Editor's note: These comments were transcribed from a panel discussion that took place at The Scholar & Feminist Conference XXXII, "Fashioning Citizenship: Gender and Immigration," held on March 24, 2007 at Barnard College.

Malik Ahmed: I wanted also to tell a story, an incident that happened in New York, six months after 9/11. I had a very good Pakistani friend named Abbas. He was actually undocumented, but I had no idea, since you just don't ask people that kind of a question. I had met him at a gay club in New York soon after I arrived here.

He had a boyfriend with whom he lived for ten years, who had grown up in the States, but was from Trinidad. So one evening, soon after I met him, I got a call from my friend's partner, telling me that his boyfriend, Abbas, had been deported. Unexpectedly, Abbas called him from Pakistan, saying that he wasn't just being deported, he was already there.

And he couldn't do anything about it. As I mentioned, I had no idea that Abbas was actually undocumented. I knew he had lived in the United States for almost 20 years and I had no idea that there was something that could have been done. Apparently the boyfriend tried to do everything.

Even though they had been living together for ten years and the boyfriend was a U.S. citizen, he was not allowed to meet him since he was not family. He was not even allowed to bring a change of clothing. And he told him, on the phone from Pakistan, "I tried to call you and tell you what was happening."

His boyfriend had actually reported him missing. Abbas was a cabdriver and that's how they arrested him. According to the cops, he jumped a red light, which is unbelievable because he had been driving a cab for 15 years. Yeah, actually, he might have jumped it.

But his I.D., a driver's license, was forged, which is how you make ends meet sometimes in this underground economy around undocumented immigrants. So he still has not been able to return. They have tried to write to Senators and they've even thought about moving to Canada. Abbas's boyfriend could move to Canada and then bring him over to marry him, but he would have to be a Canadian citizen first before he could actually invite his partner over.

So the stories are many.

During the Queens Pride Parade two years ago there was a big scare that—it was almost like Al Qaeda was about to attack Queens Pride. If you go to Queens on a Sunday, there are three Muslim guys who stand on the street corner. They are there every Sunday—rain, shine, hell, high waters, they are there.

And they have pictures of Abu Ghraib. They keep changing. Abu Ghraib happened and then you had pictures of Abu Ghraib. But before that, they always had mutilated bodies—this is a child in Iraq. Anyway, very interesting stuff, which they took from the Internet.

Two of them have converted to Islam; they are both white Americans. One of them is an Arab-American. So they said that they would picket the Queens Pride Parade. I have been to many Pride Parades in different cities here and in other parts of the world, and there are always religious groups picketing it—"Turn or Burn," "Repent or Perish."

I have never really seen a Muslim group protest during a parade because all these countries have very small gay minorities. This particular one sent both the Pride committee and the press into chaos. So, what should the people at the Queens Pride Parade do? I was contacted because I was with Al-Fatiha, which is a queer Muslim group, so that we could explain this phenomenon.

So I told them—I said there will be two or three of them there because they are there every Sunday. They won't be there because there is Queens Pride Parade. But they would not believe me, like I was part of some conspiracy by Muslims to hide homophobia in their communities.

Now, if you have been to a Queens Pride Parade, it goes through the South Asian neighborhood in Jackson Heights, where half the businesses are owned by Muslims. All the shops that I go to know that I am gay. They may not approve of it, but it's none of their business. They are not my relatives, they are not related to me. I am a guy who comes there and shops with some friends who are drag queens. Sometimes I am in drag when I am eating there.

It was very interesting because they asked, "Homophobia in Islam, what would you do with this in a Muslim community? Should we be having this parade here?" And I walked into Kebab King, which is right around the corner, next to Eagle Theater. It's owned by Pakistanis, and they had a lot of food on display, extra food.

So I asked him, I said, "why do you have so much food here today?" He said, "this is the Gay Pride Parade, so they will be coming in to eat."

(audience laughter)

And this is generally the reaction. Actually, when I first came to New York, there was a Pakistani friend of mine in Queens, when I came out to him, basically to stop him from introducing me to girls all the time, he was surprised to learn that I was gay.

The first thing he said to me was, "I don't know, I'm used to it; they go right by here in Jackson Heights; I've been living here for 12 years and I have gay friends."

He didn't have gay friends, he just knew of them. So, that was also happening in the same community. There was a bunch of journalists from all kinds of newspapers in New York, especially the gay newspapers, that were asking me and a couple of other people, "what should be done about it?"

I kept reminding them that those people, those shopkeepers are also Muslim. They are not actually attacking the Gay Pride Parade. It happens in their neighborhood, they are ready for it, they are looking forward to it because it's good business for them.

But those three people that are actually going to picket it, they're just going to picket it. Let them stand there. They can hold their little signs "Turn Or Burn" or "You're Going To Go To Hell." I was there when this incident happened, with these three guys. All I did was predict that there would be three. There was a fourth one, like the backup, who was carrying everything.

(audience laughter)

And suddenly, a few people started screaming and ran to the NYPD. They got around 18 cops for these four guys and they were saying, "you can't be here."

I was standing there and I thought, "Well, I'm from Al-Fatiha, South Asian Gay and Lesbian Association, do you want me to talk and mediate?" They said no. So they started removing them and of course, they asked, "What are you doing here?"

I responded, "What am I doing here? I was marching in the parade, I was in the parade." So they said, "You are going to go to hell." I responded that I've heard that since the day I was born. I don't have those memories, but yes, I've known that.

I asked, "When did you convert to Islam?"

And he responded, "It's not about conversion. I was born a Muslim."

I said, "No, you converted to Islam." He converted seven years ago, he eventually told me when we sat down. He kept telling me, "Abandon my ways." It's nothing that you don't usually hear from very religious people. But it was very surprising the level of fear that suddenly went up in the community, before and during the Queens Pride Parade.

And then it was over. It was the same thing like those Muslim men that are really, really fearful all the time. And it was there, in the gay community. It's the same thing with the LGBT press and the way they cover Islamic countries or what happens to gay and lesbian people in Iran and Pakistan.