ISIS Stereotypes

In the lecture “What It’s like to Be Muslim in America” by Dalia Mogahed, Dalia emphasizes how “Muslims are like canaries in the coal mine, we might be the first to feel it, but the toxic air of fear is harming us all” (Mogahed). This xenophobic behavior is what strives citizens to fear one another and find an excuse to polarize a certain ethnicity for their alleged affiliations with terrorist groups. This overwhelming fear causes the initial hatred towards some people but it ultimately ricochets onto the rest of society. Next, the abundant amount of fear proves to be detrimental to society due to the fact that it provokes disastrous behavior between citizens. According to Dalia, “ISIS has as much to do with Islam as the Ku Klux Klan has to

In this photo a Middle Eastern woman is pointing a gun directly towards the camera, symbolizing the way she, like many others, are stereotyped in America. The picture is clear and concise, with front view and level angles that let the viewers see the struggles she has gone faced. Her face and arms display Arabic writings that symbolize the stereotypes given to them in America: terrorists, muslims, extremists, and fanatics. The picture is limited to the colors black and white to represent the seriousness of this issue. Her eyes staring directly towards the viewer causes them to feel sympathy, leading them to wonder why there is such hate towards Middle Easterners. The concepts of this picture go back to the main idea of the research question

The terrorism towards Muslim-Americans pales in comparison to the war in the Middle East. During 9/11, al-Qaeda (a terrorist group made of citizens of several countries, not affiliated with any government whatsoever) killed over 3,000 Americans. In return American troops killed, 1.7 million Iraqi civilians, mostly children, in the Iraq war. Americans also killed roughly 3 million Afghan since the early 90’s, before 9/11. Altogether, Americans have afflicted around 7 million in the Middle East. However, the American government hides the death toll and researchers find it difficult to document Arab deaths due to language barriers and information manipulation. Nevertheless, Americans have killed from 6 to 8 million Islam. Not only can many people consider this morally wrong to kill innocent civilians because of a terrorist attack they had nothing to do with, but it also puts a bigger target on America. ISIS and other Islamic terrorist groups will not take too kindly that 7 million of their people killed by Americans. They will seek revenge and do everything in their power to raise their death toll on America (15 Years After

Ever since the infamous day of September 11th Americans have been constantly stereotyping Muslims. Due to the fact that the attacks caused on the Twin Towers were caused by a group of Muslim extremists, it is now a popular stereotype that all Muslims must be extremists. Even Patel, who worked on making peaceful connections between religions, was categorized as a Muslim terrorist or an extremist on a series of Anti-Muslim blogs. I believe that most people aren’t well informed when it comes to Muslims and those who practice Islam and have just learned to associate those terms with terrible things. Most people portray Islam as an angry and violent religion while in reality it is quite the opposite. Many would be surprised to see the amount of similarities between the Qu’ ran and the Bible. Followers of Islam and Muslims are for the most part a peaceful group of

There are many religions throughout the world in today's society. One of the religions that is discriminated the most is Islam. Muslims who are part of the religion are hated because of a terrorist group called Isis. Some of the reasons why they are discriminated is because Isis shares the same religion, Americans think they are terrorist, and are the fastest growing religion in the world. Although people around the world look at this religion being terrorist, they need to understand that the innocent muslims don't want to be a part of the terrorist group.

Aside from what the news portrays, many Americans have limited knowledge of Islam and Muslim people. Because prejudice against Muslims has been deeply integrated into American society for such a long time, it has even become clear in classroom settings. For example, in my AP Human Geography class, we were debating on ways we could prevent terrorism, specifically referring to ISIS as the basis. The discussion could’ve been harmless, however, my teacher made a point to place the only two Muslim kids in the class, including myself, on the negative side, while Christian students spoke for the affirmative. Naturally, they were allowed to speak first; the first solution they thought of was the improvement of education in the Middle East so that students would learn that terrorism is wrong, and it astounded me—everyone knows that terrorism is wrong.

The most prominent part of this problem is how often a person relates Muslims to terrorism. An assumption is made after every attack that the ones involved in it were committing this violence in the name of Islam. In reality, this statement is very incorrect and research has been made to come to the conclusion that actually “94% of Terrorist attacks in the US since 1980 are by non-Muslims”

Stereotypes exist everywhere. From styles of clothing to dishes of food, stereotypes exist because there is some truth in it. By social classifications and categorizations, people take small truths and instances from a small amount of people and generalize it into the broader population. The example given here shows that anyone that is Muslim or has a traditional Arab garb on can be considered a terrorist. This stereotype is taken from the event of 9/11. Since then, people have been calling anyone following the Muslim faith publically terrorists. In the video, one of the Jalal brothers throws a bag at people and they automatically assume it is a bomb. This presumption comes from the stereotype that all Muslims are terrorists. This creates a fear that would control one’s actions.

