A fabricated statistic about mosques seeded two hundred anti-Sharia state bills

Evidence

One example illustrates how Islamophobic propaganda is amplified in the mainstream media. The new McCarthyites have long claimed that 80 percent of mosques are controlled by jihadists. In 2004, Republican congressman Peter King stated on the Fox News network’s Sean Hannity Show that “eighty to eighty-five percent of mosques in this country are controlled by Islamic fundamentalists.” He backed up his claim by citing the research of Emerson and Pipes. This story was repeated again and again by the Islamophobes, even in the mainstream media. In 2010, Pamela Geller stated that “four out of five mosques preach hate” on CNN. In March 2011, Republican representative Peter King held hearings on the supposed radicalization in American Muslim communities. A few months later, in June 2011, Yerushalmi made the same claim in the spurious report mentioned above. Gaffney immediately endorsed the findings in his column in the Washington Times. The upshot of this propaganda is that few in the media challenged the King hearings, giving credence to the notion that Muslims are in fact being “radicalized” and need to be questioned and monitored in ways similar to the “reds” in the Cold War era. This was also the year when Obama unveiled his Countering Violent Extremism program, which set out to uncover radicalization by deputizing members of the Muslim community to act as surveillance agents. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 709 (#expands, via linked claim)

One example illustrates how Islamophobic propaganda is amplified in the mainstream media. The new McCarthyites have long claimed that 80 percent of mosques are controlled by jihadists. In 2004, Republican congressman Peter King stated on the Fox News network’s Sean Hannity Show that “eighty to eighty-five percent of mosques in this country are controlled by Islamic fundamentalists.” He backed up his claim by citing the research of Emerson and Pipes. This story was repeated again and again by the Islamophobes, even in the mainstream media. In 2010, Pamela Geller stated that “four out of five mosques preach hate” on CNN. In March 2011, Republican representative Peter King held hearings on the supposed radicalization in American Muslim communities. A few months later, in June 2011, Yerushalmi made the same claim in the spurious report mentioned above. Gaffney immediately endorsed the findings in his column in the Washington Times. The upshot of this propaganda is that few in the media challenged the King hearings, giving credence to the notion that Muslims are in fact being “radicalized” and need to be questioned and monitored in ways similar to the “reds” in the Cold War era. This was also the year when Obama unveiled his Countering Violent Extremism program, which set out to uncover radicalization by deputizing members of the Muslim community to act as surveillance agents. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 697 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: One lawyer’s fabricated report seeded two hundred anti-Sharia bills across states.; A false 80 percent mosque statistic powered the anti-Sharia legislative campaign. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 680; Anti-Sharia legislation spread across 43 states via one network’s fabricated data (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• A fabricated mosque statistic propagated through media legitimated the King hearings and radicalization policy #expands (0.93) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 709
• A fabricated mosque statistic spread from far right into mainstream media #expands (0.92)
• Islamophobic propaganda about mosques seeded hearings and counterterror surveilling of Muslim communities #expands (0.90) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 697
• An unchallenged false mosque statistic legitimized McCarthy-style Muslim monitoring #expands (0.88)
• The framing of mosques as terror nest legitimated surveillance of religious practice #expands (0.85) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 818
• An unfounded claim about mosques spread across media for years unchallenged #expands (0.82)
• Anti-Shari’a bills converted private Islamophobia into state structural policy #expands (0.78) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 306
• Anti-sharia campaigns exploit fabricated fears to gain political support #expands (0.75) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 519