Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) 229: Orientalism vs. Occidentalism

: Khabib Nurmagomedov versus Conor McGregor Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) 229 battle was among the most controversial mixed martial art fights of the past decade. In this study, the author examined how the various popular media outlets from the Eastern and Western world portrayed Khabib Nurmagomedov after UFC 229. The author used Huntington’s (1993) clash of civilization thesis by grounding it in the Orientalism and Occidentalism paradigms to examine the phenomenon. Fairclough’s (1989, 1995) model for critical discourse analysis was employed to investigate the various Western and Eastern popular press and digital media platforms (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites). The author analyzed 57 (Western n = 38, Eastern n = 19) media reports per the inclusion criteria. The study results unveiled conflicting predispositions present in the Western and Eastern media for Khabib Nurmagomedov. This study contributes to the limited knowledge about how a Muslim man athlete with diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds is seen contrarily in the Western and Eastern media. The author discusses the theoretical implications of the study.


Introduction
"The Dagestani champion mauled the brash former 'champ champ' -as McGregor calls himself -taking down the Irishman repeatedly, subjecting him to an absolute skullshattering ground-and-pound that lasted for an excruciating two minutes, before using his terrifying wrestling skills to neutralise McGregor on the ground with a rear naked choke turned neck crank. As Khabib warned before the fight, it was certainly a long night for Conor." (Turkish Radio and Television Corporation World, 2018) "Vladimir Putin has expressed his sympathy for Khabib Nurmagomedov after the Russian fighter lost his cool at UFC 229…Nurmagomedov stole headlines around the world after he leapt out of the cage towards his opponent's entourage and incited a massive brawl inside the stadium……Nevertheless, in a meeting with Nurmagomedov……President Putin congratulated the fighter on his victory." In international relations, political science, and sociology literature, one of the most debated theses of the 21st century presented by Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 remains the clash of civilizations (Haynes, 2019). The basic proposition of the clash of civilizations thesis is that the fundamental source of conflict in the new world will not be based on ideologically driven economics (i.e., Communism vs. Capitalism) but will be based on cultural differences (Huntington, 1993(Huntington, , 1996. Further, Haynes (2019) argued that the clash of civilizations could be implicit or explicit, such as conventional warfare or conflict in various social activities.
Scholars have widely employed the clash of civilizations thesis to understand the Western world's bias against Muslims in the form of Islamophobia (Haynes 2019;Vorlander et al., 2018). According to Considine (2017), Islamophobia is a type of racial prejudice deeply rooted in the cultural fabric of the Western world. In comparison, the abomination towards the Western world in the Muslim community can be observed through increased terrorism and extremism against Western civilization. Further, outrage in the Muslim world concerning the West could be understood through Huntington's (1993Huntington's ( , 1996 explanation about cultural differences could be the cause of implicit and explicit bias. Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 established his arguments by first dividing the world into eight civilizations: Sinic, Japanese, Hindu, Islamic, Orthodox, Western, Latin American, and African. Next, Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 unveiled how the balance of power historically has shifted across various civilizations. The scholar underscored that the decline of various civilizations was not linear but dependent upon numerous factors. Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 also highlighted that after the Cold War, the world order had shifted again towards Western civilization. Finally, Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 gave the clash of civilizations thesis by unfolding differences between Western and other civilizations. Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 emphasized that in-depth historical friction exists between the Muslim and Western worlds. Thereby, a vital clash would happen between the Muslim world and Western civilization. Fundamentally, Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 developed his thesis based on Lewis' (1990) work about deciphering the roots of Muslims' rage towards the Western world. Huntington (1993Huntington ( , 1996 highlighted that the unsatisfied and unemployed Muslim youth and the Western world leaders' attempt to universalize Muslim values had generated intense resentment in the Muslim world. Lastly, Haynes (2019) argued that the clash of civilization between the Muslim world and the West could be observed via social activities (e.g., sports).

