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  3. Azhar Usman, a stand-up comic, says he is a "very patriotic" American Muslim

Azhar Usman, a stand-up comic, says he is a "very patriotic" American Muslim

游客2023-12-07  51
问题     Azhar Usman, a stand-up comic, says he is a "very patriotic" American Muslim. "I would die for this country," he declares. After a pause, he adds: "By blowing myself up." After another pause: "Inside of a Dunkin’ Donuts." His largely white, liberal audience guffaws. But not everyone gets the joke: one furious listener thought he was advocating the murder of police officers, who apparently can often be found in doughnut shops.
    Asked what it is like being a Muslim in America, Mr. Usman says it depends on the headlines. When he heard about the young Nigerian who tried to down a Detroit-bound plane with a bomb strapped to his crotch, he says he felt two things: disgust at the perversion of Islam that teaches that mass murder is sacred, and a feeling of "Here we go again. " Mr. Usman has a bushy beard, South Asian looks and the middle name "Muhammad". At times like these, people like him attract fearful glances.
    It was worse after September 11th, 2001. Recorded hate crimes against Muslims soared. These were mostly non-violent—the FBI reported no instances that year of an American Muslim being murdered for his faith. But threats and vandalism are nasty enough. And Muslims endured countless slights that, while not worth reporting to the police, were vexing. Shabana Shakir-Ahmed, a suburban mother from Cincinnati, recalls chatting with a shop assistant not long after the twin towers fell. She does not wear the hijab, so the assistant did not at first realise she was Muslim. But when she saw the name on her credit card, her attitude stiffened. Mrs. Shakir-Ahmed had bought enough cosmetics to qualify for a free bag, but when she asked for it, the assistant said they were all gone, though there was a heap of them behind her.
    To an encouraging degree, America’s Muslims are well-off and well-integrated. A Gallup poll last year found them slightly more likely than other Americans to have jobs, and slightly more likely to be professionals. They are much more satisfied with their lives than Muslims in France or Britain. According to a Pew poll, 72% say their communities are good places to live and 71% believe that most people who want to get ahead in America can do so if they work hard. Muslim Americans are somewhat less likely to vote than other groups, but they were elated when Barack Obama, a man with Muslim roots, was elected president. Many chafed when he ramped up the war in Afghanistan, but hardly any would prefer his predecessor.
    Overall, this is a far brighter picture than the headlines suggest. It is a diverse one, too. Asked about their race, a plurality(35%)of American Muslims describe themselves as African-American. Another 28% say they are white, 18% say Asian and 18% tick "other". Racial disparities among Muslims roughly mirror those in the broader society. Asian-American Muslims are better educated and earn more than African-American ones, for example. And an immigrant Muslim dentist will have quite different experiences from a black American who converted while in jail.
    Dalia Mogahed of Gallup’s Centre for Muslim Studies argues that because American Muslims are so well integrated, they strongly reject terrorism. This is true, but not uniformly so. Muslim Americans under 30 are twice as likely as their elders to believe that suicide-attacks on civilians in defence of Islam are sometimes justified(15% versus 6%, according to Pew). There is a marked streak of alienation among black Muslims, only 36% of whom say they have a "very unfavourable" view of al-Qaeda. Only a minority of Muslim Americans believe that Arab Muslims carried out the attacks of September 11th, 2001.
    Among those who express alarming views, only a tiny fraction will do anything terrible. Most of those who speak approvingly of suicide-bombing are no doubt thinking of wars in far-off lands, rather than blowing up the local mall. But it does not take many terrorists to cause mayhem. Major Nidal Hasan, who shot and killed 13 people at Fort Hood in November, acted alone. Such attacks may be rare, but people fear them because the victims are chosen at random and the perpetrators are utterly merciless.
    Obnoxious pundits pour petrol on the flames. Michael Savage, a talk-radio host, describes the growth of America’s Muslim population as "throat-slitters...clawing at the gate". Being a religious minority rather than a racial one, Muslims are easier to stereotype. In theory, they all believe in one book. By selectively quoting Koranic verses that sound bloodthirsty, Islamophobes can argue that Islam is a religion of war.(One could do something similar with Bible verses that, for example, endorse slavery, but few Americans worry that the Christians next door will enslave them.)Muslims are viewed more suspiciously: only atheists and Scientologists score worse in polls. A survey of Protestant pastors found that two-thirds of them deemed Islam "dangerous". [br] After 9/11, hostility towards Muslims included the following EXCEPT
选项 A、intimidation.
B、destroying property.
C、mass killing.
D、discrimination.
答案 C
解析 细节题。由题干定位至第三段。该段第三句说明人们对穆斯林的排斥是非暴力的，因为FBI没有接到任何穆斯林被谋杀的报告，故[C]符合题意。
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