Norway: Misconceptions about Muslim opinions

On average ethnic Norwegians think that Muslim Norwegians are more religious, fundamentalist and more negative towards Norwegian society, than they are in reality. These are the results in a report prepared by think tank Liberalt Laboratorium.

The report "What we know of each other" puts together the results from a new question survey of what Norwegians believe Muslim Norwegians think on a series of actuality issues, with a previous survey on what Muslim Norwegians really think on these issues, wrote Liberalt Laboratorium in a press release.

The biggest differences according to the report are in what Muslims think of their relationship to Norway. The general population thinks that just 38% of Muslims want to integrate more and that 37% think immigrants must do more to achieve this. In reality, all Muslim Norwegians answered 'yes' to these questions.

There are also big differences in answers on religion. The general population thinks 62% of Muslim Norwegians take part in religious ceremonies at least once a week. The real number is 18%.

When it comes to more controversial questions, the populace also has wrong ideas of Muslim Norwegians. They think that 39% are encouraged by Muslim leader to "Jihad of the sword", while just 2% say they have experienced that.

"All the participants in the public debate have a responsibility to correct the misconceptions." writes Martin E. Sanbu, of Liberalt Laboratorium in the report.

There are differences within the populace and there are different groups which have bigger misconceptions than others. On average the report says that the biggest misconceptions can be found by the elderly, less educated, those who live outside the bigger cities, earn less than average or vote Progress Party.

The surveys which the report is based on were conducted by TNS Gallup: the first for TV2 in 2006 and the second for Liberarlt Laboratorium in 2007.

Source: Dagbladet (Norwegian)

See also: Liberalt Laboratorium report (Norwegian)