Causes of antiislamism in the West

[angus]

Anti-Islamism seems to be on the rise in the US. All though it is probably not yet on European level.
What do you think are the main causes for the growth in anti-islamism?

In my country it is:

1. Perceived Muslim hypocrisy: Muslims wanting equal rights but many of them claiming women are inferior to men and  harassing  gays and Jews.

2. Pesky "un-Scandinavian" macho attitudes

3. High crime rate/ gang activity

4. Many Muslims on welfare + cheating with welfare and/or taxes

I would assume that Islamic terrorism and killing of US soldiers plays a bigger part in the rise of US anti-Islamism.

Historically Europeans are more anti-Muslim than US people are not for the reasons you mention, but for the reason that the United States hasn't existed for very long.  Anti-Islam started in the Medieval period in Europe (and earlier in the Middle East), although the word Islamophobia doesn't show up till about one hundred years ago.  The Crusades were probably exploitative mini-culminations rather than causes.  Throughout the Renaissance and Age of Enlightenment there are many critical references to Islam.  Muhammad figures very negatively in Dante's works.  Even well-respected writers like David Hume impugn Muslims.  It has long been a part of European history and tradition to isolate, and sometimes murder, Muslims.  

The US didn't exist for most of that period, and when it did come into existence, with the ratification of the US Constitution in 1787, a defining characteristic of the United States was the right to free exercise of religion.  To the extent that anti-Islamic feeling does exist, it has more to do with very recent history:  hijacking of planes by Islamists starting in the 1970s as a response to US policy regarding Israel.  About this aspect I think you're right.  Over the past four decades we have increasingly associated Islam with terrorism.  I imagine that eventually we'll have our own version of Tomás de Torquemada.  Such well-fermented bigotries take time.  US culture, being relatively young, simply hasn't been around long enough to develop them.

[angus]

Yes. Islam is historically the arch enemy of Christian Europe. Every 10th coat of arms in the Hungarian nobility includes the chopped of head of a Turk etc. But I don't think this legacy is that relevant today. As I wrote the Muslim macho culture, opposition to the liberal dogma of equal rights for all and failure to integrate in the labour market are the main causes in Denmark (this is also true for the rest of Northern Europe IMO). Those are all modern causes unrelated to history. Most European societies are highly secularized today and the knowledge of history is rather sparse in Western Europe (this is of course very different in the Balkans).

I don't think you can ignore a millenium of history when considering these things.

Moreover, your comments may be very specific to Denmark.  Take cities with huge numbers of Muslims, such as Marseilles or Brussels, for example.  Very clearly the politicians use ethnicity as a motivator, especially those of the National Front and parties like it.  Similarly, there have long been anti-Turk sentiments in Germany.  Sure, much of it is practical, and for the reasons you mention (welfare abuse, crime, etc.), but much of it is simply historical.  It may also have to do with a desegration.  Muslims in many cities (e.g., Paris), are concentrated in various suburbs, and even second- and third-generation French-born citizens of North African descent are viewed as others, despite the official French tradition of liberty, equality, and fraternity.

The US simply doesn't have a thousand-year history telling it what to do.  Everything we try is new (and a number of our really good ideas were co-opted and improved upon by northern European societies).  I would venture a guess that even more ancient societies have even more ancient prejudices.  The Chinese, when they are allowed to speak freely, don't have much good to say about Muslims either, but they have a government structure that allows them to move large numbers of people into the provinces that were historically Muslim, and even to hold Muslim leaders without charge if necessary, in order to dilute the political strength of Muslims in those provinces, so you never see tensions coming to the foreground the way you see them in European cities.

[angus]

There's something else:  familiarity breeds contempt.  I was thinking about this and I found a table of European countries in order of percent Muslim population.  Ignoring the three with a majority Muslim population (Albania, Bosnia Herzegovina, and Kosovo), the top ten are something like this:

Macedonia [33%], Montenegro [17%], Bulgaria [15%], Cyprus [22%], Georgia [12%], Russia [12%]. Belgium [6%], France [5.8%], Switzerland [5.7%], and Austria [5.7%].

I bet if you could come up with some list of Islamophobia-inspired tensions, and control for economic factors, you'd find a nice correlation between those and percent Muslim populations.  I haven't found such a clean list yet, but I'll search a bit.

By contrast, not many US regions have such large numbers.  From the US Census bureau, the 10 states with the largest Muslim populations are California, New York, Illinois, New Jersey, Indiana, Michigan, Virginia, Texas, Ohio, and Maryland.  But that's a tricky thing, because you'd have to divide by population to get percentages, and the ten most concentrated may not be in this list.  

I did find that Dearborn, Michigan had the most Muslims, by percent, among US cities, and in that city, according to Zogby, Muslims claim not to feel isolated.  In fact, more generally, Zogby states that "Unlike Muslims in Europe, American Muslims do not tend to feel marginalized..."   Pew research has similar findings.

See here:  http://pewresearch.org/assets/pdf/muslim-americans.pdf

Of course, none of this answers your question.  In fact, it only raises new ones.  I still claim that the long arc of history provides us the easiest and most tangible answer, and in the spirit of Occam's Razor, I suggest that we at least consider it before dismissing it as irrelevant today.

[angus]

LOL.  "Dees my freend Mahir.  He very nice guy.  Well, he don't like wife work, or show herself in public and he want all Jews dead, but otherwise he very nice guy.  Say hello Mahir."