Introduction
In my work, I shall consider how ideology is used to support Arab Muslim oppression and discrimination. Facts from all over the world show that lately, Islamic people have faced unprecedented persecution and discrimination. For example, after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, Americans see Muslims as facing more discrimination inside the country than any other religious or ethnic group. Nearly 60% of adults said that Muslims were subject to a lot of discrimination. So, the question arises as to the reason for this discrimination. Facts show that all over the world ideology is used to support Arab Muslim oppression and discrimination, and what is this ideology?
Main body
To speak about this important issue I believe it is important to specify the term discrimination in itself. Discrimination is the unjust attitude to certain individuals based on their being a part of a particular group or category of people. It involves offensive acts and works towards these individuals, for example excluding or restricting members of this group from advantages that are available to other individuals. In this work, I will consider numerous sad facts which show the way Arabs and Muslims are oppressed all over the world and how their oppressors explain their behavior.
Muslims are oppressed around the world: in the US, in Chechnya, Iraq, East Turkestan, Palestine, Afghanistan, Kashmir, Burma, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Azerbaijan, Nigeria, and more. Nowadays, especially after 9/11, Muslims became targets of abusive and sometimes violent retaliatory attacks. According to Casciani, “some Arabs in the UK said they had suffered subtle discrimination at school or the workplace, others had suffered physical or verbal abuse on public transport. Several children were also recorded as having been attacked because of their faith, said the authors.”(2004) They also face economical discrimination as applying for jobs became a problem for them. According to Connor: “The unemployment rate among British Muslim men is around 13 percent, which is approximately three times higher than the rate among men belonging to other faiths. Young Muslims are at even higher risk of being unemployed. Muslims aged between 16 and 24 have the highest jobless rates of any group and are more than twice as likely to be unemployed compared to Christians of the same age, with a jobless rate of 28 percent compared with 11 percent, according to the Office of National Statistics.”(2010) The same situation is evident in the other western countries, for example, France where always lived numerous Arabs reported a high level of unemployment among Arab citizens, which never happened before.
So what causes the world society to act like this toward Arab people? The aggressive oppression and discrimination toward Islamic people are explained by the fact that Muslims are viewed as ‘troublemakers’ all over the world. People are only motivated with what they see, hear and fear and after 9/11 the atmosphere around Muslims is quite fearful as over 16,000 terrorist attacks have been committed by Muslims since that day, more people are killed by Islamists each year than in all 350 years of the Spanish Inquisition combined, Islamic terrorists murder more people every day than the Ku Klux Klan has in the last 50 years, more civilians were killed by Muslim extremists in two hours on September 11th than in the 36 years of sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland. And these are only a few facts mentioned. In addition to this, numerous world politics made statements of great importance in forming in people’s minds a negative position towards Arabs. For example, President Bush said in connection with Islamists: “All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: The United States will not ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors. When you stand for liberty. we will stand with you”( Ajami, 2007) Such words by the president formed a strong negative aura around Islamic people.
The other reason for the misunderstanding and thus discriminating and oppressing Arabs is their Islamic religion, which seems to be very strange for western world mentality. It is very difficult for the world society to understand why Arabs are so zealous about their faith, why they proclaim religious war to non-Muslims, why they keep on telling that their religion is the best and the only true one, why they disregard the other Holy Scriptures as the Bible for example and many, many more other “ whys”. Another troublesome thing for people’s understanding is the attitude of Muslims toward women formed by their religion, which at times are so oppressed by men that it even seems that animals have better rights and are more valued among Aram men. Religious incompatibleness also causes cultural one as people can’t understand the culture of Muslims as it is so firmly established by the Islamic religion. Arabs’ culture also forms in the particular attitudes and their bad behavior: Muslims act as if they are superior to all others and want special treatment.
Conclusion
After concluding all these facts, I must say that Arab Muslim oppression and discrimination is gaining momentum day by day mainly because of world terrorism which is fully associated with Arabs and Muslims, and on the reason of religious and cultural misunderstanding.
References
Ajami, F. (2007). Liberty for Strangers: American Power and the Predicament of the Arabs. The American Spectator, 40, 32+.
Casciani, D. (2004). ‘Rise’ in Muslim discrimination. Web.
Connor, S. (2010). Employers discriminate against Muslims, study finds. Web.