For a second, the U.S. stood still. Looking up at the towers, one can only imagine the calm before the storm in the moment when thousands of pounds of steel went hurdling into its once smooth, glassy frame. People ran around screaming and rubble fell as the massive metal structure folded in on itself like an accordion. Wounded and limping from the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, America carried on, not without anger and fear against a group of innocent Americans, Muslim Americans. Nietzsche’s error of imaginary cause is present in the treatment of Muslim Americans since 9/11 through prejudice in the media, disregard of Muslim civil liberties, racial profiling, violence, disrespect, and the lack of truthful public information about Islam. In this case, the imaginary cause against Muslims is terrorism. The wound has healed in the heart of the U.S. but the aching throb of terrorism continues to distress citizens every day. Movies, one can argue, are one of America’s greatest pastimes. Unfortunately, after 9/11, films have become increasingly prejudiced against American Muslims. In movies Muslims are frequently portrayed negatively. According to James Emery, a professor of Anthropology, Hollywood profits off of “casting individuals associated with specific negative stereotypes”. This is due to the fact that viewers automatically link characters with their clichéd images (Emery). For Muslims, the clichéd image is of the violent fundamentalist, who carried out the terroristic attacks on 9/11. As a result, the main stereotypes involved in movies display Muslims as extremists, villains, thieves, and desert nomads. An example of a movie that has such a negative character role for Muslims in film is Disney’s cartoon Aladdin, depict... ... middle of paper ... ...b. 10 May 2011. Emery, James. "Arab culture and Muslim stereotypes." World and I May 2008. Expanded Academic ASAP. Web. 10 May 2011. "Hate-Crime Laws." Issues & Controversies On File: n. pag. Issues & Controversies. Facts On File News Services, 5 Jan. 2001. Web. 10 May 2011. "Hate Crimes up in Wake of Terrorist Attacks." CNN.com. Cable News Newtwork, 16 Sept. 2001. Web. 16 May 2011. "Islamophobia." Cair.com. CAIR. Web. 5 May 2011. "Race and Ethnicity in Entertainment." Issues & Controversies On File: n. pag. Issues & Controversies. Facts On File News Services, 24 Aug. 2007. Web. 10 May 2011. Sarfraz, Ayaman. Personal Interview. January 2010. Shabbir, Mohammad. Personal Interview. 14 May 2011. Ward, Lucy. "Muslims Get Angry at 'Bad Guy' Film Images." Guardian.co.uk. The Guardian, 25 Jan. 2007. Web. 12 May 2011.
"PORTRAYAL OF MINORITIES IN THE FILM, MEDIA AND ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRIES." PORTRAYAL OF MINORITIES IN THE FILM, MEDIA AND ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRIES. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Apr. 2014.
The attitudes toward Muslims today have not changed significantly since September 11, 2001. Any Muslim person; man, woman, or child is automatically suspect to instigate pandemonium, based strictly on their appearance and faith. Regardless of any evidence, reasoning, or perspective to the contrary, Muslims are seen as an enemy to United States citizens. The events of 9/11 left Muslim Americans unceremoniously lacking any respect from U.S. citizens regardless of any affiliation with Al-Qaida. We assess Muslim people with a common image of terror. We see the turban or hijab and assume a terrorist is hidden within its folds. Our mentalities inevitably come to a paralyzing halt, and we can never see through the fabric of the religious garments. When we see any one of these people, one person comes to mind, and that is the person who attacked our country. Today, in our nations cities and towns these arrogances still exist forcefully. Muslim people are still profoundly victimized and discriminated against by the means of assumption and negative mental sets. In the novel Zeitoun, author Dave Eggers takes time to assess the spitefulness encountered by Kathy and Abdulrahman Zeitoun, along with narrating the family’s endeavors with hurricane Katrina. Zeitoun presents racial differences in America, primarily in New Orleans, by discussing how they are created and the ways in which they exist today.
Sherman Alexie’s Flight Patterns, which discusses racial stereotypes, relates to the effects of 9/11 on American citizens, who tend to inappropriately judge Muslim and other cultures in the world today. Although 9/11 was a horrible day, it still should not be used to categorize and stereotype people. Stereotypes do nothing but harm to the people who receive it and to the people who dish it out.
In the essay, the writer acknowledges the misunderstandings that come from media images by explaining the contrasts between these images and the teachings of the faith to support her claim that fear is the reason for this misconception. The conception that many people have of Muslims is that they are terrorists, anti-Semites, and fanatics. This conception exsists because television news and newspapers support that stereotype. The broadcast of such stereotypes encourages fear and accusations of the Islamic relegion's teachings. The writer explains that Islam teaches peace, tolerance, and equality. She further states that Muslims shown in the media have violated these teachings ...
The moving caravan of overused stereotypes has been traveling behind the camera for centuries now. It has adopted the culture and color of everywhere it has been, but the final print of this reel project is black and white. Hollywood over the years, has continued to misrepresent the enriched Arab culture and the religion of Islam and it’s people with degrading stereotypes shown in movies which a tremendous amount of viewers watch, questioning the integrity of arabs and muslims. I have been researching this topic due to the complexity of power behind these images we see throughout movies. The question bounces around in my head and I have a hard time understanding why the same stereotypes are continuously used, over and over again. It’s proof that orientalism still exists in modern day, and it affects how people may see Arabs and muslims.
