History Main / MistakenForTerrorist

* The main conflict in ''Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay'' revolves around [[Film/HaroldAndKumar Harold Lee and Kumar Patel]] on the run as fugitives from the US government, which has mistakenly charged both of them with terrorism. This all happened in the first place because Kumar (a bearded brown man of Indian Hindu descent) unwisely chose to smuggle weed into an airplane and then smoke it inside the restroom. When he lights up a bong, other people think he's got a stick of dynamite; he tries to correct them by saying that "it's only a bong", but the others mishear "bong" as "bomb". This leads to Harold and Kumar (who are respectively mistaken for a [[FarEastAsianTerrorists North Korean spy]] and an [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Al-Qaeda member]]) being immediately arrested and sent straight to [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Guantanamo Bay, before escaping]] back to the United States. They go on a cross-country journey in hopes of finding someone who can help them [[ClearMyName prove their innocence]], while a [[BigotWithABadge very racist (and stupid) government official]] leads the federal manhunt for them.

* The main conflict in ''Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay'' revolves around [[Film/HaroldAndKumar Harold Lee and Kumar Patel]] on the run as fugitives from the US government, which has mistakenly charged both of them with terrorism. This all happened in the first place because Kumar (a bearded brown man of Indian Hindu descent) unwisely chose to smuggle weed into an airplane and then smoke it inside the restroom. When he lights up a bong, other people think he's got a stick of dynamite; he tries to correct them by saying that "it's only a bong", but the others mishear "bong" as "bomb". This leads to Harold and Kumar (respectively mistaken for a [[FarEastAsianTerrorists North Korean spy]] and an [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Al-Qaeda member]]) being immediately arrested and sent straight to [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Guantanamo Bay, before escaping]] back to the United States. They go on a cross-country journey in hopes of finding someone who can help them [[ClearMyName prove their innocence]], while a [[BigotWithABadge very racist (and stupid) government official]] leads the federal manhunt for them.

* The main conflict in ''Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay'' revolves around [[Film/HaroldAndKumar Harold Lee and Kumar Patel]] on the run as fugitives from the US government, which has mistakenly charged both of them with terrorism. This all happened in the first place because Kumar (a bearded brown man of Indian Hindu descent) unwisely chose to smuggle weed into an airplane and then smoke it inside the restroom. When he lights up a bong, other people think he's got a stick of dynamite; he tries to correct them by saying that "it's only a bong", but the others mishear "bong" as "bomb". This leads to Harold and Kumar (respectively mistaken for a [[FarEastAsianTerrorists North Korean spy]] and a [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Muslim militant]]) being immediately arrested and sent straight to [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Guantanamo Bay, before escaping]] back to the United States. They go on a cross-country journey in hopes of finding someone who can help them [[ClearMyName prove their innocence]], while a [[BigotWithABadge very racist (and stupid) government official]] leads the federal manhunt for them.

* The main conflict in ''Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay'' revolves around [[Film/HaroldAndKumar Harold Lee and Kumar Patel]] on the run as fugitives from the US government, which has mistakenly charged both of them with terrorism. This all happened in the first place because Kumar (a bearded brown man of Indian Hindu descent) unwisely chose to smuggle weed into an airplane and then smoke it inside the restroom. When he lights up a bong, other people think he's got a stick of dynamite; he tries to correct them saying that "it's only a bong", but the others mishear "bong" as "bomb". This leads to Harold and Kumar (respectively mistaken for a [[FarEastAsianTerrorists North Korean spy]] and a [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Muslim militant]]) being immediately arrested and sent straight to [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Guantanamo Bay, before escaping]] back to the United States. They go on a cross-country journey in hopes of finding someone who can help them [[ClearMyName prove their innocence]], while a [[BigotWithABadge very racist (and stupid) government official]] leads the federal manhunt for them.

** In the Season 3 finale "It's Goin' Down", Huey is misidentified as a possible suspect in an alleged terrorist conspiracy in Woodcrest, and so a federal agent named Jack Flowers ([[{{Expy}} a parody of]] [[Series/TwentyFour Jack Bauer]]) pursues him. Huey abducts [[AssholeVictim Uncle Ruckus]] at knifepoint, and forces Ruckus to drive his school bus in a frantic car chase while fleeing from the authorities. It ends with Huey and Ruckus both being arrested and interrogated, until Jack Flowers is persuaded that neither of them are actually guilty of being involved with the terrorist plot, the true culprits being [[spoiler:[[CorruptCorporateExecutive Ed Wuncler I]], [[WhiteGangbangers Ed Wuncler III and Gin Rummy]], who are [[ItMakesSenseInContext planning to blow up an entire building just to kill a single security guard in a convoluted scheme to profit from that guard's death]].]]

* ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'': In "[[Recap/SouthParkS11E4TheSnuke The Snuke]]", Cartman automatically assumes that a new boy at school is a terrorist because he's Muslim. [[spoiler:While there does turn out to be a terrorist plot going on in town, it's actually being done by Russian mercenaries working for the British government.]]

* Played with in ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks''. The main protagonist Huey Freeman is a 10-year-old [[MalcolmXerox far-left black nationalist]] who tends to spout a lot of revolutionary socialist rhetoric. The US federal government has placed him on a watchlist for suspected domestic terrorists. While Huey isn't exactly a nonviolent activist, as he's done a fair amount of shady illegal actions throughout the series (from carrying weapons like an electric shock glove or a katana sword, and at one point he even made an aborted plan to forcefully liberate a wrongfully-convicted death row inmate from the state prison), [[RevolutionariesWhoDontDoAnything he never really gets around to doing any real acts of militant political extremism]]. As far as the "terrorist" label goes, Huey's certainly not a ruthless bad guy who wants to hurt innocent people, [[WellIntentionedExtremist but he does believe in the use of violence to advance a noble cause]].

* At the beginning of ''VideoGame/InFamous'', [[TheProtagonist Cole MacGrath]] is tricked into opening [[MailBomb a mail package containing]] [[FantasticNuke a powerful bomb-like weapon]] called the Ray Sphere; which produces an explosion that destroys a large portion of Empire City, killing tons of unlucky innocent people as a result. After video footage showing Cole's (accidental) role in causing the Blast is leaked to the public, he is now feared and hated by almost everyone around him, as if he had intentionally committed mass murder. He even starts narrating with the line "Ever been called a terrorist?", while describing how he became scapegoated for the whole tragedy. Making things even more personally stressful is that Cole's girlfriend Trish now hates him because her sister Amy died in the Blast, despite his honest insistence that he didn't even know there was a bomb in the package he opened.

* At the beginning of ''VideoGame/InFamous'', [[PlayerCharacter Cole MacGrath]] is tricked into opening [[MailBomb a mail package containing]] [[FantasticNuke a powerful bomb-like weapon]] called the Ray Sphere; which produces an explosion that destroys a large portion of Empire City, killing tons of unlucky innocent people as a result. After information about Cole's (accidental) involvement in causing the Blast is revealed to the public, he is now feared and hated by almost everyone around him, as if he had intentionally committed mass murder. He even starts narrating with the line "Ever been called a terrorist?", while describing how he became scapegoated for the whole tragedy.

[[folder:Standup Comedy]]
* Creator/RussellPeters has a routine where he describes his experiences of being an Indian-looking man trying to fly right after 9/11. He describes a man freaking out and screaming "OH MY GOD, NO!" when Russell attempts to pull something out of his bag.
-->Quite down, man! It's just my headphones! ...[{{beat}}]...[[LampshadeHanging gotta listen to my instructions]]."
* In the "Axis of Evil Comedy Tour", Maz Jobrani shows how easy it is to be mistaken for a terrorist by saying "This party is going to be a blast" in his natural American accent and then repeating it in a Middle Eastern accent.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Comedy]]

* This trope is invoked and exploited by the villains in ''Film/BloodRedSky''. A team of WesternTerrorists (who seem to be more like [[TerroristsWithoutACause apolitical mercenaries]] hired by an unknown third-party) hijack an airliner flying from Germany to New York, as part of an elaborate FalseFlagOperation to make this whole incident look like an [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Islamist terrorist attack]]. They grab a few innocent Muslim men among the passengers (including supporting character Farid) and force them to recite a a threatening message in Arabic to [[FrameUp frame them]] as [[FallGuy fall guys]]. This still causes problems later on after the hijacked plane ends up landing at a British RAF airbase in Scotland, as the local military officer in charge still believes that Farid is a genuine terrorist and ignores his pleas of innocence.

* The main conflict in ''Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay'' revolves around [[Film/HaroldAndKumar Harold Lee and Kumar Patel]] on the run as fugitives from the US government, which has mistakenly charged both of them with terrorism. This all happened in the first place because Kumar (a bearded brown man of Indian Hindu descent) unwisely chose to smuggle weed into an airplane and then smoke it inside the restroom. When he lights up a bong, other people think he's got a stick of dynamite; he tries to correct them saying that "it's only a bong", but the others mishear "bong" as "bomb". This leads to Harold and Kumar (respectively mistaken for a [[FarEastAsianTerrorists North Korean spy]] and a [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Muslim militant]]) being immediately arrested and sent straight to [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Guantanamo Bay; before escaping]] back to the United States, where a [[BigotWithABadge very racist (and stupid) federal agent]] pursues them.

