How many books or TV shows have you watched has included a Muslim character in it? I’d say that there are none that come to mind. Even if there are, pay closer attention to the character. Do you notice anything? Like maybe how they are just there to be the token minority or to only help the main white character? Or maybe they fall into some nasty stereotypes? More proper representation needs to happen with minority characters in TV shows, movies, books, etc.
Let’s look at TV shows for young children. On Disney channel and Nickelodeon, the shows revolve around white characters with ‘token minorities’ sprinkled in. Take Coop & Cami Ask The World (Disney) and The Loud House (Nickelodeon) for example. The Disney show is about a white family who has two siblings that are popular streamers. In this show, the only recurring character who isn’t white is their Asian friend Fred, and a semi-reoccurring Black character who’s dating their mom, Principal Walker. As for the Nickelodeon show, it follows a white boy and his family, with the main character’s best friend being Black and that best friend has two dads who are together. Fred is there for comic relief and to make Coop and Cami look better, and Principal Walker is just there to add some drama from time to time. Neither of them have any of their own storyline that is the focus of the episode. Now these two minority characters are groups that have been occurring in movies and TV shows for years, even though their representation has been more harmful than good.
I could go into more detail about how these shows focus on white characters and leave the minorities for show. Oftentimes, they don’t even play a real role and are just there to help their white counterpart who’s the main character, like in Tall Girl. There is another show that Nickelodeon came out with called Glitch Techs. The two main characters are a Hispanic/Latino boy and a Japanese girl. One of the side characters is Muslim and a hijabi (girl who wears a headscarf), named Zahra. I’ve watched the two seasons that have come out and genuinely enjoyed the show. It’s so much fun watching a show that has minorities as the majority of the cast. Seeing Zahra made me genuinely so happy to a hijabi Muslim in a cartoon show. The side characters had small roles in the first season but the second season gave them more personality and involved them more in the main plot. While this show is wonderful and is giving good representation to many different minorities, the show does lean towards light skinned characters for those who aren’t necessarily characterized by dark skin, meaning that only the Black and Indian characters were dark skinned. Muslims aren’t defined by their skin color and since many believe that only dark skinned people are Muslims, it was interesting to see a light skinned Muslim character to show that even light skinned people are Muslims. While this is great, creators can’t keep on having pale Muslim character or pale characters in general, because there are still dark skinned Muslims and people that deserve to see someone like them in what they watch or read. In the second season, the show made Zahra have a crush on the main guy lead. Nothing is wrong with that, I just think that this often happens in a lot of shows and can lead to so many problematic misconceptions. For example, in the shows Hala and Elite, the woman takes off her hijab to impress a guy. That’s not okay. It plays right into the stereotype that Muslim women need to be saved from their ‘oppressive’ religion and that a white boy will save her from it. That’s setting a horrible example for Muslims who watch this. It makes me sad to see that because it’s making Islam into something it’s not.
Not only that, but Nickelodeon put Glitch Techs on Netflix only, so those who don’t have access to it won’t be able to contribute to the official views that companies look at and many can’t watch it anyways. It’s sad because the show is struggling to stay alive, and I wanted to see more of the characters. So many people love this show yet it’s hard to make sure that Nickelodeon will keep it because many people can’t watch it. So while the representation is great, and such an enjoyable show to watch, there is no easy access to this show. With no easy access, that means most of the people who are minorities aren’t able to watch it and that’s truly disappointing to me.
People want to see themselves on screen. When you see a character who looks like you or shares some part of an identity with you, it feels like you belong. I want to see a Muslim woman on screen who’s truly represents her religion and doesn’t take off her scarf for a guy. If she does, I want to see the internal struggle of having to wear a hijab in today’s society. We want to see a Muslim character save the day. We want to see a Muslim who doesn’t ‘rescuing’ from their tragic home country or from their ‘oppressive religion’, who isn’t a terrorist, whose mother country isn’t full of war and tragedy. All we want is to not be seen as terrorists or characterized as people who need saving from Islam. We don’t want Muslim kids growing up thinking and seeing that they’re seen as monsters or outsiders in the world that they have to live in. Even Muslims who are older don’t want to feel like that. Is that really too much to ask for?
There are many other shows and books that I could talk about, but for the sake of not writing a whole book, I’ll summarize my point. While Muslims, and other minorities, have been gaining representation in shows and books, they often fall into being the token minority or support the ideology of colorism. Either that, or the characters fall into stereotypes that send the wrong message to those who are consuming the content. All we want is to be included properly into stories and for good representation that’ll show everyone watching that we can all be heroes and that we aren’t the villains of every story.