Posted on 01/17/2005 3:11:22 PM PST by dennisw
Fox Cuts Out Anti-Muslim Scenes from “24”
“We thank Fox for the opportunity to address the Muslim community's concerns,” a CAIR spokeswoman said.
WASHINGTON, January 16 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – The Fox television network has decided to remove some stereotypical aspects about American Muslims from its action drama “24” thanks to immediate action from community leaders.
“We thank Fox for the opportunity to address the Muslim community's concerns and for the willingness of network officials to take those concerns seriously in an atmosphere of mutual respect and cooperation,” Rabiah Ahmed, Communications Coordinator of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), said in a press release e-mailed to IslamOnline.net Saturday, January 15.
Following a January 12 meeting with representatives from CAIR, the largest US Muslim civil liberties advocacy group in the country, Fox officials promised that the popular series will be balanced in its portrayal of Muslims.
“There aren't any positive or even neutral portrayals of Muslims on TV,” the BBC quoting Ms Ahmed as regretting.
“When Muslims or Arabs are portrayed, it is always in a stereotypical way.”
Premiered on January 10, the drama portrays a Muslim family as a terrorist “sleeper cell,” who are plotting attacks inside the US.
A young man is seen helping his parents mastermind a plot to kill as many Americans by launching an attack on a commuter train.
The drama showed the mother poisoning her son's non-Muslim girlfriend because she poses a threat to their plans.
The US secretary of state is also seen taken hostage by the “Muslim terrorists.”
It climaxes with the defense secretary shown on an Internet video tape like those coming out of US-occupied Iraq.
Pro-Muslims Ad
Fox further decided to distribute a CAIR public service announcement (PSA) to network affiliates to be aired in proximity to “24.”
CAIR's 30 and 60-second PSA feature American Muslims of European, African-American, Hispanic, and Native American heritage.
Each person in the spots states how he/she and his/her family have served America and ends by saying, “I am an American Muslim.”
“What we are hoping to do is to try and mitigate the damages of the stereotypes because it can bring real-life consequences on American Muslims and their lives here,” Ms Ahmed said.
“When average Americans don't have any personal interaction with Muslims, whether it be at work or at school, they base their perception of Islam and Muslims from what they see on TV.”
CAIR urged State Department officials in a meeting on January 13 to issue a report on Islamophobia across the world.
CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad presented in the meeting -- attended by Assistant Secretary Patricia de Stacy Harrison, Assistant Secretary Richard Boucher and Ambassador William Burns -- a proposal for cooperative efforts to challenge both Islamophobia and anti-Americanism.
A recent nation-wide poll, conducted by the Cornell University, showed that at least 44 percent of the Americans backs curbing Muslims’ civil rights and monitoring their places of worship.
A May 2004 report released by the US Senate Office Of Research concluded that Arab Americans and the Muslim community in the US have taken the brunt of the Patriot Act and other federal powers applied in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.
>This is like when Hollywood made the terrorists in "The Sum
>of All Fears" be from Russia, when they were Arabs in
>Clancey's book.
Yeah, and in doing so completely ruined the story.
Saw the show tonight...no public service announcement and it doesn't appear to be a "sanitized" version.
Once again, it would seem that islamonline and CAIR were less than forthcoming.
Good letter!
And of course no Muslim would do these types of things . Nope..... they wouldn't behead men and women, slaughter children in school, or take a leader of the Catholic Church hostage, plot mass murder against Western nations, or strap bombs to their own children......
I can still hear the crickets chirping as I wait for these Muslim Rights organizations to condemn the actions of their psychos. They have much more serious issues to worry about than the plot of a TV show.
(My guess is that the plot will now be that the Republican president and VRWC are behind the evil acts. The Muslims will now be shown as poverty stricken victims, and Michael Moore will come in and save Jack Bauer and the day...AAAAAAAAAAAAAarrrghhh :-( Too bad they caved, because it was a good show.
That said, I do wish there would be more coverage and attention in the news media given to the Muslims in Iraq and elsewhere who are trying to make positive changes and don't subscribe to the madness of the radicals.
But that would go against the agenda of democRAT party- They want Iraq to fail. The more they (news media) and elected rats like blimp Kennedy can stir up the nut-cases to attack our soldiers and Iraqi police trying to keep order, the better.
(sick b#stards)
F/X, the cable network, usually shows the most recent episode of "24" a week after it originally aired--at least that's the way they've handled it during the other seasons. Don't know about this season.
Pray for W and Our Troops
Noticed "NOTHING" that would suggest any anti-muslim scenes cut, nor did I see any PRO-Muslim PSA's during commercials.
I don't know if anybody's floated this theory, but could all of this "controversy" have originated from Fox itself? After all, there's no such thing as bad publicity.
Casting Ben Affleck as Jack Ryan had a lot to do with it, too.
I just watched it. I don't think that anything was edited out. This is, and has been a favote show for the last two years. The producers and writers aren't going to cave in to the PC crowd. They haven't yet.
If they were going to edit out "sterotypical" scenes to placate CAIR, I would think they'd have edited out the Bad Guy uttering "Allah Akhbar" before driving head on into a cement truck.
ROTFLM*O!
Okay - went straight to the best source I know on this...A friend who is on the team of scriptwriters for "24". Without asking for any crucial plot giveaways, I voiced the concerns expressed in this forum...
To keep it short and sweet, yes the show is already "in the can" as they say. No rewrites or available "alternate endings" are on tap. Islaam will not be whitewashed, greywashed...whatever.
No, Fox is not going to cave to CAIR...private word is that certain execs in the entertainment division were laughing their a$$ets off at CAIR, and could not believe they actually thought they would wring any meaningful concessions from the network.
What they offered was a token meant to insult CAIR, and by putting the onus on the individual market stations, FOX insulated itself as a corporate entity, and allowed their viewership the latitude to call local station managers to vent their opinions, thus shaping the decision of station managers and their programming directors.
The "compromise" was supposed to be confidential, but they knew their enemy well enough to expect them to violate the terms. LOL! How's that for strategic thinking?!
Frankly, FOX is laughing their buttocks off over the free publicity this whole mini-tempest is bringing the series.
FWIW, FOX in Portland, Oregon (little Beirut) did not "choose" to air the CAIR PSA during/after tonight's installment of "24".
If the "big plot twist" is for the big villain to be an Evangelical Christian group trying to make Muslims look bad, I vote we all forget about FOX from now on
Great thing CAIR has going - getting Fox to pay for PSAs that CAIR should have been producing since 9/11 if they were so concerned about their American reputation.
Signed, CAAR (Council on American Amish Relations).
If they take suggestions, can the big baddie be, oh, I don't know, a soft-spoken, fat Islamic spokesman who goes on TV a lot and has the first name Ibrahim?
Pretty please?
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