When Victor grew up in his small town, his childhood was already planned out as it was for every other child there. He'd go to one of three elementary schools, one of two middle schools, and the same high school as the rest of the county. The only private school was in a neighboring county and his parents couldn't afford to shuttle him back and forth like that. They did well, but not that well.

They had grown up during the civil rights struggle and had participated themselves in the final years of it before desegregation took effect and the old 'colored' high school was closed down and boarded up. The Black population of their county wasn't that large, so the high school had also been the middle school. Only the elementary school remains, almost still segregated except for a few Mexican children whose parents have recently moved into the rural counties to do construction and the jobs that no one else will do without higher pay. Race was still everything to one's identity when Victor was growing up, and the only two races were white and black with a few Indian families having just arrived there. His parents, being 'conscious', were in fact not like most other black parents there. Not all, but many didn't care about their children learning to read and do math by the time they were in third grade. They were more concerned with their children learning the dances and wearing the latest shoes. Victor's parents were more concerned with raising him and his sister Victoria to be proud of their history and heritage and to not believe the stereotypes perpetuated about his people on television. What the Jama couple hadn't realized was that the less fortunate of his classmates at the elementary school would believe the sterotypes before they were even old enough to comprehend them. And with Victor not of that same mindset, he'd suffer for his access to better teaching.

It wasn't every day, but he noticed that when he expressed an opinion within earshot of his classmates, a few of them would always look at him like he had a whole in his head. "What the hell?! Man, you hear this nigga not make no sense at all? Vic, what the hell are you talking about?" He first noticed it in 4th grade, so he thought maybe he was using big words and he tried being more straightforward. Didn't work. It wasn't how he said it or even what he said. It was simply who was saying it. They couldn't relate because they didn't feel close to him, and they didn't feel close to him because they couldn't relate. He was proud of his ancestry going back to West African kingdoms like Dahomey and Benin and the Kongo. They were obsessed with the latest episode of the Cosby Show, the latest Air Jordans to come out, and the upcoming drug dealers that were fleecing the Black community at that time. Most had dads and uncles, but they were too busy working the long shifts at the lumberyard to be a match for the drug dealers who were in the neighborhood before the dads got home too tired to even know what was going on. The lumberyard wasn't closing down yet at that time, but it wasn't hiring anymore people, either, white or black. Whites were still getting hired at city and county jobs or the businesses there. They often worked at the electric company if there was no other job available, so most of them couldn't make much but they could still use black labor cheaply for their own comfort levels. Though it wasn't legal anymore, black applicants to the jobs now 'open' to them were just not hired and this was known, resulting in fewer black applicants within five years of desegregation and until Victor was in middle school.

By that time, though, the drug problem had grown to an epidemic even there in that small town. The police did not patrol the black neighborhoods except around the 7th and the 21st of each month when the chief would give bonuses to whoever made the most collars. Or whenever some Black male was seen eyeballing a young white girl. The drug dealers were very unlikely to be arrested for their activities but they were quite well-off now. Only two main drug dealers had stayed around, the rest either being bought out or run out of town. But the ones who worked for them were a total of eight. These youths would show up at the basketball court on Saturdays and the girls would just flock to them, the young boys wanting to be like them. Victor's classmates wanted this, too, and this is what they discussed. "Man, you see how Charlette was on Eric like that? She fine, too! Big ole booty! When I get big, I'm gonna be just like that! I'm gonna have a jeep and if Charlette ain't still his, she gonna be mine! Just watch! Two years, and I'm gonna be doin' it just like he do!" So whenever Victor talked about how the middle school teachers intentionally graded Black students more harshly and didn't tell them what they needed to do to get better grades, they'd look at him like he was speaking Greek. "What? Nigga you stupid! They hard on everybody!" Jerry had said.

"No, they ain't! I saw when Brad and Ted got their papers back! They don't study that much and they both look relieved! They should have been relieved, I saw their grades and they must have cheated to get them. We know Gregory studies so it makes sense he'd get a B. But Brad and Ted at the same time getting an A and a B?! That's a miracle!"

"You sound stupid. You need to shut up, you li'l--"

"F__ you!" Victor had swore to interrupt Jerry, making the hallway quiet. Victor had had enough of being treated by his own kind like he was so incomprehensible. "I told yo' dumb a__ I saw the papers they got back! You know if Eric had said that to you you'd have believed it even if he hadn't seen the papers! Even if Mario in our class had said it you'd believe it! So why I sound stupid saying the same thing!"

