Really
Why do americans, dislike arabs, or muslims?
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I thought you would elaborate.
Well as I said I have muslim friends and some of them have sisters when i was younger and better looking I used to consort with the muslim girls and others on a regular basis.
Oh, you mean young people. I have a problem with calling the offspring of Muslims- Muslim. They aren't necessarily Muslim, they have only been raised in a certain tradition. There are no Jewish, Christian, Muslim, or Buddhist children.
Dude I am 42 years old so the young people I refer to are now my age and are as frisky as they ever were the point I am making is this look hard at any race color creed or ideoligy and you will find extermists and you will fined average everyday people. But the average people are not the ones that make the news it is all ways all ways the bad ones that dominate the news which leads to people thinking that every body from the affecte race is bad.
Well I would make an exception to Muslims to don't follow Islam, like your horny friends.
Oh but they do follow islam just like any chirstian religion that has vises against drink and sex they follow islam that appeals to them no different then most christians so you see they are not all that different.
I agree, the only thing that can redeem religious fundamentalism is hypocracy or complete rejection.
BTW I am an religion as is evil advocate aswell well but that is for another thread..
In all honesty, it's not a matter of "dislike" as much as it is one of suspicion of people that are different and don't seem to "fit in."
As a good example, here's something from the news just recently that involves only average Americans and illustrates my point perfectly:
A small and shrinking town in the U.S. midwest actually advertised nationally for people to move to their little city. They offered free building sites in addition to a cash incentive. So far, so good.
A fairly young couple, tired of the crime and cost of living in their current part of Florida, took the offer and moved there. They were even given a lot of free help in getting their new house built.
A few years later - they are now moving back to Florida.
What went wrong? Their lifestyle ("city-fied" you might call it) did NOT fit in the basic down-to-earth style of the people of the town. They couldn't make friends very well and felt like outcasts. Their biggest pleasure while living there was to drive 45 miles to a bigger town and go shopping at the large WalMart there. It was the sort of thing they were accustomed to.
So, in short, it was because they were "different" and didn't conform to the local culture that made them outcasts. And that's exactly what happens to many Muslims in other countries as well as America.
As a good example, here's something from the news just recently that involves only average Americans and illustrates my point perfectly:
A small and shrinking town in the U.S. midwest actually advertised nationally for people to move to their little city. They offered free building sites in addition to a cash incentive. So far, so good.
A fairly young couple, tired of the crime and cost of living in their current part of Florida, took the offer and moved there. They were even given a lot of free help in getting their new house built.
A few years later - they are now moving back to Florida.
What went wrong? Their lifestyle ("city-fied" you might call it) did NOT fit in the basic down-to-earth style of the people of the town. They couldn't make friends very well and felt like outcasts. Their biggest pleasure while living there was to drive 45 miles to a bigger town and go shopping at the large WalMart there. It was the sort of thing they were accustomed to.
So, in short, it was because they were "different" and didn't conform to the local culture that made them outcasts. And that's exactly what happens to many Muslims in other countries as well as America.
Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
For more than half of my life, Americans regarded Arabs as somewhat mysterious and charming, and had no real negative feelings about them. As for Islam, none of us knew anything about it, except for the American "Black Muslim" movement in the 1960s. When I was a kid we used the name "Mohammedan" and didn't even know the word "Moslem," which eventually became "Muslim."
That all changed abruptly in November 1979. Iran had already had its Islamic Revolution and the Shah was deposed--and most of us didn't care about that. But then the Iranians attacked the U.S. Embassy in Tehran--an act of war since by international law all embassies are on foreign soil--occupied it, and held all the occupants hostage for an entire year.
Yes, I know that the Iranians are not Arabs but Persians, an Indo-European people closely related to the Indians. But few Americans were aware of that bit of anthropological data. Since they were Muslims like the Arabs they were just grouped with the Arabs in our psyche. Americans now had a reason to be hostile to Muslims, and as far as they knew, Arabs make up the majority of Muslims. To this day you'll have a hard time finding an American who knows that the four largest Muslim countries are Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nigeria, or that there's a Muslim nation--Albania--in Europe.