Sociology of Sports Scholarship and Clash of Civilization Thesis
Despite scholars trying to study the Muslim world through several sociological and socio-psychological frameworks (Hussain & Cunningham, 2020;Malcolm et al., 2010;Nakamura, 2002;Ratna & Samie, 2017;Samie, 2017), there is a lack of scholarship about the clash of civilizations thesis as a framework to understand the Islamophobia, ethnocentrism, eurocentrism, and the prejudice of the Muslim world towards the West in sports. Nevertheless, as sports are a social institution (Bourdieu, 1978), they provide an opportunity to test the clash of civilizations thesis in a competitive environment (Dyreson, 2012). For instance, the 1998 FIFA soccer world cup encounter between the USA and Iran is a classic example of the clash between the West and the Muslim world, not only in the sporting arena but also across the media and public. For example, Billingham (2014) argued that the USA versus Iran in the 1998 soccer FIFA world cup was the most politically charged sporting encounter in the last century. Dyreson (2010) also underscored that the 2008 Beijing Olympics depicted a clash of civilization between American Capitalism and Chinese Confucian culture. Many Chinese believed that the Olympics is a Western-oriented phenomenon, and Chinese athletes winning the medal were considered a win against American imperialism. Likewise, Sen (2015) argued that cricket became a prominent sport in the Indian sub-continent and the Caribbean in the early 20th century because it offered a means to the colonized countries to challenge the British hegemony. Additionally, Pakistan and India cricket matches are seen as a religious war by the people of the two nations (Bandyopadhyay, 2007). Thus, sporting events can provide a means to understand the clash between various cultures.
Even though the clash of civilizations thesis remains a fundamental framework to study international relations in the 21st century, especially the Muslim community (Haynes, 2017(Haynes, , 2019, sport sociologists have not widely employed this framework to understand conflicts between cultures, especially in international sports and media communications scholarship. Ratna and Samie (2017) accentuated that sports scholarship is rooted in ethnocentrism and eurocentrism. They also claimed that numerous scholars try to depict the Muslim world as pejorative, inhumane, emotional, and secondary compared to the Western world. However, there is a paucity of sport sociology scholarship about Muslim men athletes' portrayal in Western popular media platforms (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) in comparison with the Eastern media outlets (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites). Moreover, due to a Western essentialist world-view dominating the broader sport management discourse (Newman, 2014), Muslim athletes are only seen through the lens of religion, with little to no research done on broader intersections, such as nationality, ethnicity, gender, Orientalism, and nature of sports shaping Muslim athletes' perception in the West through the popular media. In addition, there is a lack of scholarship about how the various Eastern media outlets (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) are portraying Muslim athletes' success over non-Muslim athletes. Therefore, this study contributes to the various gaps in the scholarship.

Criticism on Clash of Civilization Thesis
According to Haynes (2019), Huntington's (1993) clash of civilizations thesis has been challenged by numerous scholars and reinforced by various right-wing populist political leaders. For instance, Noam Chomsky criticized the clash of civilizations as a new proposition developed to propagate warfare and division among the nations (Shahi, 2017). However, Haynes (2019) argued that numerous world leaders are influenced by the clash of civilizations thesis implicitly and make Islamophobic decisions regarding trade, human rights, and immigration. For instance, due to recent unrest in the Middle East and African countries, nearly 35000 individuals have died while trying to escape in European countries (National Public Radio, 2018). Further, the ban on Hijab in various European countries and the movement against Hijab depicts the implicit bias against the Muslim world in Western societies (Harkness, 2019). On the other hand, Muslim leaders' explicit hate in their political speeches is reported somewhat daily by popular media (e.g., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites). Nevertheless, this implicit bias has not been studied in the sport management scholarship regarding the portrayal of athletes in the Western and Eastern media (e.g., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites).

