How Americans think about Muslims mostly comes from the headlines they read

Americans use headlines to form their opinions of Islam since many Americans do not personally know any Muslim people.

(Image credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

published 24 November 2015

How Americans perceive Muslims is linked primarily to headlines — which makes sense, because most Americans haven't even spoken to a Muslim in the past year, The Washington Post reports.

According to the Public Religion Research Institute's American Values Survey, which was conducted before the Nov. 13 Paris terror attacks, 56 percent of Americans believe the values of Islam conflict with values of the United States.

However, since the U.S. Muslim population is relatively small — only about 1 percent — and spread out across a handful of cities, many Americans are forming opinions about Islam from a distance. In 2011, seven in 10 Americans said they hadn't even talked to a Muslim in the past year. In 2013, another survey found that a majority of Americans couldn't even locate Syria — a predominantly Muslim country — on a map.

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That's a problem, considering "the act of simply knowing someone from a minority group can be a powerful perception game-changer," The Washington Post reports.

Look no further than the recent speedy cultural shift toward accepting gay and lesbian Americans [...] In fact, by the time the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in June, nine in 10 Americans said they knew someone who was gay. It would seem Americans don't have that kind of connection with Muslims.Filling that knowledge gap is, of course, the media. And the brutality of the Islamic State — taped beheadings, brash threats, the Paris attacks — is dominating most American news coverage about Islam these days. [The Washington Post]

President Obama has also recently condemned the media for its portrayal of Islam. "We will not give in to fear, or start turning on each other, or treating some people differently because of religion or race or background. That's precisely what terrorists like ISIL want, because, ultimately, that's the only way they can win," he said.

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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.