Muslim Terrorism Being a Muslim in today’s society is not very easy. The most common misconception about Muslims is that they are terrorists. Even though many people just say to ignore hateful words, it is hard to ignore people when they say “you are a terrorist” right in front of your face. When a person talks about the religion Islam, they cannot take the word terrorist out of their minds because that is the usual stereotype people make towards this religion now. Each global terrorism act that occur will always point their first fingers towards the Muslim community, which gives us no opportunity to prove ourselves as a good community. The religion of Islam mostly consist of peaceful people who mind their own business but because of that …show more content…
The word terrorists is usually consisted of Muslims in the minds of most Americans. The continued utilization of illogical term “Muslim terrorists” signifies how the norm of our society is still a white Christian (Singh). Religious and racial bias keep affecting the community of the United States negatively (Singh). In the wake of terrorist attacks in the 2000s, Muslims have been targeted for hate crimes by racists who found them to be convenient scapegoats for dehumanized, nonwhite "others" at whom they wanted to strike (Singh). Due to their visibility and appearance, Muslim were proportionately singled out for harassment during the hate crime epidemic. The very first attack on a Muslim took place shortly after the second plane hit the World Trade Center. Amrik Singh was looking up at the crash when he realized a small group of men across the street were yelling at him, "Take that f---ing turban off, you terrorist!" They chased him into a subway station before Singh escaped. A group of young white men attacked 60 year old Attar Singh with a nail studded baseball bat (Singh). Balbir Singh Sodhi, was the first person murdered in the post attack hate crimes (Singh). The stereotype of all Muslims are terrorists became a big problem in the 2000s; it created violence, which included injuries and killing of Muslims. These stereotypes are still going on but they have lessened more and more over time but it is still a cause for
Hijacked planes were purposely flown into the twin towers in New York and killed about 3,000 innocent people. This was one of the most disastrous incident to ever occur during the era. After the release of who caused the attack, lots of people from the Islamic culture were the center of attention right after the event. They were falsely accused of being called terrorists without little to any evidence. It was mainly because of their appearance and beliefs. It was more like racism and stereotypes towards them. Society has painted them to be these terrorists because they were feared and immediately got the wrong idea when they approach them. The day the terrorist attack happened, it sparked a new beginning for their culture. They not only felt scared when they were around them, but they felt like they were going to become a part of a violent attack that they’re going to cause without them acknowledging it. It can be disrespectful and rude to assume they’re terrorist but they didn’t care. It was “[society] [who] feared what [they] don't understand. In a frenzied state of irrational behavior [they] will point fingers and name names and accuse the innocent because [they] are afraid” (Garcia). Society was terrified for their lives. They made them feel unwelcomed and unwanted. The fear exponentially rose and became a problem when they wanted to fly to a destination. Lots of “Americans became paranoid
An American survey conducted by the Arab American National Museum, the National Network for Arab American communities and the National Voices Project. The aim of the survey was to measure the portrayals of Arabs and Muslims in the media and its impact on children. The initial findings of the survey represents that the persistent negative bias in the media is the highest for Arabs and Arab Americans, compared with other racial/ethnic/religious groups. Nearly half of the adults (44%) believe that media is biased against Muslims.
Every time a terrorist attack happens the media jumps all over it, and puts their own twist on what had happened. “Thus, the media has a strong potential to influence how the public thinks about social problems like terrorism, especially because most people only experience terrorism through mass-media accounts...This research also finds that media portrayals of terrorism increase anxiety among the viewing public.” (Chermak, 2006) The media is one of the leading causes of stereotypes, and what influences our beliefs today. When you think of a terrorist, you may think of either a middle aged muslim male or a middle aged white male with some sort of mental or social disorder. This isn 't always the case. A terrorist can be of any race, age, and social class. Due to the media 's influence, we all believe in the same stereotypes and imagine the same description of what a terrorist may look like. This is one of the main reasons behind racial profiling.
On September 11, 2001, since the terrorist attacks, many American Muslims have been stereotyped negatively in the United States. Salma, a Muslim woman, says that the way Muslims have been recognized in the media has played a big role in the antagonisms directed to her. “I don’t know how many time I heard my classmates accuse me of being al-Qaeda or a terrorist” (Mayton 2013). Salma, along with other Muslims, even after a decade, are still struggling with trying to find their “American” and “Islamic” identities, while facing verbal attacks for their ethnicity. Too often, the general Muslin population gets lumped in with the immoral acts of a few because of the lack of knowledge about their culture.
Islamic terrorists are estimated to comprise approximately 10% of the Muslim population, which is equivalent to 160 million out of 1.6 billion people. A terrorist is defined as a person who engages in violence and the infliction of fear in order to gain something either for themselves or for their people. Most Muslims are not terrorists. It is stereotypical to deduce that all Islamic people are involved terrorist groups, however, there are many people who are involved in these groups. Islamic terrorist groups use religion to justify their violent movement by claiming that their religion is the only just religion, strictly following religious leaders and sacred texts, and preserving their aboriginal religious beliefs.
... There are those individuals that have a strong hatred for Islam, than we have people that feel sorry for Muslims in America and make them feel like they actually belong to society. However, it would be fantastic if people can start to actually separate terrorists from the Muslim community. Their religion was hijacked by the attack. Like I previously mentioned, we many not seem to stop and realize that our own religion might be part of terrorism. Religion should not matter when we look at a person because there are two kinds of people in the world, the good and bad. If we all had to look at the flaws in everyone’s beliefs and religious we would probably come to the conclusion that we aren’t all terrorists but some people with the same beliefs as us, might be. We tend to find the bad in something and associate it with everything else that is somehow connected to it.
