Wait a Minute ... Not All Arabs are Muslims? And Other Myths of Media

Recently, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof pushed the boundaries of our national conversation by daring to suggest that not all Muslims think and act alike.  He’s worth quoting at length:

“Many Americans honestly believe that Muslims are prone to violence, but humans are too complicated and diverse to lump into groups that we form invidious conclusions about. We’ve mostly learned that about blacks, Jews and other groups that suffered historic discrimination, but it’s still O.K. to make sweeping statements about 'Muslims' as an undifferentiated mass…. Muslims are one of the last minorities in the United States that it is still possible to demean openly, and I apologize for the slurs."

Kristof is right to call out the American public, and the American media, for its monolithic portrayal of Muslims and Arabs.  So monolithic is that image, in fact, that this simple and really not all that surprising fact bears repeating:  Not all Arabs are Muslims, and the majority of American Muslims are not Arab.

Finding stories that treat Muslims and Arabs as people, rather than objects, can be a tall order in the current media market.  I suggest starting with author Alia Malek’s book, A Country Called Amreeka, which uses profiles to tell a hundred years’ of history of Arabs in America, or The Mosque in Morgantown, a documentary about one woman’s challenge to her West Virginia community's narrow interpretation of Islam.

And check out the Voice of Witness project, the brainchild of Dave Eggers (of, indeed, staggering genius).  Voice of Witness uses oral history to highlight human rights struggles; it has published “Underground America,” stories of our country’s undocumented residents; “Voices from the Storm,” about Katrina; and “Surviving Justice,” about the wrongfully imprisoned.

Now, Voice of Witness is working on Who is This Enemy?  Narratives of Social Injustice After 9/11.  Edited by Malek, the book will share the stories of Americans – Muslims and Arabs, yes, but also stories from others who simply 'Looked Too Brown' after 9/11 – who found themselves persecuted in their own country after the September 11 attacks.

What kind of stories?  Take this one, which the project recently shared by email, about an eight-year-old Sikh boy speaking at a San Francisco Human Rights Commission meeting:

He didn't understand why the security officers took him away from his mother and father and detained him in a glass-walled cubicle. He described the humiliating process with as much detail and grace as an 8-year-old can possibly muster: the way people looked at him strangely, how they made him touch his turban and then wipe his hands on something to test for explosives, the way that this happened every time they took a family vacation.

This little boy, who says he hopes one day to become a police officer, looked up at the commissioners and asked: "Why aren't the other kids put in a glass cage?"

If you or someone you know has a story to contribute to Who Is This Enemy? you should email the editor here: alia @ voiceofwitness dot com.  If you can’t offer a story but you want to be part of the effort, you can donate to the project – they need to raise $5,000 before November 1 to continue their work.

Photo credit: Beth Rankin