By Souheila Al-Jadda
"Excuse my ignorance, but I didn't know whether Muslim kids are allowed to play with dolls," he said.
Terry Howarth, my parents' neighbor in Ohio and a wood craftsman, admitted this to me after giving a hand-carved wooden doll's cradle and train to my 20-month-old daughter.
"Of course, they do," I said. "I played with Barbie as a kid!"
"Hey, have you seen this new show about Muslims?" he asked.
This is how our conversation began about All-American Muslim, a new reality TV show featuring five Muslim-American families living in Dearborn, Mich. — a city with the highest concentration of Arab Americans in the U.S. The show airs on The Learning Channel (TLC) and has sparked controversy, to put it mildly.
This past weekend, Lowe's hardware chain said it pulled its advertising because the show "raised concerns."
What concerns? Terry went on to ask me about my hijab (head scarf) and other aspects of my faith based on what he saw on the program. To me, and many other Muslim Americans, this is the strength of the TV show — demystifying a community that has long been misunderstood. With an opening night audience of 1.7 million, according to Broadcasting & Cable, All-American Muslim will hopefully change the national discourse about Muslims from that of suspicion and exclusion to one of greater trust and inclusion.
Propaganda charges
But a number of critics and activists are unfairly attacking the program, claiming the show is Muslim propaganda that hides the extremist agenda. Some are even pressuring companies, in addition to Lowe's, to pull their advertising to force the show off the air. These attacks are not only short on substance but also wrong on principle and bad for America. They undermine ever-evolving American values of pluralism and tolerance.
The Florida Family Association (FFA), a conservative non-profit organization, has initiated an e-mail campaign targeting the show's advertisers. One FFA e-mail states, "The show profiles only Muslims that appear to be ordinary folks while excluding many Islamic believers whose agenda poses a clear and present danger to liberties and traditional values that the majority of Americans cherish."
Does this group really want to see the day-to-day lives of, um, terrorists? Reality TV is about humanity, not ideology.
This show is about Nader and Nawal Aoude, who are having their first child and feeling anxious about being new parents. Nader speaks to the camera, "I don't know how to be a father; it's really overwhelming."
We learn of life as experienced through the teary-eyed Suehailia Amen, a thirtysomething single, working woman who wants to meet the right man. "When am I going to find that person that, at the end of the day, I can lean on?" Suehaila asks her best friend, Josephine, a Christian Arab. "It upsets me so much because I hear so many guys tell me, 'I'm intimidated by you' … I want to say, 'I'm sorry you're not man enough.' "
See why this portrayal of Muslim Americans is so … dangerous? I mean, what happens to the bigotry and stereotyping if they're just like … other Americans?
Is the fear-mongering working? Perhaps. The FFA claims that it has pressured nearly 90 companies to pull ads from the show. In an e-mail to FFA's executive director, Lowe's wrote: "There are certain programs that do not meet Lowe's advertising guidelines, including the show you brought to our attention. Lowe's will no longer be advertising on that program."
After news reports and public outrage over the company's actions, Lowe's has since backtracked, saying it pulled its ad based on receiving e-mails not from one group but from a "broad spectrum of customers and viewers who represent multiple perspectives." I asked a Lowe's spokesperson how many e-mails the company received when it decided to pull the show. She said not thousands, not hundreds, but "dozens."
Lowe's should expect many more e-mails, as the blogosphere and social media sites are abuzz debating the merits of the show.
Certainly, any company's primary focus is on its bottom line. But pandering to those who seek to defame an entire minority population is not just wrong, it's bad for business. At stake: an estimated 7 million American Muslims with a purchasing power of $12 billion, according to the New York-based Center for American Muslim Research and Information.
A long way to go
It's no secret that anti-Muslim rhetoric continues to plague public discussions about this community. From New York Rep. Pete King's Muslim radicalization hearings in Congress this year to the anti-sharia movement to the debate surrounding an Islamic center near Ground Zero in New York, Muslims hear this drumbeat of suspicion even a decade after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Indeed, Americans still hold unfavorable views of Muslims. According to a CBS/New York Times poll in August, a quarter of Americans still hold negative opinions of Muslims — all Muslims — because of 9/11.
Perhaps All-American Muslim can change this. Already, important dialogues about faith have begun, such as those on interfaith portal Patheos.com or religiondispatches.org as well as other social networking sites.
If TLC hadn't taken a chance with this show, my friend Terry would have never asked me about life growing up as a Muslim in America, leaving him with the mistaken belief that Muslim girls don't play with dolls.
Souheila Al-Jadda is a senior editor at The Islamic Monthly and a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors.