"You want to do something, nigga?" Jerry challenged him, knowing Victor had been raised not to fight his own kind if he wasn't cornered. Victor talked his way out of it saying that he didn't want to fight another 'brother' so if it wasn't necessary then he wouldn't. Jerry didn't say that was a good reason, though he didn't force Victor, either. Instead, he swaggered off saying, "Yeah, I know you don't want none!" so everyone else could hear him as if he had scared Victor.

It got around the school that Victor was scared to fight even though the black students knew his upbringing and how he was taught. The rumor was still whispered just to give them something to talk about. And so Victor, who had been more concerned about his people at such a young age than anyone else, was the one. And then the inability to relate was replaced by a growing disrespect from the other 'brothers'. From seventh grade to eleventh, he tolerated this in the name of Black Solidarity. He represented a break from the bad habits of the community, his stance against them was known to all, and this antagonized the very people he loved.

In eleventh grade, a lot had changed as far as he was concerned. Jerry was in jail and only a small-time thief and weed peddler when he was out. Eric, his hero, had moved out of town and never come back. No one knew what had become of him. But what hadn't changed was his mistreatment for being so 'militant'. It wasn't whites who ever mistreated him, they left him alone and kept a distance. It was still only his own kind, his fellow children of Africa. The signs of the end that he had read about in the Final Call for years were manifesting. The Soviet Union had collapsed two years earlier. A movie about Malcolm X was popular. Nelson Mandela was out of prison in South Africa and had just been elected president there, soon to be inaugurated. He had even made a cameo appearance in the movie about Malcolm X. The Rodney King riots had torn up Los Angeles and the spirit had even moved the community in his little town, making the world seem smaller to him.

That 'movement' was short-lived. Soon the community was back to its same old negativity and in-fighting and the drugheads and their drug suppliers became the reality again of black life. The poverty and the gunshots took over again and made the happenings in South Africa and Los Angeles so distant they might have been in another decade. EJ Miller, also known as Foots, took chances to make fun of Victor's pro-Black stance. It didn't bother Victor because he joked with everyone and did it to their faces in a playful manner. It was Lorenzo who sat with them in gym class that did it every so often. Vick never knew Lorenzo's real name because the gym teacher never called roll, he just went by the seating chart before he told them to dress out. But Lorenzo did the one thing that Victor had refused to tolerate anymore. He singled him out. One day when Foots was just making everyone laugh at themselves, he got on Victor. "Want some bacon, my brother?" he teased, to which they all laughed, even Victor.

"I'll pass, Fiddler," he joked back. Then singing to no one in particular, he continued. "What's that sniffin' round dat treeeeee? Dog, Fiddler. Dog sniffin' round dat tree!" This also got a laugh from everyone at Foots' expense.

"You talkin' dat Black Power s__ all you want, but if I dangle a pork chop in front of you, you will call yourself Toby to get it. No-- not a porkchop--- a white woman! You know a Black Panther got to have his white woman and his whiskey!"

"And he be saying some stupid s__, too!" said Lorenzo. It wasn't amusing at all, so Victor wondered if he was even joking. He wasn't. "I mean, this nigga was talkin' about angels and s__ like I wanted to hear that! He was on some s__ about leaving his body and stuff!"

"Who?" Victor asked, knowing he hadn't conversed like that with anyone at school.

"You, Malcolm Farrakhan! Don't play stupid!"

"Are you joking or are you serious?" Vic asked as those he didn't know still laughed and those who knew him well stopped laughing.

"B___h, I'm for real, for---"

CRACK! Victor hit him dead in the nose and was all over him as the others scattered a few feet away to give him space. They started hooting in amazement as Victor punched and Lorenzo started to swing back as best he could. Caught by surprise, Lorenzo lost the fight as the guys began to separate them, Victor getting one last real good lick before they pulled him away. "Next mother f___er to lie or single me out gets it worse!" he said. Then addressing Lorenzo, "You ever make up some s__ like that again, I will kill you, black or not! I'm not sparin' niggas no more just for being black! Those days are over!"

