Campus, News

Islamophobia unwarrented, BU students and faculty say

A pastor in Florida plans on burning copies of the Quran, the Muslim holy book, on Sept. 11, to mark the ninth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.

In California, an Abercrombie &' Fitch kids store allegedly would not hire an 18-year-old woman who applied for a position stocking merchandise because she was Muslim and wore a hijab, the traditional Muslim headscarf, and didn't fit the Abercrombie "look." The company is now being faced with a discrimination lawsuit.

And in New York City, the proposed construction of an Islamic community center and mosque two blocks from Ground Zero has many Americans protesting what they believe is an insensitive placement.

Some are arguing that these examples all illustrate the growing trend of Islamophobia in the United States, which began to escalate after the 9/11 attacks and worsened with the United States' wars in the Middle East.

International Relations professor Charles Dunbar said he thinks this phenomenon is becoming more of a problem.

"I think it's due to a whole combination of things," he said in a phone interview. "Islamophobia is something that has never been too far below the surface and with the Ground Zero mosque issue it has become worse."

Dunbar also said he thinks certain political leaders have helped to encourage this and make it OK to be Islamophobic.

Political figures such as former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League, whose mission includes securing "justice and fair treatment to all citizens alike and to put an end forever to unjust and unfair discrimination against and ridicule of any sect or body of citizens," have publicly protested against the building of the mosque so close to the World Trade Center site.

Many in the Boston University community place blame for the negative impressions of Islam on the media's portrayal of the religion.

"We only ever see and hear about the extremists... but that's just a very small part of their religion," said College of Arts and Sciences freshman Miriam Bachman.

CAS sophomore Jamie Jacobsen agreed.

"People listen to what they hear on the television and Internet first," he said. "It's really easy to stereotype."

Jacobsen said he thinks much of this has to do with appearance.

"People just associate any Arab looking person... with Sept. 11 and the war in Iraq, it's just so completely false but people who aren't educated or haven't traveled just don't understand," she said.

Nikki Long, CAS sophomore, believes the intolerance toward Muslims and the Islamic religion as a whole is due to ignorance.

"People don't understand the whole belief system and just put a label on it before they even try to understand," Long said.

Dunbar said that though the controversy facing Islam is significant, other religions, especially Judaism and Roman Catholicism, have faced significant barriers as well and overcome them.

"I hope that will be the same for Islam, but it will be a long haul," Dunbar said.

Bachman said she thinks a better understanding between religions will come from education.

"Islamophobia is just a form of racism, which of course is something we tried to obliterate in America," she said.
Website | More Articles

This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.

Comments are closed.