Muslim Stereotypes Essay

Due to the Anti-Muslim sentiments rising around the United States, many American Muslims have been killed, or severely wounded in hate crimes. Asma Jama, a Muslim woman, was having dinner with her family in an Applebee's restaurant as she was approached by a woman who was upset over the fact that Asma was not speaking English. The situation escalated, and “As Jama waited for her pasta Alfredo, a woman at a nearby booth smashed a beer mug in her face” (Ibrahim). Asma was left heartbroken and confused as blood poured out of the deep cuts on her lip. Amidst the increasing Islamophobia, it is the women who faced the most hate, and are more likely to become victims of Islamophobic attacks. Women who wear the burqa, a popular type of clothing in

Islamic stereotypes are not new to Western culture. Problems can be traced back to the time of the Crusades, when Christians and Muslims were vying for control of Jerusalem. At

Immediately affter 9/11, Muslim Americans were victims to more frequent hate crimes and bias incidents. According to the FBI (2002), hate crimes against Muslims rose 1,600 percent between the years of 2000 and 2001; going from 12 hate incidents in 2000 to 93 in 2001. A study conducted immediately after 9/11 showed that 40 percent of Americans felt that the attacks represented the “true teachings of Islam” and that between 2002 and 2003 the number of Americans that thought Islam promotes violence against non-Muslims rose by 14 percent (Panagopoulos, 2006). When Muslims themselves were surveyed, their feelings mirrored the findings in post 9/11 studies: 91 percent of Muslims surveyed believed that discrimination against Muslims in the United

One of the most widely discussed issues in the U.S. Muslim community is the negative image of Islam in the American media, an issue that was cause for concern even before 9/11. While appeals to the media for accuracy and fairness continue, newspaper headlines regularly print the words “Islam” and “Muslim” next to words like “fanatic,” “fundamentalist,” “militant,” “terrorist” and “violence.” Uses of the term “jihad” in television programs

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

Ever since the 9-11 attack in America, the majority of Americans have been assuming that all of the Muslim citizens are terrorists as well and have a keen eye on everything they do. They are assuming that all Muslims are either part of the Al- Qaeda or ISIS terrorist groups. For example, Mr. Bhanjee, their lawyer, claims that “Arman, Sami’s father, is a loyal American. A lot of time and energy’s gone into making [him] look like a terrorist” (Stratton 172-173). As the setting is in America, people are ready to make assumptions about who is a

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

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.

With the American people showing ever increasing interest in Muslims since the attacks on America, it was inevitable that this would change the way Muslims would be viewed in the United States. The 9/11 attacks - carried out by nineteen Islamic extremists - have no doubt changed how Muslim-Americans are perceived in this country, and those feelings have simmered for 15 years now. Even though a stigma against the Muslim American community had been growing in the US because of wars and conflicts, the attacks on the world trade centers in New york marked an era that ushered in mass stereotypes and disenfranchisement for Muslim Americans (Bakalian, Anny, and Mehdi Bozorgmehr). According to Mehdi Bozorgmehr and Anny Bakalian, an Associate Director and Mehdi Bozorgmehr is Co-Director of the Middle East and Middle Eastern American Center at the Graduate Center, immigrants from the Middle East are familiar with stereotypes and discrimination in the United States. In backlash 9 ⁄ 11, they examined the harassment, discrimination, and hate crimes committed by individuals against members of the targeted communities or people who look ‘‘Middle Eastern.’’Islam has established a niche in America. Estimates vary, but there are about 4 million Muslims in the United States and Canada. Although a major portion of this community is made up of immigrants, there has been a steady increase in the number of Americans accepting Islam (History of Islam). According to Karine Walther, an Assistant

The mass media selectively promotes racial profiling. The assumptions driving terrorism profiling are not any different than “street-level” profiling—in that, a particular crime (in this case, terrorism) is most expected to be committed by members of a particular religious, ethnic, or racial group and that the members of that group (in this case, Muslims) are, in general, likely to be implicated in that manner of criminal activity…These assumptions are highly defective. The assumption that terrorist acts are inevitably perpetrated by Arabs or that the architect, of a terrorist act, is likely to be Islamic is a faulty assumption. While all the men, believed to have been, involved in the September 11th hijackings were of Arabic nationality, Richard Reid, who on December 22, 2001, attempted to ignite a volatile device on a trans-Atlantic flight, was a British citizen of Jamaican ancestry. This furthermore coincides with my line of reasoning that extremists exist throughout all cultures. In fact, prior to September 11th the deadliest act of terrorism on United States soil was initiated by [Oklahoma City bomber] Timothy McVeigh. Even non-Arabs like John Walker Lindh, a Californian, can be linked to the Taliban, al-Qaeda and

There was once a time in my life where I had judged a certain racial group by a ¨ single story¨. Social media had altered the appearance of the Muslim community. Muslims were altered to appear as terrorists, suicide bombers, and a great threat to the United States. Because of social media altering the Muslims´ appearance, this had made me view Muslims in a very negative manner. I saw Muslims as the way they were portrayed by the internet, a group of terrorists, suicide bombers, and a threat to our country. However, my false opinion had soon changed when I met a Muslim in person, she was the kindest woman I had ever met. I had also taken a liking to her culture as well meeting her family and getting to know them well had completely changed my

Identities and stereotypes are followed by the person/s depending on ready-made ideas. These ideas are related to the previously known as their; customs, traditions ,cultures, religious and heritage .Until this moment stereotype is inconsequential because it’s not completely accurate since it’s based on the status quo not backed up by facts . We are all humans; there is no difference between blacks, whites, Arabs, or foreigners. It’s true that humans standout from each other, morality, the acquired culture, but that does not mean to classify others as stereotypes. One stereotype concerns Arabs and Muslims, people should recognize that not all Muslims are Arabs and not all Arabs are Muslims, not all Muslims are terrorists, and last not all of the Arab women are “housewife”.

In recent years, the prevalence of Islamophobia has been on the rise, with a huge outbreak right after the attacks of 9/11 and the recent attacks in Paris. Oxford Dictionary defines Islamophobia as “the dislike of or prejudice against Islam or Muslims, especially as a political force”. Before we can understand Islamophobia in depth, we must understand the definition of racialization, which is the combination of the ideology that the human race is divided into distinct races, a “historical power relationship” in which groups are racialized are based on specific characteristics that were natural of that group, and forms of discrimination flowing from this hatred

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).