The next two weeks, Jerry got out of jail and got into an argument with Victoria, who was 3 years younger. He used some sexually abusive language. When Victor showed up in his door the next Saturday, Jerry came to the door and immediately challenged him, too. "Oh you want some, too? We can---"

CRACK! You know what happened next. This time, Jerry put up a better fight, but Victor just pulled his brass knuckles from his pocket and then knocked Jerry unconscious, continuing to beat him savagely. He dragged the limp body into the front yard and then began kicking him in the stomach. To awaken him, he then broke a finger and made Jerry come to with a scream. "Tell everyone I did this except the cops. You tell them and I'll kill you and burn you. I mean that! I don't spare niggas no more! When my sister comes around here later today, you apologize to her or I'll kill you. You got it?" When Jerry didn't nod his head, Victor twisted the broken finger and hit him again with the brass knuckles in his already broken nose. Jerry screamed and emphatically nodded his agreement as he wet his pants in pain and panic. When Jerry's mother made it to the door, she screamed, but was shocked into silence by who was hurting her son. Victor of all people? The good kid?! She knew in her heart of hearts that if it was Victor Jama doing this, he was right and Jerry was wrong.

Victor later graduated high school and went on to college in Alabama, now having a new outlook on Black nationalism and solidarity. "No one can stay united on wrong for long," he said in a discussion in his African history class. At that, he noticed one student looking at him periodcially until class was over. When it ended, the student came to him and introduced himself. "My name's Bilal," he said. "There's something I want you to read over the Thanksgiving break if you can. Will you come with me to get it for you?"

"Yeah, I can come. My name's Victor, glad to meet you, Bilal."

"Likewise." Victor went with him, and Bilal went into his dormroom while Victor waited outside. He came right back out with a book that said English Translation and Commentary of the Qur'an.

"I'll read this, but why? The Nation of Islam is about selling bean pies and Final Call papers, that ain't made a difference yet!"

"Because they're not the real Nation of Islam. It's falsehood, that's not Islam, Victor. Do you see a Final Call in my hand or a bean pie? I don't have to sell it, instead I gave you a Qur'an translation for free. I heard you say in class how you were raised. Uniting Black people is not the mission, it's bigger than that. I gave this to you because you're right about unity. People can't unite on wrong for long. The whole theme in this translation is that! People got to choose right over wrong and I'm not here to sugar-coat it."

"No hype, no propaganda?"

"None. I got it free and it's free for you. If you don't believe in it, I don't lose anything at all, but you do."

"I doubt I'll loose, but I'll read as much as I can. And thank you for caring, that does mean a lot." he was thinking that it was man-made, nothing new, but he'd read it because he could and it wouldn't hurt. But when he opened to read it while Bilal left for his next class, the first verse he saw said, "If this had come from man, you would have seen in it much contradiction." He thumbed again and got to another verse that said, "Bring one verse the likes of this...." When he got to Surah 99, it was exactly the dream he had dreamt the night before!!

He said to himself outloud and slowly right there in the hallway by himself, "Nothing.... will ever be the same...... again!"

Bilal (not from Christian Programming) brought Cedric with him to Hamid's house. Bilal had been Muslim for years, Cedric for a few months, and Hamid had been raised Muslim in Kuwait. Because Cedric had accepted Islam in South Carolina before moving to Tampa, he had been very versed in the sheer basics but had been starved for knowledge beyond that. He wanted to learn so much in so short a time, he didn't even care to use his leisure time to study in advance for the coming semseter when he would enroll in school. Bilal was familiar with the arguments and debates between Muslims, but he was sure that the other American Muslims and the South Asians from one masjid were liberalizing Islam too much. He wanted to protect Cedric from this. He wanted Hamid there to check anything Bilal himself might have learned that was incorrect. He knew Hamid had been Islamic courses from grade school, all for free.

But an hour and a half into the questions Cedric had, Hamid had said one thing that irritated both of them. Sad to say, but Hamid was a stereotypical Gulf Arab in one way, he was spoiled and snobbish. He had never learned to truly think of people as equals no matter what was done to them. He had a "blame the victim" mentality to top it all off. So, as if to suggest that African Americans were not as good a catch as white Americans when they converted, he asked "Why don't the whites accept Islam?"

"They do, just not as many as us," answered Bilal.

"Yes, I know, but why not? If they accepted..." then Hamid kissed his fingers and smiled to finish the sentence.

"Are you saying that it would be easier to practice Islam here in this country? Is that it?" asked Bilal to give Hamid the benefit of the doubt.

"Of course! Everything would just be easy!"

"Maybe that's why Allah won't guide them in," said Cedric. "You remember how Muhammad had to conquer Mecca before Abu Sufyan would accept Islam? Once he took Mecca by force then two thousand Meccans accepted Islam that same day. Some people just have to be conquered before they'll admit someone else is right."

"So you're saying the whites are like Abu Sufyan?" Hamid asked."The ones who know and reject Islam, yeah. Just like him."