Orientalism versus Occidentalism: The Clash of Civilization Thesis
In the extant scholarship, there are two theoretical approaches (Orientalism and Occidentalism), which have profoundly influenced the body of knowledge about the Muslim World (Buruma and Margalit, 2005;Gill, 2004;Venn, 2000). First, the notion of Orientalism stems from Said's (1978) seminal work on how many Western scholars perceive the Eastern world. Said (1978) underscored that some Western scholars generalize the Eastern world as static, homogenous, intellectually weak, and underdeveloped. In contrast, they demonstrate the West as developed, superior, and rational (Said, 1978). Likewise, many Western scholars present Muslim countries, such as the states in the Middle East, as homogenous and radical. Said (1978) argued that although many Western scholars try to explore the Muslim communities through robust methodological means. However, in reality, they compare their values with the Muslim people, which produces faulty Preprints (www.preprints.org) | NOT PEER-REVIEWED | Posted: 27 September 2021 doi:10.20944/preprints202109.0456.v1 knowledge. Said (1978) also elucidated that some Eastern scholars reaffirm the Western ocular due to Western supremacy dominating the scholarship. Scholars have widely cited Said's (1978Said's ( , 1992 work to decolonize the broader literature concerning the Muslim world (Roose & Turner, 2019;Samiei, 2010).
On the other hand, Occidentalism refers to how some Eastern scholars perceive the West as inhumane, immoral, sinful, racist, a threat to religion, all-White, and market-driven (Buruma & Margalit, 2005;Gill, 2004;Venn, 2000). This deep-rooted bias towards the West shapes the ideological values of some Eastern scholars (Buruma & Margalit, 2005). Further, these researchers only see the West and its relationship with the East as noncompliant (Buruma and Margalit, 2005;Gill, 2004;Venn, 2000). The above two philosophical terrains create a broader discourse about the Muslim and the Western world (Buruma & Margalit, 2005;Gill, 2004;Venn, 2000). In this study, I have grounded the Orientalism and Occidentalism notion in the clash of civilizations thesis to offer how a Muslim man athlete with intersecting identities can be seen differently in the Eastern and Western media. Hence, I expand Huntington's (1993) clash of civilizations thesis by arguing that the clash between the Muslim and Western world could be observed in the Orientalist and Occidentalist media discourse.

Current Study Context: Khabib Nurmagomedov versus Conor McGregor
Khabib Nurmagomedov retired with an undefeated record in 2020. However, the UFC 229 became a global front-page news-not due to Khabib Nurmagomedov winning the match and retaining his UFC title (Zidan, 2019), but more so because of Khabib Nurmagomedov's after match attack on Conor McGregor's ring-side team. This attack was in response to unceasing Islamophobic and racist slurs before and during the match by Conor McGregor and his team members (Zidan, 2019). Before the fight, Conor McGregor openly disparaged the Islamic faith of Khabib Nurmagomedov on social media and UFC's official platforms. For instance, Conor McGregor titled Khabib Nurmagomedov as a 'backward cunt' and offered him alcohol in the UFC 229 pre-fight press conference. Alcohol consumption is prohibited in Islam and perceived as disrespectful if offered to a Muslim. Conor McGregor also called Khabib Nurmagomedov's wife a 'towel mate' because she covered her face with Hijab in her wedding pictures (USA Today, 2019).
On the other hand, Khabib Nurmagomedov, in various media discussions, has openly discussed his strong Islamic beliefs being the cause of his unbeaten track record at the UFC against non-Muslim MMA fighters (Pugmire, 2018). Khabib Nurmagomedov also criticized the Western media for showing abhorrence towards his religious beliefs. The Russian fighter has also been criticized for not showing up with the Russian flag in the octagon but wearing an identifiable sheepskin headwear, 'the papakha' (Vestnik Kavkaza, 2018). In addition, after the victory against Conor McGregor, Khabib Nurmagomedov was invited by the Turkish and Russian Prime Minister to congratulate him on his victory on a personal basis. Thus, Khabib Nurmagomedov's victory was celebrated in the Muslim world as a victory against the West, which shows potential bias held in the Eastern world against the West. Therefore, Khabib Nurmagomedov versus Conor McGregor provides an interesting case study to understand how the clash between the West and the Eastern world could be observed in the sporting context by analyzing the popular discourse. Fairclough's (1989Fairclough's ( , 1995 model for critical discourse analysis (CDA) was used to understand the phenomenon. Fairclough's (1989Fairclough's ( , 1995 underscored that CDA entails three inter-related procedures of analysis that are tangled to three inter-related dimensions. The three dimensions are the identification of the object of study (e.g., newspapers, blogs, and websites), understanding the source of object creation (e.g., an event-Khabib Nurmagomedov v. Conor McGregor) by a human subject, and socio-historical perspectives about the phenomenon interpreted in the object of analysis. These three dimensions require three types of analysis: textual analysis, processing analysis, and social analysis. In this study, I did the textual analysis by exploring newspaper databases, online sporting websites, and blogs. I used an open coding system (Creswell, 1998) for processing analysis. Finally, using the theoretical framework and previous scholarship, I conducted a social analysis of the retrieved data.

