"Not Easy Being British"

SalmanAsif

" For far too long we have been teaching English in a white, middle-class, racist, sexist fashion. If we want to encourage immigrants to assimilate into our society we must help them learn our language. For this reason, the Government has decided to scrap the old A is for Apple, B is for Ball, C is for Cat method and introduce a new alphabet tailored for Muslim pupils. For next term, all schools will be required to use the following system.

"A is for Ayatollah, B is for Baghdad, C is for Curry, D is for Djabella, E is for Emir, F is for Fatwa, G is for Gaddafi, H is for Hizbollah, I is for Intifada, J is for Jihad, K is for Khomeini, L is for Lebanon, M is for Mecca, O is for Onion bhaji, P is for Palestine, R is for Rushdie, S is for Saddam, T is for Tehran,……" - The Sun, 12 November 1991

It was some years ago when I had a rather chillingly eye-opening insight into the British mainstream press' commitment with what is often smugly regarded as the 'truth.' I was returning from attending the Prince of Wales' historic lecture on Islam and contribution of Muslims in the making of the modern world, at the Oxford University Islamic Society (1994).

A twenty page paper, pulsing with an reserved, most embracing endorsement of the role of Islam in the evolution of modernity, tucked in my bag, I spiritedly keyed in my story in my mind. Two hours later at my newspaper office I was being graciously offered by a journalist colleague if I wished to use a mainstream news agency's story (which had arrived on the NewsNet in the meanwhile) on the Prince of Whales' lecture.

Out of sheer professional curiosity I cast a fleeting gaze at the computer screen, and there in front of my now stumped vision was the British version of the what Prince of Wales had said about Islam and muslims. 'Prince Charles pleads Muslims to respect British way of life,' it said. Many mainstream newspapers the next day had carried the story with little or no modifications.

Out of twenty pages of most remarkable tribute to the greatness of Islam and a generous acknowledgement of the contribution of Muslims in the west, what all BBC chose to broadcast was his comment on the plight of the Kurds in the Iraqi marshland. The selection was carefully made to remind the viewers that a villain Saddam Hussain was. No mention of his tribute to Muslims and Islam was made.

It is never easy to construct an encompassing argument on the role of the media, the implications of the power and influence of media in society. One has to see whether the media is interested in informing us with the truth, the whole truth or the selective truth. In terms of either living in a consumerist society or in a controlled Marxist style environment or even in a dogmatic-theocratic society, often media presentation is a reflection of the ethos and values of those who control it. Or the philosophy that besets its priorities.

In Britain the media has and continues to influence the way people have seen their world and perceived the 'other' world. From the 1950's reluctant inching towards the Americanisation of the British society to 60's and 70's obsessive immersion in the American model. Following this model the British media has continued top catalyse the process of cultural osmosis of sorts. But one of the British realities is the emergence of its multi-religious and multiracial culture, opposed to its own 'British culture' or its interest in other Western cultures - which is very much unlike the US model, where over the centuries and decades a greater integration has taken place between diverse communities and the US culture as a whole is described as a one which is hybrid.

As a Muslim in Britain it has been of special interest to me to explore the role of the media in forming views on the 'other culture,' and in this instance on the British Muslims in particular. Of particular curiosity to me is a recent report published by the Runnymede Trust on the issue of increased mainstream media ignorance of and hostility towards Muslims and Islam. It is a thought provoking road, from exercises into media "Packi-bashing" to whipping up notions of "Islamophobia" at times with patronising and subtle mannerism and other times with blatant and unabashed robustness.

That the former Gulf War veteran Timothy McVeigh is found guilty of the Alfred P. Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City in which 168 people died - must be a matter of some reflection for all those media pundits who enjoyed a field day pointing fingers to most conveniently perceived demon, who else but: "Muslim-fundamentalist-extremist-terrorist" Hand Behind The Bomb "We do not know who primed and put the Oklahoma bomb in its place; we do not know that they were, in the fullest meaning of the word fanatics. Unlike most of us, they do not in the least mind being killed:

Do you realise in perhaps half a century not more, and perhaps a great deal less there will be wars, in which fanatical Muslims will be winning? As for Oklahoma it will be called Khartoum-on-the Mississippi, and woe betide anyone who calls it anything else," hence spoke the Times columnist Bernard Levin.

