Man bites dog

My email to Eddy Mair on Radio 4’s PM programme this evening:

Can you prove to me that the huge crowds witnessed on the streets of Khartoum after Friday prayers today were because of the teddy bear insult? If you go to any Muslim city anywhere in the world after Friday prayers you will witness massive crowds. Indeed, you will witness them even outside the mosques up and down this country? Virtually every Muslim attends the Friday prayer – clearly they have to go somewhere when the prayer ends and in the absence of a teletransporter the first thing they will do is pour onto the street.

You may not care about this, you may not know about it or you may be enraged by the behaviour of Muslims, and not want to read these few short thoughts of mine. That is fine – you can simply pass over this post.

But here we are, I have been “enraged” – yes, by media hype – what hypocrites they are given that they constantly attack the government with accusations of spin. I have always defended “the media” against claims of bias: they report the news, they do not make it.

But here I sit amidst my “enraged” fellow countrymen – lambasting the Muslims, demanding that they be deported, that they deserve no respect, that their religion is barbaric and inhumane – listening to interviews on the radio and reading newspaper articles all covering this same ground, and I ask myself a question.

Why do you not know about 138 Muslim leaders and scholars from around the world reached out to Christian leaders in an open letter to the heads of all Christian churches just a month ago, emphasizing, “the future of the world depends on peace between Muslims and Christians.”

http://www.islamicamagazine.com/Common-Word/Christian-Response.html
http://www.islamicamagazine.com/Common-Word/Muslim-Response.html

Why too do you not know about the Amman Initiative which saw 170 Sunni and Shi‘a religious scholars and Muslim intellectuals from 40 countries gathering to condemn terrorism in absolute terms in July last year?

Why is it that you nothing about these? Where was the media coverage? Where the vast acreage of opinion pieces? Where the journalists demanding that Muslim’s reaction? Where?

Yes, dog bites man – not news; man bites dog – news. But some of us have to live with fallout.

I was just thinking the same thing

A comment on a weblog regarding the current tendency for those opposed to Muslims to quote a piece of research which suggests that a quarter of us believe in conspiracy theories regarding the massacres on the London transport system in July 2005:

redleader, Comment No. 626343, June 8 15:12, GBR

EdmundWest,

I agree that the 24% of Muslims polled, who believe that the London tube attacks were carried out by some third party unknown, are deluding themselves. And, of course, ignorance is always, to a greater or lesser degree, an evil to be combatted.

What I don’t understand about you, and those like you, is why you’re brandishing this finding in our faces as something terribly sinister and an omen of terrible things to come.

I mean, there’s one thing for sure about this 24%, isn’t there? The sort of person so convinced of the essential goodness of Islam that they cannot accept that even the most red-handed co-religionist can possibly have committed an act of violence – that’s not the sort of person whose ever going to cause you any trouble, is it? That is the sort of person you can happily ask to babysit your teenage daughter, to take your used notes to the bank, or happily sit next to on the tube. Maybe you wouldn’t want their help with your Political Studies homework, that’s all. So – what’s your point?

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/inayat_bunglawala/2007/06/mystery_demo.html

Madeleine Bunting…

Writing in The Guardian, Wednesday 16 August with a column entitled, The venomous media voices who think no Muslim is worth talking to

I feel she makes some good points and has identified some real issues. It seems to me that she is one Commentator who has actually engaged with the British community and knows what she’s talking about.

An extract:

…For a story to really work you have to have good guys as well as bad, so the critics conjure up another absurdity – the “silent Sufi majority” of British Muslims. These are the gentle, peace-loving Muslims at the grassroots who have been betrayed, so the argument runs, by those who claim to represent them, such as the Muslim Council of Britain. One can argue for hours about how to define a Sufi in this country; and, leaving that aside, the characterisation of Sufism is wide of the mark: some of the most violent anti-colonial struggles have been led by Sufis, for example Chechnya and Algeria, even the Mahdi who did for General Gordon in Khartoum. Furthermore, some argue that Sufi-inclined traditions such as the Kashmiri Barelwi have failed to travel well to urban Britain and that it is precisely their youngsters who are most disorientated and likely to fail prey to extremism – as was the case of the July 7 bombers from Leeds.

The main target for Bright is the Muslim Council of Britain; he loathes it with a contempt that is hard to explain. Given that the MCB is in effect a small volunteer parish council scrabbling to represent a hugely diverse – both ethnically and theologically – community, it’s not surprising that it has scored own goals in its time. It’s a young, underconfident institution and falls short in many ways, but the fact remains that of all the Muslim organisations to emerge in recent decades it has proved the most successful in winning affiliates. There is no comparable substitute waiting in the wings. The Sufi Muslim Council of Britain has been in existence all of a month; I wish it well, but unlike the MCB it cannot claim to represent anything like the 40% of British mosques affiliated to the MCB.

