- Clean your ass, next question. (gentle music)
- Hi, my name is Marie, I'm Lebanese American. - Hey, I'm Laila, I'm Lebanese-Palestinian-American. - Hi, I'm comedian Alyssa
Dookhi, I'm from Kuwait. - My name is Michael
Kamel, I'm Palestinian and today I'm going to be answering commonly Googled questions about, Arabs. Is it Arab or is it Arabic? - Arab? Me, I am Arab. The language is Arabic.
Dance move is arabesque. A coffee is Arabica. - Arab is the people.
Arabic is the language. - Arab is a people.
Arabic is the language. I am Arab and my family speaks Arabic. - It's a language and then the people. I'm right on that, right? That's right. Yeah, like yeah. Is Arab the same as Middle Eastern? - Arabs are Middle Eastern but Middle Eastern doesn't equal Arab. - It's kind of like that thing
of, a square is a rectangle but a...
No or whatever it is. Middle Eastern is a blanket term for like many different ethnicities. - You can be Persian. You can be a Syrian. You can be Kurdish. A lot of the language
around the Middle East and Arabs is really complicated and loaded and it comes with a lot of baggage. - That's one reason why I like to say Southwest Asia and North Africa. It connects us all through the things that keep us similar while focusing more on a geographical location. Are Arabs considered white? - Oh, I knew this question
was gonna come up. - If you ask me, I'm not white. - I personally do not
consider myself white and people generally get that I'm from some
Middle Eastern area. There are Arabs who are
white or who look white. So for example, I have
people in my extended family that have blonde hair and blue eyes and if you didn't know their names, you would not think they were Arab at all. - According to the U.S. Census, Arabs are meant to check
the white category. - When Arabs first came
to the U.S. in 1870s, pushed out of Greater
Syria by the Ottomans and had to prove, because
of the Exclusion Act, that they were not Asians and could stay in this country. So those people said, "Look at
us, we're from the Holy Land, we're Christians, we could be white." - Decades later, the
diversity of Arabs in the U.S. has been much more expanded and so it's been really problematic because the U.S. Census
doesn't account for who we are. We're a much larger population that can't accurately be measured because the census doesn't
have a category for us, so we get lumped in
with those who are white and so now there is a
concerted effort by activists and advocates all around the
country to have designation for people who identify as being Arab or more broadly, Middle Eastern. - [Alyssa] Why do Arabs use bidets? (Marie gasps)
(Marie laughs) - I have been wanting one,
but it doesn't have anything to do with me being Arab. - For the Arabs that are Muslim they do use bidets in order to be clean, 'specially before prayer
and for the rest of us 'specially Lebanese,
it's cause we bougie A-F. - Because you have to wash your ass. (man chuckles)
Like... - Clean your ass. Next question. - [Laila] Do Arabs eat pork? - This Arab does.
Do not show this video to my dad but many Arabs do. Not all Arabs come from religions that prohibit eating pork. - Don't worry about what
I'm eating (laughs). - [Michael] What do Arabs wear? - Arabs We're all sorts of stuff. These are funny, like (laughs). - Well today I'm wearing
just a black T-shirt and some shorts that I actually cut up because these were pants that
I didn't really want anymore but I didn't want them to go to waste. So that's what this Arab wears. - Depends on the region. There's lots of different
clothing that is indigenous to each different place. I mean, there's a huge part of the planet covered by Arab countries,
so in each different place people wear all sorts of different things. And then, don't forget, there
are Arabs in the Diaspora who are wearing whatever
it's normal to wear where they live. - Is Arab the same as Persian? No, Arab is not the same as Persian. - Persians are people that come from Iran. Iran is in the Middle East, but
Iran is not an Arab country. - I get this question a lot especially as a Palestinian,
people are always like, " Oh, are you Persian
or are you Pakistanian?" No, no, no. Persian, Pakistani and Palestinian are three
different ethnicities, three different locations. - [Laila] Do all Arab
countries speak Arabic? - I actually don't know
this and I'm not gonna claim to know this, but I'm
assuming like yes and... Most Arab countries speak Arabic, but often there's like French influence and often they're educated
in English as well. - All Arab countries speak Arabic, but in most of Arab countries especially those who have been occupied or colonized by other
countries in their history, there's several different
languages spoken. - There's usually another
primary language along with it. Sometimes that's an indigenous language and a lot of North Africa
there are so many cool different languages. I highly encourage you to check out and learn about. where do Arabs come from? - Arabs come from a lot of places. - A magical place. - When a mommy Arab and a daddy Arab love each other very much. - Our mothers wombs (chuckles). (baby coos) - They can come from
the Gulf, North Africa, Sudan, the Levant. - And there's Arabs in America
that are born in America. They're from all over. - [Michael] What does Arab American mean? - This means so many things
to so many different people. I'm Arab American because
my mom is from America and my dad is Arab. - I'm still 'tryna figure that out. I'm still 'tryna figure out if I am... If I can call myself Arab American. - It also is that because
I'm an Arab in America. Some people distinguish
between Arab American and Arabs in America. - To me, Arab American means somebody who considers themselves
both Arab and American in whatever capacity makes sense to them. - Look I wear being Arab on my sleeve to the point where people probably think I'm totally obnoxious. "Like we get it, you're Arab." (chuckles) - But I get kind of self-conscious feeling like, "Am I the right one to
educate this person on this?" - In my experience, these questions have come
from a place of curiosity. I'm glad that they feel safe enough to ask me those questions
and they wanna learn more. - I would recommend asking
people for resources if they have any, or
give it a quick Google.
