Human Rights Speech : The Muslim Religion

Over 1.6 billion people are muslims. That is about about a quarter of the entire world. Islam is the second largest religion the world. This beast of a religion started out in the small town of Mecca on the Arabian Peninsula. Over the next thousand years it spread to the astonishing size we know today.

Following the terror attacks in The Unites States in 2001, there has been an increase in Islamophobia in the Western World. Following 9/11, respondents indicate that levels of implicit or indirect discrimination in The United States rose by 82,6% and experiences of over discrimination by 76,3% (http://jiv.sagepub.com/content/21/3/317.short). A combination of how Arabs and Muslims are portrayed in the media, with the increase of organized terrorist groups and refugees since the Arabic Spring, makes this a big political challenge today. This bibliography is written to get an overview of why Islamophobia has increased and the challenges that comes with the rise of Islamophobia.

Muslims are one of the most marginalized people in the U.S for their beliefs and their religion but after 9/11 discrimination and hate crimes against them had become even worse.Throughout the U.S people have been “Anti-Islam” and believed that the Muslim’s religion is absurd, want muslims to change their beliefs or, leave the country.According to “Anti-Islman Discourse in the United States in the Decade After 9/11:The Role of Social Conservatives and Cultural Politics”by David D.Belt on page 211-212, talks about how a post on Charisma News with an article title “Why I am Absolutely Islamophobic” was urging at the fact that Muslim-Americans needed to be deported as soon as possible ,or go under sterilization.Also Belt talks about one of Bush’s family friend being,Franklin Graham saying that he thinks the muslim’s religion is “very evil “and “wicked”.One last example a man named Gabriel had said Islam is the real enemy of America and that we supposedly “we will be doomed in war if we don’t realize it”. People are so brainwashed it honestly insane and very ignorant at the things people think about Muslims, its barbaric.They believe what Muslims believe in and their religion is wrong and they should switch to “Christianity” because it is the “American way “ or have them deported because the do not belong there and are “terrorist”.

Hate speech is a term of art in legal and political theory that is used to refer to verbal conduct – and other symbolic, communicative action –which willfully attacks a person or group based on attributes such as race, religion, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, disability, or gender. Hate speech thus includes things like identity-prejudicial abuse and harassment, certain uses of slurs and epithets, some extremist political and religious speech. For example, statements to the effect that all Muslims are terrorists, or that gay people are second -class human beings, and certain displays of hate symbols like swastikas or burning crosses are part of it. Those such activities are classified as hate speech if, and insofar as, they convey the idea that belonging to a particular social group warrants someone’s being held in or treated with contempt. However, Freedom of speech is the most important and basic right that a human in every country deserves. Freedom of speech and hate speech are two opposite things. Therefore, the government needs to draw a line between hate speech and freedom of speech to protect a citizen. Hate speech should be banned and extreme speech regulated because it is one of the reasons for many negative consequences in human lives

One incident that had really triggered all of this was what happened in New York City on September 11th, 2001. On this day that is better known as 9/11, 19 militants from the terrorist group al-Qaeda hijacked four aircrafts. Two of said aircrafts crashed into the World Trade Center and one crashed into the Pentagon near Washington D.C. During those attacks, Over 3000 people were killed, including more than 400 firefighters and policemen. After the incident, Americans had been paranoid about people who were Muslim, as Al-Qaeda was an Islamic group. Many years later to this day, anti-Muslim bigotry has got much much worse. Things like portrayal and treatment of Muslims has gotten terribly worse.

Those who follow Islam are called Muslim. Muslims believe that there is only one God. The Arabic word for God is Allah.” There is really no difference between there and Christianity or Catholicism, they all believe in one god and two of them believe that their messiahs have already come and spread the word of their gods. There are instances were people commit terrorist attacks on citizens or people that they have personal issues with and claiming to be apart of a terrorist organization like ISIS. For example there was a shooting recently in Orlando Florida where the culprit targeted homosexual, killing 49 people and wounded 53 others. At first people who heard about it assumed that there was a connection with ISIS and later found out that it was indeed a hate crime. This happened because this specific terrorist group is relevant. The experience of these bullies is effecting the entire Islamic culture. Muslim citizens all over the world are now fearful of freely expressing their traditions, because they're worried that they will be shunned and hated for there “resemblance” the these different terrorist organizations. Back in the mid-1500s the Roman Empire persecuted any suspected Christians so throughout the world people had to his there faith in their god in fear of both their and their families death. “Long after the threat of persecution has past hidden christians in Japan are still closeted.

