Toronto Muslim Artist Nemahsis Says a Man Was Afraid of Her on a Flight

Ahead of the release of her single “I am not going to kill you,” Nemahsis has shared the inspiration for the track—an Islamophobic encounter she had on a flight. 

The Toronto-based singer took to her widely popular TikTok account to detail what happened in a storytime video. “So this six-foot-something middle-aged dude was scared of me, a five-foot-nothing hijabi Muslim girl sitting on the flight next to him. Are you kidding me?” she says.

Nemahsis says that while on a flight from Toronto to Los Angeles, she was sat beside an uncomfortable looking man. She offered to swap seats with him, since she assumed he might not have enough leg room in the middle seat. 

When the man took her up on her offer without saying “thank you,” she didn’t think too much of it at first. Then, things started to get weird. 

Once the plane was in the air and the seatbelt signs turned off, the man bolted out of his seat. Nemahsis just assumed he had “the flying jitters” and needed to use the bathroom, but then she noticed they were vacant. 

When she asked her flight attendant what was up out of concern for the man, the picture started to become more clear. 

“This flight attendant was so nervous to tell me, even kind of embarrassed to even say it, but was like, ‘He didn’t feel safe, he asked to switch seats,’” Nemahsis says, adding that the attendant couldn’t believe what happened either. “She felt bad for me that this is even my truth.”

Nemahsis also pointed out the irony of the whole encounter. “You’re scared of me on a plane, but then I’m scared to walk at night because of you,” she says in the video. 

“I am not going to kill you” is set to drop on March 11.