Stereotypes is a fixed, over generalized belief about a particular group or class of people (Cardwell, 1966). Stereotypes are used to making interactions with new people easier. However, it also means people forget differences of individuals and assumes based on generalization. Stereotypes eventually leads to social categorization which creates prejudice towards groups. Racial stereotypes such as described in “Look, Mohammed the Terrorist is Coming!” by Nadine Naber, they describe the stereotypical “Mohammed”, an Arab or Middle Eastern Muslim man with a beard and brown or dark complexion that usually fits the profile of a terrorist. It’s not only Muslims who becomes victims of this stereotype, majority of Middle Easterners, including Christians, Muslims, and even atheists, and majority South Asians, including Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs.

As Representative John Cooksey stated in response to the attacks on September 11th, "If I see someone come in and he's got a diaper on his head and a fan belt around that diaper on his head, that guy needs to be pulled over and checked”(Ervin). Linking people of Arab descent to terrorism is very common, and of course there is a reason this stereotype has become so popular. For example in 2013, “More than half of all attacks [57%] and fatalities [66%], and nearly three-quarters of all injuries [73%] occurred in three countries: Iraq, Pakistan, and Afghanistan”(Statistics on Incidents). According to Statistics on Incidents of Terrorism Worldwide, the majority of the top ten countries with the most terror attacks were in the Middle East or Africa.

The religion of Islam garners large amounts attention. Many believe it is a violent and backwards religion. Since 9/11, "Islamic reform" has become an all-purpose phrase: equally a western impulse to protect itself from Muslim violence and a humanist notion aimed at assisting voiceless Muslims (Eteraz1). Extreme displays of Islamic faith such as the attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11 have generated negative stereotypes about Islam as a religion. These stereotypes of violence and backwards thinking have been further perpetuated by even more recent examples of extremism by Muslim terrorists. Although most Muslims are peaceful and do not endorse the violence of their Muslim brethren, there are some who believe it is their

Currently, the anti-Muslim and anti-immigration political party is gaining more and more support all over the world, making it the third largest political group worldwide under the pre-text that “It isn’t Islamophobia when they ARE trying to kill you (barenakedislam).” While activists spread misleading information about Muslims to help protect their nation and culture, the public needs to stop accepting most media about Muslims as truth because it causes prejudice towards immigrants of middle-Eastern origin, it creates a fear of terror in our society, and it contributes to violence based on misinformation.

In her talk about confronting anti-Arab and anti-Muslim racism, Carol Fadda-Conrey began by explaining the astonishing boom in Arab-American writers, which is related to the growing biases against Arabs and Muslims, not only after 9/11, but also taking place before it too. Fadda-Conrey emphasized the fact that these biases and stereotypes against Muslims and Arabs have existed since before 9/11, but this group of people in present day has experienced heightened hostility in America due to the assumption that all “Arabs and Muslims are terrorists”. Furthermore, the stereotype has turned into the fact that specifically Muslim men are the terrorists, and the women are oppressed and in need of Americans help to save them. One way she discussed

Since Islam is a religion that promotes peace and kindness, one could ask where the stereotype that all Muslims are terrorists originated. Following the tragedies of September 11, 2001, Arabs and Muslims have been presented as potential terrorists. This idea stemmed from the theory that, “media bias increases when a specific ethnic, religious, or racial group is seen as a threat to national security.” (Stiffler, 2013). Since the attacks on September 11, 2001 Muslims and Arabs have been “hyper-visible” in the media as potential terrorists. Due to the negative media attention and failure of most media platforms to

After the attack of 9/11 many American citizens sought out an answer to why one would hijack a plane and run it into the Twin Towers, killing millions. According to the Huffpost, Islam became the main reason for the attack and furthermore labeled religion as the inspiration for many terroristic attacks (Gibson, 1). According to many Muslims, however, the attacks are anti-Islamic because the Quran states not to harm civilians who are not involved with war and to avoid it at all possible times (PBS, 3). The conflict between Muslims and Americans is growing and many issues in the Middle East has become the focus for religious terrorism.