A Representation of Islam in the Media and Understanding its Gaining Popularity in Today’s Time.
A Representation of Islam in the Media and Understanding its Gaining Popularity in Today’s Time.
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Just as in other regions, countries with a Muslim majority have witnessed a rapid diffusion and adoption of social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube in recent times. In the Arab World, Facebook is still the leading social networking website with 81,302,064 users. Twitter follows with 5,797,500 users (Arab Social Media Report, 2014). The Arab Region is only second to the USA when it comes to the number of daily YouTube views. With 90 Million video views per day, Saudi Arabia has the world highest number of YouTube views per Internet user.
The popularity of social media platforms in the Arab World has led some scholars to expect its impact on religious life to rise. The common argument is that social media has the potential to change people’s religiosity and practices of piety. The impact of social media on religious behaviours of individuals and communities in environments characterised by conservatism and traditionalism, it is argued, will be more profound than in environments characterised by liberalism and openness.
Non-believers through da’wa is a central commitment for many Muslims and Islamic leaders. Today, social media has become an invaluable means to pursue the path of da’wa and the dissemination of the Muslim thoughts. Only very few voices condemn the use of the new digital media as incompatible with Islamic practices. For instance, Abdul Aziz Al Shaikh, Grand Mufti in Saudi Arabia. Advances a critical stance towards social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. As he says, they disseminate lies and may destroy established relationships in the real world. In a similar line, religious authorities in some Islamic countries issued fatwas against the use of social media like Twitter, arguing for its incompatibility with shari’a because of trading accusations and promoting lies.