ISIS has continued operations in full force yet again, with the claiming of attacks at a mosque this time.

While the western world has been fixated with the latest episode of the hottest reality TV show known as the United States Presidency, we have seemed to divert our attention away from the more legitimate conflicts throughout the world. One such instance can be seen with ISIS claiming the responsibility of a recent terror attack, claiming the lives of at least 30 and injuring and trapping more than 100 people within a mosque.

During Friday prayer on the 25th of August, a crowded mosque in Kabul, Afghanistan was attacked by a group of suicide attackers, continuing a series of attacks against Muslims all across the Middle East. This attack in particular took more than 30 lives and counting, and injured near a hundred. The blast caused the mosque to collapse, trapping more than a 100 people within the rubble.

There is a constant infliction of damage against the civilian followers of the religion that is supposedly the central point of terror all around the world. The western fixation on Islam being the ultimate source of violence is constantly being disproved by the targets of the attacks. A large majority of the attacks by ISIS have been targeted towards Shiite Muslims, one of the most important focal points of their targets. This effectively shows the power of scapegoating and just how damaging such an ideal can be to hold onto. For a global dynamic, such scapegoating turns a blind eye to tragedies.

Instead of fixating on drama, we need to recognize and revisit the problematic nature of our current priorities. American media coverage display the drama within the United States in a much more dramatic light. Even all across the world, the antics of Donald Trump and the ludicrous nature of the current American presidential system take a considerable amount of focus away from the limelight, where legitimate global and domestic humanitarian issues belong with equal prominence.

Smaller displays, such as The New York Times coverage of this issue, serve as a prime example of such a problem. Publications are fixated on attempting to attract attention to eye-catching news, which results in information taking center stage only if it is something that is intriguing to the average reader. This points the finger at the issue concerning our schema of interest, which involves anything dramatic or entertaining. A shift of schema, regarding a variety of information, including concepts that are saddening, is imperative to increase receptivity. It is crucial to bring the focus back to such crises that require immediate attention.

We need to change what we consume so we can bring attention to things that matter.