Syrian immigrants are in dire need for help after fleeing their country, but messages like these are telling one story that all immigrants are an imminent danger to Americans. Muslims are dangerous. Muslim immigrants are rapists. Muslims teach children to be murderous and vicious. The hashtag "MuslimsAreComing" is being used in a campaign to help Americans understand Muslims better, but these tweets purposefully misused the hashtag to combat this message. The language used is meant to make the reader feel dumb for disagreeing. It tries to intimidate.
This one-sided view of these people ignores the fact that, simply, Muslims are people. A people that for the most part respects other people, with a small portion gone bad. If others analyzed and formed our perceptions of Americans based only on what shows up on the front page of the newspaper they may think we are dangerous for having so many school shootings or so many violent movies. Every people has children trying to go through school with hope for a brighter future and parents trying to provide the means to achieve those goals. This story is ignored completely. These tweets try to drive fear into American's perception of Muslims through the acts of small, extreme groups. They define over a billion people through very few.
These posts come from people that have consumed extreme media without pausing to look at an issue from another angle. I believe that the other story, the opposite story, should have greater influence on a person's view on Muslims. Just because the story of someone waking up and living life the best they can every day isn't shocking news doesn't mean it isn't important. It should still be used to form an opinion just the same.
I like how you mention the importance of language and angle. Both can be used to create almost any story from a few facts.
ReplyDeleteThis made me think of a tweet I saw the other day saying something about how American privilege means thinking you can move to Canada if Trump becomes president while rejecting Syrian refugees from moving here because of war. We totally single-story other people, but give ourselves limitless excuses for doing things that really don't make sense, or that we hate others for doing. It's pretty sad how this is directly playing out in our politics.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of how those with strong opinions may speak out on an issue, and it seems like everybody feels that way, when really they are in the minority. Just because some people act a certain way does not mean that an entire population of people are the same.
ReplyDeleteReading that first image reminded my of WWI and WWII propaganda with pig faced jews, murderous Japanese and burly, merciless germans. It also reminded me of the movie "Bridge of Spies" and how Americans viewed communists at the time. Looking back on each of these instances I feel ashamed of my forebears for acting so irrationally and,with out cause, hating people they know nothing about. How is our current treatment of Muslims any different from then? Have we learned nothing?
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of stories like Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in the head by the Taliban but survived. She received the Noble Peace Prize in 2014 and is a Women's Rights Activist. It is sad that even with all that she has accomplished, people like her are overshadowed by this stereotype.
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