"They are," Bilal agreed. "They're stuck on their own way because they're in power and they believe they're superior to others, therefore their way is superior. Think of it like this, Hamid. If an imam started a school of thought that the Arabs are allowed to enslave everyone else, would the Arabs have accepted this?

"Of course!"

"Now what if another scholar started a manhaj that all races are equal after the Arabs had followed the first imam for centuries? What if he had said that others are also allowed to enslave Arabs?"

"Then the Arabs would leave that manhaj and the other races would accept Islam with that manhaj!"

"There you go! So the ones with the most money and power in this life are usually the last to accept when Muslims are being persecuted. They can't bring themselves to accept Islam when it's a disadvantage to do so. You're looking for the white people to accept Islam in large numbers and make Islam easy to practice right here in America, so you can have it easier in this life and still go to heaven. Allah didn't give that to the Sahaba until after they had fights, so why would he give that to you?"

"You just don't want whites to be Muslim because you're still racist!" Hamid said hostilely. "You know you have to accept them once they become Muslim!"

"It's not me that has to learn that. Most African Americans don't have a problem with the whites who become Muslim. They're the ones who don't do nothin' to us. They obviously don't hate Black people if they accept to be more like us by being Muslim, Hamid. Arabs are Muslim and they still have problems with Black people and everyone else. But especially Black people! Arabs have problems with dark skin, and they've been Muslim for 1400 years!"

"Of course we look at Black people like something is wrong with them! You were slaves, and even now you are the poorest people in a rich country! And face it, your women aren't beautiful!" This raised Cedric's and Bilal's eyebrows as Hamid continued like they had no self-respect. "That's why they go and do that stuff to their hair to make it like other races!"

Bilal had ceased to see Hamid as a brother and instead looked and saw Hamid just as Cedric saw him for what he was; a half-breed mulatto who deep down thought that Blacks were inferior. The difference between Hamid and the mulattoes in Charleston who had their own church apart from other Black people was that Hamid was a Muslim and should have known better. But somehow, he had all this knowledge of Islam and had not yet gotten rid of this way of thinking. Bilal knew that very few of the other Arab youth still thought this way, but he had made the worst choice in terms of where to go with Cedric.

Cedric opened his mouth and adressed him. "Hamdi-"

"It's Hamid," Hamid interrupted him. "Hamdi is a name that they use in Somalia."

"Must be why you don't like being called that, huh? I don't care if I get your name wrong. You're lucky I don't call you a faggot after what you just said!"

"Why are you angry? I just told the truth, you all get too angry about these things. Sometimes, you people are more racist than anyone else!"

"Is your opinion valid in Islam, or is it your shortcoming?" Cedric asked.

"What do you mean? Of course it's a valid opinion in Islam! I'm a real Muslim, not a convert!"

"Have you ever met an ex-Muslim?" Cedric asked, shocking Hamid and Bilal into a silence. After a silence, he continued "'Cause I've been Muslim for only a few months and all I've seen is problems, problems, problems. You f---ing Arabs are Black yourselves, look at you with your nappy ___ hair! But you hate Black people and love whites no matter what! You hate your friends and love your enemies. You give these sermons and lectures in Arabic like everyone is an Arab and I don't understand half of what you all say, but your characters suck in real life! Soon as Jumuah lets out, you all go back to drinking and arguing over stupid stuff. You Arabs are the ones making it the hardest to practice Islam! You think I'm less than a white convert? Even the white converts don't think that, but here you-- you know what? Why would I be a brother to you? If you're Muslim, then I'm getting a new religion! F__ you, Hamdi! I know this is your house and I don't care, you ain't ___! You're the first one to make me curse since I became a Muslim, you make me so angry!"

"You're a murtad!" screamed Hamid angrily. "That has a death penalty in Islam, so go and get out of my house!"

"See, there you go a again with the Arabic! What the ___ is a moower-todd?! A Black man that doesn't tolerate racism, especially from other Blacks like you?"

"It means an apostate, Ced. He's right, you're an apostate and in an Islamic state it carries a death penalty unless you come back to Islam before it's carried out."

"Why would I come back to be his brother?! I don't want this m___f___er praying beside me!" But as he said this to Bilal, he winked at him to show he was up to something.

"Get out of my house!" screamed Hamid again.

