Miss USA 2010, Muslim American Cyber-Discourse, and the Question of Exhaustion

Abstract

On 16 May 2010, NBC Universal and Donald Trump gave the Muslim American community its first Muslim Miss USA.1 Upon finding out the basics – Rima Fakih is of Lebanese Shi`ite origin and represented Michigan at the beauty pageant – many began to wonder what the appropriate response should be: a “Thank you, Mr. Trump” and befitting celebrations, a “No thank you, Mr. Trump” and its share of condemnation, or an ambivalent “something in between.” In this essay I discuss some of the considerations that made the third option a highly favored one among young voices on the Muslim American blogosphere. I argue that their articulation of this position shows significant trends in the development of a young Muslim American cyber-discourse, and that these trends cannot be fully understood without paying due attention to a shared sense of exhaustion among young Muslim Americans today ...