Mariam Raja 13c
“Praise to Allah – dancing with joy the warrior race of fanatics born to detest the west
[1]”: How is Islam represented in the media?
“We can not escape the media. It is involved in every aspect of our lives”
[2] (Roger Sliverson, 1999). It can therefore be argued that as a powerful institution, the media has the power to influence an individual's thoughts and belief through the way groups and issues are represented. Each media representation is mediated and often portrays dominant ideologies, and according to the hypodermic model, it acts like a syringe injecting “ideas, attitudes and beliefs into the audience”
[3]. This is evident when looking at the representation of Islam in the media. Historically, both politically and economically the Western world and Islamic world have constantly been in conflict, with holy battles such as the Crusades, the fight over oil and, more recently, terrorist events, such as 9/11 and 7/7, as evidence of this, yet there have also seen periods of peace. These former events are broadcasted globally through the world of the media, and this therefore gives the opportunity for the establishment to represent Muslims, however they choose. What is evident is that a great deal of Western media tends to show Islam in a negative light and repeatedly stereotypes all Muslims of being "fanatics". This negative representation is both the product and cause of Islamophobia and has lead to many social and political problems, so that currently we are witnessing a moral panic.
The media tends to set up the idea of the West and Islam as two forces that are against one another in a Straussin binary opposition. When Ted Koppel investigated the issue of terrorism on an American television show, “Nightline”, he started the show by saying, “They’re often the first we think of when there’s a terrorist incident”
[4]. Here the usage of the words ‘we’ and ‘they’, subtly presents the ideology of “they” (Muslims) as being in opposition to Western culture. This helps reinforce the idea of conflict between the two cultures which can be linked back to historical conflict that has occurred between the two groups. ‘The Crusades’ were the product of religious, military and political rivalry between Christian and Muslim groups. “The relationship between Christianity and Islam was permanently altered and the Crusades continue through to this day to influence how Islam sees the West”
[5], and evidently vice versa. Islam and the West also hold very different beliefs and ideologies, “as the principles of Islam fundamentally clash with those of liberal capitalism”. This amplifies the conflict and “it is therefore clear that the source of this negative media portrayal of Islam is ideological”
[6]. The dispute between the two groups is often portrayed in the Western media through negative news reports, images and headlines.
This anti-Muslim attitude is termed “Islamophobia”. Islamophobia is a
neologism referring to a fear or
prejudice towards
Muslims and the religion of
Islam. Some consider these views to be irrational; others believe them to be perfectly justified
[7].
The media is seen to be the main factor as to why Islamaphobia occurs, due to the fact that it is such a large and powerful institution and is so omnipresent in people lives.
It is also apparent that the mass media continues to expand in the 21st Century. Over time, technology improves, so the audience now see twenty-four hour news that is up-to-date and is portrayed to be more accurate. Not only this, but there is much more choice in the news genre with an explosion in the amount of people with satellite and cable television, so we see larger audiences who can watch the news that they feel is the ‘truth’. This enables Islamophobia to spread through the many reports that misrepresent the majority of Muslims.
In these recent times, the media has been given the task to report world, changing events such as 7/7 and 9/11, for which they bear great responsibility in their response to these Muslim fundamentalist terrorist attacks, the news media of could be held accountable for depicting Muslims as “backwards, irrational, fundamentalist, misogynist, threatening and manipulative”
[8]. The majority Western media tends to undertake an Islamaphobic approach, and generalise and stereotype all Muslims as terrorists or supporters of these terrorist attacks. This therefore portrays Islam to be a violent religion.
Post 9/11 saw the media now giving a much more threatening negative portrayal of Muslims whereas before they had been seen as much more passive. This a Eurocentric view linked back to the idea of colonialism
[9], which refers to a historical phase of Western imperialism, when Pakistan, for instance, was under British rule and which led to racism and denigration of the oppressed as “The Other”. This colonialist racism was evident for the rather simple Pakistani Muslim character, Ali, in ITV’s 1970’s show “Mind your Language”
[10]in which a teacher is trying to teach English to a class of mixed nationalities. “Character development was kept to a minimum, with the comedy firmly fixed on misunderstandings of English language and customs, and the relentless exploitation of obvious national stereotypes”
[11]. However, after 9/11 the representations became much more threatening in their manner. Example of this is the US television show “American Dad”
[12] , in which the protagonist, Stan, learns his new neighbours are Iranian and immediately suspects that they are terrorists and starts sending his son to scouts so he can defend himself from the neighbours. When comparing the two examples we see how the common representation has changed to become more violent, due to the events of 9/11.