"Get out of my country, b___!" retorted Cedric. "Before I call Homeland Security on your terrorist racist behind! You're a true to life faggot, you know that? Back in the time of the prophet, you'd have been one of those who talked bad about Muslims in Mecca and then started kissing their behinds when they took power! You'd have been a hypocrite if you're not one already. Did you know that a Muslim is not allowed to take sides with oppressors against the oppressed? So if I'm an apostate, what are you? 'Cause you sure ain't no Muslim!"

"How dare you tell me I'm not a Muslim!"

Click! Bilal had withdrawn his pistol without either of them noticing until they heard it cock. "Aside from leaving Islam, he's right and you're wrong, Hamdi." Bilal called him Hamdi intentionally. "Even though we've been friends for a while, I see that my educating you about the effects of white supremacy have been for naught. You obviously still have racist views, not us. Remember, the Jews were enslaved by Pharaoh, but Allah didn't prefer Pharaoh to them, did He?" Don't either one of you move. We're gonna have a trial right here and right now, and I am judge and executioner. Both of you sit down. Hamid, you go first."

"You point a gun at me?! I am a descendant of-"

"I obviously don't care about that, do I? I'm asking you to state your case, because you each have accusations against the other for apostasy, right? He says you're a kaffir, you say he's a kaffir, and both of you have said the kalimah before."

"I'm not a kaffir murtad, he is! He said he's not my brother. All I said is you people are racist!"

"You people? You sound like a Klansman," Cedric said loudly.

"Yes, he does. But what do you say about your apostasy? Are you in fact leaving Islam?"

"I thought I was, but I just realized that he already did. I remember a hadith qudsi. Allah said 'By my might and holiness, I will grab the oppressor sooner or later, and along with him whosoever saw the oppressed and did nothing.' He has clearly sided with the oppressor against the victim. He prefers their conversion to ours."

"Hamid?" Bilal said turning to him.

"You niggers get out! I don't care if you ugly blacks leave Islam or stay, you can't face the --" CRACK! Bilal swung the pistol in Hamid's face and knocked him down. Before Hamid could fully register the pain, Bilal put the muzzle of his nine millimeter in his mouth and pulled the trigger, killing him. The report was muffled by Hamid's mouth, but the pool of blood was growing quickly from the back of his neck. Hamid's eyes were open, a puff of smoke trailing from his agape mouth. There was no nervous twitch, he was completely dead as though he had been dead for an hour already.

"Ashadu an la ilaha il Allah!" exclaimed Cedric. "Allahu Akbar! If this happened to all of the racists, then how much more easily Islam would spread!"

Cedric, not truly having left Islam except to provoke Hamid, had now erased all doubt by restating the shahada. But he was so elated at the death of Hamid that Bilal had to ask him why.

"You shot him just now. If he had admitted he was wrong for his racial views, he'd have still been Muslim and you'd have let him live. But you shot him to death! Just like that! You knew he had left Islam already!"

"Yes, I shot him for two reasons and that was one of them. The other reason I shot him is that if I hadn't, he'd have worsened divisions between Muslims, the whole while being an apostate himself for not admitting racism was wrong. I hate killing, but this guy with his privilege and his money and his ideas all put together, he was too dangerous to Islam here in the state. Frankly, I think you really were tempted to leave and I didn't want him tempting more people to leave like this."

"I was angry, but I wasn't tempted to leave, not yet. But thanks for taking him out. Because I would have killed him myself if you hadn't. Let's get out before someone else knocks on the door."

You know, I've gotten so sick of hearing about this "American Muslim" identity and this "American Islam", I'm about ready to throw up. Really. This crap is getting out of hand. How is it that the country that steals the most from others and confesses to it in their declassified CIA documents can have Muslims (who are supposed to be above nationalism in the first place) try to bend their religion to fit America's system?! I really think it's snobbery on the part of Muslims here to be honest. Here's why; do Muslims in the UK try to come up with an British Muslim identity and a British Islam? Yes, they do. Do they try it in Canada and Australia and Europe? Yes. Do they try it in Botswana or in Uganda? No, they don't. Islam has already developed in a cultural context there but they aren't Muslim countries Muslim aren't in the majority. What about Malaysia? They have a Malay Muslim identity already, been having one for generations, but we don't take on the cultures from those places because we see them as inferior in their Islam. Don't lie and don't purse your lips like I got two heads! I know, I know, you're the exception, right? Well, the rule is what I'm talkin' about here. The rule is we think of Pakistani Islam and Arab Islam as inferior to our western understanding of it. And we balk at some of them who think of our western understanding of it as inferior to their Arab or Pashto understanding, right? Yes we do. I'm one of them. But for a different reason. Many think of them as inferior because their countries are poor or were until recently. So therefore, their Islam is inferior due to inferior education. So far, the logic stands up. But Islam in developed countries isn't superior, either. We're both lacking in knowledge to be honest. And in faith. And in concern for establishing the right and forbidding the wrong. That's why in developed countries, we make interest halal when it's still haram. That's why we call someone a terrorist if they even suggest that Muslims should own arms with which to defend ourselves in case these hillbillies come to take matters out of the hands of the police. The developed societies are dangling carrots in front of us and leading us into compromising Islam to get it.

