Reflection 9
Take a moment to make a Google search of the word “terrorist”. Look through the photos that pop up when you click on the images tab. There is something all of these photos have in common. All of these images show a person of color, typically a man who is most likely from the Middle East, and most likely identifies as Muslim.
The documentary Constructing the Threat of Terrorism makes these points and many others throughout the film. The documentary goes through a history of these ideas in America and how it has been continually perpetuated throughout history, such as the way American’s treated Japanese citizens just after Pearl Harbor during WWII into recent years, citing the Trump Administration’s travel ban in early 2017, which ties back to seven countries former president Obama had pin pointed as areas of concern, all of which were a majority Muslim.
According to dictorinary.com, the textually defined definition of the word terrorist reads, ” a person, usually a member of a group, who uses or advocates terrorism” and “a person who terrorizes or frightens others”, images in the media say otherwise. As previously mentioned, a quick Google search will show you how society defines terrorism.
The media is also to blame for these false images of what terrorism looks like through the stories they choose to tell, or not tell, and how they choose to report on stories on terrorism. On the contrary, white men have been the ones who are most likely to commit terrorist acts and pose a threat to the American public. Racism and xenophobia are often the center around reporting such stories.
Terrorism is often times very misunderstood in our society. The documentary states that in a 40-year time period, from 1975-2015, the people from the seven countries previous administrations viewed as threats to the American public actually posed no real threats at all, and had not been responsible for one terrorist-related murder in the United States.
The United States government and media have created this idea that Muslims, or followers of Islam are considered “radicalized others”. They did so through major historical events such as 9/11, which has created this public image that, through the actions of a few people, all Muslims are terrorists. Although, despite that being said, the documentary pin points the top ten leading causes of death to Americans, none of them being terrorism.
Muslims have been dehumanized and demonized in our society. Through the government and media, their image has been warped into what they want the American people to believe is true about Muslims to control our perceptions. Just as not all Christians are like those who belong to the Westboro Baptist Church and are not all white supremacists, not all Muslims should be held responsible for the actions of a small group of people, nor should an entire religion be dehumanized and demonized.
The statement “our imaginations have been constrained by a system that creates moral panics and focuses our attention on racialized threats” is unfortunately true for many Americans. If we look into the definition of moral panic, we see it defined as, “A moral panic is a widespread fear, most often an irrational one, that someone or something is a threat to the values, safety, and interests of a community or society at large. Typically, a moral panic is perpetuated by the news media, fueled by politicians, and often results in the passage of new laws or policies that target the source of the panic.” The article then goes on to explain this is typically done for social control.
We can think of this in many examples, such as when video games first became popular and many parents were afraid. They thought video games would turn children violent, although that is not the case. It often times leads back to unfamiliarity and uncertainty around something new to us or something we don’t understand, which does NOT mean it is bad or wrong.
In order to fix this false image the American government and media has created around Muslims we must start in correctly addressing situations at their core. We can begin to break through these stereotypes but calling people out when they are feeding into them and breaking the cycle. We can take the time to educate ourselves and speak out against injustices and continue to support our brothers and sisters around the world. We must be comfortable seeing others around us who don’t look like us and live differently than us and be okay with that instead of feeling threatened.
Alayna Kelty 