Looking at People’s Phobia of Muslims
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Does the fact that Barack Hussein Obama’s last name rhymes with that of the al Qaeda leader mean that he loves terrorists? Or how about that dangerous middle name? Should all women who wear head scarves be searched for weapons by airport security? Do we “know,” as some allege, what terrorists look like?
The fear surrounding what makes a Muslim, from appearances to beliefs, has been defined in recent years as Islamophobia, an issue permeating politics, pop culture and even the price of gas. A group of professors and academics from around the nation are gathered this weekend at UC Berkeley to discuss what it means.
At what is believed to be the first academic conference focused on Islamophobia as a concept, the professors aim to study and understand how a religious identity of 1.2 billion people around the world has become fused with a monolithic set of beliefs and racial category. Under this dynamic, the beliefs of a Muslim engineer in Silicon Valley are rendered the same as those of a shopkeeper in Baghdad or a Hamas politician.
The “Muslim” racial category can be defined by a woman with a head scarf or a brown-skinned man with a beard. In reality, adherent Muslims include Chinese people, African Americans, whites and Latinos, as well as women who do not wear head scarves.
Just as black people, Jews and colonized groups have historically been defined as exceptionally dangerous “others,” Muslims are today, conference participants said.
{snip}
Contentious issues
{snip}
Islamophobia entails “some of the most contentious issues in the United States or worldwide,” said Professor Evelyn Nakano Glenn, director of UC Berkeley’s Center for Race and Gender, which sponsored the conference.
Friday’s panels touched on issues ranging from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and U.S. immigration to European anti-Semitism and the legacies of colonialism. For some, the importance of studying Islamophobia also was a matter of more intimate concern.
Glenn said that her own family paid the price for how its group was defined as “the other” in a past era of the United States and subjected to persecution. During World War II, she said roughly 30 family members were “incarcerated” in internment camps due to perceptions about Japanese American beliefs. Those camps also interned Italian Americans and German Americans.
{snip}
UC Berkeley lecturer Hatem Bazian defined Islamophobia as “unfounded hostility toward Muslims and therefore fear or dislike of all or most Muslims.” As a result, Muslims are painted as monolithic, unable to adapt to modernity and dissimilar to other major faiths. Islamophobes present Muslims as inferior to the West, archaic, barbaric and irrational, Bazian said.
{snip}
Panelists at the conference traced the roots of Islamophobia well before Sept. 11, 2001: They include slavery, colonialism and the Spanish Inquisition against Jews and Muslims beginning in 1492.
Cultural phenomenon
Marquette University Professor Louise Cainkar presented a paper about hate crimes against those of Arab origin, a category that includes Christians but is often conflated with Muslims in post-Sept. 11 pop culture. In analyzing patterns in the Chicago area, she found that hate crimes were fewest in African American neighborhoods in the South Side, despite the high prevalence of Arab shopkeepers. But anti-Arab hate crimes were highest in “white flight” suburbs. A mosque in a southwestern suburb of Chicago came under a “three-day siege” by neighbors after the Sept. 11 attacks and had to be protected by more than 100 police officers in riot gear, Cainkar said.
Cainkar believes the results showed, in part, that Islamophobia is a cultural phenomenon. The black neighborhoods had a history of community organizing around concepts of race and did not buy into treating Arabs as “the other.”
{snip}
Email Matthai Kuruvila at mkuruvila@sfchronicle.com.
(Posted on April 29, 2008)
Comments
My hostiliy towards Muslims is not “unfounded,” as this Bazian says. My hostility is caused by ongoing and increasing Muslim terrorism all around the world; by he fact I am considered an “infidel” or unclean low life because I am too smart and informed to embrace this faith of inadequate men and women of no self esteem. I know every Muslim has hostility towards me. And I have hostility toward every one of them. Islam is a cancer that eats at everything that makes human beings noble. Anyone who thinks there are good Muslims simply has no understanding of Islam.