Then 9/11 happened. A Muslim fundamentalist organization took credit for the attack, and the majority of the hijackers were citizens of Saudi Arabia. At this point a great many Americans who had been trying to be objective and unbiased were overcome with outrage, grief and patriotism. Hatred for Islam and Arabs and calls for revenge became, for them, a part of their identities as Americans.
Students of terrorism movements suggest that Al Qaeda's leaders may actually want the people of the USA and other nominally Christian nations to hate Muslims. They point out that terrorists are not true warriors and do not act rationally to accomplish a military goal for their people. Fomenting hatred among their enemies, in their bizarre reasoning, forges solidarity among their own people. This could sway the secular Muslims toward piety, the pious toward fundamentalism, and the fundamentalists toward a holy war. (It might also stem the tide of emigration of Muslims to the United States and Europe where they're likely to be corrupted.) Religious fundamentalists don't worry about the preponderance of military might in a holy war, because they're certain that God will step in and make sure the most righteous army is victorious. In any case, those fundamentalists aren't too concerned with life and death in this mortal world, since they're certain that both they and their enemies will be properly rewarded in the next world.
If this analysis is correct--and it is supported by considerable research--then a very short answer to the question, "Why do Americans hate Muslims," would be, "because the people who have been allowed to become Muslim leaders want us to hate them."
Seizing an embassy and killing thousands of people with hijacked airliners are not tactics that have any impact on the results of a future war, and they're certainly not overtures of friendship; i.e., the goal of those two incidents can reasonably be seen as a desire to make us hate them. The embassy takeover was performed by the sovereign government of a Muslim nation, and 9/11 was perpetrated by people whom many Muslims regard as heroes. So whether the average Muslim likes it or not, those are the people who represent him to the average American--the people who want us to hate him.
That all changed abruptly in November 1979. Iran had already had its Islamic Revolution and the Shah was deposed--and most of us didn't care about that. But then the Iranians attacked the U.S. Embassy in Tehran--an act of war since by international law all embassies are on foreign soil--occupied it, and held all the occupants hostage for an entire year.
Yes, I know that the Iranians are not Arabs but Persians, an Indo-European people closely related to the Indians. But few Americans were aware of that bit of anthropological data. Since they were Muslims like the Arabs they were just grouped with the Arabs in our psyche. Americans now had a reason to be hostile to Muslims, and as far as they knew, Arabs make up the majority of Muslims. To this day you'll have a hard time finding an American who knows that the four largest Muslim countries are Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nigeria, or that there's a Muslim nation--Albania--in Europe.
Then 9/11 happened. A Muslim fundamentalist organization took credit for the attack, and the majority of the hijackers were citizens of Saudi Arabia. At this point a great many Americans who had been trying to be objective and unbiased were overcome with outrage, grief and patriotism. Hatred for Islam and Arabs and calls for revenge became, for them, a part of their identities as Americans.
Students of terrorism movements suggest that Al Qaeda's leaders may actually want the people of the USA and other nominally Christian nations to hate Muslims. They point out that terrorists are not true warriors and do not act rationally to accomplish a military goal for their people. Fomenting hatred among their enemies, in their bizarre reasoning, forges solidarity among their own people. This could sway the secular Muslims toward piety, the pious toward fundamentalism, and the fundamentalists toward a holy war. (It might also stem the tide of emigration of Muslims to the United States and Europe where they're likely to be corrupted.) Religious fundamentalists don't worry about the preponderance of military might in a holy war, because they're certain that God will step in and make sure the most righteous army is victorious. In any case, those fundamentalists aren't too concerned with life and death in this mortal world, since they're certain that both they and their enemies will be properly rewarded in the next world.
If this analysis is correct--and it is supported by considerable research--then a very short answer to the question, "Why do Americans hate Muslims," would be, "because the people who have been allowed to become Muslim leaders want us to hate them."