Another example of this Islamophobia in the media is the recent cartoon that was published in the Danish newspaper “Jyllands-Posten”, which shows a caricature drawing of the Prophet Muhammad wearing a headdress shaped like a bomb, while another shows him saying that “paradise was running short of virgins for suicide bombers”
[13]. The newspaper, by publishing such cartoons, is sending out the message to the Western world, in a satirical manner, that Muslim people are all ‘violent fanatics’ and that Mohammed is being hijacked by violence . Also the newspaper uses doctrines of the religion and manipulates and presents them in a manner that will seem absurd and ridiculous to the Western world. The caricature caused many social problems worldwide in the Muslim world. Foreign journalists, diplomats and aid workers began leaving Gaza after a dozen armed Palestinians surrounded the EU offices there and threatened to kidnap citizens of France, Norway, Denmark and Germany unless those governments apologized for publishing the cartoons.
[14] The Muslim world were appalled that images had been produced of their prophet, many felt victimised that the newspaper had chosen their faith to mock. However, what was even more insulting to the Muslim world was the European newspapers were oblivious to see what they had done wrong, and went to the extent of “republishing the pictures last week, saying they were defending freedom of expression”
[15], ignoring the fact that any image of the Muslim prophet Mohammed are forbidden in Islam and are seen as blasphemous. Furthermore, it goes against the ‘Race Relations Act’ (1976), which states that media institutions may not broadcast or publish any material which might be deemed offensive to ethnic minorities and racial groups.
Moreover, the CCN website showed pictures of a Muslim protest, with the caption: “Militants from Islamic Jihad burn a Danish flag during a protest in Gaza City on Tuesday”
[16]. Here we see a prime example of where the “militant” stereotype comes from and the caption is used to help anchor the idea of protest and violence.
Some Western media have also be seen to be quick to judge and to not allow Muslim groups, a fair trial before declaring them responsible of a terrorist attack. The perfect example of this was the national British newspaper
[17] front page the day after the Okalahoma bombings in the 1990s, which read, “In the name of Islam”.
[18] However, it was later discovered that the bombs were planted by two Christian males. Such a mistake highlights the fact that Muslims are the first port of call when it comes to finding the perpetrators of a perceived terrorist attack, without any real supporting evidence. It further demonstrates the misrepresentation of Muslims and also how the media does not always portray the truth.
This misrepresentation is linked to the ‘Drip Drip theory’
[19]. This is the theory in which it is believed that if an ideology, an image or a concept is repeated numerous times in the media, the audience begin to believe it to be true, and the fact that the one idea is getting so much media coverage allows it to ‘drip’ slowly and embed itself in the audience’s mind.
For instance, this is apparent when the media repeatedly uses Abu Hamza as an icon to represent the Muslim community in Britain. “Abu Hamza al-Masri is one of the most distinctive radical Islamic figures in Britain; the 47-year-old has also defiantly justified the attacks in New York and Washington in September 2001”
[20]. The media tend to be fixated with stories on Abu Hamza. An example of this is the Daily Mail newspaper which printed the same anti-western picture of Abu Hamza on the 14th, 15th, 17th, 18th, 20th, and 21st of September 2001 and the same radical interview with him printed on the 13th, 15th and the 18th. In addition to this, The Sun, Mirror, Star, Express and Telegraph also printed the same images and interview
[21]. Newspapers repeated the images of Abu Hamza generate a negative reaction and because of the fact that his appearance is different to that of western social norms: his hook arm and long beard play into anti-Islamic prejudices. His appearance is intimidating and fits the stereotypes of a crazed terrorist is the perfect archetype.
Abu Hamza and his ‘newsworthy’ stories fit into Galtung and Ruge’s theory
[22]of ‘News Values’. “They suggested that the selection of news for newspapers and for news broadcasts is done by application of these news values – explicitly or implicitly – by the gatekeepers who control the news we receive”
[23] His interviews are therefore seen as ‘news worthy’, as they are exactly what the hegemonic Western media need to show that the Islamic world is ‘at war’ with the West. He follows all the stereotypes of what it is to be a terrorist and he is presented as the Islamic representative voice, even though the majority of the Muslim community condemn the terrorist attacks and do not support him.
