Religious Teachings Discriminated Against Muslims

Over the summer, Mohamed Sabra, a practicing Muslim and student at Scottsdale Community College (SCC) in Arizona, filed a lawsuit against his professor, Nicholas Damask. During a world politics class, Damask, who also served as the chair of the school’s political science department, included questions on an exam that portrayed the Islamic faith in a negative light. In order to receive full credit on the exam, Sabra had to say Islamic terrorists are emulating the Prophet Muhammad when carrying out acts of terrorism, and the Medina verses also promoted acts of terrorism.

By answering these questions, Sabra felt his right to exercise his freedom of religion was being infringed upon because he was being forced to directly contradict the values of his religion in order to receive a good grade on his exam. Fortunately, when the exam was brought to light on social media and attracted the attention of the college’s president, the statements were condemned and Sabra received the points he missed for refusing to ascribe to negative language about his religious beliefs. However, Damask refused to apologize for the language on his exam, and when pushed further by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, the Maricopa County Community College District, which includes SCC, stated there was nothing wrong with the exam. In fact, they even went so far as to say that Sabra’s lawsuit actually infringed upon Damask’s First Amendment rights by not allowing him to teach his class as he saw fit. The district’s interim chancellor reiterated the fact that there is no right that protects any individual from being offended. The case was dismissed by the United States District Court of Arizona. 

Even though Sabra was given his points back on the exam, school officials largely backed Damask on his decision to include those questions, so the question of unconstitutionality remains prevalent as the school has allowed an opening for a situation such as this to arise again in the future. So, were Sabra’s First Amendment rights infringed upon by Damask?

Because of the undue burden placed upon Sabra, the college’s funding source, and--while it may originally seem contradictory--the precedent set by the Fourth Circuit when addressing a Maryland public high school student who had similar complaints to Sabra, all point to this action being unconstitutional. 

First, as students, we all know that our grades are immensely important. By placing Sabra in the position where he had to choose between his religious beliefs and academic success placed an undue moral dilemma upon him. Additionally, this was done without any compelling State interest. Damask told Sabra that the sole purpose was to teach the course material, but it was done so in a way that was clearly discriminatory and placed Sabra in a position that led him to disregard his deeply held religious beliefs for the sake of the class. Teachings Islam from a secular point of view could have been executed in a way that was much less discriminatory and bias, therefore making Damask’s choice wrong.

Additionally, SCC is a state-funded college. By allowing the professor to spew these discriminatory beliefs about a religion is not only morally wrong, but is religious discrimination on the State’s dime. In the case of McCollum v. Board of Education, it became clear that no school time should be used to advance religion, especially because not all religions were being equally favored. In this case, Damask, an employee of the State, did not favor one religion over all others, but instead discriminated against one religion and talked about it in a scathingly disfavorable light, when there have been no complaints of that being the case with other religions in his classroom. When following the precedent of McCollum, it is clear that the money provided by the State should in no way go towards advancing any particular religion, and by presenting the Islamic faith in the way he did, Damask disregarded this precedent and placed all religions above Islam through his discrimination and bias. As an employee of the State and the district also not condemning the practice, they are allowing government funds to go towards discriminating against Islam.

Finally, Caleigh Wood took a somewhat similar issue to court when she had to fill out a worksheet that discussed Islamic teachings, which was ultimately deemed as constitutional. However, this proves that Damask’s lesson was unconstitutional due to their reasoning when dealing with Wood’s case. The court decided that Wood’s case was constitutional because it was simply factual and did not advance or disprove any particular religion. By using this logic, Sabra  was then subjected to unconstitutional events as he was forced to ascribe to content that was very clearly discriminatory to Islam. 

Because of the undue burden that could have been avoided by non-discriminatory practices, the presence of State funds, and past precedents, the events at hand are unconstitutional.