Seizing an embassy and killing thousands of people with hijacked airliners are not tactics that have any impact on the results of a future war, and they're certainly not overtures of friendship; i.e., the goal of those two incidents can reasonably be seen as a desire to make us hate them. The embassy takeover was performed by the sovereign government of a Muslim nation, and 9/11 was perpetrated by people whom many Muslims regard as heroes. So whether the average Muslim likes it or not, those are the people who represent him to the average American--the people who want us to hate him.
That's not a reasonable description of the embassy takeover.fraggle said:
It was not the work of a sovereign government, a terrorist organization, or jihadists; it was not at all motivated by a desire to make Americans hate anyone, much of its intensification and exaggeration were accomplished by the US, its extension for so long has been reliably attributed to alternately domestic Iranian and then domestic US politics, and the generalized Muslim-hatred inculcated among Americans should be attributed to its more apparent source: bigoted and jingoistic and carefully manipulated US media.
Really?? You must be our local "propaganda minister.":bugeye:
According to your pronouncement, the "carefully manipulated US media" must then be responsible for the attack on the embassy in Iran, the bombing of the USS Cole, the bombing of the marine barracks in Beirut, and the attacks on 9/11. And other terrorist attacks around the world.
I knew there was something pretty odd about you, and NOW I know what it is.
? Where does this kind of bizarre response come from?read said:
I's the damndest thing - it's like a couple of trigger words (Iran, Muslim) completely short circuit the reasoning capabilities of the rightwing brain. It seems almost to be a physical event, like an epileptic fit.
exactly they are not much different then most jewish woman or any middle eastern woman, they have been so oppressed by their parents, family and spouses.
If your just a little nice to them, give them a few complements. Your off on a wild Persian carpet ride.
It's no wonder they call us infidels, cause we are the ones having a good time with their woman. You would think they would get a clue.
Given the number of muslim men that are in the closet it's no big surprise.
Nope - the only "fit" anyone is having here is you. I've taken you to task for claiming the U.S. media is responsible for causing the American distrust of Muslims and I simply pointed out world events in which the media did nothing but report.
It was very clear who did the attacking in the events I listed so presenting THAT in the fashion you did is what makes you a "propaganda minister."
What?!?! Of course there are! Indoctrination by the various organised religions starts early. Brainwashing children before they are worldly enough to rationally decide for themselves is the whole basis of organised religion.
Media of course, when was the last time you saw Arabs portrayed as the good guys?
Reel Bad Arabs: how Hollywood vilifies a people.
Doesn't help that so many Americans are just simply clueless in general and ready to hate anyone their government wants to kill.
Stereotypes of Arabs and Muslims
See Fraggle for instance. Otherwise a person with something resembling a brain and yet he skips the whole coup in Iran and 25 years of torture by the western puppet and only focuses on the student revolution where the Iranians finally did what anyone does with foreign terrorism in the country.
And thats just Arabs, as for Muslims:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia
There is a kind of bizarre notion about Muslims which is condensed by all Americans to the turbaned bearded robe and the veil.
Reel Bad Arabs: how Hollywood vilifies a people.
Doesn't help that so many Americans are just simply clueless in general and ready to hate anyone their government wants to kill.
Stereotypes of Arabs and Muslims
See Fraggle for instance. Otherwise a person with something resembling a brain and yet he skips the whole coup in Iran and 25 years of torture by the western puppet and only focuses on the student revolution where the Iranians finally did what anyone does with foreign terrorism in the country.
And thats just Arabs, as for Muslims:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia
There is a kind of bizarre notion about Muslims which is condensed by all Americans to the turbaned bearded robe and the veil.
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I am American and I don't have any problems with Muslims or Arabs...hmmm....I don't seem to fit into your generalization :bugeye:
Also, I'm pretty sure there are plenty of Americans who are Muslim and Arab and don't have a problem with themselves.
I know you said "Not all of course", but the title of your thread suggests other wise.
If there is any animosity from some Americans towards Muslims or Arabs I would think that the answer is obvious...take 9/11 and Bush and mix it all in with war, hate, prejudice, and stupidity and a dash of media propoganda and what do you get? A bunch of racist ignorance.
Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
We've been deceived by our government often enough that a huge segment of the population is immediately skeptical of anything they say that's provocative. See my history of the Baby Boomers and the Generation Gap, which is all over this website. By 1979 when a large fraction of the Boomers had finished their university degrees, that fraction were familiar with the Cold War political overlay in the Middle East and they knew that the Shah was a puppet installed by the CIA shortly after WWII. The anti-American feelings of the Iranians were understandable to them, and they were a powerful counterbalance to the older Americans, who were ready to declare war.
Jimmy Carter was an accidental President like Obama (Big Bird could have defeated Gerald Ford, Nixon's appointed VP) and he was as "clueless" as Obama. Yet as a true Christian and--by political standards--a pacificst, he trod very carefully through the Iranian Hostage Crisis and avoided a military solution. He actually sent a small group of commandos on a rescue mission, which was totally bungled (we pacifists don't make good Commanders-in-Chief) and ended in disaster before they got close to the Embassy.
When the hostages were freed, all you can say about American opinion of Muslims is that it was divided, not to mention complicated. The Boomers were already becoming impatient with Israel over its treatment of the Palestinians, but the generation that is still campaigning (finally successfully) to end drug prohibition was enraged at the Turks for their draconian prosecution of an American with drugs in his luggage.
We did not yet understand that "clueless" President Carter had created the Afghan force that would evolve into the Taliban, as a move in the chess game against the Russians, in which the entire Middle East was our chessboard and its people merely pawns. So at this point we were "cluelessy" waiting to see how politics in the Middle East would develop. We got our answer two decades later, on 9/11.
You're being disingenuous again and I'm calling you on this intellectual dishonesty, which will be reported to the Administrators for their consideration.
- You've read enough of my posts on this website (I know this because you've responded to many of them) to know that I understand history better than most Americans and I know full well the role of the European powers and the Cold Warriors in the shaping of modern Middle Eastern Politics.
- You know that I'm not an Arab-basher, and that I'm an equal-opportunity atheist who holds Christianity, Judaism and Islam in equal contempt. I would be delighted if we could ship all the fundamentalist Christians, Jews and Muslims off to a separate planet where they could happily go on killing each other in the name of their imaginary god and not keep catching us in the crossfire.
- The question in the OP was about "Americans" as a people, and you have changed it to me as an individual. My answers explain why Americans, as a people, feel the way they do, and they are rather carefully worded to emphasize my distance from the consensus. Any inconsistencies in rhetoric (due to the fact that I'm not being paid to write this and so don't proofread it as well as my professional work) must surely be easily identified as errors--especially by you, who are quite familiar with my opinions, including my continued solidarity with you on the Israel-Palestine conflict.
All in all, the leftists who typify the Boomer generation in the press were a brake on American rightist politics, but their influence was not uniform in all political arenas. They had a tremendous impact on race relations, the environment, the growth of the teachers' lobby that is now bankrupting California, and the spread of the welfare state, but as they grow older they have shifted to the right with their disdain for science, their religious fundamentalism and their irrational risk management.
The latter is illlustrated by their refusal to spend a few billion dollars to install breathalyzer interlocks in all new cars, which as the fleet turns over would save one hundred fifty thousand lives per decade from drunk driving, while they commit trillions of dollars, give up their freedoms to the Homeland Gestapo, make this country a pariah state, and piss off one billion Muslims, in a dubious attempt to save the three thousand lives lost to terrorism in that same decade.
Your use of the word "all" is inflammatory and another instance of disingenuity. The majority of Americans live in cities, where they encounter Muslims in real life, and virtually no Muslims wear turbans and veils in America except diplomats from other countries and their wives. There is no stigma attached to wearing beards in America. I have one and so do several members of Congress, newscasters, and other prominent public figures.
At the very least, Americans understand that Muslims differ from one another as much as any people. We are constantly bombarded with news reports from the war zones in the Middle East highlighting the common people who do not hate America or support the terrorist movements. There is considerable support for the Palestinian cause in America, even among its Jewish community.
And thirty years after the Tehran Hostage Crisis we are virtually in love with the Iranian people. Their struggle against Ahmadinejad is front-page news.
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