* This trope is invoked and exploited by the villains in ''Film/BloodRedSky''. A team of WesternTerrorists (who seemed to be more like [[TerroristsWithoutACause apolitical mercenaries]] hired by an unknown third-party) hijack an airliner flying from Germany to New York, as part of an elaborate FalseFlagOperation to make this whole incident look like an [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Islamist terrorist attack]]. They grab a few innocent Muslim men among the passengers (including supporting character Farid) and force them to recite a a threatening message in Arabic to [[FrameUp frame them]] as [[FallGuy fall guys]]. This still causes problems later on after the hijacked plane ends up landing at a British RAF airbase in Scotland, as the local military officer in charge still believes that Farid is a genuine terrorist and ignores his pleas of innocence.

* The main conflict in ''Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay'' revolves around [[Film/HaroldAndKumar Harold Lee and Kumar Patel]] on the run as fugitives from the US government, which has mistakenly charged both of them with terrorism. This all happened in the first place because Kumar (a bearded brown man of Indian Hindu descent) unwisely chose to smuggle weed into an airplane and then smoke it inside the restroom. When he lights up a bong, other people think he's got a stick of dynamite; he tries to correct them saying that "it's only a bong", but the others mishear "bong" as "bomb". This leads to Harold and Kumar (respectively mistaken for a [[YellowPeril North Korean spy]] and a [[MiddleEasternTerrorists Muslim militant]]) being immediately arrested and sent straight to [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Guantanamo Bay; before escaping]] back to the United States, where a [[BigotWithABadge very racist (and stupid) federal agent]] pursues them.

* In ''Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay'', we see a [[POVCam POV Shot]] from a little old lady on the plane and Kumar looks like a terrorist — turban, beard, EvilLaugh. Then he lights up a bong in the restroom and people think he's got a stick of dynamite. He even says "it's only a bong" and people mistake him for saying "bomb."

* In ''Fanfic/TheKarmaOfLies'' and its RecursiveFanfiction stories, part of Adrien Agreste's bleak fate is being assumed by Paris to be in cahoots with Hawk Moth [[SinsOfOurFathers just because he is Gabriel Agreste's son]]. In a number of other ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'' fanfics (such as ''Fanfic/TruthAndConsequences'') this is one of the major fears Marinette thinks of when she discovers Adrien is Cat Noir (in this particular Fic, Hawk Moth even invokes said fear [[spoiler:to convince Marinette to [[FaceHeelTurn ally with him]]]]).

* In ''Fanfic/TheKarmaOfLies'' and its RecursiveFanfiction stories, part of Adrien Agreste's bleak fate is being assumed by Paris to be in cahoots with Hawk Moth [[SinsOfOurFathers just because he is Gabriel Agreste's son]].

* A game called ''[[http://kotaku.com/the-fake-terrorist-conspiracy-game-that-fooled-people-f-1710418998 ALFA-ARKIV]]'' or, alternatively, ''Junko Junsui'' wound up being so effective that some of the material from the game was [[https://www.cnet.com/news/junko-junsui-and-alfa-arkiv-behind-the-curtain/ logged in intelligence databases,]] the game's characters mistaken for actual terrorists. Some {{Conspiracy Theorist}}s also thought that the game was [[http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread1023320/pg1 a Russian psy-op.]]

[[folder:Comic Strips]]
* In ''ComicStrip/MadamAndEve'', Mother Anderson's chemist (pharmacist) "Al" [[http://www.madamandeve.co.za/cartoons/me003447.gif gets subjected to this]] just because he's unfortunate enough to have the last name "Qaeda".
[[/folder]]

* Music/StiffLittleFIngers sent their demo tape to several labels, and as a joke about the british term for cluster munitions "cassette bomb", added a picture of a bomb on the cassettes, which caused small panics, especially coming from a Northern Irish return address.

* A game called ''[[http://kotaku.com/the-fake-terrorist-conspiracy-game-that-fooled-people-f-1710418998 ALFA-ARKIV]]'' or, alternatively, ''Junko Junsui'' did something similar, and wound up being so effective that some of the material from the game was [[https://www.cnet.com/news/junko-junsui-and-alfa-arkiv-behind-the-curtain/ logged in intelligence databases,]] the game's characters mistaken for actual terrorists. Some {{Conspiracy Theorist}}s also thought that the game was [[http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread1023320/pg1 a Russian psy-op.]]

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[[caption-width-right:310:Wait! ICanExplain!]]

[[quoteright:350:[[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mistakenforterrorist.png]]]]
[[caption-width-right:350:Wait! ICanExplain!]]