all right my brother is glad to have you here it's really a pleasure and honor really so i'll start with you brother mohammad give us your name and toss a little bit about yourself x so i've been heavily interested in islam for really long time and when i converted it was a personal decision and it was what i wanted to take my time with and be patient about it makes i made the right decision and i made the right decision my wife and my son supports during the day and they still want me to do like string you speak to them like you know any but i mean i push myself either way you know so you really are do you kno want to become muslim and i was overseas in iraq and my wife and i had a conversation as like when i got back i would take out with the and as i was going my research and is watching you tube videos and reading books i came across this by watching  so when i went to this office he works in the vision and his main building is different religions people in there and we go to meet is the was wide open with discussion islam first time gave me a great hook a lot a lot of information that i didn't know about and you know with him being there he may mean that now i have a shadow of a doubt war hero of stan i'm a muslim no matter what morale you know and in the military that's kind of a cliche where we know we're overseas a lot and they had this this this miss halliday that you know you talk about islam and be a muslim they relate that to me in a terrorist you know so that the emulate what he has done for you know the muslim narrative and how it can be subjective he's you know so so somebody know what's really going on is that way other than all this propaganda that they put in there it's general masses all right so i will put this paper down but this is a muslim journal article  n june eighth two thousand and eighteen muslims observed twenty years of if target pentagon they had to good brother that we're talking about and four other brothers and you know it's also amazing they're all african it but let's talk about within yourself within you my how you see being a part of the american military as a most so i can go first i can take that question i'm a fairly new muslim and what i can say is that before becoming muslim i've been around different different people within the military i've been three different locations and there's there's definitely a narrative and a propaganda that's out there based on what the news in the media portrays about muslims that a lot of people in the military you know it's not that they don't know what it is ignorance who they don't understand the religion as a whole they take well they take what the military teaches them as far as being overseas and the one in the middle countries in the middle east and they paint their picture as if all muslims are terrorists or they can't be trusted audit would turn on you and they have no loyalty but in all actuality changed the dynamic in the vibe in the community you know between the you know the muslims the been there lived you know years prior to the institute in place and i got a lot of different questions and you to dictate society you know and in the beginning there was a little nervousness you know it was a little shaky you know trying to understand that these opportunity for me to like show shot a different light you know people to interact with me speak of me and stuff like that you know they realize that you know i have a different type of mind frame a different type of mindset i carry myself differently as well compared to what they think i would do what they think they know you know so and it's creates like a dialogue you know not so much as a religious debate a discussion you know and to differentiate and also to compare and contrast you know and it's pretty much very much in life thank you but it's give us every every year forty five hundred dollars to go to school and a lot of our military training you know it converts into college credits so i think knowledge is power i think knowledge is infinite we can never get enough education as we can is that the education part of it because everyone doesn't want to do twenty years in the military some guys want to get out so whatever and they can capitalize on this school option and create some kind of transition to where he can get out and get a good job so i think for me i think that's one of the greatest assets that you can get from the military outside of the pay and the benefits  you know there's more to it in your neighborhood is more to it in your city you know you get to experience a different people different cultures different backgrounds you know different characteristics and person that you learned most to have pride you know you know from  but been in the military you know you get you know horizon expands just defected you've been around different people from different parts of the country and you have to work together and everything you know you get to learn about them they get to learn about you you know arise and experience so the experience just that part is valuable you can't pay no money to get that grant but but but you have about it to civilian life people look on your resume have a job so where you are a prominent position is in the once something that takes a higher intelligence to do so is a different skill set in the military and what you do find is that a lot of different job descriptions such as those those th is what jobs you have an opportunity to have in the military when you showing that we know a lot of african americans who deal who who go to who live in probably stricken areas the education is low the teachers don't come here to teach really  education and what that translates into is that test taking ability and we you know score lower on those tests that we end up only given opportunities new jobs such as support that doesn't take a lot of intelligence to do you know but what the military does have is to where you can go in there retake that cess and try to get out of that occupation and do something different but it's the narrative when you see a lot and i've been in twelve years in a lot of support jobs and you see a lot of african americans in them you know and i think there's no way to act in changing  west you don't see a lot of african americans in those as well so you know you start to see a lot of division what you saw on the occupation in the in the organization you start to see the division within them and that's what out our encounter and  joining i just knew i can get a steady paycheck i can lease st louis and i can get medical benefits and so i say no with those small things that everyone else sees but what i'm joined what i daylon is that a young guy was coming in who doesn't know he's going to narrow tunnel vision about all you know my neighborhood to understand there's a bigger world out there and i became a man the military i became a man you know already and shut up that day kane has some stability under the life if you've been back and forth you know in and out of trouble with stuff like that oh you've seen family members and friends of their come for six eight ten twelve still get the best out of it and the one fuse there when you come out you know do a sleeping on the streets and the like that like good allow these veterans audit or homeless you know a prime military or