The Media's Influence On Muslims And Islam

Islam: suppressor of women, enemy of Western nations, and breeder of terrorists. The West has many stereotypes and misconceptions about Islam that are due to the media, prejudice, and ignorance. Islam is often seen as an "extremist" or "terrorist" religion. Often, the media's reports about Islam are incorrect due to ignorance or not wanting to acknowledge its true teachings. This is one of the reasons why Westerners are often wary of Muslims. In contrast to what the media portrays, Islam is a peaceful religion, which does not promote violence or terrorism.

After September 11, 2001, U.S. citizens were shocked that over 2,900 people were dead because of Islamic extremists (Kean, et al. "National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States"). More deaths occurred in the Paris and San Bernardino attacks. Tensions between the U.S. and Islamic extremists have not yet subsided. Americans receive information regarding Islamic extremists through the media, from which they form opinions on what the U.S.’s foreign policy with the Middle East should be, which affects military spending. To what extent has the media’s portrayal of Islamic extremists affected U.S. military spending and relations with the Middle East?

Today one does not even have to wait for a movie to be released. Simply click the “ON” button on a remote and suddenly, thousands of news and television shows are available for one to enjoy. Muslims are also the target of prejudice in these news broadcasts and programs. One such television program released was a drama titled “24.” Issues and Controversies reports: “The show, which deals with a counterterrorism unit based in Los Angeles, featured a group of Muslim terrorist characters who were plotting to detonate nuclear weapons in the U.S. At the end of one episode, the terrorists successfully detonated a small bomb in a Los Angeles suburb, killing about 12,000 people” (“Race and Ethnicity in Entertainment”). This fictional show wrongly spreads the stereotypical image of Muslims and their clichéd image of the fundamentalists on 9/11. By adding the title and image of “Muslim” to the phrase “terrorist” the program wrongly advertised that potentially every Muslim could be a terrorist. This stereotypical image is similarly expressed in news broadcasts through the use of terrorism news. By increasingly using terrorism and Muslims in top

After the attacks on September 11, 2001, media approaches have altered. On Television shows and movies, in newspapers and on the radio, there has been an increase in hate crimes targeting Arabs and Muslims. Most coverage today follows a script that represents Arabs and Muslims only in the context of terrorism. Evelyn Alsultany wrote a book called Arabs and Muslims in the Media in 2012. The stories explained the new standards in racial and cultural representations after 9/11.

In the recent years there has been an increase in the number of terrorist attacks and groups such as 9-11, Paris, and Isis . As these attacks get more and more frequent and so does the amount of media that covers them. When the media reports about these events they can spread untrue, misleading or misunderstood information. This kind of spread can get cause stereotypes among the American people.

Terror attacks committed by Islamic extremists resulted in the dehumanization towards the Muslim community and gave rise to a Muslim terrorist frame. From the images media portrayed of

During the Cold War and the War on Terror, the United States of America used the media to depict Soviet and Middle Eastern people as foreign enemies that posed a threat to U.S. national security. The bombing of the World Trade Center on September 11th, 2001 changed the lives of millions of Muslims forever because they began to be targeted by U.S. media corporations. Media corporations started to depict Muslims in the Middle East as terrorists to persuade the American public to wage the War on Terror in the Middle East in order to stop the spread of terrorism and homeland threats, like 9/11, from occurring again. However, even though media corporations portrayed the War on Terror as a justification to defeat terrorism and to protect the

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

In the contemporary world, many individuals are continually exposed to different types of news, movies, television series, radio programs, media texts and social media among other popular cultures. Such cultural products surround people with images that contribute to the shaping the way they understand different groups of people. Consequently, how facts are portrayed shape our insight of others and negatively impact our opinion and view of a group of people. According to Elbih, the concept of portrayal or representation has the capability to imply that certain media expose, repeatedly, particular situations, stories and images (112). The result of this representation makes the culture appear familiar or natural. One example of the popular culture in the U.S.A is in The American Sniper; a film in which the portrayal and the consequential conflation of Muslims communities were outlined in a manner that they are seen to be the threat to the United States of America (American Sniper). Therefore, The American Sniper demonstrates a very harmful representation of the Muslim populations concealed behind hypnotizing panoramas of the American patriotism. Thus, the focus of this essay will be how The American Sniper portrays negative stereotypes of the Muslim religion as violent while representing a positive stereotype of other religions in America.

American mass media is a huge contributor to the demonization of Muslims. A grisly beheading results in days of media coverage. Muslim leaders holding a press conference denouncing terrorism, which they have done extensively in response to ISIS, will result in two to three minutes of media coverage on cable news. This is terrifyingly inaccurate considering less than 10% of terrorist threats and actions are from Islamic terrorists. America Instead of reacting to any of these attacks as they had Right-wing Timothy McVeigh's attack in April 19, 1995. America would start the mislabeled “War on terror” proceeding to pigeonhole Islamic extremism and brush aside the motivations of groups likes McVeigh and other group’s violent actions. Compounding this issue is that there are few positive images of Muslims or Muslim Americans in American entertainment media. In fact, even many Muslims are shockingly ignorant of their own religion. With no official leadership or governance like in many Christian religious, Islam falls more

Coming from a suburban town filled with rich white people, I did not encounter much diversity, especially in the context of religion. To this day, I do not personally know anyone who practices the Islamic faith or identifies themselves as Muslim, leaving much of what I know about Muslims to be based on what the media portrays them to be. Growing up in a Post – 9/11 world, I often blindly followed the tediously long precautions of airport security and became increasingly fearful of the people around me that covered up their skin. I succumbed to the demonizing media portrayal of Muslims that only showed the Islamic faith in a negative light. Like many Americans, I thought Muslims were dirty Arabs whose sole purpose was to strike terror in our

Islam is portrayed and is commonly accepted as the most violent and largest direct threat to the West. This is a generalization made by most of the West, but it is not particularly the West or the Islamic people’s fault. There is constant turmoil in Islamic countries in the Middle East and these conflicts are what make the news in the West. The only representation in the media that the Islamic nation gets is that of war. Though most Islamic people are not violent, the select few that do participate in terrorist groups give the rest of the Islam nation a bad image.

"The US media has been clubbing together terrorism and Islam, influencing the American public to think that all Arab Muslims are "crazy and violent terrorists"… The American media has been a primary agent responsible for creating racist stereotypes, images and

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).

“When I think Islam, I think belly dancers, bombs, and billionaires” This is something I have heard from many people’s mouths. When people think of the word Islam, or Muslim, a certain generalized picture comes to mind. I am sure this picture involves such things as sand, camels, oil, covered women, hookah, amongst other things. Though this is what the Western media generalizes Islam as, there is much more to Islam than the three B’s and these pictures that come to mind. Islam is not only a religion but is also a way of life. Like many things, Islam is stereotyped, generalized, and misunderstood. When most of us think of Islam we think of the “oppressed” women and “messed up” laws and we fail to see the truths of Islam and what it really stands for.