Yeah, that's right, I also think Arab Islam is full of crap. A daughter is a whore for fornicating once, but a son is just a normal guy for doing so frequently? What a dumb idea! You can't marry except from your own tribe? Idiot! So potato chips cooked in veggie oil are haram because they're associated with American culture? What about that liquor you drank at the bar to fit in with the other doctors from the hospital, hoping to be accepted? You're a punk who thinks your culture is Islam by definition, and of course westerners who become Muslim will hate that.

But nothing makes "western Islam" or 'first-world country Islam' superior and better! We ALL make halal what is haram and make haram what is halal in our cultures! Yes, Arab culture is backwards! Yes, Pakistani culture is backwards! Yes, Malay culture is backwards (but maybe not as much). Yes, Senegalese culture is backwards! But what's so great about western culture? Stealing is lightly punished if at all, adultery is now seen as normal, children are left with no dads and are abused by other men, and people value their own opinions entirely too much, even over proof! No matter the evidence, people believe what they want to and refuse to believe what's inconvenient to what they want. America is a country founded on wrong, and is full of people who think that every opinion is right even when proven wrong. Every gain she has made has been dishonest, because all of her gains stem from the first two gains; free land and free labor. How she got those, everyone knows. It's worse than the example of a drug dealer who took his drug money and then invested in legitimate ventures. He sold drugs, but he didn't murder and he didn't run a sweatshop to do it. Now, take a drug dealer who also murdered to acquire real estate and then ran a sweat shop in which he never paid his laborers, got rich, then invested in legitimate business ventures, but used his ill-gained wealth to put others out of business. That's America, England, Australia, France, Holland, Spain, and Canada to a lesser degree.

American Islam seeks integration and acceptance. No matter what happened to other groups who lose their identity in the process, American Islam seeks the same path. British Islam seeks to put Muslims in Parliament so they can be outnumbered if they vote for anything like making abortion illegal but making teen marriages legal. French Islam seeks to integrate with France and beg to be able to wear hijab. Equal Employment and Equal Housing aren't the problems. It's our willingness to become just like others that is. A Hispanic whose parents are integrated into society and successful isn't going to lose his religion for being here, he'll lose his language. He may even intermarry and lose the last name for his descendants. But it won't affect his hereafter, it will still be the same. He lost his language and culture, not necessarily his religion. But for Muslims to blend in too much is dangerous, because then the youth lose aspects of their belief and they become something other than Muslim. Islam does get changed in America and other western nations, at least in the minds of the Muslims living there. All of a sudden stoning to death is too harsh a penalty for a man who cheats on his wife and manages to get caught by 4 witnesses. All of a sudden stealing expensive items because you don't want to work for them is kind of bad, but amputating the hand to stop a proven thief from doing it again is too harsh, even though it would prevent others from even becoming thieves. All of a sudden polygamy is wrong in itself, not just the abuse of it. No matter that some women would rather share a rich husband than to have a poor husband all to themselves, because they can't help that. So what? You see where this is going?

It's already gotten started, and that's why American Islam is a joke, just like the other national Islams out there. The Islam of Muhammad (saws), which allows customs that fall within the Shariah limits, is what is not a joke and is better for any society or culture out there. But somehow that's equally unpopular throughout the Ummah, in a 3rd world or in a developed nation.

Just a quick note before I write my little short story to illustrate another moral lesson. On one end of a spectrum, some Muslims, especially elders, say you can't have an Islamic society with out a properly Islamic household. Others don't mention the home as much as they do mention the society itself.

Actually, I don't really respect either opinion for this reason; you niggas been arguing about it too doggone long! More than a generation at this point! "Brother, your kids are having kids themselves, how you gonna talk about an Islamic society? Your house is in bad shape!" "Oh yeah?! Brother, the society being built on kufr is a bigger problem than a forgiveable sin like zina in my house!"

