To the Editor:
After seeing what transpired on the night of March 6 in the Bayonne High School auditorium, I am not proud to live in the town of Bayonne. We really had to have a meeting about the need for a place of worship? How does this Muslim center affect the everyday routine of your life? You wake up in the morning, go to your job/class, work an eight-hour shift, and go back to your house and wait for 5 p.m. on Friday.
Who are we to say something humans made up, is not welcomed here? What happened to freedom of religion in America? It doesn’t apply to a bigoted town, and like it or not, that is what we are labeled as all across New Jersey, although many, like myself, came out to support our Muslim brothers and sisters. What are the reasons people don’t want the center here? Is it because of the religion that comes along with it? Because all Muslims are “terrorists” (not my stance)? Well, sadly we live in a world of stereotypes and people continue to perpetuate them; all Jews are thieves, all Christians are judgmental and hypocrites and all Catholics are rapists. Now, I know that these stereotypes are not true, but after hearing the way people acted that night, they made it seem that way. What is wrong with us as a human race? Why must we fight and disagree about things we made up to make ourselves sleep at night. We are just people who rent this Earth. We don’t own it, so why ruin our experience on it with meaningless arguments.
I attended that meeting on March 6, because I hoped that humanity would have shined through like a lighthouse beacon through a foggy night, but sadly it did not. To my Muslim brothers, sisters, friends and classmates stay strong and know that you have support in our town.
ISAIAH OTERO
