If not me, then who? (with Dr. Ayaz Virji)

Closer Than They Appear

Al Jazeera

News, Society & Culture, Personal Journals

4.8 • 626 Ratings

🗓️ 29 November 2017

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Going out and talking to people is a little thing, but it's also a big thing. Especially if those people are different from you, or might not like you, or might even reject you. Carvell Wallace talks to someone who's doing just that. Dr. Ayaz Virji is the town doctor in the 1400-person town of Dawson, Minnesota. He, his wife, and their three children are the only Muslim family in Dawson. The 2016 election changed how he saw his neighbors — so he started talking.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This week on True Crime Reports.
0:04.0	George Stinney was the youngest American in the 20th century to be electrocated to death.
0:09.3	He was accused of murdering two white girls without any evidence.
0:12.9	What does his story tell us about the US justice system and the ways it continues to systematically fail African Americans.
0:23.4	Find out on the next true crime reports.
0:28.3	Subscribe and listen wherever you get your podcasts.
0:36.2	One of the things I said very publicly in the hospital to one of the nurses that I regret saying was like, you know, you guys don't want me as in the brown Muslim. You want the doctor. So if you could peel my brownness and my Muslim off and you could just keep the doctor and put the other part of me on a registry, you would do that. And you proved it by the way you voted, you know, and that's probably going
0:58.5	too far. But this is how I felt after the election.
1:05.8	That's Dr. Ayaz Virgi. I'm Carvel Wallace, and this is closer than they appear.
1:15.6	Dr. Virgi is the town doctor in the 1,400-person town of Dawson, Minnesota. Maybe you read about him
1:23.0	in the Washington Post. He and his wife and three children are the only Muslim family in Dosset.
1:28.6	He's been the town doctor there for the past three years.
1:31.7	He used to work for this big health care chain in Pennsylvania, but then he left that job
1:36.1	because he wanted to focus on working with people in rural communities.
1:40.5	And he did.
1:41.7	And it was fine.
1:42.9	He was happy with his choice until November 9th, 2016.
1:50.0	Because that morning, he woke up to find that nearly half the people in his town. A lot of them, his patience, had voted for Trump.
2:02.2	And it was very easy to see who voted for Trump and who didn't because the people who didn't
2:07.3	made it known to me that I can't believe in, you know, this whatever. And the people who did
2:12.2	were very quiet. I mean, just didn't say anything. And, you know, I was like, how can you be quiet?
2:19.4	This guy wants to put me on a registry and you voted for him.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Al Jazeera, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Al Jazeera and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.