Gaza and the global double standard: Grief is selective
We are led to believe that the silence around the suffering of Palestinians is passive. They might pretend to maintain neutrality, but the truth of it is purely ideological. It’s the result of decades of cultural conditioning that have taught audiences, especially in the West, to view Muslim life as “other,” as disposable, as permanently positioned outside the frame of empathy. This is deeper than geopolitics or media bias. It’s about representation. Or rather, the lack of it.
Here is my attempt at answering the question that’s keeping us up at night: why does it feel like the suffering of Palestinian children doesn’t evoke the same collective grief that tragedies elsewhere do?
But before I do, I need you to reflect for a minute on this question: When was the last time you saw a beloved Muslim character on screen? One that wasn’t a stereotype, a terrorist, or a token? Where are the Muslim equivalents of Monica and Ross from Friends, Howard from The Big Bang Theory, or Ted from How I Met Your Mother?
This goes beyond a PR issue.
Audiences have grown up with Jewish, Christian, and secular characters who have been humanized to the point of becoming family. But Muslims? We rarely make it past the security checkpoint in the script.
Representation matters for visibility. Because pop culture is more powerful than we would think. It shapes who gets mourned, who gets rooted for, who gets saved. When Muslims are only seen through headlines about war and extremism, it’s easy to look away when their children die.
The camera has taught the world not to feel for us.
Islamophobia doesn’t have to be loud. Sometimes it shows up in the form of who gets empathy and who doesn’t. Representation creates familiarity which then builds empathy and leads to action, or at least attention. When Muslims are erased from pop culture, it becomes easier for the world to stay silent when they’re erased in real life.
When literature, cinema, and art are known to mirror real life, it’s no surprise that the global absence of Muslims in these spaces reflects something deeper.
The world needs more mirrors than news. More stories that show Muslim joy, Muslim grief, Muslim complexity. Stories that dare to humanize, to complicate, to center. Until then, the silence will remain because people were never taught to care.
Let’s not forget cinema has been used to justify horror before. Hollywood made Pearl Harbor to romanticize the violence that led to the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Nazi Germany produced films to dehumanize Jews and legitimize their extermination.
So no, we don’t need to wait for anyone to recognize the genocide in Gaza. We need to keep writing, filming, painting, creating. Let our art speak the truth they keep trying to bury. Because in the face of silence, creation becomes our loudest weapon.
By Nourhene D., PhD
English Literature | Manchester Metropolitan University
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