In the past week, there have been at least two terrorist attacks in the United States alone.
On Tuesday, Feb. 10 Craig Hicks, a 46-year-old white man, murdered three Muslim students by shooting them “execution style” in the back of the head in their home. Their names were Deah Barakat, 23, Yusor Abu-Salha, 21 and Razan Abu-Salha, 19.
Barakat and Yusor Abu-Salha had just been married six weeks earlier and Razan Abu-Salha, Yusor’s sister, was visiting them. All of them were American citizens, born and raised here. If you have heard anything about this incident, you’ve probably heard it referred to as a “Parking Dispute.”
When the media finally deemed the story important enough to report, headlines read, “Three killed over parking dispute” or “Man shoots three over parking dispute.”
Man, not terrorist.
I want you to use your imagination for a minute. Imagine a Muslim. Take that image that popped into your head and imagine that he walked into the home of three white students, age 23, 21 and 19-years-old and imagine that he shot them all in the head at point blank range, killing them on site. Would the media call him a “troublemaker” like Craig Hicks? Would they vouch for his character by saying that “he advocated for the rights of others on his Facebook page”? Would they say he killed these students over a parking spot? Be honest with your answer.
Apparently in American mainstream media, you’re not considered a terrorist unless you’re Muslim, brown or a combination of both. The media has said some crazy stuff in the past about Muslims, but to dismiss the murders of these three young people as nothing but an unfortunate event resulting from a parking dispute is a vicious insult.
Muslims all over the country and the world have been urging the media to call it what it is — a hate crime. If Deah, Yusor and Razan (who both wore the hijab) were not easily identifiable as Muslims, then they might still be alive today.
I will try not to go into a long tangent on the amount of hate crimes and threats on Muslims across the country that have occurred since this attack, some even on this campus. This isn’t what I want this column to be about. We are at an institution of higher education, right? We are supposed to be learning to utilize our intellect. We are supposed to be able to ask the tough questions.
So here’s mine: Why is it so easy for people to get away with the dehumanization of Muslims through platforms such as film and media? When said dehumanization and Islamophobia begins to be internalized and expressed why are people so quick to dismiss it when Muslims end up dead in their homes?
Hawa Henderson is a senior in microbiology. She can be reached at [email protected].
