Friday, October 21, 2011

Eliminating Anti-Muslim Bias in FBI Training and Intelligence Materials | ISNA

(Oct 14, 2011) A national security report published last month by Spencer Ackerman of Wired, "FBI Teaches Agents: 'Mainstream' Muslims are 'Violent, Radical,'" highlighted many of the biased and factually inaccurate anti-Muslim training materials utilized by the FBI. Many of the training materials stated that the more devout a Muslim is the more likely they are to be violent. ISNA immediately took action to urge the FBI to revisit the use of these damaging materials and joined with organizations across the nation to demand accountability.

ISNA was pleased to hear that, in response to such appeals and the release of Ackerman's report, the FBI announced that, "strong religious beliefs should never be confused with violent extremism." Unfortunately, in addition to training materials, there have been official reports developed by the FBI and other federal agencies in recent years that promote the same biased and inaccurate information used in the training materials in question.

ISNA believes that factually-inaccurate and biased intelligence products are just as damaging as biased training materials. We have joined with other leading civil and human rights organizations, through the Shoulder-to-Shoulder campaign and other coalitions, to ensure that, while the FBI re-examines its anti-terror training materials to remove discriminatory and inaccurate information, it also re-examines such information found in its public reports which inform the practice of law enforcement officials across the nation.

For complete text, see Eliminating Anti-Muslim Bias in FBI Training and Intelligence Materials.

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