Islam: Discrimination In The United States

Within the past twelve years, Islam has grown to be the second largest religion practiced around the world. Growing up, there weren’t many Muslim people that practiced Islam as there are now. Ten years ago, I would only see about one or two Muslims as I walked down the street, but now I see many more. In Philadelphia, there are more than 200,000 people who are Muslim, and 85% of those people are African-American. In this city when people see African-American Muslims who are garbed up they don’t discriminate against them. To be a Muslim in this society it causes controversy because people are constantly pointing out all of the flaws within them.

Muslim Americans are people whose religious belief is Islam, but they were born in America. Before September 11, 2001, Muslim Americans were rarely a discussion or a problem. However after September 11, 2001, Muslim Americans were the main topic. Even though Islam is a religious belief, people are fearful of anything associated with it. Some people discriminate against people who resemble those who are practice the religion. Even though it is not relevant to race, the difference between racism; and religious discrimination is often unclear to people. People believe that terrorists are Muslim activists, but that’s wrong because not all terrorists are Muslims.

The Islamic community was not responsible for 9/11 and therefore shouldn’t be blamed or receive discrimination for it. Although Americans have gotten away with it so far, they don’t understand their strength or the effects of their hate. We, as a people, need to make right our wrongs and work together to make the Islamic community feel accepted

After a horrible terroristic attack that shocked the whole world on September 11th in the center of New York City, Muslims in the Western world have been constantly fighting against prejudice. After September 11, media interest in Islam increased, where Islam was usually portrayed in a negative way. Before 9/11, many Muslims lived the normal, everyday life. However, the attack has changed lives of many people that belonged to the Muslim community, where they were the victims of guilt. Unfortunately, many Americans were introduced to Islam, after the 9/11 attack, thus even till today, Islam is associated with terrorism. For the past ten years, Muslims felt excluded from the American society by being rifled, attacked, discriminated, checked

the government and media. I believe that people running this country are Anti Islamic due to there view on things. Also this is a Zionist country, which is another reason that makes the media discriminate against the Muslim’s, due to the conflict with Palestine and other Muslim countries. The media has always portrayed Islam in a negative way. The reason the media is biased when it comes to Islam because they hate the Islamic structure and the beliefs. The majority of media conglomerate ownership is of people who

Century after century religions have been made up of sects, have trials and tribulations (some bigger then others), and continue to recruiting but most of all religions have offered culture, belief systems, status, and customs within the religious communities; this is also true for the Islam religion. As a whole it can be broken into a number of sects, and below the sects are more sects, with additional breakouts of how, when, and where people practice this sect, of a sect, of a religion. The point being there is no one face to a religion, including Islam. At one point the Islamic follows lead relatively private lives in the U.S. but a number of things stated to reveal some negative attention including 9/11. The media had a negative feeding frenzy on the Islamic culture and the U.S started to listen and learn. “The terrorist attacks on U.S. soil dramatically increased the

Muslim women are continually marginalized by American society, due to their gender, religion, ethnicity and race. Between growing up in an Islamophobic country, being divided by race and religion, the social and cultural pressures of being a woman and the media/public labeling one as a terrorist, Muslim women face extremely challenging issues living in America. However, as a result of their unique intersectional axis, they fail to receive support from advocacy organizations. Thus, it is evident that the prevailing narrative concerning Muslim American women needs to change. The best approach would be an intersectional method, that addresses gender, religion, ethnicity and race. These steps should include increased funding and support for “outreach and support programs in schools, mosques and neighborhoods,” that seek to deepen the ties between Muslim American women and the broader communities at large

According to report conducted by the Federal Bureau Investigation (FBI), there has been an increase of violence against Muslim Americans between the year of 2000 to 2001. According to author Junaid M. Aleef of the news article, “To Fight Terrorism, we need to deal with the American Muslim Identity Crisis”, there have been numerous instance of hate crimes toward Muslim-Americans. Aleef mentioned that three Muslim students were assassinated at The University of North Carolina at Chapel. In addition, a teenage Muslim boy died from a hit-and-run motor vehicle incident. Lastly, many mosques along the east coast had possessions stolen and have been vandalized. The progression of terrorist attacks has contributed to the increase in hate crimes against Muslim-Americans. (Aleef).

The agonizing terrorist attacks of September 9th, 2001 left the country in emotional distress. The United States of America decided to prepare for tragic attacks like this and reevaluated its immigration and foreign policies, the citizens of the US also became united and stronger from these attacks. This ideology that the US has become more united after an attack that killed nearly 3,000 people has become mainstream and may be true in some cases, but many people overlook the impact it had on the millions of Muslim Americans. The Muslim generation before us had its own problems dealing with racial discrimination and hate crimes, many people believed it stop their but this contempt was passed on to my generation. The discrimination I have received has caused me to change my aspirations in order to ensure that no one else receives the treatment I had gotten.

Terrorism due to alienation or Discrimination: Many groups of peoples came from their home land to other countries for employment or education and ultimately settled there. Many times, they face discrimination from the original citizens of the countries where they shifted. These groups may become jaded towards the society and feel excluded. Due to sentiments of discrimination and isolation, these groups become more conservative and start terrorist acts against the original citizens and government.

According to Dictionary.com, “The word discrimination is the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex.” Muslims have experienced a lot of discrimination in their lives. How did this happen? Since the attack on the world trade center (9/11) the Muslim people have been viewed as the lower class in society. This event has changed Muslim Americans in many different ways such as; being profiled in everyday life, obtaining a job in aerospace, discrimination for their religion. Even after the 9/11 attacks the discrimination against Muslim Americans. In politics some presidential candidates are trying to ban Muslim Immigration in America.

I think that Muslim discrimination in America got worse, but some things have to get worse to get better. Historically and presently, when Muslims travel to the United States or live in the US they face discrimination because of a small number of Islamic extremists take their religion too far. Historically there have been attacks on America that caused the discrimination. Currently in the US there have been some attacks by extremists and radical terrorists. The “islamic terrorists” are trying to “protect their religion” from the United States of America. In the future, I think there will still be discrimination against Muslim people. Further in the future there could be a time when there is very minimal discrimination against Muslims.

I am interested in this topic because I’m taking a Sociology class, and this serious problem encouraged me to manipulate my knowledge into explaining why this becomes such a controversial issues. Looking at Muslim discrimination from a micro-level would help me having a better and deeper understanding, about what Muslim communities are experiencing everyday under the intense period right now in the United States. And how many people come to discriminate people who follow Muslim religion. I hope by doing research and go deeper to seek answers for the problem, I would be able to understand the social factor behind it, and spreading awareness about Muslim discrimination.

After the attack of 9/11 many American citizens sought out an answer to why one would hijack a plane and run it into the Twin Towers, killing millions. According to the Huffpost, Islam became the main reason for the attack and furthermore labeled religion as the inspiration for many terroristic attacks (Gibson, 1). According to many Muslims, however, the attacks are anti-Islamic because the Quran states not to harm civilians who are not involved with war and to avoid it at all possible times (PBS, 3). The conflict between Muslims and Americans is growing and many issues in the Middle East has become the focus for religious terrorism.

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