Chance Williams
Intro to Intercultural Communication
Module 4
A quote by Andrew Smith “People fear what they don’t understand, and hate what they can’t conquer”. This is as true of a statement I have ever heard when it comes to Arab Americans. It is human nature to look at someone and instantly pass judgment on them before we get to know them. So what gives us the right to do this? What makes Americans the judge of humanity and gives us the rights to do this? We are not born with the ability to stereotype someone, we are taught it from our parents, grandparent, sisters, brothers, cousins, friends, coworkers. Two of the most contemporary stereotypes of Arab Americans is that they are all terrorist and going to blow something up, and that they are religious fanatics. According to Webster’s Dictionary a terrorist is a radical who employs terror as a political weapon, usually organizes with other terrorist in small cells; often use religion as a cover for terrorist activities (Webster’s Dictionary). A religious fanatic is a person or group that is devoted to ones religion. So after reading these definition, I do not see anything that relates to race, or country of origin, the color of one’s skin, or the language they speak. But regardless of those facts we stereotype Arab Americans as terrorist and assume they are all plotting to blow us up. We forget that they are American citizens and are probably a 2nd,3rd, or 4th generation to be born in this country. So how and why is this detrimental to our interactions with people of American heritage? By rushing to stereotype Arabs we forget that they are human beings and did not choose their ethnicity. Also we assume that they hate America and are only here to plan an attack like 9/11. In the days following the Oklahoma City bombing and 9/11 over 200 Arab American were the victims of hate crimes. We all know that the 9/11 attacks were carried out by terrorist of Arabic ethnicity, yet the Oklahoma Bombings were carried out by a white Christian named Timothy McVeigh. Despite the separate attacks by different people we stereotyped Arabs in both cases. So by stereotyping Arab Americans we harm ourselves by rushing to blame all Arabs for the actions of a few. So how do we fix this problem or fight against it? I would love to save that it is a fixable problem but it ‘not. But we can fight against it and work to prevent serotyping. As Andrew Smith said, “We fear what we don’t understand, and hate what we cannot conquer”. We must start by understanding Arab Americans, and get to know them before we pass judgment. We then must stop trying to conquer them and accept them as Americans. It was not long ago that the same occurred with Japanese Americans after the attack on Pearl Harbor. American assumed that all Japanese were bad and we placed them into camps separate from all others. Over time we moved on and began to accept them as Americans. So we must now move on and allow the wounds to heal and accept Arab Americans as equals. So how can we as citizens and the media counter the negativity of this portrayal of Arabs? There are countless