Actually, both are needed and that's all there is to it. It's as obvious as sunrise after fajr prayer. Individuals compose societies and societies affect the composing individuals. It's a cycle. Problems in the society come home with the individuals and the problems at home go out into the society with those same individuals. So both are necessary to reform as best we can do. I don't see why we Muslims, especially African Americans, feel a need to debate about this. Wait, actually I do see why now that I think about it. Because after we took our shahadas we still kept being niggas and ex-slaves. And the immigrant Muslim communities are just niggas with other nationalities, that's all. So, we still have nigga problems in the masajid because of it.

Do whatever you can to work on both or whichever is easiest for you, but stop debating about it! If you neglect one, it will ruin and setback the work done to improve the other.

Ron Hudson was only ten when all of this happened, and this was why he was still Ron Hudson. He had not yet become Jabril Saleh, the adult Muslim that opposed a Satanic ring in Lafayette forty five miles from where he grew up. No, in the year this all happened, in 1986, he hadn’t seen Lafayette, nor did he know about witchcraft or devil-worship. He only knew that it was the last weekend before Halloween and it was a full moon when he stepped out of his house to meet up with his buddies Mario and Todd, or T for short. Ron liked to do his homework when he got home and have the rest of the weekend to play. This Friday evening would have been the same but he didn’t have homework that time. He had been playing in his backyard with his little brother, and then decided to meet up with the other guys right before nightfall.

The three of them and who ever joined them would play pranks at times on people in the neighborhood, but mainly harmless pranks. They’d normally spy some home with a kitchen light on around dinner time, and they’d creep close to the window and make noises that just didn’t sound right, like gorilla noises with a chest thumping or that of a parrot trying to talk. Since this was the weekend before Halloween, they would try making witch sounds or ghost noises if they could do so.

Ron met up with them on the main street of the subdivision, which ran just a house away from his own, but it was further into the neighborhood that he met them. The night time noises of the woods close by were beginning, which were at the far end of that street at the edge of the neighborhood, beyond which the interstate ran. In the cool and dry autumn night air, they could hear the distant but clear sound of cars on it along with the woods in between. Soon, the noises of the crickets would come from all of the trees in the subdivision, not just those of the wooded areas surrounding it and the islands of tees and bushes where houses had not yet been constructed. They wondered around the subdivision, joking around and looking for a good house to target from which there would also be a suitable escape route. There was one house they would not go to, though. It was close to the Jones’ residence, and even close to T’s house, but it wasn’t nearly as well-lit, and it had just recently been moved into. No one knew the resident, but the house itself was spooky, and in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, night time was spooky enough. A full moon didn’t help much, either. The house was set back from the street and surrounded by trees and vines and bushes that covered it most of it. The fence in the front of it afforded a small view of the front door next to which an upside-down cross was hung, though it had been there before the recent occupants. The boys did not even go in the direction of the house, they went to another part of the neighborhood altogether, more towards its center.

They spied there a house with a light on. It was not coming from the kitchen or dining room itself, but from the living room next to it. They could see in through the kitchen window and spy the man of the house sitting on his couch and watching television. Like the other resident, he had recently moved in and didn’t know the neighbors very well, but unlike the other resident, he had been seen and wasn’t rumored to be a devil worshipper. The three boys winked at each other did their thing. Mario shook a branch to tap the glass lightly, T growled like an angry dog, and then Ron howled like wolf, which made even his comrades stop and look at him. His was an eerie melodic howl, carrying far above the roof tops and sure to be heard by anyone who was outdoors. As it was, it was very loud to the other two.

They then ran when they saw the man inside react, laughing to each other as they cut through his yard to the next block to Saratoga Avenue. There, they turned left and ran up to Bennington which was perpendicular to it and sat on the corner of Bennington and Potomac, in front of Judge Matthew’s house. They giggled to each other as Mario said to Ron, “That was loud and scary! You got all the neighborhood dogs barking, too! Better hope that wasn’t a mating call!” This made them laugh harder, and just a few seconds afterwards, they heard it.

It was another howl, like Ron’s but not identical to it. It came from the direction of T’s house further down Bennington, and it didn’t make the dogs bark. It made them stop. Not just the dogs, but even the crickets and the night owls in the trees that hooted as they hunted for mice. Everything got quiet, completely. The guys looked at each other with wide eyes and all ran to the bushes on the side of Judge Matthews’ house. Ron said to the other guys, “Let’s get together again tomorrow after the cartoons go off!”