Data Collection
Data was collected from the following newspaper databases: ProQuest Recent Newspapers, Google News, and Press Reader. Further, online sporting websites and blogs were analyzed through a google search. I also analyzed various top newspapers from the Eastern and the Western world via Google search.  (2009) PRISMA (preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses) approach was employed. I initially identified 480 media reports (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites), out of which 57 were deemed appropriate per the inclusion criteria (see Appendix A). The snapshot of the Western media outlets (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) analysed is given in Appendix B, while the snapshot of the Eastern media platforms (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) is presented in Appendix C.

Data Analysis
Elo and Kyngäs's (2008) three-phase content analysis procedure was employed for data analysis. The three phases are preparation, organization, and reporting. First, I prepared data by analyzing the sources of data collection. Second, data were organized using open coding (Creswell, 1998). Next, I combined open codes to develop themes (Corbin & Strauss, 2008). Finally, I report the final themes in the result section using the selective coding method (Creswell, 1998).

Positionality and Reflexivity
Singer et al. (2019) underscored that clearly putting forward the researcher's positionality increases the trustworthiness of the research. In the recent past, sport management and sport sociology scholars have extensively written about Islamophobia, Orientalism, and colonized Western scholarship shaping the perception of Muslim athletes and the Muslim world (Hussain & Cunningham, 2020;Ratna & Samie, 2017;Samie, 2013Samie, , 2017Samie & Sehlikoglu 2014;Toffoletti & Palmer, 2017). However, scholars' silence about how the Muslim world depicts the West signifies deep bias (Occidentalism) in sporting academia. Therefore, I accentuate that our service to the scholarship should not be based upon our religious and racial identity but upon understanding and reporting the contrasting and multiple realities. I am a practicing Muslim man from Pakistan working in the United States. My ontological view is that truth is socially constructed. Therefore, there exists no singular reality. While my epistemological opinion is that knowledge is negotiated and dynamic. Thereby, my worldview and research paradigm might have influenced this study.

Western Media: The Orient within the Clash of Civilizations
The content analysis of the Western media platforms (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) unveiled deep racial and ethnic bias held against Khabib Nurmagomedov. In addition, his victory against Conor McGregor was overshadowed by focusing on his nuanced identity. Khabib Nurmagomedov was also blamed by the Western The first theme that emerged from data is the portrayal of Khabib Nurmagomedov as the culprit of the after fight-brawl and overshadowing his victory, as the BBC (2018), while quoting a popular blogger Ruslan Usachov from Russia, reported, "Official Rossiya 1 TV hails the Dagestani fighter as 'our Khabib' who 'almost literally tore McGregor's head off.' However, not all Russians were proud of Nurmagomedov. It is Khabib who won, but it is I who feel ashamed." Likewise, the Bleacher's Report (Botter, 2018) headline was, "Khabib Nurmagomedov brought his best vs. Conor McGregor; then we saw his worst." Similarly, the headline of The New York Times (2018) was, "Khabib Nurmagomedov could face fine and suspension after brawl at UFC 229." Hence, The New York Times (2018) focused upon the afterfight brawl rather than celebrating Khabib Nurmagomedov's victory. Similarly, Business Insider (2018b), a US-based online website, blamed Khabib Nurmagomedov for his early actions to be the cause of disputes with Conor McGregor. For instance, the Business Insider (2018b) registered, "The bad blood between McGregor and Nurmagomedov, which was sparked when the Russian was seen on video slapping McGregor's team-mate Artem Lobov in April, has been well documented." This bias in the broader Western media (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) remains despite UFC's various attempts to assimilate fighters from diverse ethnic and racial backgrounds. One can understand the incompatibility of Khabib Nurmagomedov's identity within the Western world via Feagin and Feagin's (2009) understanding of Gordon's (1964) work about why people of color face bias in the US. Feagin and Feagin (2009) discussed three competing critical concepts of assimilation of people of color in a Westernized phenomenon: melting pot, cultural pluralism, and Anglo-conformity. The melting pot elucidates understanding in the West that people from diverse backgrounds should be made part of the harmonious stew. This provides an opportunity for various groups to be part of larger group phenomena. However, the stew itself is tilted towards bias understanding of race (Armstrong, 2011), escalating tension between the minority and the majority group. The other method of assimilation is via cultural pluralism. Cultural pluralism is described as a minority group being part of the majority group activity while maintaining their cultural differences (Feagin & Feagin, 2009).
Nonetheless, keeping cultural differences can also be dangerous for the minority group because of unfathomable racial biases within society. For instance, Khabib Nurmagomedov is part of a Western phenomenon (i.e., UFC) while maintaining his religious identity. Though his religious and racial ethnicity directly clashes with the core values of the Western world. Thereby, Khabib Nurmagomedov and many other athletes like him might continuously face racial and ethnic bias in the West, despite being offered an opportunity to be part of a social event. Lastly, Anglo-conformity elucidates people of color being part of the West by following Anglo-White norms and traditions. This does not guarantee them an opportunity to be fully assimilated within the group because the majority will never consider them as part of the mainstream group (Armstrong, 2011). Consequently, the blame towards Khabib Nurmagomedov is natural and tilted towards a broader understanding of Khabib Nurmagomedov being incompatible with the Anglo-White norms and traditions.

