{"id":22800,"date":"2012-10-14T11:27:07","date_gmt":"2012-10-14T07:27:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/?p=22800"},"modified":"2012-10-14T11:27:14","modified_gmt":"2012-10-14T07:27:14","slug":"humour-a-creative-intelligent-way-to-debate-difference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/middle-east-society\/humour-a-creative-intelligent-way-to-debate-difference\/","title":{"rendered":"Humour: A Creative, Intelligent Way to Debate Difference"},"content":{"rendered":"

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In a cartoon published in Egyptian newspaper Al-Watan<\/em> at the end of last September, a man holds up a newspaper. \u201cThey\u2019ve sold me a fake newspaper!\u201d he cries to his friend. \u201cIs it really possible that today no country, no film, not even a cartoon insulted Islam?\u201d<\/p>\n

What a month September has been for the world\u2019s Muslims. First, a YouTube video insulting the Prophet Mohammad was publicised on 11 September and spread insult across the Muslim world.<\/p>\n

Then, after several very localised but violent protests against it in the Muslim world, French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo<\/em> published a cartoon depicting what appeared to be a Muslim in a wheelchair pushed by an Orthodox Jew. It was a reference to the title of French blockbuster The Intouchables<\/em> whose main characters are a disabled white man and his black helper \u2013 ironically, an uplifting stereotype-breaking comedy \u2013 to imply that religion could not be criticised. But what must have appeared to a Western audience as a statement about the sensitive nature of religion, anchored in French cinematic and secular culture, was perceived by most non-Western Muslims, who had probably not seen the film, as yet another way to belittle their religion.<\/p>\n

Two imaginary monolithic blocks, the Muslim and the Western worlds, clashed once again. While in the media journalists rightly debated the fine line between freedom of expression and hate speech, the actions of a few extremist, or irresponsible, individuals fed into two infinitely flawed stereotypes: the West is waging an anti-Islam campaign, and Muslims are angry. The only people set to benefit were extremists of all avowed religious affiliations.<\/p>\n

It all felt ridiculous and depressing. But amid the misconceptions, there were also creative initiatives developed by intelligent individuals to debunk these stereotypes and foment intelligent debate on the responsible use of freedom of expression. Here are two, one from the West and one from the Muslim world, which deserve to be highlighted.<\/p>\n

After the great journalists who, in Egypt at least, highlighted widespread opposition to the violent protests against the offensive video, my favorite initiative was a peaceful, sarcastic social media campaign in response to a Newsweek<\/em> magazine cover focusing on the recent protests which was branded with the words \u201cMuslim rage\u201d and a stereotypical image of an angry, bearded, and \u2013 yes \u2013turbaned man.<\/p>\n

In his article 13 Powerful Images of Muslim Rage<\/em> on the entertainment and news site Gawker.com, American blogger Max Read posted the following pictures: an Egyptian man on a chair reading a newspaper, a Jordanian girl on a swing, an Iraqi performing a high dive into a sparkling swimming pool, lovers in Iran and a tiny girl in bright pink jacket clutching an Egyptian flag. \u201cInsane #MuslimRage\u201d, reads one caption. There couldn\u2019t be anything less enraged about them.<\/p>\n

While Read disarmed a negative image with more representative images, in Egypt, liberal newspaper Al-Watan<\/em> replied to cartoons with cartoons. But they were not spiteful.<\/p>\n

Instead the series, published on 24 September, was a clever comment on cultural misconceptions, media representation and double standards. The cartoon described at the beginning of this article is one of them. Another depicts a bearded man in long white Middle Eastern dress and a punk. \u201cWhat weird clothes he\u2019s wearing!\u201d both think as they cross paths. In a third, a man in a hat sees a man with a long unruly beard. \u201cA bearded terrorist!\u201d he cries, before he catches a glimpse of the star of David on his cap. \u201cSorry I didn\u2019t see properly!\u201d he stumbles, offering him a flower. The most evocative perhaps shows two portraits: one of a man in front of a mosque, and another of a wild-bearded, wild-toothed man in a turban holding a bloodied knife with plumes of smoke behind him. A torch painted with the American stars and stripes shines on the second image and leaves the first in the dark. On the torch, the cartoonist could equally have written “media”.<\/p>\n

Humour is a great tool to highlight the media\u2019s shortcomings, but more responsible journalism, highlighting diversity of opinion within one religious or cultural group, might help to reduce stereotypes in the first place.<\/p>\n

Alice Hackman is a freelance journalist based in Cairo.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ALICE HACKMAN: In all of the uproar and furore of the past few months in the ongoing West vs Islam narrative a few voices have risen above the heat of rage. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":22801,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[154,173,90,482,5],"tags":[634,5082,378,1192,1439,909,18300,18306,91,191,2409,15078,1996,365],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22800"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}