“Yeah!” agreed Mario emphatically. They were close to his house, so he patted T on the back and took off running, looking around nervously. Once he was out of sight of them, he was in sight of his own house, so they felt no fear for him, only themselves. T couldn’t go home because he’s only meet with the dog they had heard, and it was known that the few whites in the neighborhood would let their dogs loose only to bother the Blacks who were moving in. Any who had dogs that were unaggressive wouldn't even let them loose in the evenings. When the weather was nice like that night, they knew they’d be out jogging or the kids out playing, so they’d let their dogs out at night sometimes if they had an aggressive one, hoping it would bite or threaten someone. The boys had to go to Ron’s house instead, and so they crept out of the bushes and walked up their side of the sidewalk so they would not pass underneath any streetlights and be seen by the loose dog. A minute later, Ron looked back and saw it coming up Bennington. He then tapped T and indicated to hm to look, too.

It was not running or trotting at the time, so it may not have seen them. But it wasn’t normal-looking at all. It was abnormally large, mainly it was tall with long legs, but the legs appeared thicker than any dog’s even though it had a long coat of fur. This was visible to Ron even at a distance because it was under a streetlight, and it then stood up and looked towards its left! Not only did it stand up, but Ron saw clearly how it had shoulders, and its front legs didn’t hang out in front of it like a dog’s normally would. It was comfortable standing on its back legs and looking! Then it got back on all fours and continued up Bennington. Ron and T were amazed into silence and scared into being still lest their movement betray them, but it was still coming in their direction. They began to move slowly in concert, but when they passed by the Clark family’s driveway, the motion light came on! Ron and T stopped again, eyes wide and looked at each other and then back towards the abnormal dog. It had seen them and was taking off for them just as they looked at it.

Ron and T ran for their lives, Ron leading the way to cross the street and cut between two houses to get to Valley Forge. When they came to a front yard on Valley Forge, there was an evergreen tree in it he knew to expect. It was just what they needed, a tree with low branches that didn’t shed its leaves in the fall. They clambered up the tree quickly like little monkeys, energized by the cool air and the terror. A little ways up, they stopped as they heard a growling and a panting noise getting closer, and they then saw it run underneath them and into the middle of the street, sniffing around and confused. Again, they saw it stand up and look around, and again they saw the shoulders on it. Maybe T didn’t notice, but Ron knew that canines he had seen before stand up weren’t so balanced, nor did they have shoulders. But both noticed it scratch its own head while on its back legs!

When a car came down the road, the headlights scared the abnormal wolf, but it didn’t run, it just jumped behind the trash can of the family across the street from where the boys were hiding, and let the car pass it. What saved them was that a neighbor’s dog happened to come running the opposite direction, and the boys’ pursuer then got in the middle of the street again and challenged it. After a little tussle, the pursuer tossed the other dog with its forlegs and then chased it down Valley Forge and between two houses again.

T and Ron quickly climbed down the tree again and ran the few feet to the next block which was the main street through their neighborhood, well-lit and well-traveled, then they ran the next block-and-a-half to Ron’s house. Ron’s father knew that something was amiss when they came running in, panting. Ron told him it was merely that a big dog had jumped a fence and chased them. He didn’t believe it was that at all, though. Mr. Hudson later drove T home, and on the way back, Ron asked him, “Dad, I know dogs don’t have shoulders, but do wolves have them?” That’s when he believed it.

Ron never told his dad about it standing up or using its front legs to toss another dog, or that its legs were abnormally thick. But he and the other guys the next day agreed to never do the pranks again after dark, only in the day time, and they didn’t go trick-or-treating that Halloween. T and Ron told Mario what he had missed, but he only said, “No, I didn’t miss it. It missed me! I saw it from my rooftop deck later that night! I knew it was the same one, because he stood up and scratched his back for a second. Next thing I know, it was gone!” T thought that maybe it was just like in the movies, someone who couldn’t help himself and had just been bitten by a werewolf and become one before. That Halloween, two kids got sick and it was determined that one had been poisoned and the other drugged, from which they both recovered. But the drugged child had nightmares for years of demon-dogs.

Only many years later, after Ron became Jabril Saleh, did he learn that this phenomena was reported around the world. T and Mario both couldn’t remember it by then, but Jabril did, and when he investigated what could have caused it, he found that in all cases, they were believed to be people who had to break serious taboos to get that kind of power. Only as a grown man did he learn that there was nothing innocent about it. So it was that even years before he found religion, he gave up celebrating Halloween, and then found out why he stopped later.