Posted by Vlad The Emailer at 6:47 PM on April 29
Maybe we are simply afraid of Muslims because they tend to blow people up.
Posted by at 7:05 PM on April 29
Once again, left-wing academics speaking on behalf of all of these phantom moderate Muslims? How come they never come and speak for themselves? It’s always somebody who is also hostile to traditional Americans who assures us that Muslims are not a threat.
“Does the fact that Barack Hussein Obama’s last name rhymes with that of the al Qaeda leader mean that he loves terrorists?”
Who knows.
“Or how about that dangerous middle name?”
You mean the one he shares with Saddam. Maybe it’s like Smith in the Middle East.
“Should all women who wear head scarves be searched for weapons by airport security?”
The head scarf isn’t the potential threat. The muslim wrapped inside of it is.
Do we “know,” as some allege, what terrorists look like?
Well, let’s put all of terrorists’ pictures next to each other and see if there is any resemblance among them. If I recall there are some distinct skin tones and facial features common to all of them.
Posted by Civilized Neighbor at 8:03 PM on April 29
I don’t fear them as much as I loath them. Phobia isn’t a word I would use for what I feel for the bunch of them. I spent time in the Middle East. I know how despicable their behavior can be towards other religions.
U C Berkley. It doesn’t surprise me. I wonder just what they would feel like if muslims had their way with them. There tolerance of gays would be a real challenge to their muslim tolerance.
Posted by TypicalWhitePerson at 8:04 PM on April 29
I don’t think it’s a “cultural phenomena” of any kind. I think it’s a perfectly justified fear.
Posted by Robert T. - San Diego at 8:14 PM on April 29
if BUSH and other traitors stopped immigration we would not need to talk of all this stupidity
Posted by enraged at 8:27 PM on April 29
I prefer to treat them the same way Id treat a cobra ; leave it alone in it’s own environment and do not handle it or try to befriend it, nor bring it home with you.
Posted by cartman at 8:29 PM on April 29
When Christian, Jews, Buddhists, or Hindus start flying hijacked jets into building, murdering thousands, then I’ll start looking at islam as just another religion. Until then, I will look at islam the same way I look at satan worshipping, dedicated to evil, and filled with nut-jobs.
Posted by AvgDude at 8:31 PM on April 29
Cultures all over the world have known that muslims are evil, ever since Mohammad founded this fascist, satanic movement.
Posted by at 8:48 PM on April 29
Not to worry—Berkley will take care of this. Where else could you find a group of anti-Americans to discuss something so illogical. Of course, Muslims hate us: so why should we not hate them? those 19 hijackers were not Baptists.
Posted by Frank at 9:28 PM on April 29
“Just as black people, Jews and colonized groups have historically been defined as exceptionally dangerous “others,” Muslims are today, conference participants said.”
Gee, maybe it’s because certain “groups” like to kill “infidels”, as well as assault, rob, or otherwise rip you off?
Posted by Superman at 9:54 PM on April 29
“No suspicions of Muslims have any foundation—none whatever.”
LOL! Yes, how true. That’s really hilarious.
This article reminds me of all the black talking heads on television, who arrogantly believe that all the childish rhetoric they vomit in defense of their main man, the good Reverend Wright, is so persuasive and superior they just have whitey’s head spinning.
Little do they suspect that every time they open their mouths they’re setting more people against them, nor do they realize how stupid people think they are.
Posted by ice at 10:36 PM on April 29
Doh, no grounds for not liking muslims? It’s like asking that we have irrational fear of going into the ghettos with athletic sneakers, Fubu clothing, and ‘bling bling’. The day that these mostly white liberals go freely into the ghettos or live there is when I’ll start accepting muslims as just another religion like Tibetan buddhism, Christianity, Druidism?, Zoroastrian, and Taoism. What are these people smoking?
Posted by realist at 10:36 PM on April 29
“Panelists at the conference traced the roots of Islamophobia well before Sept. 11, 2001: They include slavery, colonialism and the Spanish Inquisition against Jews and Muslims beginning in 1492.”