While smoke still rose from the tragic aftermath of the site of the Oklahoma explosion, the mainstream media remained quite partial to the view of a Muslims/fundamentalists hand behind the tragedy. Newsnight (BBC 2) presenter Peter Snow went to such lengths as calling an American-Muslim leader on his programme and cross-examining him as the guilty party.

Questions like "Why do you Muslims talk so much of Jehad, what do you mean by it?" coming from a very angry Mr Peter Snow only mirrored his stereo-typical image of Islam and Muslims.

Suddenly images of Sadam Hussain and The Ayatollah became a ubiquitous in the media and references to "fundamentalism" became the most faddish interpretation of the "reality of Muslims."

In the U.S. the implications were even dire for the "convicts" of media trial of the Oklahoma bombing. Muslims were singled out and victimised often subjected to torture in various parts of America. An expectant mother was so brutally hit, that she lost her unborn child (Reuters).

"You can be British without speaking English or being Christian or being white, but nevertheless Britain is basically English-speaking, Christian and white, and one starts to think that it might become basically Urdu-speaking and Muslim and brown and one gets frightened and angry…Because of our obstinate refusal to have enough babies, western civilisation will start to die at the point when it could have been revived with new blood.

Then the hooded hordes will win, and Koran will be taught as Gibbon famously imagined, in the schools of Oxford," cried out a very phobic Mr Charles Moore, the erstwhile editor of the prestigious The Spectator.

The term 'fundamentalist' a convenient catch-word of the mainstream media seems to be determining anything from: a Muslim who returns for spiritual guidance to the sources of his faith.

A Muslim on mere ideological grounds questions and challenges the Western way of life and perceptions of things.

Clearly its not just the tabloid newspapers which have contributed to attaching stereotypes to Islam and Muslims, there are routine derogatory references in most of the press. At the time of the Rushdie affair, for example, Fay Weldon howled in a fit of hysteric rage, "Qur'an is food for no thought. It is not a poem on which society can be safely or sensibly based.

It gives weapons and strength to the thought police." The Daily Express adourned its page with BBC 1 "Kilroy" talkshow celebrity, Mr Robert Kilroy-Silk's poisonous words declaring, "they (Muslims) are backward and evil, and if it is being racist to say so then I must be and happy and proud to be so."

When Prince Charles called for bridge-building between Islam and the West, in a speech at Witon Park in December 1996 there were widespread criticisms of his views. An article in the Daily Telegraph, for example, implied that the Prince Charles' proposal should be rejected since "many British Muslims…, feel, first, members of the world wide Muslim community and only secondly member of British Society".

Stephen Spender wondered in The Spectator, in the light of the Rushdie affair, "how far democracy is taught in English schools where there are large numbers of immigrants." And he added that he found himself thinking "almost nostalgically of America schools where children are made to salute the American Flag". The context here seems rather unambiguous that the term "immigrants" meant Muslim, and Spender believed that Muslim children in Britain as distinct from other children, need special training in democracy and patriotism.

The BBC's Panorama presented Nisha Pillai (produced by Samir Shah) implied that the younger Pakistani and Bangladedshi generation is doing liitle more than prostitution, drug-trafficking and promoting general crimes in Britain.

Not long after this Channel 4 happily allocated a prime-time for a six-episode series "Karachi Cops" by Faris Kirmani. The series in its repetitive treatment of the subject seemed to imply Pakistan as a whole in the jaws of terrorism and inept police. Each series was edited painstakingly to a particular bias towards Pakistan.

Adding to this ongoing media contention was the famous Imran Khan ball tampering controversy. The tabloid press and the BBC having cast aspersion on Pakistan's winning of the World Cup, declared the Pakistani team as cheats and frauds.

Of course despite an overall media as a site for hegemonic struggle, the dominant viewpoints and the status quo, there is room for other views.

The litany is long and it continues. And to bear such ignorant jibes and subjected to such racist derision, is nothing new for the followers of Islam. Treading on a path fraught with challenges is the tradition of the Prophets.

The question in spite of such systematic hostility, however is divided, as we stumblingly scramble to stand, can we seriously claim to have been successful in cleaning our own act. Sorting our own house out? For it is far easier to play at the vulnerabilities of a community driven with petty squabbles and rivalries than to point a finger at a people who stand firm on their ground in an unyielding unison. May such adversities trigger a sense of self-reflection within our community. May they prove, as they did in the times of our elders, a binding force for us.