Imagine you are walking down the street and see a woman wearing a traditional hijab (head scarf). What is your first thought? Terrorist? Isn’t she warm in that? Even before September 11th, 2001 people all over the world have had unkind stereotypical opinions about Muslims. Anything from a man with a thick beard to a woman with a hijab makes a lot of people a bit fearful. Our culture today is very much about looks, and our first impressions are based on what we see before us. We stereotype even if we try not to. However there is nothing to discourage us not to do this, however. The media we are surrounded by tells us that stereotyping is okay. Our society’s stereotypical behavior often causes many people to racially profile individuals from different ethnicities or religions. Racial profiling is the use of race or ethnicity as grounds for suspecting someone of having committed an offense. For example, many individuals believe that members of the Muslim religion are terrorists. This has become one of the biggest stereotyping behaviors that Muslims face everyday, ever since the aftermath of when the twin towers were destroyed, many believe that all Muslims are horrible and they all are terrorists. In Robert Heilbroner’s essay he writes as Walter Lippmann has said, “For the most part, we do not first see and then define, we define first, and then we see” (Heilbroner). This seems to be true for many Muslims, because without getting to know that specific individual, many make the wrong assumptions about them. There doesn’t seem to be any faith in the fact that Muslim people can do well for society. In that case, most citizens are closed minded because of the stereotypes that have been built about this group of people. However, this kind of thinking is what takes away from the Muslim community. There has been many times where I have personally experienced this situation. For instance when I was out running a regular errand for my mother in the month of November. If you don’t know already in this specific month many males will not shave their face due to the tradition known as “No Shave November.” Well, I was taking part in this tradition and while being at the checkout line of a local grocery store there was an elderly woman in front of me in line who kept her distance from me. As I moved forward in line to set my groceries on the conveyer belt she reacted with a fearful expression on her face. While the cashier was still ringing her items that she purchased, I continued to set my items on the conveyer belt, which she then proceeded to start yelling at me about how I should stay away from her because she felt like her life was in danger with me standing that close to her. That was not the end of that conversation between the two of us. She continued with saying it was because I was a terrorist.