American comedian Chelsea Handler recently hosted Muslim actor Kumail Nanjiani - star of HBO's Silicon Valley - on her Netflix show Chelsea.  The two discussed his upbringing, religious faith and everything in between. 

Being Muslim and an immigrant, Nanjiani has battled through a number of stereotypes, so he decided to use the discussion with Handler to prove a point. 

"I think the issue with Islam has been that there’s no pop culture image of Muslims who are open-minded really," Nanjiani said. 

That's when Nanjiani asked Handler one simple question: 

"Like, when you think of Muslims what do you see in your head?" he asked to pinpoint the actual problem: misrepresentation.  

"I think of serious people. A beard and very kind of serious ... not like fun," Handler said.

"Right, that’s what I mean! My wife … she wanted to start a Tumblr called, ‘Muslims Having Fun.’ Because you never see them! Like, when you go to like, a theme park, you see Muslim people and they’re eating ice cream and they’re screaming on roller coasters. Why don’t we ever see those Muslims? Why do we only think of Muslims on the news when we think of Muslims?" Nanjiani said. 

Nanjiani has spoken out against negative stereotypes on countless occasions

Following U.S. President Donald Trump's Muslim Ban, the actor criticized the ban altogether, saying the only thing it produces is more hate.

The "Muslim ban accomplishes nothing but hate," the actor said at the time.  

"As someone who was born in Pakistan, I can tell you coming into America is VERY difficult," he tweeted at the time.

Nanjiani was born in Karachi, Pakistan, but attended college in the U.S. and holds dual citizenship. 

Pop culture, as Nanjiani said, has only reinforced the existing stereotypes around Muslims

Insufficient representation and negative portrayals of Muslims in Western media and pop culture leaves many non-Muslims with very little knowledge on the people who follow the faith. 

This has led to increased Islamophobia and a spike in hate crimes against Muslims in general. 

Hollywood constantly perpetuates negative stereotypes of Muslims and Arabs alike. 

"Nearly zero Arab and Muslim identities are portrayed three-dimensionally on screen," British-Iraqi actor Amrou Kadhi once wrote in an op-ed for The Independent. 

Kadhi himself has been asked to play a terrorist over 30 times and has been told, time and again, that he should see racial profiling as "a positive thing" by casting directors.

Will this ever change? And when?