Sympathetic media portrayals can legitimize racism by denying it operates

Evidence

The notion that the United States has overcome racism, while tantalizing, is deceptive. If we take these positive portrayals at face value, if we believe that complex characterizations of terrorists and valiant portrayals of patriotic Muslims do solve the problem of stereotyping, then racist policies and practices will persist under the guise of antiracism. A diversity of representations, even an abundance of sympathetic characters, does not in itself demonstrate the end of racism, nor does it solve the problem of racial stereotyping. — Evelyn Alsultany, Arabs and Muslims in the Media, 98

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels the argument that surface-level representation (tokenism) in institutions likewise leaves structural racism intact. — connects to: Sympathetic multicultural portrayals can still legitimate racist policies — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 374; Sympathetic multicultural TV portrayals can still legitimate racist counterterrorism policies.
• SEED: An essay angle: ‘The good terrorist fallacy’ — how sympathetic villains like the ‘patriotic Muslim’ actually do the ideological work of justifying the War on Terror.
• corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — Evelyn Alsultany, Arabs and Muslims in the Media: Race…, 98