Goodstein, Laurie. "Across Nation, Mosque Projects Meet Opposition." The New York Times 7 August 2010: 1. Web. 17 November 2013. .
As the world progresses, developments occur that have a profound significance on the entire nature in which society functions. One such event is the growth of the film industry that has prompted restructuring of the way we view certain groups of people. Hollywood can be seen not only as a major driving force behind cultural, political, and social change, but also as an enforcer of preconceived notions and an outlet of misrepresentation. Among the various groups of people illustrated on the silver screen, Arabs are perhaps one of the most misunderstood and stereotyped groups of Hollywood. This multi-billion dollar industry produces a wide range of movies that heavily influence the way we perceive this group, and most importantly, the way in
The United States of America: once a small colony, now one of the world’s most powerful nations; a nation that has been fraught with wars, protests and continuous conflicts between religion and state. This essay will investigate the relationship between the religion and state, discuss the states declaration’s about this relationship and the practice of these declarations. Americans, after the September 11 attacks, have marginalised the Muslim community, which is largely due to their Christian origins and misinterpretations of Islam.
After the tragic events of 9/11 attacks in the United States, there has been over a hundred terrorism-themed films such as Black Hawk Down and American Sniper that portrays a generalization of Muslims with violence, uncivilized, and is described as crude villains (Aguayo, 2009). This has unfortunately affected the way the American public view the Muslims negatively, which in turn leads to discrimination, prejudice, and irrational fear of Muslims (Islamophobia). The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) stated that the American Sniper film has caused a significant rise in violent hate and racist threat targeting the Arab and Muslim-American communities due to the promulgation of anti-Muslim propaganda and bigotry (Khalek, 2015).
In the first scene we observe a Muslim man inside a firearm store, attempting to buy a gun. The owner is a white Caucasian male that presents a negative attitude towards the customer because of his Muslim background. This feeling triggers in the owner, negative attitudes based on the assimilation and stereotypes with the Muslim race. Being immediately associated with the Al Qaeda terrorist group, which was responsible for suicidal bombers that have killed thousand of Americans.
Alex Seitz-Wald, “Fox News Watchers Consistently More Likely To have Negative Views of Muslims,” February 16, 2011, Think Progress .
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.
Tarr analyses the representation of Islam in a corpus of films made since 2006 that focus on the changing identities of Muslims in contemporary France. She states that “protagonists’ negotiates their Muslim identities in a French context and, by implication, the films may be arguing for the integration of Islam as a legitimate referent of French identity. However, their construction of Islam does not extend to positive representations (…), and the films thus still risk confirming the oppressive majority view that certain practices associated with Islam, are incompatible with the secularism of the French Republic”. Tarr also analyzes how males of Maghrebi descent, through their sense of exclusion, develop an anger and frustration that exposes mainly violence-oriented male characters in cinema de banlieue. Those films are made by white filmmakers, while beur filmmakers use comedy but both show beur actors’ lack of agency in the world. Alec Hargreaves talks about maghrebi-french filmmakers, mentioning that their success goes beyond their background. Michel Cadé wrote on the role of Islam in francophone cinema and argues that “French cinema has had little interest in portraying Islam” and “reference to Islam were neglected perhaps in an effort not to alienate spectators”. However, he also mentions that some movies shed light “on the attachment
The rise of terrorism and extremism in the Middle East during the time this piece was composed prompted Mohi-Ud Din to engage in a passionate argument about how these terrorists have ruined the image of Muslims. He explicitly highlights the main points of his argument by using transitional words such as firstly, secondly, and thirdly. He initiates his argument by proposing that the media’s one-sided focus on Muslim extremists prevent the viewers from recognizing that the majority of Muslims are not violent. Next, he debunks the stereotypes Americans have about Muslims and then he shifts his concern to how America’s political and military actions have exploited Muslim countries. He concludes his argument by explaining why Islam is not a threat to
We live in an age and time where media influence is at its highest. The media has an impact on us as an audience through every possible medium including both television and print media. As scientists find and cure diseases, as America finds a new country to invade, as the European markets fluctuate, there has been one constant subject prevalent in the Western media- Islam. 1.6 billion people in the world are of the Muslim religion (Desilver 2013), making it the world’s second largest religion, second to Christianity. Even prior to the events of 9/11, the religion of Islam has been under scrutiny by the media. Edward Said, infamous for his works on Orientalism has greatly contributed to our understanding of the Western misunderstanding of the Eastern based religion. Said has defined Orientalism as the Western’s style of domination, reconstruction, and authority over the Orient (Said 1978: 3). Orientalism has observable effects in the most forms of media. As a result, and irrational fear of Islam and those that practice the religion began-Islamophobia. As defined by the International Civil Liberties Alliance, Islamophobia is “a term which is widely used by NGOs and frequently appears in the media, tends to denote fear, hatred or prejudice against Islam and Muslim” (ICLA 2013). This project will attempt to understand what the audience perception is about Islamophobia in the media. It will aim to uncover the ways in which television channels amplify common misperceptions about Islam. As a Muslim myself, this is an area that has always been of interest to me, and like many audiences I have been able to witness the dimensions of Islamophobia s depicted by the western media. After the events of September 2001, the fears of Islam and ...