Is there a war on American Muslims?

Out of 3.3 million Muslims, there were 301 hate crime offenses and 257 incidents in 2015. 

Politico reports that there was 67 percent spike in hate crime incidents targeting Muslims, from 154 to 257 incidents. Numerous news outlets offered the same percentage increase.

{mosads}While working in Ocean City, MD during college, I volunteered for a crisis service. There I met “Jay” through a series of telephone calls. Jay was gay; it was my first detailed exposure to the concerns of the gay community.

Jay was a young adult living on Maryland’s rural eastern shore; he was suicidal. Harassment and discrimination were daily parts of his life. The pain was intolerable.After many hours of conversation, we agreed that he needed to move to gain a new life.

Hate is insidious, painful and life destroying. I’ve read the articles regarding increasing hate crimes after the election. They make my heart ache.

But based on the FBI’s new statistics, are hate crimes against Muslims skyrocketing? Some have suggested that there is a war on Muslims.

We exist within a new political reality where people need to take sides and voice their opinions in the harshest possible terms. There are many who must denounce president-elect Donald Trump as a racist, a fear-monger, and a demon. The reported 67 percent increase in hate crimes against Muslims validates those who feel that the election of Donald Trump ushers in a new era of hate based on his campaign statements.

But at what point does political rhetoric create an inability to have an accurate conversation?

There is a national discussion on fake news. Does focusing on a 67 percent spike in crimes without the context that we are talking about 301 hate crime offenses among 3.3 million American Muslims fall into the category of questionable reporting?

What about American trust of the media, which is now at record lows? Search for articles on hate crimes and related terms and you will find a wide variety of major news outlets focusing on the percentage increase without the context of raw numbers, or contextual information (if it exists) is buried.

I previously wrote that there was no war on cops and my friends in law enforcement were appalled. Firearms-related fatalities (32) spiked 78 percent in the first half of 2016 from 18 during the same period last year, but those are based on small numbers. As I write this, four police officers were shot during the previous twenty-four hours. One is dead. 

I will make a similar argument that there isn’t a war on Muslims based on the relatively small numbers involved.

Increases when numbers are small make for percentage surges.

Yes, the FBI’s hate crime statistics are an undercount in the same way we know that anything the FBI creates regarding data is an undercount.The United States is a big country with 18,000 law enforcement agencies. We have a system that doesn’t dictate cooperation on hate crime plus a wide variety of data collection efforts. We don’t have precise data on crime and a wide variety of topics like police involved homicides. Why would data on hate crime be any different?

Search “hate crime” or related terms and you will come to the conclusion that they are exploding in the United States.

“Hate crimes against Muslims in America soared 67 percent in 2015, according to an FBI report released Monday. Overall, hate crime surged nearly 7 percent last year, reports Politico. The bureau’s Uniform Crime Report, which catalogs data about hate crimes, documented 257 anti-Muslim hate crimes — up from 154 in 2014 — and 5,850 total incidents reported to police last year, a 6.8 percent increase over the 5,479 incidents reported in 2014.”

“The data expanded on previous findings of an alarming rise in some types of crimes tied to the vitriol of this year’s presidential campaign and the aftermath of terrorist attacks since 2015, says the New York Times. That trend appears to have spiked in just the last week, with civil rights groups and news organizations reporting dozens of verbal or physical assaults on minorities and others that appear to have been fueled by divisions over the election.”

“More than 1,000 incidents each were reported in 2015 based on religious bias and bias against sexual orientation. A majority of those religious cases — 53 percent — involved anti-Semitism, and 21 percent were anti-Muslim, a group of people President-elect Donald Trump alienated last December when he called for “a total and complete shutdown” of Muslim immigration.” Politico.

Pew Research Center estimates that there were about 3.3 million Muslims of all ages living in the United States in 2015. This means that Muslims made up about one percent of the total U.S. population (about 322 million people in 2015). 

So out of 3.3 million Muslims, there were 301 hate crime “offenses,” different from the 257 “incidents” reported by Politico.

According to the FBI report, there were 695 hate crime offenses against Jews, gays had 758, lesbians had 168, mixed had 235, and African-Americans had 2,125.

Where are the reports regarding a war on Jews or gays or African-Americans? Where are the articles regarding a war on cops?

Muslims may have a striking percentage increase, but the numbers remain small; there is nothing here suggesting a war on Muslims in America. Yes, it’s an undercount, but we already addressed that.

Where Muslims and many Americans may be justifiably concerned about group-based rhetoric, and where we are all ready to defend any American’s right to be who they are without fear, there is no war on Muslims based on the FBI’s numbers.

Hate may be on the increase, but “war” is an unjustifiable overstatement. It applies to cops. It applies to American Muslims.

I will get disparaging statements in a variety of forums for my observations, but contextual observations are necessary if we are to truly defend the rights of all Americans.

While everyone on the right and left are determined to have a say, it’s up to all of us to make our cases responsibly.

Context and accuracy remains important. You may love Donald Trump, you may hate Donald Trump, but you still have an obligation to logically and contextually report data.