It parallels the idea that news is constructed and that the “News consists of an artificial narrative, with stories shaped around a beginning, middle and an end”
[24]. This artificial narrative follows Propp’s ‘character theory’
[25], in which the binary opposition is present, with the Islamic terrorists portrayed to be the ‘villains’ and President Bush and the west to be the ‘Heroes’. These roles represent Muslims in such a way, so that it causes the audience to fear Muslim and Islam.
What the majority of Western media is culpable of is stereotyping and this is not only stereotyping of the Islamic world. ‘A stereotype is a standardised representation of a specific group of people and a simplistic and unidimensional representation of a culture’
[26] . Often this is what evidently the Western media does to any ethnicity that differs from the mainstream. The Western media is also notoriously known for favouritism towards the upper/middle class white audience, especially in the news reporting genre. Here the audience are presented with a hegemonic view, in which “those with most power are able to exercise their influence culturally rather than force”
[27] and this is done “through everyday cultural life, including media representation of the world”
[28]. This is why the majority of representations use stereotypes to help portray the hegemonic view of Muslim as violent. Another example of the hegemony elsewhere in the media is the recent news story where the head of the Metropolitan Police in London said “murders in minority communities appeared not to interest the mainstream media".
[29] He said that equal amount of police time is put into investigating murders of other races, but the institutionally racist media just focus on the murder of those of white origin.
However, not all the Western media tries to promote these dominant ideologies. The media can present a pluralistic view, which is believed to be more truthful and diverse as it sees that the “main function of the media is to please the audience”
[30] . This more open-minded media tend to present Islam more fairly and do not just use the stereotypical representations. An example of this is the recent drama “The Road to Guantanamo Bay”
[31] which showed the audience four innocent Muslims being falsely accused of being Al-Quaeda and then being brutally abused by American military officers. So a pluralist media presents ideas of terrorism but in a less threatening and narrow-minded style. Shows such as “Spooks” have shown a British mosque as a training ground for terrorists, and depicted the people there turning young boys into suicide bombers
[32]. This was paralleling the true story of Finsbury Park mosque in London
[33], and presenting the truth about Muslim terrorism in the U.K, but it did this in a less Islamophobic manner. Also shows such as “Gay Muslims”
[34] are representing Muslim in other ways than the stereotypical terrorist, and opening the audience’s mind to other views of Islam.
This choice of what to present to an audience links to the ‘Agenda setting theory’
[35]; the idea that the media has the power to control what the news is, and what an audience learn about their society. This shows “the ability of the media to direct people’s attention toward certain issues”
[36]. Islamophobia is reinforced in the hegemonic media, as it can pick what they wants to show about Islam and what it wants to edit out. Through editing, for instance, it shows repeated images of “Muslim men burning American flags whilst juxtaposed with angry young men shouting outside a north London mosque”
[37]. The Islamic community is seen only in a bad light and the media fails to investigate any positive aspect of the community.
The media, then, tends to play on these stereotypes and present this hegemonic view of the Muslim “terrorist”. Newspapers use particular language to stereotype all Muslims. The term “fanatic” and “fundamentalist" is commonly used to describe Muslims, even if they are just simply followers of this religion. The irony, however, is that the term “fundamentalist” is actually a Christian term but now, because of the media, it is associated with the Muslim faith. This is, therefore, evidence of how the media is so powerful and how it has the capability to cause social change through effectively changing the meaning of words. The Western media also focuses on the idea of ‘Jihad’ to support the idea of Islam being a violent religion. Jihad is the idea of having a “Fight in the cause of Allah; those who fight you, but do not transgress limits”
[38]. The idea of Jihad is to fight a Holy war when being attacked by those deemed non-believers But Here we see how the hegemonic view through media manipulation of the idea of jihad. We see Headlines that claim Muslims are “Extremist who ‘threaten us all’ ”
[39]. The “extremist” are seen to be all Muslims, and this is wrongly justified by reference back to a misreading of the concept of Jihad.