Source: USA Today
"Excuse my ignorance, but I didn't know whether Muslim kids are allowed to play with dolls," he said.
Terry Howarth, my parents' neighbor in Ohio and a wood craftsman, admitted this to me after giving a hand-carved wooden doll's cradle and train to my 20-month-old daughter.
"Of course, they do," I said. "I played with Barbie as a kid!"
"Hey, have you seen this new show about Muslims?" he asked.
This is how our conversation began about All-American Muslim, a new reality TV show featuring five Muslim-American families living in Dearborn, Mich. — a city with the highest concentration of Arab Americans in the U.S. The show airs on The Learning Channel (TLC) and has sparked controversy, to put it mildly.
This past weekend, Lowe's hardware chain said it pulled its advertising because the show "raised concerns."
What concerns? Terry went on to ask me about my hijab (head scarf) and other aspects of my faith based on what he saw on the program. To me, and many other Muslim Americans, this is the strength of the TV show — demystifying a community that has long been misunderstood. With an opening night audience of 1.7 million, according to Broadcasting & Cable, All-American Muslim will hopefully change the national discourse about Muslims from that of suspicion and exclusion to one of greater trust and inclusion.
Propaganda charges
But a number of critics and activists are unfairly attacking the program, claiming the show is Muslim propaganda that hides the extremist agenda. Some are even pressuring companies, in addition to Lowe's, to pull their advertising to force the show off the air. These attacks are not only short on substance but also wrong on principle and bad for America. They undermine ever-evolving American values of pluralism and tolerance.
The Florida Family Association (FFA), a conservative non-profit organization, has initiated an e-mail campaign targeting the show's advertisers. One FFA e-mail states, "The show profiles only Muslims that appear to be ordinary folks while excluding many Islamic believers whose agenda poses a clear and present danger to liberties and traditional values that the majority of Americans cherish."
Does this group really want to see the day-to-day lives of, um, terrorists? Reality TV is about humanity, not ideology.
This show is about Nader and Nawal Aoude, who are having their first child and feeling anxious about being new parents. Nader speaks to the camera, "I don't know how to be a father; it's really overwhelming."
We learn of life as experienced through the teary-eyed Suehailia Amen, a thirtysomething single, working woman who wants to meet the right man. "When am I going to find that person that, at the end of the day, I can lean on?" Suehaila asks her best friend, Josephine, a Christian Arab. "It upsets me so much because I hear so many guys tell me, 'I'm intimidated by you' … I want to say, 'I'm sorry you're not man enough.' "
See why this portrayal of Muslim Americans is so … dangerous? I mean, what happens to the bigotry and stereotyping if they're just like … other Americans?
Is the fear-mongering working? Perhaps. The FFA claims that it has pressured nearly 90 companies to pull ads from the show. In an e-mail to FFA's executive director, Lowe's wrote: "There are certain programs that do not meet Lowe's advertising guidelines, including the show you brought to our attention. Lowe's will no longer be advertising on that program."
After news reports and public outrage over the company's actions, Lowe's has since backtracked, saying it pulled its ad based on receiving e-mails not from one group but from a "broad spectrum of customers and viewers who represent multiple perspectives." I asked a Lowe's spokesperson how many e-mails the company received when it decided to pull the show. She said not thousands, not hundreds, but "dozens."
Lowe's should expect many more e-mails, as the blogosphere and social media sites are abuzz debating the merits of the show.
Certainly, any company's primary focus is on its bottom line. But pandering to those who seek to defame an entire minority population is not just wrong, it's bad for business. At stake: an estimated 7 million American Muslims with a purchasing power of $12 billion, according to the New York-based Center for American Muslim Research and Information.
A long way to go
It's no secret that anti-Muslim rhetoric continues to plague public discussions about this community. From New York Rep. Pete King's Muslim radicalization hearings in Congress this year to the anti-sharia movement to the debate surrounding an Islamic center near Ground Zero in New York, Muslims hear this drumbeat of suspicion even a decade after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Indeed, Americans still hold unfavorable views of Muslims. According to a CBS/New York Times poll in August, a quarter of Americans still hold negative opinions of Muslims — all Muslims — because of 9/11.
Perhaps All-American Muslim can change this. Already, important dialogues about faith have begun, such as those on interfaith portal Patheos.com or religiondispatches.org as well as other social networking sites.
If TLC hadn't taken a chance with this show, my friend Terry would have never asked me about life growing up as a Muslim in America, leaving him with the mistaken belief that Muslim girls don't play with dolls.
Souheila Al-Jadda is a senior editor at The Islamic Monthly and a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors.
Source: USA Today
No comments:
Post a Comment