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RIO DE JANEIRO – This is Ibtihaj Muhammad.

“Being an American. Being an African-American. Being Muslim. Being a woman. These are things I can’t change, and that I wouldn’t change for anything,” she said.

What she wants to change, as the first American athlete to compete in the Olympics wearing a hijab, is the conversation about Muslims.

She wants to change the way they’re perceived, misconceived and threatened by increasingly hateful rhetoric in the United States. She has to, she says, because no American should live in fear in their own county, just because of who they are or what they wear.

This is Ibtihaj Muhammad: an Olympic athlete who gets stalked like a criminal in New York City because she has a traditional Muslim head wrap.

“[I feel unsafe] all the time. I had someone follow me home from practice, trying to report me to the police. And that was right on 28th and 7th in New York City,” she said. “I’m very vocal about these things, especially on social media. Because I want people to know that I’m not an anomaly. I’m not special in any way. I’m a woman who wears hijab. These are my experiences.”

This is Ibtihaj Muhammad: a 30-year-old sabre fencer from Maplewood, New Jersey, who knows her responsibilities as an Olympian extend well beyond the arena in Rio this month.

“I’m hoping just my presence on Team USA changes perceptions people have about the Muslim community. A lot of people have misconceptions about who Muslims are – and what a Muslim woman even looks like. Who I am challenges and shatters those stereotypes,” she said.

“Our conversation about the Muslim community has to change. It’s a slippery slope when you use hateful rhetoric. When you openly use bigoted comments against a group of people, and encourage violence. I hope it changes. I hope it changes fast.”

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Muhammad’s path to Rio was unusual and exceptional, both as an athlete and as a role model.

Many fencers are products of a system that identifies them in their early teens and trains them for the next 15 years. But she took up the sport as a 17 year old, and didn’t have her first international competition until she was 23.

“My friends told me not to fence, because only dorks fence,” she said.

But Muhammad saw a sport whose elegance fascinated her and whose uniforms adhered to the rules of her faith, which was something she was searching for. Her arms and legs are covered. Her hijab is worn under a mask.

“It allowed me to be who I am,” she said. “People didn’t look at me as a minority or as a woman. It was simply for my skills-set. Once you put on your uniform, you can’t see who’s behind the mask. That’s what I’ve always appreciated about this sport.”

But even in a sport whose athletes exist in faceless anonymity, Muhammad met friction.

“Very early on in my sport, I remember being told that I didn’t belong because I was African-American or there were things I couldn’t do because I’m a Muslim,” she said.

She overcame those impediments to thrive in her sport. But she knows many, many other minority athletes simply quit instead.

“I know not everybody has the same strength. They can be deterred by comments when they’re younger. So I hope just being vocal about these obstacles, and why they’re wrong, I can inspire the younger generation in face of these comments and misconceptions,” she said. “It’s something we can all relate to: Getting picked on, getting bullied.”

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