the money to make The Silmarillion.) But please, Mr. Abrams, consider going back to Sector 001 one more time. There’s just nowhere like it.
Especially for the away mission we need you to go on.
A Pakistani kid growing up on the margins, I was an awkward child with overly large glasses and way too much hair (not a problem for me anymore, incidentally), who had his first conversation with a girl he was attracted to many years after most of his peers forgot about their braces. I adored Star Trek because it portrayed a future where imagination, discovery and courage were all that mattered. Who cared about races or religions when there was an entire universe out there to explore and discover?
That's the very kind of place where America can not only meet a Muslim, but see her as a hero. What other franchise can do that? A white guy called Luke, born on a planet named after a city in overwhelmingly Muslim Tunisia (Tataouine inspired Tatooine), that we can all believe. But a Jedi named Muhammad? Right now that feels unlikely.
By bringing a Muslim to Star Trek or Star Wars, you'd be so very faithful to the enterprise, too, continuing a proud tradition of breaking boundaries, of reconfiguring the stuff of our stereotypes. Just like Gene Roddenberry, of course the original creator of the Star Trek TV series.
When the Star Trek creator cast Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhura, he made a Trekkie out of Martin Luther King Jr. One of America’s greatest leaders knew the power of visibility. In fact, he urged her to stay even when she was disillusioned with her role. (When Kirk and Uhura kissed, the show was banned by CBS affiliates in parts of the South.) There was a Russian character too, Pavel Chekov, when Russians were the evil empire on the other side of the world. There was Hikaru Sulu, too, of Japanese descent, when the internment camps were not so distant a memory.
All of them, on the bridge, against Khan or, better yet, joining forces to expand our knowledge of the universe. These weren’t characters briefly introduced and revoked. They were protagonists who opened the door to the diversity many of us now take for granted, precisely because they challenged the norms and expectations of their time. Let’s do it again.
A crew of Asians and Caucasians, Vulcans and Muslims (bottom line, there would need to be a few of us to represent anything close to global population stats, but I'd be satisfied at this point with one), seeing what's just around the corner, facing down danger together: Star Trek against the clash of civilizations, a movie that inspires generations, that takes hold of our imagination, that forces us to wonder whether the things that divide us today might not tomorrow. Make it so, please.
In general you only fill in the background of characters if it’s relevant to the story. Therefore the fact that our main character, Mohamad Drax, is Muslim must play a prominent role in the story.
Plot. Mohamad’s eldest daughter, Molena, wants to become an exotic dancer on Muldeb Five. This insults the family honor so Mohamad must track her down through several adventures, return her to home so that he can use her as an object lessen to the other daughters. Having returned her home, he kills her in the traditional style in front of the other daughters, as terror is actually a kindness if it forces adherence to Islam. Mohamad lives happily ever after.
Below is a link explaining why this is consistent with Mahamad’s Islamic character. And, yes, the author is right. We need more stories like this.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/384980/
They could call him the Terrorist
Syed was a really interesting character. Locke was also up there.
“It is a simple thing, it is the word of Vaal.”
There is probably one Muzzie on Star Trek. The doctor on “Deep Space Nine”.
Mohammedism is all about conquest.
Why not be a hero yourself and protest publicly and condemning the murder of innocent people by people of your faith....Oohhhhh... no you wont do that will you.... so screw you.
He’s calling for pro Islamic propaganda in our already putrified media content, that’s all. These people never stop. Public opinion is something solely to be manipulated and shaped, never taken as it is. They’re so much smarter than we are, you know, they could never respect our wishes, even as the bullets start singing past their empty heads. They need to do less manipulating and more listening.
Bump all of the above. These need to be taught at the elementary school level. Mohammedism is a threat to the Western world's way of life.
Maker your own superhero.
Haroon must not be all that familiar with the works of JJ Abrams. In my humble opinion Sayid Jarah a character in Lost qualifies as a hero. What a whiner!!
So the Washington Post wants a superhero who rapes and enslaves women and murders anyone not of his mosque......Seriously?????? They think this is a superhero????
Jedi is close enough to Jihadi. Let the Jedi represent what Islam should reform itself to. Case closed.
The rights accorded women in islam is slavery....so they can have slaves and slaves, what lucky men.
Honestly, we don't have several generations to play with "peaceful progress" experimentation. Three or more generations down the road, Islam will still be the ticking time bomb that it has always been.
After 1400 or so years of utter stagnation, odds are that any possible reformation of islam is most unlikely, if not impossible.
Science Fiction lets us look at the world (or any world) with one or more things different from current reality. For example, imagine Earth with no 23.5 degree tilt of its axis ... there would be no seasons and the rich would live in the temperate zones while the wretched refuse would be stuck at the equator and poles. Just as an example.
I always found it thougt-provoking that Star Trek had no hijabs on the bridge and no obvious evidence of Islam. Why? Were the Muslims wiped out in a violent purge? Was Islam finally “reformed” into a civilzed religion?
Star Trek also has no mention of money and little reference to civilian government. So what?
Sci-fi is supposed to make you think. So think of no Muslims. I’m cool with that.
the man is sitting at a keyboard. type out a hero yourself, mister.
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