Islamophobias In America

In america, few peoples face more prejudice and hate than muslim americans. So much hate crime and fear surrounds muslims that they have even developed a word for it, “Islamophobia”. Islamophobia may be spreading

Although Islamophobia stems from religious differences and oppression today's it is present because way too many people have the perception that Muslims and anyone from the Middle East is a terrorist and has an evil agenda. "Although every Muslim is not a terrorist, every terrorist is a Muslim" (Gul,2011). This view of Islamic and Middle Eastern people is present for many reasons. One being how they are being portrayed in the media. Whenever something ISIS related is reported the views of non radical Islamic people are rarely shown and if it is it's a two or three minute segment (Obeidallah, 2014). Of all violent crimes committed in the US each year the crimes of Muslims are bring to public attention more than others yet they only account for 160 of thousands (cite). In most Hollywood movies you will find nothing but Muslims being portrayed as the assailant. Another cause for Islamophobia in our society is how the government portrays people in predominantly Islamic communities. The US is constantly in need of oil and many other natural resources that are in abundance in the Middle East. With someone these countries refusing to share for the proposed prices the US has waged war against them to gain control over these

Extremist and terrorist are terms synonymous with Muslim. But who is responsible for this negative, simplified word association? Do we need to cast a critical eye over the role of the media? This is simply because that is how the media typically portrays Islam. They have an influence over our perceptions of many controversial issues such as Islamophobia. But has there been strategies and efforts used to prevent and eliminate Islamophobia?

Islam is a monotheistic religion, centered around the teachings of the Qu’ran and serving Allah (meaning God in Arabic). However, this Abrahamic religion has been harshly discriminated against in the United States for years. Most prominently throughout the last twelve years, post September 11th, 2001. Unfortunately, issues such as socialization through the media, power distribution, religious ignorance, stereotyping and visible differences have contributed to the ill attitudes towards Muslims. This paper will examine how Americans have been socialized in islamophobia within the United States.

Islamophobia has always been prevalent in the past 50 years in the U.S., and especially NYC. Since 1950, American courts used the excuse of being a Muslim in order to deny people citizenship (Wendeiss, BBC News). Ever since the tragedy of 9/11, Islamophobia has grown rapidly in the past two decades at a pace that has never been seen before.

One of the biggest stereotypes that Americans have is that all Muslims are terrorists. A poll taken showed that twenty-seven percent of Americans think ISIS represents “true Islam.” But in fact, the number one victim of the terror group are Muslims. ISIS has killed thousands of Muslims across the Middle East, including, beheading Sunni Muslims in Iraq for failing to pledge loyalty to them, executing Imams for not submitting to them, and even killing an Imam in Iraq for simply denouncing them. (Obeidallah, Dean)

Prior to the attacks of September 11, 2001 most Americans knew very little to nothing about Muslims nor had an opinions towards them. The lack of knowledge quickly changed due to a combination of factors. Terrorist attacks against America have unfortunately persisted for years, the attacks of 9/11 were fundamentally different. Such attacks evoke a response and the response has evolved and transformed Americans attitude. Non-economic factors, such as prejudicial stereotypes, place a significant role in shaping intergroup relations and in influencing public attitudes. Negative treatment of Muslim Americans in the United States after 9/11 was not caused by the 9/11 attacks alone, but by pre existing social constructions that configured them as

This is due to the attacks of 9/1, which was caused by Al Qaeda, an Islamic extremist group. 9/11 has changed the mind of Americans on what they think of Muslims. According to Elaine C. Hagopian of Haymarket Books, “Muslims and Arab-Americans are increasingly under attack as a result of the U.S ‘war on terror’- at home as well was abroad. Since the tragic events of September 11, Arabs and Muslims have faced major assault on their civil liberties.” The 9/11 attacks have damaged the reputation of Muslims. The Muslims are not viewed as everybody else to most people, but something bad. They are being blamed on the actions of other people on a different continent! Additionally, by Christopher Ingraham, “If the incident does turn out to be motivated by anti-Islamic sentiment, it would be one of dozens of such events that happen each year, according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports program. Prior to the 9/11 attacks, the program typically recorded between 20 and 30 anti-Muslim hate crimes per year. But in 2001 that number rose more than tenfold to nearly 500. In the years since, annual hate crimes against Muslims have consistently hovered in the 100-150 range, roughly five times higher than the pre-9/11 rate.” Since September 11, more and more people are hating on innocent Muslims because they have the same religion as the group behind 9/11. People are assuming that bad and deserve to be harshly treated. The strive of destroying the Muslim faith has become a problem caused by American grudge against Al

