They are not Arabs, they are BAD ARABS

   “Oh I come from a land, from a faraway place

   Where the caravan camels roam

   Where they cut off your ear

   If they don't like your face

   It's barbaric, but hey, it's home”

The above lines are taken from the song, Arabian Nights from the Disney classic Alladin. This itself portrays how to Arabs are stereotyped as being barbaric and belonging to a far off land away from the rest. Arabs have been associated with matters like polygamy, early marriage, honour killing, illiteracy and lately terrorism. Ever since 9/11, the situation for Arabs has worsened specially in America and Europe.

Arabs are universally treated as criminals and hence are looked at with suspicion everywhere. Soon after 9/11, America tightened its security where White americans only went through he basic security checks and non americans were made to go through intense security checks. It further intensified when arab women were asked to remove their burqa (the covering on their face). Arab women are not permitted to show their faces to unknown men which they were made to for the reasons of security.

Moreover, American residents started treating Arabs and Muslims as being different from them and socially unacceptable. so much so that Arabs were seen replacing their flags with American flags outside their apartments and businesses to avoid being victimised of racial discrimination. Click here for more information

The problem is seen from its surface but its roots lie deep inside. Muslims have been associated with terrorism in a while. The acts of terrorism in countries like India, London and the Middle East had been intensely covered by the media and the entire world was well aware of it. However, they did not pay much attention to it since nothing major had happened. However 9/11 shocked the Americans since now the terrorists had targeted America and caused the death of many innocent civilians. Since terrorists are always thought of as Muslims, the first target of aggression were Arabs itself since Arabian countries are Islamic countries too. Many of them were forced to shave and remove their burqa because they didn’t want to fall victims to this social distress. However, it did seem like the entire world was on one side and Arabs were on the other side.

The question lies in the fact that why do not people understand that not every terrorist is an Arab and not every arab is a terrorist. I do understand that a small sect of the community performs such acts but it is the ‘mark of the plural’ that every Arab bears the consequences of acts performed by someone else.

Media has played an important part in portraying thr Arabs the way they are. In lieu to present videos to the audiences about what is happening around, they mostly show clips of brutality performed only by the Arabs. It is very rare to come across a report where Arabs have done something good for any country apart from their own. People’s ideologies are shaped and reshaped by the media itself since media is the only source of information to them, and hence they develop their perceptions according to what is told to them. Media should try and portray the negative and the positive side of Arabs and not only concentrate on the negative ones. Ultimately it is more about understanding the need to spread peace and information than a need to spread information and earn money.