American liberalism frames prejudice as an individual problem solvable through education

Evidence

While well intentioned, the post-9/11 interfaith movement does not address systemic racism or the economic inequities of a neoliberal, individualistic society. Instead, participant Muslim groups accept American liberalism’s treatment of prejudice as an individual problem, solved through education and interfaith engagement. The Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom, for example, gathers Muslim and Jewish women annually to discuss how to talk to friends whose views of Islam are shaped by media portrayals of Muslims as terrorists. The Islamic Networks Group (ING) boasts that its educational presentations and interfaith panels decrease stereotypes of Islam as promoting terrorism among participants. The reasoning goes that if only Christian and Jews met a Muslim, attended a Ramadan iftar (the meal at the end of the daily fast), and visited a mosque, then they would understand that Islam is a religion of peace and Muslims are not terrorists. — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 1010

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the historical arc of interfaith and civil-rights movements the book’s earlier chapters trace, and to critiques of liberal multiculturalism reading racism as informational deficit.