The FBI reported that the amount of hate crimes against Muslim Americans increased 1,700 percent from 2000- 2001 (Attitudes Toward Muslim Americans Post 9/11, n.d, para 2). The actual amount of reported hate crimes went from 28 incidents to 481 incidents (Kuek Sur, 2016, para 4). The amount of hate towards muslims has continued to increase. The number of Americans with favorable views of Islam dropped from 41 percent in 2005 to 30 percent in 2010 (Clay, 2011, para 3). Although American Muslims have nothing in common with the 9/11 attackers besides religion, many have been treated unfairly by Americans whose views of Islam have been skewed by the 9/11
Islam in America has historically been misunderstood, and this is due to the misconception of culture and religion as well as lack of education and incorrect portrayal in the media, which gives a skewed idea of Islam. Especially in the United States, Islam has been seen as the “terrorist religion” or a religion for the extremists and a religion in which freedom is not an option. Among the countless misconceptions, the basis of stereotypes by Americans is due to the mix up between religion and culture. Furthermore, the media only fuels fire to these misunderstandings and lack of factual information about Islam causing Americans to lash out on American Muslims without reason.
This all started on September 11, 2001 when 4 airplanes were hijacked. Two crashing into the twin towers, one into the Pentagon, and one into a field that was either heading towards the White House or the Capitol. A total of nineteen terrorists from Middle East, who were a part of a terrorist group known as al-Qaeda led by Osama Bin Laden, were involved in this attack. Killing almost 3,000 people and destroying some of America’s most known buildings left Americans hurt, scarred, and afraid. Since September 11, 2001, Muslims have been stereotyped as terrorists on daily basis and especially on every September 11th after the attack and while Americans fear Muslims, Muslims fear Americans.
In current day, Muslims have to face discrimination due to other Muslims doing the wrong thing. According to an article by Fox News published on April 19, 2017; a 14-year-old Muslim girl was tackled and had her headscarf ripped off from her head while the victim yelled terrorist. The name of the subject is not publicly disclosed, but can only be described as an older white male. They are wanted on charges of assault and theft. Even though this event seems scaring, it did not affect the life of the girl. She still lives her normal, day-to-day life; following her Muslim beliefs and continuing to wear her headscarf.
Americans have grown to be cautious with their surroundings when a Muslim is present in the same scene as them. Muslims can’t peacefully get around to grocery markets or airports without being criticized by their appearance or “bad” reputation. We come from a country with certain areas of society believing all Muslims are terrorists from what they have seen or observed from in past events. For instance, think back to the shootings in Paris this past winter or even further back to the collapse of the twin towers and Pentagon buildings fifteen years ago. These two catastrophic events marked a black hole in U.S. history books. According to NBC news, last year, a third incident irritated many Americans to strengthen security in public schools after a
These acts began motivating and causing isolated and small group discriminations against Middle Eastern Americans. The media also contributed to spreading panic as it would cover the events in a biased way and would mention that everyone should be careful and watchful when being around these individuals. In the first nine weeks after the terrorist attacks there were 700 violent crimes against Middle Eastern Americans just because they “looked” Muslim due to their race or ethnicity (Conan 2011). While in 2015 there were 91 aggravated assaults and 120 intimidation crimes that physically injured individuals; in total for the year 2015 there were 257 hate crimes against Middle Easterners (Kishi 2016) .
After 9/11 has induced negative attitudes towards Muslim peoples who tend to be strongly associated with any act of terrorism. The media has played a colossal role in developing such negative association wherein it constantly portrays Muslim people in combination with violent terrorist acts. It does so in a way that they both go hand-and-hand. In other words, it has made it as though the Islamic religion is synonymous with terrorism. The media has perpetuated Muslim stereotypes over the years that followed the 9/11 incident. Because of this, society has developed, and still has developed, this prejudiced mindset about the Islamic religion and the Muslim communities around the world. People immediately assume that any violent act being depicted through the media is the direct result of Muslims. They automatically generate this idea that the act was performed by a Muslim terrorist even when they were not involved whatsoever. Regardless of whether it was true or not, Islamic religion and its Muslim adherents are at the top of societies’ agenda just waiting for the evidence to be generated so that they can then safely blame them for such world affairs. Again, this has led to the attack on the Islamic religion itself wherein people have come to postulate Islam as an act of oppression, violence and hatred towards non-Muslims. Anti-Muslim sentiments and campaigns have resulted from such misinformation the media has been generating and feeding its viewers.
Often times, Islam is viewed as something negative as a religion that consist of violence, it is feared. It is seen negatively because there are many stereotypes that surround it. For example, like terroristic acts, specifically the 911 tragically even that occurred in New York. Some feel that Islam is a religion of peace while others make the claim that it’s a religion of war. Some claims are invalid because people base them off the ignorant stereotypes when they don’t know much about the religion. Muslims seek peace take the path through submission and surrender themselves to who they believe is the true God.Muslims use the phrase: salaam alaykum, to greet each other, it translates to: peace be with you. Which is then responded by: wa alaykum as salaam which means
The horrific events of September 11, 2001, killed 2,996 people and caused at least $ 10 billion in property and infrastructure damage. After September 11, people started point fingers at the Muslims for doing, just because small group of Muslims it doesn’t me that everyone is the same. September 11, have forever changed Americans view of Islam and Muslim. Even before September 11, they were still hate toward Islam and Muslims. These this famous quotes online by unknown person “I’m Muslim, Islam is perfect but I am not. If I make a mistake, blame it on me, not on my religion.” I am here today, to clear the misunderstanding about my beautiful religion, not everything we see or hear is true. “Islam is a violent religion, Islam is a terrorist group,