Just like the Red Scare, people were protective over themselves avoiding any Muslim. They thought, “any muslim could be a terrorist spy.” People grew suspicious of muslims. The attack changed many people’s minds about how they saw Muslims. The were no longer the peaceful human beings. Most non-Muslim Americans saw them as a threat. Many innocent Muslims faced discrimination along with harassment and physical injuries. Angry Americans, who’ve probably lost someone in the attack of September 11th,2001, took out their frustration on the unimpeachable Muslims. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 481 hate crimes committed in 2001 were found to be anti-Islamic. Later years, that number increased. The first anti-Islamic hate crime was committed to Balbir Singh Sodhi only four days after the September 11th attack. The sad part of it is that Sodhi is not Muslim, he is a Sikh. He was mistaken to be a Muslim. Laila Alawa shared her experience as a Muslim aftermath of the September 11th attack, saying that “ ...being a Muslim kid in upstate New York meant being alienated and isolated without understanding why.” The discrimination is still going on today but very slowly, it is

On the other more extreme side of things, religious persecution can be extremely fatal, leading to loss of life over differing beliefs and attitudes. Just look at today’s political climate. ISIS, an extremist radical group known for being religiously charged, takes credit for virtually every act of mass violence across the world. This has caused people all over the world to be afraid of Muslims even though their religion really has nothing to do with these acts of violence. People have made the religion out to be the problem when that isn’t the issue.

Throughout the years there have been several hate crimes or laws put in place to put down the muslim community, two of the most recent and most controversial examples of discrimination towards the muslim community would be president donald j. Trumps attempt to pass both a muslim registry and a ban on all muslims coming in the U.S. thankfully the bills weren't passed, this however does show the level in which some americans are willing to go to in order to remove a “threat to society” this also show the change in americans psychi making racism and discrimination socially acceptable more and more when even the government is making it seem acceptable to discriminate thus increasing the amount of hate crimes towards

After 9/11 and the subsequent increase in national security, many Muslims, or those who fit the stereotype of Muslims, have been profiled and “randomly selected” for screening in airports. Islamophobia, which is a result of Muslim stereotypes, has also caused many Muslims (and Arabs that fit the Muslim stereotype) to be faced with racial slurs, threats, physical assault and even death. This is because most people cannot dissociate the stereotype that Muslims are terrorists from reality. As a result they lash out at anyone they believe fits the profile of being

Muslims faced tremendous amounts of prejudice after the September 11th attacks. The September 11th attacks were four coordinated attacks perpetrated by the terrorist group known as Al Qaeda. These attacks killed 2,996 people and injured more than 6,000 innocent people. These terrorist attacks also contributed to the fear that we now know as Islamophobia.

There are double standards within freedom of speech. What is acceptable now to say, may not be 20 years from now. Within our culture and society there are things deemed appropriate to discuss, and within the interview that is brought up about the Jewish and the Muslims. There are lots of double standards within societies today, and some things are socially acceptable more so than another thing based on a given cultures idea of right and wrong. But, as said in the interview, if things can be said towards just one given culture and its okay, then you should be able notice that what you may be saying may still offend another individual, “my point is not your freedom of expression. It is the freedom that you have to target the people who are weak

Ever since the start of September 11, 2001, Muslims around the world and in the United States have been targeted, taken to war, murdered,

Imagine a world in which you are prohibited from traveling to another country, even though you are guaranteed the basic right to practice your religion. Remember how over fifteen years ago, people that shared nothing but your religion committed acts of terrorism, and people still hold you responsible. Picture an era where you and your people were persecuted, but now reciprocators of the oppressors are marching freely without a second thought. You can stop imagining now. Because this is the world we live in. A society of religious intolerance. It is defined as, “not respecting the fundamental human right of other people to hold religious beliefs that are different from your own” (“Religious Intolerance Introduction”). Around the world in six predominantly Muslim countries, citizens are forbidden from coming to America because of an executive order issued by the US. Likewise, on September 11th, 2001, a group of Muslim terrorists hijacked a plane, killing thousands. In present day, people only connected to them by their religion are still being judged for actions they didn’t perform. Another situation in which bigotry occurred was in World War II. The Nazi Party attempted to gain control of many European and Asian countries, all the while trying to rid the world of races and religions they saw as inferior. Now the Neo-Nazis have the right to march freely and spread their hateful messages. Religious intolerance is a pressing issue, causing harrassment, inequality, violence, and

The connection between Islam and terrorism was not intensified until the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center that pushed the Islamic faith into the national and international spotlight (Smith, 2013). As Smith (2013) articulated, “Many Americans who had never given Islam a second thought before 9/11 now had to figure out how to make sense of these events and relate to the faith tradition that ostensibly inspired them” (p. 1). One way in which people made sense of these events was through the media channels that influenced their overall opinions by shaping a framework of censored ideas (Yusof, Hassan, Hassan & Osman, 2013). In a survey conducted by Pew Forum (2012), 32% of people reported that their opinions of Muslims were greatly influenced by the media’s portrayal of Islam that depicted violent pictorials and fundamentalist Muslims. Such constant negative depiction is likely to lead to the inevitable—prejudice and hate crime. For instance, in 2002 alone there were approximately 481 hate crimes that were carried out against Muslims (Smith, 2013). Ever since the 9/11 attacks Muslim people have been the target of “suspicion, harassment and discrimination” (Talal, n.d., p. 9).