If there is one thing I can say strongly about my perceptions of Muslims in America is that they are complicated. I feel strange even thinking about having these perceptions because I feel that I should not have them at all. Having any sort of judgement about Muslims means that I have put their character into a nice neat little box and there is no room for diversity. Alas, given that we are in the Information Age and, given by the name, that a constant stream of information is always headed towards us, I have some sort of view of Muslims that comes (mostly) from the media.

There are so many Muslims in America, about 3.3 million Muslims of all ages in 2015. For some Americans this might be scary to know, because of islamophobia. They see all Muslims as terrorist, without knowing the reality. Islam has always been shown as a religion of violence especially after 9/11. So many news artifacts, social media, and even the tv shows being watched on tv try to show Islam as violence. But it’s not, actually it’s the totally opposite of that. Islam is all about peace, and friendship with one another. In Islam you must even be kind to your enemy. Islam is loving one another and helping one another. Islam is against violence, but so many people just believes what the news has to show or what social media has to say. Or what

What is your first thought when you are walking down the street and you see an Islamic person wearing a classic head piece known as a hijab (Brown)? You may not think anything of it, or you might feel like this person is un-American and needs to leave the country. In the next few years, with a new political regime coming to office, a growing number of people will see this person and automatically assume that they are a threat to national security. These people may see themselves as vigilantes for the United States government and try to bring an end to Islam becoming a growing force in American society. So as more Islamophobic views engulf the United States government, Muslims will face an increase in stereotyping and racial profiling by other

Syed Soharwardy asserts that “Media always tried to portray Islam as a religion of terror and all the Muslims as terrorists. The way the talk-show programs and news are produced and presented, it seems that the media has already decided the guilty verdict, regardless what would be the outcome of an investigation” (Soharwardy). So too do members of the Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee recognize the media’s predisposition toward bias, as is pointed out in this statement, found on their website: “Key industries of American mass culture, Holllywood and television, for decades have been bastions of anti-Arab stereotyping, and have consistently resisted positive or realistic representations of Arabs and Arab Americans. (Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee).”

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).

This survey reveals that the problem with the Islam faith is not racial: The Muslim people are welcomed, the Islam faith is not. The violence that has been perpetrated against America, whether executed or planned, has brought to fruition religious persecution not seen since the persecution of the Jews in W.W.II. This “trust no Arab” attitude has brought shame to the Constitutional intentions of freedom of religion intended by our forefathers, and has set religious tolerance back 200 years. Looking at media representation of Muslim Americans prior to 9-11, it shows religious diversity in America, depicting Muslim America as just another religious community seeking to advance and protect their interests, not unlike other Americans. After 9-11 the media portrayed representations of threat and fear, creating boundaries between Muslims and other Americans. Such depiction transforms the identity of Muslims and American religious pluralism (Byng, M. pg. 3).

News has played a significant role in bringing a fear of Islam to the Western world. A worthwhile example of this is the portrayal of Islam after 9/11. The first major wave of hate against Islam in North America hit on September 11th, 2001. Coincidentally I was born on June 17th, 2001, only 3 months before 9/11 happened. My guardians were forced to take care of a newborn child and 6 children in the face of a nation that hated for them. Somehow, even though we had no direct relation to radical Islamic extremists, we took the blame for 9/11 because of the media's broadcasting. My father recalled when my eldest brother got into a fight at school five days after 9/11. My brother came home bloodied and bruised with his right eye turning purple. When my father questioned my brother about how this happened, he justified his actions when he explained that another child called him a terrorist. My father's attitude went from Shocked and angry, to calm and monotone, and he said: