an american woman who converted to islam
immediately after 9 11. find out why
meet her next
well she was the girl next door blonde
hair blue eyes a practicing catholic but
after 9 11 she found herself drawn to
islam a religion she says empowered her
or what does she think of radical islam
and the folks who want to kill us angela
collins is the director and principal of
the al-rita academy it's a school for
muslim children in southern california
thank you for joining us
thank you salaamwalekum um tell me a
little bit about
why and how you made this transformation
i traveled a lot abroad across the world
i went to india and through the middle
east and met muslims everywhere
and the people that i met were so
genuine and generous in their nature and
i wanted to learn a lot more about them
so i came back to the states i met
muslims here and they became my friends
and then 9 11 happened and our entire
country pointed their finger they blamed
muslims of course
and i had an opposite experience of
knowing these people so i spoke out
against it but then of course i'm
challenged and people want to know what
islam really teaches and i didn't have
that knowledge
so what i did is i picked up a quran and
i started reading of course thinking
here's a book that discriminates against
woman does not give them their equal
rights is not fair and divided but i
found exactly the opposite after reading
the direct source and the direct word of
god and after that i took my shahada and
i converted to islam do you think angela
that um
the fact we don't hear more protests
from let's say normal caring muslims
such as yourself and from the muslim
community itself
about some of the outrageous uh comments
from
the more i don't know islamo fastest
side of the aisle
that that
rightly gives americans pause
i do blame ourselves for not being out
in the media more definitely we need to
get out there however when we do stand
in protest for instance in front of the
federal building in westwood they turn
off all the lights and we get a counter
protest on the other side and traffic
builds up
also a lot of people immigrated from
other countries they have fear that
something could happen to their status
here so it's more difficult for them to
come out but you'll see me like other
american converts out there in the front
lines and we will absolutely communicate
what our thoughts are but i've heard as
well angela that many are afraid to
communicate that or
afraid to to criticize some of the more
severe
uh
elements in the muslim community because
they're afraid of getting killed
is that true
i haven't heard that i think the only
thing that i've heard is people are
afraid of losing their status here in
america as for death no although i've
had my own experience where i was
standing out there in a protest and a
lady came out of her car she jumped in
front of my face and she pushed me
of course i didn't push her back and she
was older she was maybe in her 50s and
she was israeli and very upset
i just figured she was responding with
her emotions but i didn't react but you
know there's a lot there are a lot of
we're showing a picture of you angela
before you made this transformation and
became a practicing muslim and a lot of
young women who would be looking at you
now versus then
would say all right she's covered
herself up she seems to have given away
a lot of herself um
for religion we don't understand and
somehow seems detrimental to women
you're saying that's not the case no
absolutely not i'm not sure which
picture is being shown with me but i'm
sure i'm giving up a lot more of myself
than now how does your family how does
your family feel about this
my family at first it was difficult but
now they're extremely supportive uh we
have conversations we talk about
terrorism all the time i remember their
catholics right
any of them yeah have any of them become
catholic
no they haven't okay no angela thank you
for joining us in irvine california
angela collins
thank you