[ad_1]
Oscar-nominated actor Riz Ahmed has denounced Hollywood for the stereotypical and “toxic” portrayal of the Muslim community in its films.
Ahmed, who became the first Muslim to earn an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor, recently launched the initiative, the Blueprint for Muslim Inclusion, to increase community representation in cinema.
The initiative was launched in partnership with the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, the Ford Foundation and the Pillars Fund.
In a video posted to his social media, Ahmed said: “The problem of Muslim misrepresentation is one that can no longer be ignored.”
The 38-year-old Anglo-Pakistani actor said it was a “bittersweet” moment for him when he was nominated for the 2021 Oscars for his performance in “Sound of Metal.”
“I simultaneously carried this slightly questionable distinction with a sense of gratitude personally … I also felt immense sadness. How is it that out of 1.6 billion people – a quarter of the world’s population – none of us has never been in this position until now?
“I asked myself, if I am the exception to the rule, what should be the rule over people like me? What should be the unwritten rule over Muslims – a quarter of the world’s population – and their place in our stories, our culture and their place in our society, if any? ”said Ahmed.
The actor claimed that the problematic portrayal of Muslims in movies is something that cannot be corrected by a “handful of prominent Muslims in the industry.”
“The progress made by a few of us does not give a comprehensive picture of progress if most of the depictions of Muslims on screen are either non-existent or embedded in these stereotypical, toxic, two-dimensional representations,” he said. -he adds.
Ahmed called the Oscar-winning films – “American Sniper”, “The Hurt Locker” and “Argo” – “downright racist”.
“(These) films dehumanize and demonize Muslim characters, insofar as they are perpetrators or victims of violence, unworthy of empathy or incapable of empathy,” the actor said.
Likewise, he criticized the successful Amazon series “The Boys”.
“(It’s) a show that I loved and binge on. A modern and very self-aware kip show. One with a gigantic, multi-racial, multi-species cast … ( But) I can’t tell you how emptied I was. It was halfway through this show that Muslim showed up, the first and only time, to hijack a plane.
“Oh actually, they’re coming back again in the first series, to play supervillains whose superpower is to commit suicide attacks against people,” Ahmed said.
Such a thing would not happen to any other minority group, the actor said, citing the example of “Black Panther”.
“Even a movie like ‘Black Panther’, one of the most aroused progressive moments in our culture in recent years. And Muslims at the start of this movie present themselves as terrorists to kidnap school girls and then disappear,” he said. -he adds.
Along with the publication of The Blueprint for Muslim Inclusion, a study by the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, titled “Missing and Malaligned”, found that Muslims rarely appear onscreen, or are portrayed in a negative light if they do. do.
He reviewed a total of 8,965 talking characters in 200 top-grossing films between 2017 and 2019 in the US, UK, Australia and New Zealand.
The study found that only 1.6% of the characters were Muslim. They were mostly portrayed as strangers, threatening or submissive, and about a third were perpetrators. More than half have been the target of violence.
This story was posted from an agency feed with no text editing. Only the title has been changed.
[ad_2]
picture credit