The misconception of terrorist attacks

By JoAllie Pulachak

One in every six American citizens assert that America’s number one societal issue is terrorism. That means based on our current enrollment at Edinboro University, of 6,550 students there are approximately 1, 091 students who are living in fear. Statistically, is this panic justified?

Since 9/11, foreign-born terrorists have killed roughly one American per year. Similarly, only six Americans have died per year due to guns and bombs of Islamic terrorists both foreign and domestic. Whereas, the data from 1990–1999 states that there were 22 terrorists attacks in the United States, which collectively took the lives of roughly 1,877 individuals. Thus, concluding that when divided equally throughout the 10-year span, there were about 187 people who were killed in the United States per year from 1990–1999 due to terrorism.

So why are we as a nation more threatened now by terrorism than ever before? Our fear has increased because our awareness and coverage of the attacks has significantly risen. The media and accessibility of news coverage compared between the 1990s versus the late 2000s is unparalleled. The first social media site, Six Degrees, was established in 1997; therefore, people’s access to information prior to the very late 1990s was limited to traditional newspapers. Unlike today with our smartphones, we are able to reach any news with a touch of a button thereby distorting the difference between a dire and nonemergency event.

In conjunction, many individuals today rely on social media websites and the wide world web in general as their only source of information. The reporters then hold control over what news they produce and the way in which they present them to others.

In correlation, to the accessibility element, once people are aware of a certain possible danger, it is embedded into their mind subsequently reflected in their actions. This is understood by the overdramatized and stereotype behavior of labeling all Muslims as “terrorists.” For example, recently in our country there have been several reports of people refusing to ride on a plane with others who were Muslim due to the misunderstood label that has been placed on this vulnerable population. Furthermore, the media picks up this story and places it in our newsfeeds for a multitude of reasons. One reason is the coverage brings emphasis to a “potential threat,” insinuating there is in fact an issue of terrorism that we need to be aware of.

We need to understand as consumers of the vast media that all the information given to us and the depiction of events showcased may not be the entirety of the truth. The relevance of the matter is that although more people are now concerned with terrorist actions than in the past, the data reveals that we are not at risk, we are just more cognizant of all events due to the surplus of media coverage. Moreover, throughout the years we have recently negatively generalized the American-Muslim population and linked them to horrific terrorists events which in turn has created a divide in our country.

Next time you are scrolling through various news outlooks be aware of the distinct possibility that there may be more to the story and triple check your information before adhering to a concrete stance about the matter.