"Out there! There's a world outside of Yonkers!"That quote from the song, "Put on Your Sunday Clothes" seems to fit well with the current problem we are facing in America today. Although current technology allows us to communicate easier with people all around the globe during every second of the day, it seems that we are being even more closed into little self absorbed cocoons where we hardly notice whats happening at our nations capital never mind halfway around the world. Most of us spend more time and energy invested in the goings on of meddling housewives and steamy doctors, than even noticing the fifth of the world's population that practices Islam. When we do notice them, we stereotype all of them from the images we see on shows like South Park or The Simpsons.
When terrorists take over
Imagination Land in South Park
Shows like South Park show the more impressionable younger generations images of "terrorists" wearing traditional Islamic clothing and it gives the message that all people wearing that kind of clothing are dangerous and are going to attack you and your loved ones. As the wealthy, educated people we are, living in the Northeast United States, we don't notice what these images could portray to other because we all know better. However, for those who are less lucky, they see these images and it gives them a negative view on all of Islam and that reflects badly on all of the United States.
It's not the goal of television, as far as I know, to change how we view other cultures, but it gets in there because of the personal bias that all humans have. Even the tone a news anchor uses on a story can dramatically change how our subconscious receives it. I know it's silly to bring up, because it's really impossible to have a complete story in the news or in a newspaper without it swaying towards some side, but I think that if people are at least more conscious about it, it may help prevent any more degeneration in America's own culture.
Before the September 11th attacks happened, I don't remember ever hearing anything about the middle east, other than in geography class. Of course, since I was only nine or ten, that isn't too shocking. What is shocking though, is the amount of information and pictures that appeared afterwards. Suddenly faces like Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein were staring me down from the TV and I would honestly be a little afraid of going outside where they could get me. I think that by now, over seven years later, that feeling has mostly gone because now I know a lot more about the Middle East, but I feel that because of how Islam and Iraq and Iran were shown to me at that impressionable age, I might never feel 100% safe around a practicing Muslim who fits the American Stereotype.
