Jennifer Guilbeault, 23, shown on video assaulting Shohel Mahmud after he began reciting prayer in Arabic

A New York woman who pepper-sprayed a Muslim Uber driver while he was praying has been indicted by the Manhattan district attorney on hate crime charges.

Jennifer Guilbeault, 23, is shown in a surveillance video repeatedly pepper-spraying her Uber driver, Shohel Mahmud. The assault took place in August on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, near the corner of east 65th Street and Lexington Avenue, shortly after Mahmud began reciting a prayer in Arabic.

Guilbeault’s former employer, the public relations and marketing firm D Pagan Communications, wrote on X it is aware of her actions and “don’t condone this behavior”.

    • Sarmyth@lemmy.world
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      13 days ago

      Making shit up online is fun. Strawman arguments don’t convince anyone of anything though just makes you look like a tool.

      Islam is the 2nd largest religion on Earth. It’s not some piddly minority. When people are being weird Muslims it’s okay to call them out the same way there are hella weird Christians and Jews. I would say NOT doing so and handling a particular groups weirdos with kids gloves is just as xenophobic (but obviously not as harmful) as attacking someone for being different.

      You’re basically saying they are less human than you and therefor should be excused from behaving normally in the society they are a part of, like they were a small child.

      • HomerianSymphony@lemmy.world
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        13 days ago

        with kids gloves

        *kid gloves

        They’re called kid gloves because they’re made from baby goat.

        The leather from baby goats is soft and supple and gives you more dexterity than normal leather gloves. If you were handling something that needed great care, you might want to wear kid gloves to have greater manual control.

        Why would you handle someone with kids’ gloves? Are your hands very tiny?

        You’re basically saying they are less human than you and therefor should be excused from behaving normally in the society they are a part of

        There’s nothing abnormal about speaking a foreign language or praying. For all you know, he could have been praying for a safe journey.

        (Or praying for the endurance to put up with a shitty passenger.)

        • Sarmyth@lemmy.world
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          13 days ago

          Read my responses for the answer, pedant.

          There is something abnormal about praying in a workplace. They shouldn’t be attacked, but it’s also not normal. I don’t care what religion they’re a part of, it would be strange regardless.

          • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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            13 days ago

            How other people pray is none of your business. You don’t get to decide what is “normal”. If other peoples’ prayers upset you, then you can die mad for all I care.

            • Sarmyth@lemmy.world
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              13 days ago

              I don’t have to decide what is normal. I can experience what is normal. I don’t get mad when people pray, I just don’t like it done in front of me while I am trapped in a small space with them.

              • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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                12 days ago

                I don’t get mad when people pray, I just don’t like it done in front of me while I am trapped in a small space with them.

                So what you’re saying is that you get mad when people pray.

                • Sarmyth@lemmy.world
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                  12 days ago

                  No… I get annoyed when people put me in position where I have no reason to expect them to start praying, and the only method of distancing myself from that act would be extraordinary inconvenient for me.

                  Pray 20 hours a day for all I care, to whatever God you want. Leave me out of it.

            • nomous@lemmy.world
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              13 days ago

              How other people pray is none of your business

              Unless I’m paying them to take me somewhere, then it’s definitely my business why they aren’t doing that.

              Shit is rarely just black and white as much as we’d all like that to be the case.

              • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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                12 days ago

                What an absolutely awful person you are…

                If other people’s cultures and religions offend you, stay inside and remain alone, for all of our sakes.