@coldjoint,
I used to live in Cambridge MA. My daughter still goes to school there. It is a city where we have welcomed immigrants including a large number of Muslims (along with a community of American Muslims).
Daily we see people in hijab walking down the street. There is a fairly large mosque near my daughter's school. Like everyone else their children attend school with my children. They volunteer. There was a couple who would come to our house (the wife was good friends with my now ex-wife). They were good people.
You may remember the Boston Marathon bomber... he went to school in Cambridge, my son in high school had a math class with the younger brother. This was a terrorist attack that was against us by someone we had welcomed in.
You know what... people in Boston are strong. We weren't terrified, we didn't cower in fear and we didn't turn on our neighbors. We accept that this was a terrorist attack committed by a Muslim... and we also know that the Muslim community is a part of our community.
We judge people based on their individual actions, not based on their ethnicity.
It is very easy to use isolated stories to justify fear, hatred and racism. My city didn't give in to that, and we didn't lose our culture, our identity or fall into crime.
So yes, I know what I am talking about. We have faced terrorism without becoming racist cowards. New York did the same. I am very proud of that.