THIS man does not deserve to be treated like a criminal.
Cabby Medhat Mohamed is the new poster boy for sexual intolerance in this libertine city. He’s been branded by Council Speaker Christine Quinn as potentially the biggest bigot ever to scar the populace. Mayor Bloomberg labeled the distressed driver a “disgrace.”
Mohamed faces the indignity of having his cab license yanked by the Taxi and Limousine Commission. He’s already lost his job.
But Medhat Mohamed is no bigot, and he’s not a disgrace.
He’s also not a prude, a gay basher, a homophobe or the more colorful invective that’s been lobbed in his direction by a chorus of yuppies with a large bone to pick.
All Mohamed did, he insists, was ask a gay couple to halt their hot-and-heavy antics in the back of his taxi. When they refused, he asked them to leave.
Mohamed says the couple’s behavior was so distracting, he feared he might have an accident.
And now, after all the noise and bother, he would kick them out again.
“Losing your job, or losing your life — which one is better?” he told me.
“I’m not going to judge them,” said Mohamed, who is Muslim but says that has nothing to do with the principle here. “God will judge them.”
How did a hardworking immigrant who toiled on the night shift, giving rides to all kinds of people — including some who are abusive or intolerant of him — become Public Enemy No. 1?
Perhaps it was the media savvy of his passenger Paul Bruno, who told this newspaper he was appalled that Mohamed asked him to leave his cab in the East Village after he “hugged” a male companion. Bruno filed a complaint with the city that is, as we speak, being seriously investigated. Mohamed doesn’t stand a chance.
Mohamed, 38, who lives in Jackson Heights, Queens, came to this country from Egypt a decade ago and drove a cab for the last 3½ years. Until now, the worst thing anyone did in the back seat was smoke marijuana — then yell at him when he asked them to stop.
But the campaign against the cabby marks a new low for this city. Mohamed told me, and I have no reason to disbelieve him, that the couple in the back was doing a lot more than hugging. In fact, he feared they’d have sex right there in his taxi.
“They forced me” to kick them out, he said. “He almost was on the lap of another one, kissing his neck and his cheek. I don’t want to cause a car accident.
“It’s about them,” said Mohamed. “It’s not about me.”
The rush to blame Mohamed’s Muslim faith for the infraction seems its own kind of blatant bigotry — a move to change the nature of this sordid story into a tale of religious rights vs. gay rights.
Mohamed swears he has nothing against gay people. He would kick out a straight couple that behaved as the guys did. As a cabby in New York, you can imagine, he’s picked up gay men from the clubs many times.
Mohamed also said he has no hard feelings against his boss at Steinway Express, who told him last week not to return to work.
“I don’t blame him. He doesn’t want trouble,” said Mohamed. But with his first baby due next month, he has no idea how he will pay the bills.
If you support Medhat Mohamed, let your voice be heard. Call 311 and let the city know how you feel.
Don’t let Mohamed be shunned and shamed. It’s not right.
Bloomy ‘squeak’ far from a shock
Mayor Bloomberg’s narrow win in last week’s election came as little surprise to people of my acquaintance who uncharacteristically stayed home on Election Day. Or switched parties.
Bloomy’s turnabout on term limits angered one pal to such a degree, she turned the lever for Democrat Bill Thompson. And she’s a Republican.
I vote with my pocketbook, and I could not find a candidate who shares my views. Bloomberg has shown he has no intention of cutting the ever-expanding local government and taking pity on us poor, struggling taxpayers.
One can only hope he listens to the decidedly unhappy electorate. Give us a break!
HB-PO’d at ‘Enthusiasm’
Larry David, the self-loathing star of HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” delivered a gag on the air in which the comedian, suffering from a medical condition, splashed urine on a portrait of Jesus. An assistant mistakes it for a tear. “A miracle!” she cries. Sounds pretty funny, doesn’t it?
Imagine if David had done the same routine using a picture of the prophet Mohammed.
I am grossed out — by the bathroom humor as well as the slur. I don’t think sliming virtually any other religion should be welcomed.
Plot ‘V’aguely Familiar
They came in peace. A charismatic leader blew in from nowhere to promise all people a future of hope, prosperity and, get this, universal health care.
No, this tale is not a documentary on the Obama administration. The latest bit of social commentary masquerading as mass entertainment is ABC’s science-fiction series “V.” It’s about visitors from another planet who seduce a willing public — only to be revealed as giant space lizards who want to eat us.
“Embracing change is never easy,” is one favorite slogan of the Vs — short for visitors.
Watch out, humans. I never knew Hollywood was capable of producing a product so true to life and — dare I say it? — conservative. In the show, the media have gone gaga over the monsters, and they marginalize and bicker with the few critics who dare speak up.
Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?
Yankee truants on parade
Now that Yankee season is finally over, the kids can head back to school. Judging from the thousands of youngsters I saw lining the streets of lower Manhattan at the team’s ticker-tape parade, Friday was an unofficial hooky day.
Maybe it wasn’t just Friday. “I’ve taken the whole week off!” said one little girl with a bad case of Yankee flu.
So head back to class, truants. Until next year.