Kelly has an urgent task ahead to assuage anxiety as the possibility looms of a second-class status for Muslims in this country – profiled, suspected, searched, endlessly quizzed and found wanting. As for the armchair warriors so keen to proffer advice, one has to question the motives of those intent on undermining the meagre organisational capacity the Muslim community has managed to weld together to combat just such a threat.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,,1851017,00.html

Stupid News Day

I woke up late this morning, but now I’m up it seems like one of those Stupid News days. There was one of those debates about Islamic extremism and the moderates on the Radio 4’s Today programme on my way into work. Yahya Birt made a useful contribution, but the same could not be said of the author of a book on Immigration and Multiculturalism. He went off on the predictable “what do we mean by moderates” tangent – 40% of British Muslims believe in Shariah Law, he said, so when we’re talking about extremism it is a much bigger problem than we think.

He didn’t want to discuss the question of how we tackle those who think it’s a good idea to blow up innocents on the public transport system; he wanted to broaden out the discussion to cover anyone who thinks drinking alcohol is foolish and consuming interest is abhorrent. Well how is that going to help you prevent people from engaging in acts of mass murder? How does insisting that I am an extremist help you? I abhor wanton violence (I won’t even watch Hollywood shoot-em-ups), I pay my taxes, I don’t drop litter, I work in the public services, I try to be nice to those around me and helpful too, and yet you insist on labelling me an extremist. Sorry, I just don’t see how this helps you deal with the issue at hand.

It wasn’t the only Stupid News item. Once again the BBC is making much of Zacarias Moussaoui’s attendance of Brixton Mosque. I call it a Stupid News item because anyone who knew anything about Muslims would realise that – as people required to pray five times a day – we will attend the mosque wherever we find ourselves. So I have prayed in Brixton Mosque (once) and in the famous Finsbury Park mosque too (twice). I have also attended the Muslim Welfare House mosque in Finsbury Park many times, and Central mosque, and East London mosque, and a tiny Bengali mosque behind Euston Station. I have prayed in the Muslim Heritage mosque in Westbourne Park, the Shia mosque in Maida Vale, the Sufi mosque in Cricklewood and the prayer room in the back of the Salafi bookshop there.

I have attended the main mosque in West Ealing and the Pakistani mosque five minutes away. I have prayed in a Bengali mosque near Kings Cross that used to be a pub, and I have been to the Murabitun mosque in Norwich. I have attended an assortment of mosques in Peterborough, and the former Methodist chapel mosque in Hull. I have been to Hounslow mosque, and two in Southall, and I once tried to find Acton mosque. I have attended York mosque and Stirling mosque, and the Goodge Street mosque, and Aylesbury mosque, and Chesham mosque, and one in Leicester, oh and the Turkish mosque in Leicester too. Then there’s the Turkish mosque in Shoreditch and the other one up near Dalston. I have also walked past the main mosque in Dodoma, Tanzania, while I have attended many different mosques in Istanbul and the Artvin province of Turkey, not to mention my flying visits to Izmir, Izmit, Rize and Ankara. I have even utilised the Prayer Room at London Heathrow Airport and Wycombe General Hospital. Is that news? There’s a whole selection for you, depending which label you want to assign to me today.

The other piece of Stupid News focuses on how terror suspect Khalid al Fawwaz led prayers in Woodhill Prison in Buckinghamshire for a short period in 2003. Again, what is so incredible about this? In the absence of an imam, any of us can lead a group of Muslims in prayer. When friends visit my house, I lead the prayer. If I visit someone else’s house, my host will lead the prayer. In university prayer rooms up and down the land, students are leading others in prayer. What are the journalists thinking? Funny frock? Dog collar? Evening song and mattins? No, dear journalist, it really is not extraordinary at all.

Now I admit that I don’t really have any idea what goes on inside a Synagogue or a Sikh temple, but then it’s not my job to know. But these are journalists – it is their job to find out what is going on in the stories they are reporting. If journalists feel they have earned the right to lambaste bloggers as fountains of irrelevant opinion, they should at least try to prove it. These Stupid News items only seem to confirm that many of them are as stupid as me.

