Trek from ignorance to activism turns Bentley into Bawba

It says something wonderful about the diversity of the United States of America when a kid who grows up in an overwhelmingly white suburb, hails from a line of WASPs that stretches back to a signer of the Declaration of Independence and has the name Bentley Patterson ends up as “The Bawba,” the sidekick of a radio host who is Arab, Muslim and outspoken about his love for America.

“It's all about bridge-building,” says Bawba, a 50-year-old dad from Naperville. He got the nickname after he phoned a radio show as “Bentley from Naperville,” and personality Rashad “Rush” Darwish's confusion about the name ended with them both agreeing it would be easier if Bentley went by “Bob.” Soon, “Bob” called in with such good insights that Rush dubbed him Bawba and invited him into the studio.

Now the Arlington Heights native passes out business cards promoting his radio personality of “Bob ‘The Bawba' Soderberg: Reporter & Recovering Islamaphobe” with Rush's radio show RiseUp, which airs live from noon to 1 p.m. Sundays on WNDZ 750-AM and at www.riseupshow.com. The show has boasted impressive interviews with newsmakers from retired White House reporter Helen Thomas to outgoing Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley. Bawba says he's still got plenty to learn about Muslims and the Arab culture.

“There's not a week goes by that I don't say something stupid out of ignorance,” Bawba says.

While Rush allows that his radio partner butchers some Arabic phrases, Bawba, who graduated from Buffalo Grove High School, began researching Arabs and Muslims during the first Gulf War when he realized his newborn son could grow up to fight a war.

“‘They hate us because we're free?' That doesn't make any sense to me,” Bawba remembers thinking back then and realizing he needed to learn more about Arabs and Muslims.

While he calls himself an ecumenical Christian, he's not shy about sounding off when he thinks Muslims are treated unfairly. This week's congressional hearings convened by Rep. Peter T. King, a Republican from Long Island, N.Y., to investigate homegrown Islamic terrorism fed into a prejudice against Muslims, Bawba says. But Bawba says he was glad the testimony given during the hearing helped show that the vast majority of American Muslims are on the side of America and doing all they can to protect their nation from future attacks.

“The hearing did more to unite us than divide us,” Bawba says.

“Me and Bawba are the same,” says Rush, who was born in Bellwood, spent his first- and second-grade years with his Palestinian grandma in the Middle East, grew up in Stone Park and now lives in Orland Park. “I'm such a proud American. I'm in love with this country, but I'm in love with Palestine as well.”

In grade school, he'd get teased about camels and being an Arab, but “it was never a Muslim thing because people were way too ignorant to joke about Muslims,” Rush says.

That changed after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Now Rush calls his radio show RiseUp because he urges Arabs, Muslims and people who aren't Arab or Muslim to rise up and confront evil whatever the source.

Bawba is part of that message.

“I've got to be that vision of change that I want to see,” says Bawba, who now finds himself at events where he is overwhelmingly outnumbered by Muslims.

“We joke about him being with the FBI, but the truth is we have nothing to hide,” Rush says. “We're Americans. We have families. We're losing jobs. We're the same.”

Bawba says the more he learns about the world beyond his sheltered upbringing, the more he focuses on the similarities instead of differences.

“It isn't about religion,” Bawba says.

“It's about basic human rights.”