Islamaphobia Essay

The psychological impact of experiencing Islamaphobia.

Discrimination leads to a range of different mistreatments from feeling humiliated by another to depression, depending on the ways in which the individual responds. Having any sort of negative type behaviour towards the targeted individual, or even a group of people on either their race, or religion is seen as discrimination towards that specific group. The experience of such discrimination can be stressful, and also reduce a person’s sense of control. Having constant experience on discrimination can have major and negative impacts to the quality of an individual’s life. Racial and ethnic minorities are most likely to receive more discrimination against their groups than other groups, e.g. the Middle East (Todd 2012).
There is an increasing awareness on the discrimination against Muslims towards their religion, which people often use by the term Islamaphobia. This is an irrational phobia towards their religion Islam, which is an old and yet a new concept in today’s society that has become one of the main targets in the media. Since September 11th, 2001, Islamaphobia became extremely important in the media as society showed, negative attitudinal and behavioural antipathy towards people and symbols of Muslim faith and has become a major focus of social and political discourse around the world. Islamaphobia has been considered by some to be yet the most dangerous form of prejudice (Cohen et al. 2013).
Islamaphobia was first introduced at the end of the 1980s and has increasingly been used, to describe the fear of Islam and Muslims as a social group. Muslims have become the main new target with racism, prejudice and hatred after 9/11. Islamaphobia is also a ter...

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... that perceived discrimination can lead to mental health problems such as increased stress, depression, and anxiety. Sirin et al, 2009 have examined the impacts of negative stereotypes on Muslims in their research and stated there is a significant possibility that negative stereotypes on young Muslims can affect them in the future and make them towards members of stigmatized groups.
The psychological impact of people experiencing Islamaphobia is most crucially devastating. Experiencing this type of discrimination can lead to feeling not belonging anywhere and have a poor low self esteem. Moreover, rejection in any type of discrimination which in this case is religion, is not only painful but also tears down peoples self esteem which makes people feel less worthy, this attitude can cause generations pass it on and have major effects on people’s psychological health.