many communities of color. Kabzuag Vaj is an organizer with the Asian Freedom Project in Madison, Wisconsin. They have collected hundreds of accounts of racial profiling of Southeast Asian youth over the past year. "Talking to the mainstream about racial profiling is hard," says Vaj. "The excuse people give us is extreme times demand extreme measures, whatever is necessary to catch the terrorists." Organizers at People United for a Better Oakland (PUEBLO) face similar concerns. They recognize that although they are a multiracial organization, their campaign against racial profiling and police misconduct is inadequate to address the current political situation. "The fact that we have members from the Arab American community means we work in solidarity with that community, but our work is not set up right now specifically to meet the needs of that community," says Dawn Phillips, PUEBLO director.The debates around racial profiling have also created tolerance in some unlikely places. Shehadeh does not believe that racial profiling is an effective way to stop crime, nor that it will prevent further attacks against the United States. Still, he believes that some form of racial profiling is understandable in the current political environment. "What we say is that racial profiling is not the answer. Security for all is what’s needed," says Shehadeh. "As Arab Americans, we are tolerant of this phenomena because we understand, because we’re sensitive. But just for now." Like many Arab Americans, Shehadeh has felt an increased pressure to prove his patriotism in recent months, and is temporarily willing to put up with policies and actions that in the past have been unacceptable. But Shehadeh is not nave about the root causes of recent U.S. domestic and foreign policy decisions. "The solutions of war and hate mongering tighten the grip of racism," he says. It remains to be seen how much tighter that grip will become, and what it will ta...
