Why are Americans obsessed with Islam?

Question

It's all they think about! It's like they think their borders are constantly under attack when they're clearly not. whenever you see some nut in Iraq with a hostage, they've got the poor bugger dressed a "Camp X-Ray" inmate and they're bleating about "Our Muslim Brothers". It's clear to anyone that this didn't really happen five years ago and that America's just making the situation worse.

Of course I sympathise with the 11/9 attacks and agree that what happened was horrendous but talking constantly about killing all muslims does have certain "Holocaust" feel about it.

I'm British, so I'm not stranger to terrorism, bearing in mind the decades of IRA campaignes but I find the US' new found piety on the issue troubling considering the IRA was funded exclusively from America.

I'm not having a dig at America, just observing that throughout they're history, they've had an enemy "Who want to destroy our democratic way of life".

Answer 1

Because the communist threat is gone and the American government needs a bad guy to enable them to have little wars to keep their arms industry going. That is why.

Answer 2

In response to the question itself, it's not just Americans nor is it just an obsession; it has now transcended that to become a hatred and irrational fear.

Many questions on YA's immigration thread are inundated with people stating that, "not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslims". Additionally - I've learned from these same responders - that Muslims can come and live here on a whim with no fear of rejection or denial of resident status, that soon, "the Muslim flag" will flying everywhere, that White people cannot denounce them for for fear of being labelled racist and politically incorrect and that they are entitled to free Housing, state payouts and every other benefit at the disposal of the, namby pamby politically correct liberal left.

There is no rhyme and reason to these arguments and even less basis in fact. What surprises me is the virulence with which people hold these views.

Answer 3

Prior to 9/11, Americans were barely aware of Islam - even though it was the world's fastest growing religion even then. After 9/11, an understandable concern about the architects of that attack emerged. It ranged from the intellectual ("Islam is a concern because it has not yet undergone a liberal re-examination in the way Christianity did durring the Reformation" ) to the emotional ("Nuke the Middle East to glass, let that Al guy they worship sort them out").

And, one of the ironies of war is that you do get to know your enemies a bit. American and Japanese culture have had much more cross-polination since Pearl Harbor, for instance.

Maybe it's just America. We are an isolationist nation, at heart, and we do seem to only pay attention to other nations when they're trying to kill us.

Answer 4

Many Americans think all Islams are a constant threat because of 9/11 when it is only the extremists that need to be worried about. It is a common misconception that all Muslims want to destroy America. The extremists are nowhere near taking over America and destroying democracy but I must disagree about our borders. The illegals can get in so the terrorists can also get in. I mean we should not be fighting in Iraq...instead we should be protecting our own borders...not because our democratic way of life is in danger but because people lives could be in danger.

Answer 5

@scarface: Islam does not practice you to in trouble-free terms love your neighbour, it teaches you to love each physique. Jihad is only final hotel. Like if somebody's attempting to kill you and your loved ones, might you be like oh no Christianity says love your neighbour so its ok, pass on and kill me, i will nonetheless love you. this is needed to combat back, actual, to save your self and your loved ones. in addition, Islam is thoroughly against struggling with and killing and stuff. yet there are some circumstances in which you're able to be able to desire to combat back. answer to the question: some human beings are obsessing way too lots over Muslims and Islam, sure. no longer all. Out of the 50 or so American human beings i've got presently talked to, in trouble-free terms approximately 4 are opposed, something are very spectacular and not judgemental. The media's rather no longer assisting, it insists on portraying all Muslims as terrorists.

Answer 6

If an honest poll were done, it would be shown that relatively few Americans really feel hatred towards Muslims, and of the ones who do, most of them are very ignorant of the truth.

American media and government are obsessed with Islam because their master is Zionism. By no means do all or even half the Americans feel the same way about Islam.

Answer 7

Because the media and the government is obsessed with Islam because the middle east was a stumbling block in their quest for global domination.

Apparently particularly Iraq and now Iran.

I don't give an F about Islam and also most all Islamic's that I meet personally are nice, smart and seem like good people.

I think this is jammed down our throat by the government and the media (one and the same) so we hate islam and support wars for oil, money and power.

American's are particularly gullible, naive, and apathetic.

Answer 8

The concept of using religion (in this case, Islam) to justify murdering innocent people is new to most Americans, therefore we tend to be interested/obsessed/afraid of what we don't understand. Even one undeserved attack against our country's innocent civilians is too many. Your comment referring to Americans "...talking constantly about killing all muslims" is obviously your own anecdotal observation rather than evidential fact, so I have to disregard it. Americans want to know and to understand our enemy, so we turn to the fundamental unifying characteristic of the terrorists - Islamic extremism. Unfortunately (for peaceful Muslims) they often get lumped into the "enemy" category too. For Muslims who dislike this, the way to eliminate this form of prejudice is to take an active aggressive stand against Islamic extremists. Until this is done, Americans as a social group will see your passive indifference as tacit approval of extremism.

Answer 9

Fear and paranoia -- America is told that we need to fear someone, and every media outlet throws around the words "Islamo-fascist" or "Radical Islam" as if that was the only threat that exists in the world.

Terrorism has been around since the dawn of civilization. Islam has been around for 1400 years. The US start getting attacked by terrorist groups who claim to follow Islam for the past 20 years.

Of all the US terrorist attacks in the past 30 years, more than half were domestic in origin. And of the foreign attacks, just half (25%) were Islamic. Compared with 20% of the world's population being Islamic -- meaning it's statistical average.

And if you take out the attacks from one particular terrorist group -- Al Qaeda -- the rest of the Islamic terrorist attacks fall to under 10% -- much less than statistical average.

But people want a scape goat -- and the Christian hatred of any non-Christian religion makes Islam a great target.

Answer 10

Well first it's 9/11 second "but talking constantly about killing all Muslims" that's stupid who said anything about killing all Muslims. We are just trying to eliminate a threat to our country not killing all Muslims.

Answer 11

Let me just address one of your points. You mention the IRA and some how compare that to the 9/11 terrorist. On 9/11 America did nothing to the evil monsters who destroyed our towers and killed our people. The British invaded Ireland, tortured and starved the people, denied them freedom and rights, the IRA was a reaction to the actions of the murderous British government. 9/11 was not

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