Muslim students confront racist bigot in Exeter city centre

Categories: Latest News
Wednesday June 01 2016
The Exeter Echo and Express reports on a Facebook post by Muslim student Kalsoom Naqvi in which she relates an experience in Exeter city centre where she and a friend were verbally abused by a man outside a halal takeaway shop.
Kalsoom posted a video on Facebook of the encounter showing her confront the man who abused them. In her post, accompanying the video, Kalsoom wrote that the man walked past the two girls making “bomb jokes”. When the Muslim students challenged the man to repeat the abuse while being filmed on a smartphone, he appears to walk away before returning to continue making racist remarks.
Kalsoom wrote: “Today, my friend Tayiba Hussain and I walked past this horrible guy on our way to Sidwell Street Tesco.
“He decided to make some very funny, intelligent and educated bomb jokes (something of the sort a primary child might say): ‘I hear a trigger going off… Kaboom!’ and followed up with some racist comments telling us to ‘Go back home’, and ‘This is not your country’.
“His friend, who can be seen walking away in the video, stood by and watched at the time. My friend and I decided to return and catch some of his comments on camera.”
The man can be seen telling the girls “Do you know what the problem is in this country at the moment? Muslims absolutely invading this country, like cockroaches. You’re like cockroaches.”
When asked what it was about the two girls walking about in the town centre that bothered him so much, the man infers that he is bothered by “immigrants”. He said “Where are you from, ‘cos you’re not from England?”
When one of the students asks him; “Where are you from?” He answered: “I’m from f*****g England, born and bred.”
They then question him about where his parents are from and he replies London. When he challenges the women with the same question, and Kalsoom explains that she and her parents were also born in London, he seems incredulous at the prospect of the women being British-born Muslims.
Kalsoom said she uploaded the video in order to shame the individual into making an apology on his social media pages. The Independent notes that she has since reported the incident to the police.