In the words of Wade Davis: “the world in which you were born is just one model of reality. Other cultures are not failed attempts at being you; they are unique manifestations of the human spirit.”(6) Indeed this quote captures what ails the American people: the habit of denouncing a foreign culture as inferior, when comparing to our own. Often we hear statements that are either gross representations, oversimplifications, or simply racist about other groups of people. I believe that part of this is due to the lack of diversity in both our media and academia. So naturally, I believe that increasing the diversity of our media-that is including more views on certain cultural issues by different people- and increasing the diversity of our academia- that is, teaching our students more about other people- will cure this sickness that plagues the American people. This leaves one question: how do we improve our media and academia? In other words: whom do we ask to help us, “fill” these cultural, “holes”; perhaps an anthropologist?

Yes! It is best to seek a scholar when attempting to fix a specific issue within our society, and an anthropologist is just that scholar. An anthropologist has a better understanding of the many other people are guilty of when confronted with a different culture. I, however, am not an anthropologist. Although this does not mean that I do not understand what the cause of our dilemma is. To put it shortly, our dilemma is caused by ethnocentrism; evaluating a different culture in the same context of our culture instead of treating it as its own, unique set of learned behaviors and ideas. Of course the first step to fixing a problem is recognizing its existence.

I will be frank: as a Muslim-American I feel that my culture is very misunderstood. Many people believe that the hijab (the head scarf) is a sign of female oppression and thus perceive it as limiting, primitive, and even barbaric. In my culture (Islamic culture) it is seen as a protest to female objectification. We dress in more conservative fashion as a means of lowering the attention our bodies might otherwise draw had we dressed in more revealing outfits. In this style we are able to allow what truly matters in a woman, herself, to decide her worth; just as we allow a man’s personality decide his worth. They key word in my statement is “style” and this is what many Americans fail to realize. That is: different cultures have different styles of solving similar problems.

In the west, a woman dressing in revealing clothing exemplifies her autonomy. Also very common in the west: encouraging women to love their bodies. Women showing their bodies are proud and, “love themselves.” A clear example of this is the famous “love your body” campaign by Dove (3).

Ethnocentrism not only prevents us from looking at different cultures in a neutral light, it also prevents us from looking at our own in a critical way. I remember the controversy this advertisement in the UK (4) stirred up:

This advertisement was met with negativity from many who believed this to be derogatory to women. Many believed this advertisement perpetuated one of the problems women faced to today: that her body is everything, more than she will ever be. A petition was started to take down the ad in the UK, and with 70,988 signers the petition was a success (1). The removal of this ad was not quite however. Many who protested the removal believed this to be an “attack on western culture” and that the people wanted this ad taken down were trying to turn the UK into the Islamic Middle East (2). As a Muslim I would like to express my disappointment for these types of conclusions. A woman covering her body is not “imposing shariah law” on others and neither is removing an advertisement that is detrimental to women’s everyday struggle with society. Our culture is not behind western women taking a stand against sexism and objectification, and our culture is not detrimental to women either. It is just different.

Different cultures have different ways of solving issues within their society, and to look at one culture’s method as regressive is text book ethnocentrism. It is best for all of us to remember what this perfect cartoon (5) sums up:

What is one thing in a culture can be the total opposite in another. I propose encouraging more people of different cultures speak on their views on topics like these. If we can break an all, or mostly, western culture based echo chamber of opinions then we may be able to overcome ethnocentrism. I believe this will not be easy however, as many people are deeply xenophobic and may take these new opinions by different people as attacks on their culture. Fear will be a great challenge to overcome, as it is the most influential and least rational reaction to anything that is new. It is also the only challenge to overcome, at least in my opinion.

There is no answer to “who has the best culture” because such a question does not exist; at least in the minds of those who do not subscribe to ethnocentrism.