Media-induced Distress

Okay, so I am writing again already. Prompted by the first comment left by yet another “anonymous” under my last post, something needs to be said about media-induced distress. I cannot say that I have no sympathy for sufferers of this ailment; indeed it would be hypocritical for me to deny the anxiety stirring power of the media given the subject of my articles at the height of the cartoon fracas. I was, however, stunned by this comment:

“Why am I reading, and will continue to read, your blog? Because I now view all Muslims as terrorists with one goal; and that is to kill non-muslims. I know my view is being warped by the news media, critics, etc. so am trying to understand why…”

I cannot claim to be fanatical in following the media, but I do get a fair exposure so it is difficult for me to comprehend how anyone could come to the conclusion that “all muslims” are terrorists from this source. Is reporting really that bad? When the earthquake happened in Pakistan, I recall that a number of Muslim charities received very good publicity. Similarly their role in the relief efforts in the Darfur region of Sudan and, more recently, the famine hit regions across East Africa have received a fair amount of attention. On the other hand, much has been said about Muslims as victims of conflict and crisis worldwide. So what is it that blinds people to this reporting?

When my mother was a hospital chaplain some years ago, she used to come home telling us about “a lovely Muslim Doctor” who would come to pray in the chapel every day. When I became a Muslim myself, she asked me, “But what about the terrible way Muslims behave?” What is it that skews a person’s viewpoint despite their own experience? My grandmother once touched on this, telling me that as a child she was told never to trust Jews and Catholics; but when she finally met people of these two faiths she considered them some of the most wonderful people she had ever met. She told me this after meeting some of my Muslim friends at my wedding. They were lovely, she told me, despite what people say about Muslims.

It is interesting because I don’t take this blanket derogation of Muslims away with me from the media. In fact I am conscious that many Jews consider the BBC anti-Semitic because of its reporting from Palestine, many Black people claim it is racist, members of BNP call it anti-white, all while it is labelled Islamophobic. Furthermore, I never found myself thinking that all Irish people or all Catholics were terrorists at the height of the IRA bombing campaigns. I find it impossible to comprehend that one could be so heavily swayed by the news media. Thus, if this is a genuine occurrence I can only conclude that my own viewpoint is affected by the conscious decisions I have made.

The first such decision was to remove the television from my home. My wife and I made this decision around November 2001, primarily because we found ourselves wasting so much time in the aftermath of the attacks on America, coming home in the evening to watch the Six O’Clock News, Channel Four News, the Ten O’Clock News and Newsnight. We realised that our need-to-know attitude as actually false, for in reality we only come to know what editors choose to tell us. Life without television means that I am often out of touch with the latest trends, fashions, music, products, cars and conversations. Big deal. On those occasions when I am visiting friends and the television is on I do feel there is no need to feel regret.

Naturally I don’t have access to a hundred channels of satellite TV, indeed I never have. My newspaper when I choose to buy one is The Independent. I would never buy The Sun, The Mirror, The Daily Mail, The Express or any other such paper. Conscious choices. On the Internet, it is a cursory glance at the BBC on my arrival at work in the morning, perhaps occasionally The Times, The Guardian and The Independent as well. I used to spend a long time scanning all sorts of sources, but again I realised it served no purpose. Consciously I chose to fast my media consumption. My one weakness is Radio 4, which I tend to have on in my car in the morning and evening and to which I listen at home.

A number of my friends have given up the media altogether, recognising the addiction for what it is. It is unnatural in any case, says one of them, for even a century ago our predecessors would have known little more than what was happening across the county. Important news would get through eventually, but decisions were not required based upon the breaking news. It is not healthy to have so much information bombarded at us day and night, he argued; quite an irony given that he works for the world’s largest satellite broadcaster. Other friends go on media-free retreats and come back telling us how refreshed they feel. As for me, I find my TV-free home a true sanctuary, an abode of peace (Darussalam).

Those suffering media-induced distress may find comfort in treating the addiction, fasting for a while, turning off the TV and closing the papers. Some drink green tea to detoxicate their bodies others fast the daylight hours. A similar prescription can certainly be written for the soul.

Making caricatures of us all

When I began writing several hours ago, having just turned off the Six O’Clock News in my car, I was pretty angry. I was foaming about the way Muslims have to react so stupidly every time a red flag is waved in front of us. Just after I became Muslim seven and a half years ago, another convert told me that the action we had taken was a bit like jumping on board a sinking ship. Days like this remind me of his analogy. But I’ve had dinner now and I’ve surfed a few blogs and suddenly noticed that it’s actually very hard to find Muslims saying anything stupid. All I see are the silent images on the BBC.

