Media visibility and minority religion.

[Uncle Joe]

http://current.com/groups/news-blog/93866911_struggle-for-acceptance-media-visibility-and-minority-religion.htm

When it comes to religious diversity in the United States, the most common gathering includes a few Christian perspectives, a Jewish viewpoint and an Islamic voice. Yet the religious landscape of America includes many other voices, which often remain invisible to the general public. For adherents of minority faiths, the lack of information can raise roadblocks to acceptance and misinformation can fuel misunderstanding.

(snip)

Sunday's Sikh temple shooting in Wisconsin is one example of a religious minority that is little known and rarely discussed outside of tragic incidents. Post-9/11, the Sikh community experienced an increase in targeted abuse because Sikhs happened to fit the stereotype targeted by extremists.

"Journalistic coverage of minority faiths has huge impacts on how we are perceived and accepted by the mainstream," said Jason Pitzl-Waters, author of pagan news blog The Wild Hunt at Patheos and co-founder of the Pagan Newswire Collective. "Every minority religion has gone through this crucible of being demonized in the media or willfully misunderstood, and having to create their own media and become proactive before they're able to shift discussions."

(snip)

"All these voices of various spiritualities have their places in the great parade of belief systems, philosophies and human experiences that shape our contemporary culture," Matthews said. "When we're only given very few choices, we stop looking for the other choices and allow ourselves to be pigeonholed or rendered invisible to the large scope of human discourse."