Islamophobia: Muslims and Terrorism

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

Following the terror attacks in The Unites States in 2001, there has been an increase in Islamophobia in the Western World. Following 9/11, respondents indicate that levels of implicit or indirect discrimination in The United States rose by 82,6% and experiences of over discrimination by 76,3% (http://jiv.sagepub.com/content/21/3/317.short). A combination of how Arabs and Muslims are portrayed in the media, with the increase of organized terrorist groups and refugees since the Arabic Spring, makes this a big political challenge today. This bibliography is written to get an overview of why Islamophobia has increased and the challenges that comes with the rise of Islamophobia.

A 2006 Today/Gallup poll found that 44% of Americans had the perception that all Muslims were too extreme in their religious beliefs and 22% of the respondents would not want a Muslim as a neighbor. Islamophobia in America skyrocketed as a result of the 9/11 attacks and changed the way that Muslim-Americans and other Americans were able to interact with one another. These statistics show that there was significant fear of Muslims in the years after 9/11. In the years following the attacks, the number of hate crimes against Muslims in America spiked and have not dropped to pre-attack levels since. As Graph 1 shows, in 2001, there were a reported 481 hate crimes and majority of these would have occurred in the months following September. Although

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

The topic of this essay was one that seemed the most relevant at this given moment in time. Post 9/11, Western media became very critical of Islam and the portrayal of Muslims and the negative associations made with them has dramatically increased.

Despite the fact that Muslims hate terrorism more than many others, the society falsely points on Islamic believers for satisfaction. It is believed that Muslims are causing violence around the world. The world, in which people figure the differences, the society averted to layout the difference between Radical Islam and Islam. The community knows who to blame when a terrorist explodes a bomb, but does a Muslim know who to blame when he/she get disgraced and harassed? The public and the media can’t see that Muslims are also a human being who have emotions. Criticising one another isn’t the solution to Terrorism. Everyone must come together to wipe out terrorism

September 11th holds many hard and upset feelings around the world today. The harsh actions of Muslim extremists unfortunately completely changed the way Muslims are treated, especially in the United States. These events, exacerbated islamophobia. Unfortunately, “the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, connect Muslims and Islam to terrorism within the geographical borders of the United States.” (Byng) Although it has been over a decade since the attack, many still feel racist and discriminatory attitudes towards Muslims. Muslims are the targeted minority in the United States, “the 9/11 terrorist attacks shifted the social and political context for Muslims in the United States. Terrorism within the geographical borders of the United States carried out by Muslims places an identity at the center of national and global politics.” (Byng) The blame of the horrible terrorist attacks, rather than be placed on terrorists or religious extremist, has been placed on Islam in America. After September 11th, hate crimes towards Muslims skyrocketed, “the most dramatic change noted by the report was a more than 1,600 percent increase in reported hate crimes against Muslims -- a jump from 28 hate incidents in 2000 to 481 last year.”

There have been social experiments done to see how people would react to different situations involving someone from the Muslim faith. There was a video posted on the internet of a man reading passages from the Bible, but the book was disguised as the Quran. The man read it out loud to random people on the street. The funny thing is, they did not realize they were being read passages from the Bible. During this experiment, people responded with hateful comments and rude gestures towards the Muslim man. Afterwards, the people were told that they were actually being read passages from the Bible and the people were shocked. If one was educated - they would know that the Quran is not a hate biding book and does not teach people to commit acts of violence. In actuality, the Bible and the Quran have common characteristics. ​Obama came out and gave a speech telling the people of America to not discriminate against citizens who are Muslim. Marco Rubio had then rebutted after Obama in a later public platform and said, “Where is there widespread evidence that we have a problem in America with discrimination against

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

Muslims faced tremendous amounts of prejudice after the September 11th attacks. The September 11th attacks were four coordinated attacks perpetrated by the terrorist group known as Al Qaeda. These attacks killed 2,996 people and injured more than 6,000 innocent people. These terrorist attacks also contributed to the fear that we now know as Islamophobia.

Ever since September 11, 2001 Americans along with the majority of the world’s population have been skeptical of Muslims. It’s a sad reality but it’s hard for people to think of a Muslim without linking them directly to terrorism. But these assumptions aren’t totally out of the blue—the Muslim’s religion, Islam, teaches a low tolerance for other religions and the Islamic government has no separation of church and state, so it’s only normal to assume that their government shall have a low tolerance as well—some however, immediately translate this into terrorism. Through the Islamic government and religion, relations with foreign countries, and separation amongst themselves it can be concluded that Islamic Fundamentalism is clearly a threat

Islamophobia; fear in Muslims. After the main attack on 9/11, Islamophobia struck in the hearts of most Americans. My parents growing up had dreamt about moving to America for they wanted all the opportunities they heard America could provide for them. It was a dream of theirs. Of course after 9/11 however, those opportunities went from hard to reach to not obtainable at all. Americans started to hate Muslims and discriminated them completely. No matter the prejudice, my parents stayed true to themselves and faithful to their religion. I, however, had a problem. Growing up in a predominantly white suburban neighborhood, sticking to your beliefs get harder and harder as years go by.

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).

Media is used to influence extremism through three main points. The first, is by “painting” a violent image of Islam. This violent image is “painted” through stereotyping and misrepresenting Muslims and Islam in the media. Research has shown that, “media depict Islam as "fundamentalism", "extremism" and "radicalism"... in the modern world where the role of media is central, the image of reality can be manipulated to misrepresent the actual facts. The media have tried to represent Muslims as "terrorists" posing a threat to the western security.” (MEŠIĆ 5) The stereotyping and misrepresentation leads to Islamophobia (the fear of Islam) and can go back to the politics point of injustice against Muslims; wherein extremists feel as though they’ve been unfairly treated and must act out harshly and violently. The violence that occurs as a result also is fueled by further feelings of threat enhanced through the media; again another example of a factor having absolutely no relation to

News has played a significant role in bringing a fear of Islam to the Western world. A worthwhile example of this is the portrayal of Islam after 9/11. The first major wave of hate against Islam in North America hit on September 11th, 2001. Coincidentally I was born on June 17th, 2001, only 3 months before 9/11 happened. My guardians were forced to take care of a newborn child and 6 children in the face of a nation that hated for them. Somehow, even though we had no direct relation to radical Islamic extremists, we took the blame for 9/11 because of the media's broadcasting. My father recalled when my eldest brother got into a fight at school five days after 9/11. My brother came home bloodied and bruised with his right eye turning purple. When my father questioned my brother about how this happened, he justified his actions when he explained that another child called him a terrorist. My father's attitude went from Shocked and angry, to calm and monotone, and he said: