Are the Media Missing the Story on Radical Islam?
By Alan Stewart Carl | Related entries in MediaWhile the American media spent this week trying to figure out the difference between buckshot and birdshot, the violence over the Mohammad cartoons continued in the Middle East and Pakistan. Most major news outlets have taken a position best described as “the violence is bad, the cartoons are bad.� Such a stance is incredibly misleading as it makes the radical Islamists and the cartoons seem equally egregious.
In reality, it’s the radical Muslims that are to blame and the Imams that fanned the flames by disseminating fake cartoons far worse than the real ones originally published in Denmark. Amba at Ambivablog has it right when she says:
This is not a “clash of civilizations,” it’s a calculated and scandalously successful offensive by radical Islamists in their war on the West. And the West has played right into their hands. The only fault of the Danish cartoonists was providing a weak pretext for this disinformation campaign, but if it hadn’t been that it would have been something else. The campaign’s success depends both on the West’s desire to respect others’ legitimate sensitivities (in itself not a bad thing, within reason), and on the “Arab street’s” penchant to believe whatever emotion dictates.
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These are clever, clever devils, these Islamists, and so very dangerous. They have no scruples about inciting mobs by any means necessary, and they are bent on seizing power and getting nukes.
This view is, by its nature, a lot more complex than the “violence bad, cartoons bad� message heard from much of the American media. Sometimes I think the media confuse balance with giving equal weight to both sides’ version of the truth. Trus, sometimes the truth is hard to uncover and I sympathize with the many good journalists who work hard to separate fact from spin. But this cartoon row is not one of those cases where the truth is all that hard to find.
The radical Islamists are very, very wrong. And it’s not being unbalanced to say so in a news report. The truth never compromises objectivity. That only happens when you believe there are somehow multiple and equally valid truths.
But maybe the problem is that some journalists simply don’t believe in a universal truth. Such an instance is described and debated by Callimachus at Done With Mirrors where he summarizes one newswoman’s view of things as:
Don’t criticize Muhammad. Don’t criticize Islam. Don’t criticize anyone except the President of the United States. Only Bushco is a fair target. Otherwise, it’s not “free speech,” it’s “hate speech.
If this really is a prevalent attitude in American newsrooms, as Callimachus seems to suggest, we have a serious problem with the American media. Look, I don’t want to be one of those snarky bloggers always bashing the media. I’ve said before and I’ll say again that, on the whole, the American media does an excellent job. But there are failings. The impulse that led to hyperventilation over Cheney’s hunting accident is an annoying but generally harmless failing. But the inability to accurately depict the radical Islamist threat is a major failing.
We simply cannot pretend that the radical Islamists’ complaints are reasonable or that their violent reactions are in the least bit justified. And we cannot pretend our culture deserves equal or even a significant minority of the blame for the violence and hate spewing from the radical Islamists. We have to get a better grip on the situation and the media is going to have to help us do that.
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February 17th, 2006 at 3:24 pm
“This is not a “clash of civilizations,â€Â? it’s a calculated and scandalously successful offensive by radical Islamists in their war on the West.”
While it’s not a bona-fide ‘clash of civilizations’ (yet), it IS a clash of the very differning value systems of two cultures: the secular Western culture of free speech and the religious culture of Islam. That radical Islamists can incite the ‘Muslim street’ to riot with some fake cartoons points to this very fact.
“The impulse that led to hyperventilation over Cheney’s hunting accident is an annoying but generally harmless failing.”
I disagree. By distracting viewers and inflaming partisan passions on both sides with inane puffery of this sort and not giving issues involving the fundamental value of free speech equal play (which, incidentally, is DIRECTLY germaine to the functioning of the press itself), the media does its viewers a great disservice.
A balance of the two would be nice. I’m not privy to the inner workings of the press, but from the outside, it seems to me the mainstream press only speaks “Truth to Power” when Power deigns to “speak back” as it were.
February 17th, 2006 at 4:07 pm
Wow; you are a mind-reader. And it didn’t used to be so. When I started in the trade, I’d say most of my peers did believe in absolute reality. In fact, a buddy of mine was getting divorced by his poetess/grad-student-for-life wife, and when they came before the judge he unexpectedly asked her why the marriage was irretrievably broken. She fumbled for a bit, then blurted out, “Because he believes in an absolute reality and I don’t.”
That was enough for the judge.
February 17th, 2006 at 5:15 pm
On the other hand, I’ve also read blogs and comments suggesting that the cartoon protests may be a major blunder on the Islamists’ part, because they’ve blown the lid off of what, up until then, had been a fairly successful effort to keep their Western political ambitions under the radar. Now the cat’s out of the bag, tearing around, making a mess of things as cats tend to do, and not even the MSM can catch it and put it back in. At the very worst, this was a costly victory for the Islamists as it makes the rest of the non-violent component of their Western jihad much harder.
February 17th, 2006 at 8:25 pm
Maybe its because I get my news from more than one source I haven’t seen the media ignoring the story. And I think in some ways they’re going too far out of their way not to offend Muslims.
However, I have seen a huge anti-Muslim culture emerge that fails to recognize that being a believer in Islam does not equate to being an extremist or even a sympathizer. If anything, I’ve failed to see the media address the growing ebb in bigotry against Muslims that many justify by the disgusting acts of the extremists.
February 18th, 2006 at 12:27 am
Did you ever notice how around Christmas time or Easter, there is always a cheesy documentary on CNN or 20/20 about the historical Jesus? Newsweek and Time seem to publish a picture of Mary or Christ on the cover at least once a month, with articles discussing religion in america, various scriptural interpretations, the history of the church ect…
Why don’t we get anything similar about Mohammad? It would seem relevant in a Post 9/11 world to discuss the early history of Islam, if anything because it is what the terrorists claim they are emulating and protecting. You don’t even have to dramatize his physical character if you don’t want to offend muslim sensibilities! I believe there are 2 reasons for this:
1) The MSM has convinced itself that Islamic terrorists are just another crowd of un-educated ethnicly exotic rebels, fighting over material resources or out of a sense of nationalism, ect… the typical marxist-acedemia B.S. that interprets every conflict in history as some version of class warfare, or imperial conquest. Religion is just a ruse, an exuse by the radical leadership to rial up the masses in an otherwise secular conflict.
2) When the occasional journalist dares to investigate the life of Mohammad, he is disturbed by what he discovers. That Mohammad was a warlord who ordered assassinations, raided caravans for booty, and massacred whole tribes of people. To simply report what has been recorded by Muslim historians in sacred sciptures would invalidate the media’s pre-concieved world view (described above) and would be supremely politically incorrect, in that it would call into question the inherent morality of a religion beloved by poor brown people.
Its better to close your mouth about it; anyway you are not a muslim, its like a white person who is forbidden to use the N-word.
February 18th, 2006 at 3:31 pm
Thankyou. I appreciate your article so much on account of the fact that a centrist can take this
position, which I believe is the accurate one.
Surely there has been much “feeding of the
crocodile in the hopes that he, in the end, will
not eat us,” as Churchill said.
I believe that we are tottering on the gangplank.
The day has come for some deportations. Sackcloth and ashes seem the way for us who were so quick to jettison our own spiritual heritage.
February 18th, 2006 at 7:09 pm
The interesting thing, for me, will be to observe what effect this will have on future coverage of artwork offensive to other religions. I believe that the media has until this incident, taken a free speech friendly stance with respect to e.g. “Piss Christ” (insofar as the debate in cases of offence to religion has been centered on wether taxpayers should have to pay for it and the NYT for example has generally argued that even to withhold funding from such works would be unacceptable censorship). Now, out of what I believe is simple cowardice, they have convinced themselves that the intelligent position is a compromise that avoids offending people who could find out where they live and firebomb their living room. They probably believe in the liberality of this position with their conscious minds: no one wants to believe they’re a coward and doing things for cowardly reasons. Thus, they now have to believe that anything offensive to muslims is not liberal. Will this stance spread to things offensive to other religions when to act otherwise would result in obvious hypocrisy?
My guess is no: people can always select the facts that form their worldview (God knows I do), but as I said, it will be interesting to watch.
Oh, and also, I hate to be one of those people, but most journalists and editors in this country are henceforth a bunch of frickin’ pussies until individually proven otherwise. Unfortunate.
February 18th, 2006 at 7:14 pm
And, furthermore, I wish Joshua was right, but I think that that argument requires one to believe that people will have to see the truth if it’s sitting right in front of them threatening to firebomb their office. Unfortunately, there are none so blind as those that will not see.
Even small amounts of right wing xenophobia or denigration of Muslims in general will give mental cover to those who wish to dismiss this as a disagreement that can be compromised and wished away.
February 26th, 2006 at 12:42 pm
Just refer to the point raised by Jimmy the Dhimmi on February 18th, 2006. I also want to ask the same question as to why these CNN’s and BBC’s cannot broadcast something on Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) about his life and teachings.
Because these channels don’t want to tell the truth and they want to continue on the false propaganda about Islam and its followers that goes in favor of the current policies adopted by current American regime. The current cartoon controversy has raised many questions about the double standards that exist within the western media…after the mass demonstrations mainly in the Muslim countries have made Danes to study more about Islam and Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) and it’s said that 50 Danes have embraced Islam, they were amazed to see the somber mood of true Muslims who marched on the streets to register their thoughts on this controversy.
People from all the religions should respect Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) as he is the last prophet and he has been discussed in many Holy Scriptures like Bible etc.
For Muslims its part of their faith to respect and practice the teachings of all the prophets from Adam to Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) as all of them told people to follow ONE GOD (Almighty ALLAH). Islam never spread by force it was the high moral character of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) that draw the worst idol (Statue) worshipers of that time to start trusting and praying to on One God…
For more information on the life of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) please visit: http://www.muhammad.net/
May Almighty Allah show us all the right path
February 26th, 2006 at 3:07 pm
Hey Talha Ejaz,
What is your opinion of the Hadiths which describe militant actions on account of the prophet? For example: Mohammad (pbuh) orders the assassination of the poetess, Asma bin Marwan simply because she wrote a poem that insulted Mohammad and his followers in 624 A.D. At least three separate Hadiths describe Mohammad saying of her death, “two goats won’t butt heads about that woman.”
Do you think episodes like this, and acounts of at least 10 other assainations of poets and artists during Mohammad’s(pbuh) time, may contribute to the violent demands of today’s protesters throughout the Islamic world?
March 1st, 2006 at 4:09 pm
Dear Jimmy the Dhimmi!
I guess you are missing on a very important point here…now first of all I am not sure which Ahadith you are referring too (Source missing)…Let me relate a small incident to clarify the point you have raised..
An old women in Mecca used to throw trash at Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) whenever he passed by from that area…one day the old women didn’t appear and the prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) went to her home to see if she was OK! On visiting her, the last prophet (P.B.U.H) came to know that she was Ill…The last prophet (P.B.U.H) questioned about her health etc…The old women was highly impressed by all this and she embraced Islam…in the very same manner the people of TIAF threw stones on the prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) and yet he did not take any sort of revenge for them, infect he prayed to Almighty Allah to show them the right path…all these sort of acts and kindness made Islam spread thick and fast not in Arab only but in the rest of the world…Prophet Muhammad was hit both personally and mentally by his enemies yet he did not took any sort of revenge from anyone…
In the current scenario, its not simply about publishing the cartoons, it’s about publishing them again and again knowingly that these wrongful acts will hurt the Muslims all over the world…As per the international rules of press and media publishing any sort of Blasphemous material is disallowed so why publish it then? It’s a clear act of violation of the international press and media rules…
Muslims have a great sense of attachment with Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) that west cannot understand because they don’t know the inner feelings of a Muslim as to how much we as Muslims owe to the last prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H), you talk about the world we say this whole universe was made for him, he is a blessing for all the mankind, so my dear friend how can you even about disgracing such a personality? and expect us to observe complete silence and pretend if nothing has happened.
Black sheep’s can be found everywhere; certainly we have some black sheep’s in our ranks as well who for their own personal agenda turned the peaceful demonstrations into violent ones…The Muslim nations know it all that they are far lesser when it comes to education, technology, electronic media and military warfare as compared to west so the question arises as to why would the Muslims ever like to fight the likes of US or Israel, when they know that they won’t be able to win against them?…they throw stones against the bullet because its part of our faith to raise voice against the oppressor…you give Muslims the right to live in Palestine, Kashmir and elsewhere, believe me all these type of suicide attacks etc would end up…we also care about our own life and life’s of other regardless of any cast, color, creed, religion or race.
Let their be peace amongst our and your ranks, leave the religious differences on one side and start talking about humanity and elevating poverty from this world…