New York,
the city that has been exposed to terrorist attacks for years now, just
experienced another attack that stems straight from ideas that can be found on
the Internet. In Queens, Muslim extremist, Zale Thompson, attacked two
cops with a hatchet. Thompson was not
affiliated with a specific group but rather explored many different philosophies
and practices online. The Boston
Bombings that took place in April of 2013 were carried out by two men who, like
Thompson, were not affiliated with a particular group of Muslim extremists but
simply based their beliefs off of things they learned on the Internet. The Internet has become a dangerous place for
social interactions because many times people base important decisions off of ideas
of people who are just looking to instigate something in hopes of being
revolutionary. The Facebook page of
Thompson shows that he was not hiding his contempt for the “white government
power struggle” though his page did not refer to the radical Islamic beliefs
that would inspire an attack of this nature. 
Throughout this all, this attack can still be seen as an act of
terrorism, which reminds people that there is something to fear. In the article that we read about Muslim
Americans having two identities, it describes how the fear of terrorism often
overpowers how people treat those who are Muslim and American. Ewing and Hoyler (2008) stated, “Such moments of
awareness often coincide with a large-scale event capable of triggering the
rapid and involuntary repositioning of a group or individual within mainstream
consciousness and esteem.” Muslim
Americans become more aware of their own identity as well as those they
interact with are more aware of the Muslim identity when there is an incident
that reminds them that there is a dangerous group of people who have the same
identity. Fear is an emotion that can
completely change the behavior and attitudes of a nation. When one group of students acts up in class,
the whole class is deemed as a bad class.
This poorly constructed idea unfortunately carries through in this
scenario. Many people believe that all
Muslims are to be feared just because there are bad people who identify as
Muslim. After the attacks on 9/11,
Muslims went through many changes to try and make it clear to those who were
not aware, that there was a great distance between most Muslim Americans and the
Islamic radicals. Although Muslim
Americans attempted to change themselves and emphasize the good in their
culture, events such as Thompson’s attack on the New York policemen and the
Boston Bombings, reinforce the public ideas that Muslims should be feared. There is not only a war on terror in this
country, but also a war that Americans are slowly losing: the war on fear. The power of fear can ostracize and shape the
identity of a culture that is receiving negative attention for the actions of
extremist groups that are not the majority.
Works Consulted
Benjamin, Daniel. 2014. Motive of Destruction. Opinion piece in The Boston Globe. January 4.
Ewing, Katherine Pratt and Marguerite Hoyler. 2008. Being Muslim and American: South Asain Muslim Youth and the War on Terror. Chapter 4 in Being and Belonging.
http://reserves.wheatoncollege.edu/eres/coursepage.aspx?cid=648&page=docs
Yahoo News. 2014. New York police brand hatchet attack 'terrorist' act. October 24.
http://news.yahoo.com/man-islamic-extremist-leanings-attacks-ny-police-083342808.html
Social media is great in so many ways but can be just as harmful. It's scary to know that he was posting his anger on Facebook for the public to see but was still able to go out and attack these officers. Maybe Facebook should have a type of filter that can detect verbal aggression in order to prevent an event like this happening again. I remember days after the Marathon bombings the younger brother's twitter page was found and there was some indications that the bombings were going to happen but there was no solid evidence to know that he and his brother would carry out such atrocities.
ReplyDeleteFear is a powerful emotion. That surprises me and it doesn't surprise me. All it takes are several radical people's actions for others to perceive those of the same race as also being radical. People are only looking skin deep and that's all it takes to instill fear and uncertainty. Also, people worry that Facebook is too public and dislike that it can track their activities, yet at the same time people will question why authorities don't do anything to prevent attacks when the 'evidence' is there. I don't agree that Facebook should be tracking accounts and posts, but at the same time, there should be a way in the system to at least raise a red flag when there is, like Hannah said above, verbal aggression within the account. I find this a difficult topic though, to me its a question of citizen's privacy vs. national surveillance and protection.
ReplyDeleteI actually did research on Chechnya following the collapse of the USSR and how the region's ethnic groups dynamic gave way to many different radical ideologies to come up. It was Islamic radicals that fought and still are fighting for sovereignty from Russia that have propelled these ideologies into todays society. The Boston Bombers were coerced with this ideology. It is scary that we must fear fear now.
ReplyDelete