The Billionaire, the Bomber and the Belly dancer
Recently, Europe has suffered from many terrorist attacks from which all the variations of western beliefs about Islam seems that is embodied into a particular, self-powered feeling, fear. Perhaps, the notion that such events are triggered by the imperialistic behavior of the West against the Arab world is simplistic. But behind that, there is a truth. After all, the Western suspiciousness about the Arab-Muslims is not something new. Back in the Middle Ages, the crusade wars, and the Arab expansion in Europe, until the third millennium, the western representation of Arabs-Muslims seems to be very persisting. For our (Western) conceptualization the Arab-Muslim is always portrayal as the alien ‘Other’, or the ‘Enemy’. Stereotypical images fabricated and presented by the media in America and Europe for a long time. Especially Hollywood uses deep-rooted stereotypes or creates new ones through many film genres, and even cartoon movies. The writer and lecturer specializing in addressing racial and ethnic stereotypes Dr. Jack G. Shaheem writes in his book “Reel Bad Arabs”, as well as in the documentary film “Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People”, about how and why Hollywood corrupts or manipulates the image of Arabs. He argues that the calumny of Arabs in American filmmaking has existed since the early days of silent cinema and is still present on the biggest blockbusters. He also argues that these images characterized by showing Arabs either as thieves or savages, and Arab women as belly dancers in the service of evil and greedy sheiks. Another important image, Shaheem says, is the image of the rifle in the hands of Arab “terrorists”.
Director of media relations for American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Mazin Qumsiyeh, specifies what we know as “The Three B Syndrome”: “Arabs in TV and movies are portrayed as bombers, belly dancers, or billionaires.” Arab men as terrorists or oilmen and Arab women as belly dancers or sex objects. Besides, the report mentions that even cartoons have been insulting to Arab-Muslims. Except movies and TV, still images are playing a slightly different role in the conservation of the Orient’s myth by recycling these stereotypes into the context of exoticism. These photographs, which are produced by famous photographers and reproduced by well-known magazines over the last century, are mostly snapshots rather strictly fabricated images. But still, retain partiality against anything non-western like the Orient’s culture. Of course in the documentary and travel photography genre of the 20th century, the Arab-Muslim males and females are not depicted as the “Enemy” or sex objects. But the semiotics of these photographs reveals that the alien ‘Other’ continues to punctualized by the imperialistic western gaze. Many photographers seem to prefer a bunch of very specific features in order to exoticize the poor and underdeveloped societies. Especially portrait photography, in order to fit into our western conceptualization, delivers fragments of the Orient’s “reality” in a very narrow way. Turbans, veils, or any other piece of cloth with which Arab-Muslims cover their heads, become the most beloved subject for the western lens. Dramatic backgrounds and beautiful colors complete the imagery. These photographs are not far from the Arab representations in cartoon movies. Keeping the myth alive and shiny into our impressionable mind, feeding the new generations of photographers like me with implicit tips of “how to take a picture of the Orient”.
There is a shifting point in Photography our days. Photography is changing and because of that, I feel able to look back and see some particular features of the late 20th-century imagery, by looking at my own pictures from the first decade of new millennia, in which the echo of these features still exists. I still remember very well when I took that shot of a boy seating on a rock in the middle of the Sinai desert. After the shot he said to me: “You’re welcome…” Into the context of his ironic phrase, was hiding his comprehension of my motives. It was like he already knew what kind of picture I had in mind when I saw him in the first place. Perhaps, I suffer from a case of the white man’s guilt, although by looking at some of my favorite photographs, taken some years ago, I sense something problematic in the way of capturing. The depicted characters seem to have an attractive, almost cartoonish appearance to my eyes. While I feel that something is wrong, these photographs still interest me. Trying to figure out why I realize that they do maybe because of my success to recreate some stereotypes about the Orient’s world in my own imagery. About this photograph, I often wonder if I took a picture of a real person, but in fact, I managed to show a fictitious one.
There is a famous quote of Popeye the Sailor Man who had said: “If I’m not me, who am I? And If I’m somebody else, why do I look like me?”