The cartoons in question were first published four months ago in Denmark, apparently to test the boundaries of freedom of expression. Perhaps Denmark had already established these boundaries when it’s Supreme Court ruled that a supermarket chain had the right to sack a young Muslim woman for wearing a headscarf to work. Of course, we can’t say this; it’s changing the subject. No, the newspaper in question, Jyllands Posten, consulted the Danish theologian Professor Tim Jensen before publishing the cartoons, according to Zaman Online. He responded with the advice that the cartoons should not be published, pointing out that “It will offend Muslims and only cause pointless provocation.” So the newspaper went ahead and published them anyway.

On 20 October 2005, the BBC reported that ambassadors of ten Muslim countries had complained to the Danish prime minister about the newspaper’s cartoons. Then the story disappeared for three months, only to reappear when Arla Foods announced it would have one hundred redundancies after its sales in the Middle East fell to zero. In this bizarre twist to the usual sanctions regime, Danish companies were pleading for a food-for-oil programme. Thus the EU Trade Commissioner, Peter Mandelson, chipped in to criticise the papers that re-ran the cartoons. Why did they re-run the cartoons? Did they, too, need to establish the boundaries? Were they still in doubt? Of course not. Nothing stirs fame like controversy. So away they wave with the red flag.

All day, the BBC has been stirring the story. The Today programme on Radio 4, then the World at One and PM. On the One O’Clock News on BBC1 TV, Darren Jordan introduced the package in sombre mood, we listened as the reporter told us that another clash of cultures, like that seen with the Satanic Verses, “was developing fast”, then Darren turned to the other camera with a smile and told us how to contribute to the debate online. While the sales of Lurpak continued to plummet, a self-righteous media began to fight back, chanting death to the enemies who have no respect for pointless provocation. Calls to boycott Middle Eastern goods quickly faded, however, when it was realised that the only Middle Eastern goods available were oil and stale baklava.

Apparently there has been a massive wave of protest across the Middle East. One involved a group of men pouring lighter fluid over a Danish flag which appeared to be made of tissue paper before setting it alight. In another scene, men whose convictions were so strong that they had to hide their faces beneath scarves surrounded the EU offices in Gaza and fired bullets into the air, gaining prime time airing on the Six O’Clock News and BBC Online. But rolling into Luton, the BBC filmed men walking out of a mosque looking scarily unperturbed. Even the non-Muslim asked for his opinion on the street seemed oblivious to the media frenzy unveiling around him. Unprepared, he stuttered something about nothing and shrugged his shoulders.

Personally I believe there must be better ways to honour our blessed Prophet, peace be upon him, than to violently demand a non-Muslim newspaper observes Islamic principles of not depicting the Prophets. Islam has always prohibited this because it wanted to prevent its followers from taking them as objects of worship down the line. That’s not unreasonable, if you think of the way Iconography has been used in the Catholic and Orthodox traditions of Christianity. But would we not be better off honouring Muhammed, peace be upon him, by living as he lived, trying to curb our anger and observing patience? But then again, that seems to be what Muslims are saying on the blogs I’ve read. Only time will tell, of course; tomorrow’s Jummah and we’ll see if we have a ritual bonfire of tubs of Lurpak in the car park. We’ll see.

On the other hand, the BBC was making much of the democratic right to cause offence in the civilised countries of Western Europe today. Unlike those ignorant, backward Muslims over there with their quaint ways and failure to appreciate satire, Denmark is a land of enlightened souls doing nothing but exploring their boundaries. Yes indeed, Denmark is such a pleasant civilised land that a radio station in Copenhagen had to have its broadcasting licence taken away in August last year after calling for the extermination of Muslims. Whilst exploring the boundaries of freedom of expression, Kaj Wilhelmsen told listeners to Radio Holger: “There are only two possible reactions if you want to stop this bomb terrorism – either you expel all Muslims from Western Europe so they cannot plant bombs, or you exterminate the fanatical Muslims which would mean killing a substantial part of Muslim immigrants.” As Queen Margrethe of Denmark is quoted as saying in her autobiography, it is time to take the challenge of Islam seriously: “We have let this issue float around for too long, because we are tolerant and rather lazy.” You see: we in the civilized West are much too tolerant to behave like those flag-made-of-tissue-burning, sanction-wielding brutes over there.

Sorry if I speak out of turn, but the whole extravaganza reeks of hypocrisy – on all sides.

Meanwhile East Africa is currently suffering from a severe drought, which is threatening to put up to 2.5 million people in Kenya alone at the risk of famine. It might be time to shift our attention in that direction and come up with a positive outcome instead.