The Russian Dagestani Muslim
Preprints (www.preprints.org) | NOT PEER-REVIEWED | Posted: 27 September 2021 doi:10.20944/preprints202109.0456.v1 The second significant theme that emerged from Western media's (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) data (see Appendix B) was the portrayal of Khabib Nurmagomedov as a Dagestani Russian Muslim with a discriminatory approach. For instance, many Western media outlets (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) used the word Russian repeatedly with Khabib Nurmagomedov. In comparison, Conor McGregor's racial and ethnic identity was not widely used to describe the White Irish fighter within the same articles. For example, Reuters (2018) reported: "For once the violence in the octagon looked secondary as a mass brawl ensued after Russian Khabib Nurmagomedov retained his UFC lightweight title with a submission win over Conor McGregor on Saturday." Likewise, the Irish Examiner's (2018) headline was, "The UFC call him Russian but, like his hated rival, Khabib is much more complicated." On the contrary, British Broadcasting Corporation-BBC (2018) registered, "The Dagestani -who has never lost in his career -beat his Irish opponent in the fourth round of the Las Vegas mixed martial arts (MMA) fight." Though, BBC highlighted Conor McGregor's Irish identity but did not ponder upon his ethnic and racial background. However, Khabib Nurmagomedov's ethnic background of being Dagestani was the main emphasis of the BBC. In addition, many media outlets (e.g., Fox News and New York Times) highlighted Khabib Nurmagomedov's religious identity of being Muslim. In comparison, not even one outlet discussed Conor McGregor's religious identity.
The above examples illustrate the potential racial and religious bias against Khabib Nurmagomedov. This bias is not only limited to Khabib Nurmagomedov's religious beliefs but against his ethnic and racial background. The discrimination against Khabib Nurmagomedov depicts how Muslim athletes' identities are being universalized and homogenized. This bias towards Khabib Nurmagomedov cements the notion of Orientalism lying in the Western discourse (Said, 1978). Thus, there exists a potential racial, ethnic, and religious bias against Khabib Nurmagomedov's national, ethnic, and religious identity in the Western media (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites).

The Eastern Media: The Occidentalism within the Clash of Civilization
Analysis of the Eastern media (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) uncovered a positive bias towards Khabib Nurmagomedov's action (after fight brawl) due to his religious identity (see Appendix C). Further, Khabib Nurmagomedov was portrayed as a Muslim Messiah fighting against the infidel Western world. This biased media approach by homogenizing the Western world as all-infidel and Islamophobic depicts the Eastern world's media's deep racial bias towards the West.

