Growing up as a Sikh in Wisconsin, Sandy Dhaliwal was often a source of intrigue for her friends who’d braid her long, uncut tresses and play dress-up with elaborate garments from her annual trips to India.
“People embraced me,” Dhaliwal, 24, said, “Then, on the other side, my brother and dad — all the men in my family — wore a turban. They weren’t really treated as being unique the same way I was.”
As a young girl, she remembers sitting beside her father on a plane when a passenger behind them reached over the seat, yanked his turban, and called him a terrorist.
Leaders in the U.S. Sikh community say these kinds of isolated verbal or physical attacks on Sikhs aren’t uncommon, and they’re often fueled by misconceptions about those who follow the faith.
In response, Dhaliwal and other Sikhs launched the National Sikh Campaign in March, to dispel misinterpretations about their faith by integrating their religious identity into the American landscape. To help fine-tune their message, the campaign last month hired former Hillary Clinton strategist, Geoffrey Garin.
Garin previously worked for Clinton’s 2008 Presidential campaign and Priorities USA, the super PAC backing President Obama’s 2012 reelection. With Garin's guidance, the campaign plans to deploy grassroots and social media strategies to highlight Sikhs’ contributions to society and counter negative perceptions.
“The purpose of the campaign is to give other Americans a better understanding of who Sikh Americans are and what makes them valued members of the American community,” Garin said. “Most importantly, what are the insights about Sikh Americans that are most important to communicate?”
Garin’s research, which he says is currently a “work in progress,” will delve into what Americans understand about the Sikh community and how they react to seeing someone in a beard and turban. Currently president of Hart Research in Washington, D.C., Garin and his team will compile facts, images and stories about Sikhs to form a comprehensive message.
Identifying common values between Americans and Sikhs, such as community service and diversity, can help dissolve the faith’s “image and message problem,” said the campaign’s executive director Gurwin Ahuja. In its early stages, organizing directors across the country, including Dhaliwal, have been using word of mouth to inform communities about the campaign.
“What Sikhs actually believe and what people attack are two different things,” Ahuja said.