We have all become familiar with Islamophobic sentiment perpetuated through the media. However, the recent Twitter trend #blamethemuslims is particularly interesting and perhaps troubling because it is an example of how Islamophobia can be at times accidentally perpetuated in the public world through social networks. The hashtag has become a popular trend since creator Sanum Ghafoor originally tweeted in reply to the media’s Islamophobic responses to the violence in Norway this past weekend. Ghafoor, a young Muslim woman who lives in the UK, tweeted that she began the trend “to highlight how ridiculous it is to blame Muslims for every problem in the world.” The original tweet was intended to be satirical, yet over the weekend it has sparked a great controversy on Twitter that is still continuing. Some users, misinterpreting the intended meaning of the tag, have used #blamethemuslims to make Islamophobic and racist remarks while others, responding in protest and outrage, have unintentionally perpetuated the hashtag’s reign as one of Twitter’s top trends (#slightlyproblematic?). More recently, an overwhelming number of tweets that use the hashtag intend to clarify the original (satirical) meaning behind the trend and assure other twitter users that it is “not racist.”
Read the entire article on Islamophobiatoday.com
Emily Kianka is a summer intern here at the Interfaith Center. She is working with Prepare NY coalition to educate New Yorkers about Islamophobia and its detrimental effects. The majority of her effort has gone into organizing conversations with city government officials in preparation for the tenth anneversiary of September 11th.