I see, yet no mention of the muslims invading Europe before that time, yes? No mention that the muslims invaded and controlled the southern part of Spain for 800 years, right?
Posted by at 10:55 PM on April 29
This article is a pile of manure. On sept 10, 2002, me and the boys were tying nooses and talking about how the Spanish inquisition had led us to be lieve the Moslems were evil, not nice people… HA! Most Americans don’t know what the Spanish Inquision is.
That three day siege in Chicago- never happened! It is a lie.
Posted by flyingtiger at 11:48 PM on April 29
phobia; a persistent, irrational fear of a specific object, activity, or situation that leads to a compelling desire to avoid it.
I don’t think it’s “irrational” to be afraid of people that want to kill you and to avoid them.
Posted by Southern Hoosier at 5:58 AM on April 30
Most white people hate moslems because the so-called liberal media tells them they should(they used to anyway). Moslems have plenty of reason to dislike us and every right to do so even without reason.
If Arabs had the greatest culture in the world and were our best friends they would still have no place in our lands simply because they are not us.
Posted by Bing Cherries at 9:19 AM on April 30
I wanted to stop reading when I read the term Islamophobia. Real Islamophobia would be when a person attacks and tries to kill a person when they are discovered to be Muslim, or screams and runs away, fearing to even venture outside the house because of the threat of Muslims, instead the totalitarians of tolerance have turned the word into a smear word, a slur they seem most interested in applying to whites. Couching the concepts of white = bad, non-whites = good, in psuedoscientific social science jargon, intended to be both a racial slur and misleading, does not change what it is: naked hatred of whites at every point.
“In analyzing patterns in the Chicago area, she found that hate crimes were fewest in African American neighborhoods in the South Side, despite the high prevalence of Arab shopkeepers.”
This could be because the word hate crime only seems to apply if a crime is against a person with darker skin. All other crimes are just a response to ‘oppression’. Is she not saying Muslims are ‘oppressed’ here? Aren’t these the same people who told us the Sun revolves around the Earth? If she was truly interested in hate crimes it might interest her to note the overwhelming ratio of crimes committed against whites compared to the ratio of crimes labeled hate-crimes for the various races. If she’s looking for racism and bias, this would be a good place to begin. The San Francisco Chronical isn’t content with being dishonest, they must labor to convince us of that which is the opposite of the truth.
Posted by LHathaway at 10:44 AM on April 30
Let’s see…How many non-muslim suicide bombers so far? …anyone got that number?
Posted by Gary at 1:59 PM on April 30
Psssssssssssst I don’t have to taste poison when all along I KNOW IT IS POISON….same as….I would never stick my head inside a sharks mouth….dahhhhhhh.
Posted by lydia at 2:55 PM on April 30
“Just as black people, Jews and colonized groups have historically been defined as exceptionally dangerous “others,” Muslims are today, conference participants said.”
Gee, maybe it’s because certain “groups” like to kill “infidels”, as well as assault, rob,
- or otherwise rip you off?”
Posted by Superman at 9:54 PM on April 29
> Dangerous waters. Jews in Europe were alone allowed to loan money because Christians were forbidden to due to an interpretation of the New Testament that made money lending a sin. So Jews established banking (apart from and in with league with the Catholic Knights Templar (and with exception of the Venesians, who ignored the rule), financed the building of medeival Europe, including churches - and were hated for the service without which Europe would have remained a wasteland of villages of stick and waddle structures. (Actually, one French king did it in an effort to escapte his debts to first - Jewish bankers and then Templar bankers). Today, the sort of loans made by Christian dominated banks in the West have nearly bankrupted America. Where is the persecution of Christians?
It always helps to put EVERYTHING in a true historic perspective.
Posted by Whiteplight at 3:40 PM on April 30
HA! Most Americans don’t know what the Spanish Inquision is.
