By *Rasha Abdulla
Posted: 28 September 2012
An idiotic movie (of which we’ve only seen a trailer) produced by some who absolutely lack any religious sensitivity… An idiotic reaction by a handful of long-bearded Muslims who got idiotically moved to “defend” the Prophet… An idiotic cover by Newsweek lacking any sense of journalistic professionalism and reducing the issue to “Muslim Rage.”… But then thank God we got Twitter!
It’s amazing how Newsweek decided that Muslim Rage was an appropriate term to describe a population of more than 1.5 billion people worldwide… The same ignorant rhetoric we saw on the part of American media in the aftermath of the criminal acts of 9/11.
It is so easy to paint 1.5 billion people with a brush of rage, of red blood, of animosity and hatred towards the West. And of course, and why not, especially since the act will probably go unpunished. As a raging Muslim woman, I wonder if the magazine would’ve been able to get away with “Jewish Rage” for any of the atrocities Israel commits on a daily basis against Palestinians, including many women and children.
But as I said, thank God for social media.
Immediately after the ludicrous cover was published, with Newsweek suggesting people tweet them comments under the hash tag #MuslimRage, Muslims and non-Muslims took to the playground to show Newsweek some real #Muslim Rage. I’ll leave you with some of my favorites below, and sincerely hope the media will think twice about the consequences of what they publish before taking the raging easy way out!
Lost your kid “Jihad” at the airport. Can’t yell for him. #MuslimRage
One hour to drive six miles. Should take my camel to work next time. #MuslimRage
I’m out of Ben and Jerry’s “Sharia Garcia” ice-cream and Notting Hill is on TV. #MuslimRage
Twitter is over capacity. Heading to the U.S. embassy. #MuslimRage
*Rasha Abdulla, Ph.D., is associate professor and former chair of Journalism and Mass Communication at the American University in Cairo. She is also the author of the MDI studies on media diversity in Egypt. She tweets regularly at @RashaAbdulla.