This is part of a speech I made to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) when they were in Chicago last week, and that I turned into an open letter to the American Media to demand that she and others in the news media stop excluding Arab Americans from the public debate. The basic argument is that excluding mainstream Arab Americans from the mainstream media only feeds the extremism and results in terrorism. The media bias in this country pushes an entire community to the edge and from among that entire community, the extremists come in and harvest a handful to become suicide bombers, terrorists and killers. Is that our fault as Arab Americans or is it also the fault of the American people who sit back and respond with apathy as the news media routinely slanders, disparages and insults Arab Americans and denies them a voice on their op-ed pages.
Ray Hanania
www.ArabWritersGroup.com
Dear MainStream Media:
It's not right that mainstream Arab American voices, especially those of professional journalists, are excluded from the mainstream media debate. We are excluded from Op-Ed pages and also from web sites like your own and it is wrong. It needs to change. We need to change how we discuss and debate issues in the Middle East if we plan to encourage Democracy there.
In order to encourage Democracy in the Middle East, we have to begin by encouraging Democracy in America, first, and end this hate campaign against pro-Arab voices who are demonized, attacked, slandered, excluded, bnlacklisted and vilified so badly that they are pushed out of their employment, denied jobs and denied voices.
Just because we do not address it, does not mean it does not occur.
The real tragedy is that the failure of mainstream media to allow Arab Americans to engage in the public dialogue as equals -- rather than as token voices, usually prominence given to the extremist voices -- only serves to empower the extremists not only in the Middle East but here in the United States.
The fact is that denying Arab Americans voices in the mainstream media and pretending that we don't exist as the majority of the news media does, is actually creating the environment from which extremists can harvest potential terrorists and suicide bombers. When you exclude an entire community, you force them into a corner of frustration, despair and the option of only clinging to the strident voices of the fanatics. Not all of them will turn to violence, but in a community with as many as 250,000 despondent, ignored and oppressed people, such as we have in Chicago, and in other cities around the country with only a few exceptions, one person might respond to the call of the extremists and take up violent arms.
It only took 19 extremists to be recruited to destroy the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, 19 extremists some from abroad but some from right here in America where American mainstream media have discriminated, excluded, silenced and even slandered on their daily newspaper pages and web sites Arab Americans.
These are the remarks I presented recently at a hearing of the FCC in Chicago, to no avail.
But the next time there is a terrorist act, it is morally wrong to turn the focus on Arab Americans and ask why we did nothing. We are trying to do something but the mainstream media and news sites like yours that offer only token representation and voices for Arab Americans are really the ones to blame.
There is no debate in this country on the Middle East issues that we face. There is no debate on the terrorist threat. There is no debate on the increasing extremism in the Middle East. What we have in this country is an exclusive country club-like atmosphere in which the privileged come together to share in their common views and look with disdain at Arab Americans, who are Christian AND Muslim -- the mainstream media can't even get that fact right -- and laugh and exclude us from the public dialogue.
Arab Americans look in the mirror of American society everyday and we do not see our images. We are treated like vampires. That mirror is the American media. We see examples of hatred and racism against Arab Americans every day, in columns and in other medias, such as recently on the Drew Carey show "Power of 10" in which a contestant was asked how many Americans would refuse to board a plane if they saw a group of "Arab Men" board the plane first? The pathetic and frightening answer: 36 percent.
I believe that 36 percent figure is far below the real number that reflects the true level of racism and bigotry and discrimination against Arab Americans.
We are demanding our voices and I am asking you to please consider these facts and give us a voice.
Thanks
Ray Hanania
www.ArabWritersGroup.com