Analyzing Our Perception of Arabic Society: "Reel Bad Arabs"

What we find entertaining says a lot about who we are and what we value. Industries focus on inspiring specific emotions and attracting an audience to earn a profit. But a lot of the time we don’t think about the prolonged effect of certain content. In the documentary Reel Bad Arabs filmmakers examine Hollywood’s depiction of Arabic culture in American cinema. These movies inspire opinions that develop outside of the theater and have formed a negative connation associated with Arabic society. Throughout the documentary I recognized nine films. I also realized that I have watched most of them with my family and enjoyed them. Yet after rethinking the message conveyed from these films I realize they have contributed to my perception of the Arabic culture. Movies such as Indiana Jones, Back to the Future, and Aladdin characterize the Arab race as violent, insensitive and less developed than American society.

            Perhaps something I hadn’t thought of before was Hollywood’s display of Arabic women. In most movies they are visualized a disrespected and suppressed cohort of society, when actually the Arab culture is transforming itself to empower women. Today the majority of college students are women and films do little to display women as businesswomen or loving mothers. In the age of American female empowerment and independence, I would expect to see some translation of that into film. Yet we still see cloaked representations of women in many street scenes of movies. Another interesting idea from the film is how Islam is inaccurately represented as a religion. The main practice of Islam is to love and serve God unconditionally. Yet Muslims have been depicted in American movies as violent, vengeful human beings set out to destroy anyone who believes differently. I think that by characterizing Islam this way we hinder our capability of understanding and learning from alternate processes of thinking. The radical group of Islam extremists that perform acts of terror is what many Americans perceive all Muslims to be like. Since we are constantly exposed to the latest new about terrorist groups on the news, we forget about the rest of the innocent civilians. Because of this we have become desensitized witnessing death on our television screens and this is why violence is so prevalent in today’s entertainment industry. Judging an entire race based on one group of radicals is unfair. Imagine if the rest of the world perceived Americans as members of the KKK.   

            Since the attack on the World Trade Center, America has occupied the Middle East. I have grown up visualizing the region as an area that cannot control itself and requires military presence to assure my safety. By repeating the idea that Arabic society is somehow less developed and extremely radical, we index evil and acts of terror with that culture. Film studios capitalize on the fact that they can perceive Arabs as the enemy while America maintains dominance over them. My reaction to these films over time has been incredibly positive, I love action movies were the hero triumphs over his foe. It entertains me, so does that mean I’m subliminally forming an idea of what all of Arabic society must be like? In a way, yes, because that’s the only exposure I ever get to that world. How else am I supposed to perceive life on the other side of the Earth without witnessing it myself? I think filmmakers and news sources have a huge responsibility for accurately depicting events all around the world, and they usually only focus on what will the get most viewers or what can be produced with a certain budget. Unfortunately that almost always means violence.

            This documentary really opened my eyes to America’s depiction of Arabic culture. In some of my favorite movies its society is depicted as one that encourages violence, suppresses women, and is less developed than America. In reality the culture of Muslims is one of peace and connection with God, and one that encourages the education of women and their rights to work. My limited exposure to the culture of Islam has caused me to form negative connotations with its society. Along with millions of other Americans, I have learned most of what I know about the outside world through films and textbooks.              

Consequences for depicting the Middle East in this fashion include long lasting psychological impact. The purpose of America’s occupation is to eventually restore society to a balanced, democratic form of government. Yet the struggle with the War on Terror has only frustrated Americans more. Negative connotations pertaining to Arabs have altered our perception of them forever. Even if the countries of the Middle East establish solid governments and work to create peace, our society will always hold onto the dramatized depictions on the silver screen.