Stereotypes have often leaded to ‘moral panics’ (Stan Cohen, 1972)
[40] within society causing problems and anxiety on a local, national and international level. A moral panic is when there are concerns about perceived threats to the dominant values and beliefs in society. It is caused by the media. Throughout history, the mass media industry has been utilised as a tool to appeal to the public at large, particularly in the field of politics, where people in a position of power can tempt society into believing what they want them to believe. As Eldridge describes: "The media, wittingly or unwittingly, reproduce the definitions of the powerful”
[41]. The moral panic caused by numerous Islamophobic reports is obvious: the fear and hatred is increased towards Muslims living in Western society, and so too is fear of the general Islamic culture.
Moral panics are perfect evidence as to how the ‘Hyperdomic syringe theory’
[42] works. This is the theory in which it is believed that the media acts like a drug and injects us with information that supports the dominant ideology, which the audience take in and begin to believe. In this theory the audiences are seen as passive. It makes the audience seem like "zombies" and make the media out to be a powerful tool. So audiences are injected with the representations of Muslim people as ‘fanatics’ and ‘fundamentalists’. Example of this being Islamaphobic newspaper headlines printed for millions to read, such as; “The red menace is gone, but here comes Islam, The green menace
[43]”. This ongoing representation that the Western audience receives causes them to believe all Muslims are of a violent nature, and they begin to share the same ideologies as the Western media, and to develop an anti-Muslim attitude.
Islamaphobia leads to many social problems and hate crimes toward Muslims. Since September the 11th, the number of attacks on Muslims has risen, and communities where Muslims and non-Muslims used to live together peacefully are now living in hatred, chaos and riots. Since the September 11th attacks, Muslim communities have experienced greater hostility, including increased attacks against individuals and also mosques. Muslims are angry at anti-racism organisations for failing to do enough to combat anti-Muslim prejudice
[44]. A specific example of this is a case in which the police raided a peaceful Muslim house in South London, and abused a twenty nine on December 2 2003, while putting him into the Muslim praying position and shouting, “Where’s your God now?”
[45] This highlights the amount of hatred some in the west have toward Muslims, when even supposedly impartial institutions such as the police are prejudiced and harbour hatred towards Muslim. Another consequence of this Islamaphobic attitude was the French President Jacques Chirac asking the French Parliament to pass a law banning the ‘hijab’ in France
[46]. ‘Hijab’ is the name given to the clothing women are advised to wear in the Quran, and the fact that the Government were are trying to pass a law to ban it, was very insulting and intolerant of the Muslim belief. It also sought to take away the freedom for an individual to express themselves and dress in the way they want. It could be argued that this entire backlash is a response to the moral panic caused by the media by stereotyping all Muslims as terrorists.
However, new technology gives Muslims the opportunity of self-representation and allows them to express themselves in the way they want. The internet and digital channels allow Muslims to express their own voice. Also, organisations are formed to try and prevent this Islamaphobic attitude, and try to provide a different view to the view the mainstream Western media provides for us. The organisation “Iqra Media” write: “We are an independent Islamic media organisation which aims to produce thought - provoking media resources for the Muslim community, while offering alternative views to the wider society in Britain”
[47]. There are also new censorship laws which are in the process of being passed: “The Racial and Religious Hatred Bill” which “would create a new offence of incitement to religious hatred and would apply to comments made in public or in the media, as well as through written material”
[48]. This is a step forward in trying to discontinue the Islamaphobic attitude the Western media often holds, however it still allows the media to represent Muslims as being violent and disobedient, which will inevitable, perpetrate Islamphobia .
Overall, the media through words, sound and pictures produces a likeness of what they think the ‘real’ world is like. “Through a process of mediation, they re-present the world to the audience”
[49] as they would like the audience to believe it is. When representing Muslims and Islam, the hegemonic media has a tendency to play on the prevailing stereotypes of violence which exist about Islam, and exaggerate them and highlight them to an audience. This leads to moral panics about the religion which then often causes social disorder. To try to prevent this some countries like the U.K are trying to put through measures to ensure some restraint through censorship in their mass media concerning race and religion. Also the fact that the British media chose not to print the racist cartoons of Mohamed shows the U.K to be a more pluralistic society than some others in Europe. This gives us cause to be hopeful but the struggle to make the media an unprejudiced institution, particularly when it is still predominantly ‘white’, is not an easy task.
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