Posted by flyingtiger at 11:48 PM on April 29
> WAS - Do know what the Inquisition was? Because it wasn’t just Spanish, it was French, German - in fact it operated throughout Christiandom. (Except later on, the Protestant north). I visited a former Dominican (Inquisitor) monastery in eastern Slovenia in 2000. These guys tormented accused “heritics” everywhere. It was formed in the early 13th century by Dominic Guzman, a Catholic Cardinal to specifically go after the Cathar “heretics” during the Albigensian “Crusade.” In the Languedoc of Southern France. Hence the Dominican Order were the order of the inquisitiors. They formented a reign of terror in Europe for 500 years.
Posted by Whiteplight at 3:47 PM on April 30
Muslim Arabs enslaved black Africans for centuries.
Posted by at 11:26 PM on April 30
Who let the Muslims in, and to what purpose?
Who let the Mexicans in, and to what purpose?
Who sicced Blacks on our communities in the name of “civil rights”?
If you know the answer to these questions then you know who the REAL enemy is.
Venting against Blacks, Mexicans and Muslims is a waste of time because these people aren’t the REAL enemy, they are mere tools of destruction being wielded against us by our own elites.
Posted by at 12:03 AM on May 1
A group of professors and academics from around the nation are gathered this weekend at UC Berkeley to discuss what it means.
Read: ‘to insist itmeans what it doesn’t and doesn’t mean what it does.’
In analyzing patterns in the Chicago area, she found that hate crimes were fewest in African American neighborhoods in the South Side, despite the high prevalence of Arab shopkeepers. But anti-Arab hate crimes were highest in “white flight” suburbs.
That might have something to do with the fact that rarely, if ever, is a crime considered a “hate crime” when committed by blacks. A robbery is just a robbery, etc.. On the other hand, every time a white commits any crime against any non-white, there’s always somone who wants to describe it as a “hate crime,” regardless of what the nature or motives of the crime actually were.
A mosque in a southwestern suburb of Chicago came under a “three-day siege” by neighbors after the Sept. 11 attacks and had to be protected by more than 100 police officers in riot gear, Cainkar said.
Really? Anyone have any specifics on this? Seems that would have been some major news, especially given how for weeks after the 11th the major news outlets were incessantly reminding us that muslims are good and peaceful and wholesome and we had to remain vigilant against evil white racist who might attack them.
Cainkar believes the results showed, in part, that Islamophobia is a cultural phenomenon. The black neighborhoods…did not buy into treating Arabs as “the other.”
What a load. Only a lily-white academic who’s had precious little contact with either of those groups could possibly even suggest that, let alone believe it.
Posted by BW Sam at 2:05 PM on May 1
“It always helps to put EVERYTHING in a true historic perspective.”
True statement, as far as it goes.
A statement I made based on a general comment, not really picking on the Jews, more considering how these groups have been viewed subjectively, at any time in history.
Obviously, not all blacks are racist murderers, not all hispanics are thieves, not all Muslims/Arabs will kill an infidel for allah, and not all Jews will try to screw you in a business transaction, but these groups all do have, or have had, these reputations.
Basically, just because certain stereotypes are non-PC, there is a basis for them that was acquired somewhere, somehow, and there is always at least a grain of truth to them.
Posted by Tidey-Whitey at 2:43 PM on May 1
I wouldn’t call our collective antipathy for Muslims as a “phobia.” The term implies an irrational fear. Well-founded hatred for arrogant, murdering rapists is a much better description. We Western whites were not all born to run away from our oldest enemy.
I made an analogy while objecting to the term “homophobia” as a college student, 20 years ago, which gained me some notoriety on campus, which I will use again here: People don’t like dog poop. It’s not because they don’t “understand” dog poop, or because they’re “afraid” of dog poop. All the sensitivity training in the world would still leave anyone quite upset if five gallons of dog poop was dumped into the passenger’s seat of their car.
My own personal heroes are Vlad Tepes and Charles Martel. Good old Vlad wasn’t afraid of Muslims, and he sure knew how to have some fun.
Posted by Michael C. Scott at 5:20 PM on May 1