The Innocent Hero of the East against the Infidel
The Eastern media (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) also highlighted Khabib Nurmagomedov's religious identity but in a triumph tone. For instance, Aljazeera (2018) reported, "Violent scenes occurred inside and outside the cage on Saturday night after McGregor tapped out in the fourth round of his comeback Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) bout against the undefeated Muslim champion." Likewise, the Arab News (2018) reported, "The 30-year-old Muslim pleaded that he was not to blame for the sorry post-fight scenes. This is not my best side. He talked about my religion, my country, my father." The Express Tribune, a Pakistani newspaper headline was, "McGregor can pass racist and Islamophobic insults, but Nurmagomedov can't react to it?" Thereby, Khabib Nurmagomedov's after-match actions were justified because of his religious identity. Muharram (2014) argued that many Islamists view the West as religious ignorant, and barbaric. This leads to a broader affirmation that hostile acts against the Western world are justified and should be supported (Muharram, 2014). Preprints (www.preprints.org) | NOT PEER-REVIEWED | Posted: 27 September 2021 doi:10.20944/preprints202109.0456.v1 Buruma and Margalit (2005) claimed that Occidentalists view the West as a bourgeois society hooked to individual luxuries and selfishness. Hence, in the eye of Occidentalism, West is a fraidy-cat who awards life above bereavement (Buruma & Margalit, 2005). In the results, I found out that there was an inherent belief that Khabib Nurmagomedov was fighting against coward infidels who does not have any ethical values. For instance, the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation World-TRT (2020) headline was, "Khabib: An unabashedly Muslim champion in an Islamophobic world." Similarly, the South China Morning Post (2018) headline after Khabib Nurmagomedov being congratulated by the Russian President was, "UFC: Khabib and Vladimir Putin throw shade at Conor McGregor as Russian president praises chokehold." This highlights that the 'chokehold' of Khabib Nurmagomedov was portrayed as a sign of walloping Conor McGregor. Thereby, hostility against Conor McGregor was endorsed and celebrated in the Eastern world. In contrast, the Western media (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) depicted the chokehold as a means to take off Conor McGregor's head (BBC, 2018).
The Eastern media (i.e., newspapers, blogs, and sporting news websites) also portrayed Khabib Nurmagomedov as a savior of the Muslim world compared to other Muslim athletes. For instance, Al-Qalam's, Southern Africa's Muslim Newspaper, the headline was, "Khabib '100 times bigger than Mo Salah' after winning for the Muslim world." Khabib Nurmagomedov's victory was considered as the Muslim world victory. Overall, it can be argued that Khabib Nurmagomedov was portrayed as a Muslim Messiah fighting against the coward Islamophobic West. This categorization of the Western world to be all Islamophobic depicts potential deep racial bias against the West in the East, confirming Occidentalism notion in the Eastern world.

Conclusion
In the early 1990s, the clash of civilizations thesis was used to predict the West and the Muslim world's potential conflict. Numerous scholars have claimed that the clash of civilizations thesis has been substantiated due to ongoing disputes between the West and the Muslim world after the 9/11 terrorist attacks (e.g., the Aghan war, Syrian War, Iraq War, and Libya War) (Haynes, 2019). Further, the clash of civilizations thesis was mainly hypothesized to decipher the explicit bias held among various civilizations due to historical reasons (Huntington, 1993). However, scholars have argued that the clash of civilizations thesis can offer means to understand implicit bias among various civilizations in social activities, such as sports (Dyreson, 2010(Dyreson, , 2012. In this study, I have examined the clash of civilizations thesis through the lens of Orientalism and Occidentalism notion. I argue that a Muslim athlete with an intersecting identity can be seen in a contrasting way in the Muslim and Eastern world media. This study adds to the body of knowledge by elucidating that civilizations' clashes could be witnessed in the sporting phenomenon. Notably, in the sociology of sport scholarship, researchers have already highlighted that the Muslim world is perceived as a homogenous and monolithic entity by the Western world (Ratna & Samie, 2016;Samie, 2013Samie, , 2017. This study contributes to the sport sociology scholarship by highlighting that the Muslim world media also sees the West as all-homogenous and racist, which shows deep contrasting racial bias in both civilizations. In the future, research is needed about how Muslim women athletes are seen in both the Western and Eastern worlds. Although, there has been some research about how Muslim women athletes are being comprehended in the Western media (Samie & Sehlikoglu, 2014). For instance, Samie and Sehlikoglu (2014) conducted a critical analysis of numerous online media platforms to understand how the Western media painted Muslim women from 28 different countries during the 2012 London Olympic Games. They found out that most of the Western media described Muslim women as out of place, incompetent, in need of Western men's help, and exotic veiled objects. However, missing from the scholarship is how Western and Eastern media portrays Muslim women athletes' participation in one sporting event in a contrasting way. Further, I request scholars to take a more holistic approach in understanding the Muslim athletes' identity portrayal by media via Preprints (www.preprints.org) | NOT PEER-REVIEWED | Posted: 27 September 2021 doi:10.20944/preprints202109.0456.v1 highlighting contrasting views, rather than only stressing upon Islamophobia and Orientalist bias in the Western world. Lastly, in the future, a study could be conducted concerning how Western media portrays Western minority athletes as compared to Muslim athletes from the Eastern world.