Posted on 02/21/2005 8:03:18 PM PST by txradioguy
What has Fox's hit TV show "24" done to prompt TV Guide to report "24 in Hot Water" and Entertainment Weekly to ask, "Has '24' Gone Too Far?"?
Its bad guys are terrorists who are? Muslims. That's it.
Few of us need reminding that we are not simply waging a war against terror, but against the radical Islam that animates the enemy. The enemy is not coincidentally Muslim, but they are the enemy because their radicalized version of Islam tells them to be. "24," so far at least, understands that.
What makes "24" this season so special, though, is that it's the first entertainment production in the post-9/11 era to accurately portray the enemy. The Monday night hit features the Araz family, Turkish Muslim immigrants who live in suburbia-and are a sleeper cell for an unnamed terrorist outfit.
In recent episodes, the teenage son starts developing a conscience, and his father senses something is amiss with his only child. So, the father has a member of his goon squad take away his son to have him murdered. (The plan failed.) He felt his son had become too Americanized in his years here, and no longer regarded him as his own flesh and blood.
Explaining to his wife how he could have ordered the murder of their son, he said, "We're all expendable." One of the other terrorist operatives from a previous episode also saw himself as expendable, driving head-on into an 18-wheeler when he believed he was being followed by police.
This, of course, is part of the Jihadist ideology, where little value is placed on individual life. And "24" deserves credit for getting it right.
Instead of kudos, though, "24" has courted considerable controversy. Making the most hay has been CAIR, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which bills itself as "America's largest Muslim civil liberties group." A CAIR spokesman complained to Entertainment Weekly, "They are creating a new stereotype."
What "new" stereotype? Muslims as terrorists? Blame the news for that one. Wait, no, blame the Jihadists the world over who still wish "death to America." No one, including "24," is claiming that all Muslims are terrorists, but as "24" Executive Producer Joel Surnow told Entertainment Weekly, "Muslims are the terrorists right now."
Facts be damned, Fox bowed to CAIR's scare tactics and agreed to air a public service announcement, with "24" star Kiefer Sutherland directly addressing the camera. Unfortunately, the spot included a line that may not be entirely true: "the American Muslim community stands firmly beside their fellow Americans in denouncing and resisting all forms of terrorism."
It's not considered polite to suggest that some American Muslims might not be with us, but there is too much evidence to ignore in the name of political correctness. The radical Islam we are fighting is not found only in places like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, but right here inside our borders.
Virtually ignored by the entire mainstream media last week was a groundbreaking 67-page report issued by human rights group Freedom House, which detailed the poisonous contents of Saudi-funded and sponsored materials found in prominent American mosques.
On mosque library shelves were vitriolic Saudi screeds urging Muslims to, among other things, completely dissociate themselves from the "infidel" society, including refusing military service and citizenship. Other materials encourage Muslims to "curse" Jews and Christians, and still others encourage outright violence.
Many, or even most, mosque-goers may not be brainwashed by such bloodthirsty teachings, but is it even possible that such materials could be found in prominent American mosques if the entire Muslim community truly "stood firmly beside their fellow Americans"?
One group of Muslims that has not denounced "all forms of terrorism" is the one that pushed Fox to air the tolerance-touting ad: CAIR.
When four Americans were murdered (and burned, hanged, and mutilated) in Fallujah last year, CAIR pointedly refused to condemn the murders, only saying that mutilations were contrary to Islam-a position almost identical to infamous Fallujah cleric Sheikh Khalid Ahmed.
The Washington Post in November 2001 asked a CAIR spokesman to condemn Hamas or Islamic Jihad. He refused, explaining, "It's not our job to go around denouncing." Asked a similar question about Hamas and Hezbollah by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in February 2002, CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper called such queries a "game" and added, "We're not in the business of condemning."
Worse still, for several months after 9/11, CAIR even refused to condemn Osama bin Laden for the murder of 3,000 Americans.
Veteran fans of "24" know from the three previous seasons that the ultimate enemy might still be off-camera. But all of us know that an organization that refuses to condemn the enemy is the enemy.
Who do these people think brought down the Trade Center and the Pentagon in 2001?
Hint: It wasn't the Montana Freemen, the I.R.A. or the Republic Of Texas kooks.
It was ISLAMIC men devoted to a bastardized version of their religon.
Can you imagine the story lines that would be written and the movies produced if it had been white fundalmentalist christians that had done 9/11?
And any caterwalling from the Southern Baptist Comittee or the Catholic League would be laughed off by everyone INCLUDING C.A.I.R.
Oh right cair..this happened by bored spoiled mama boys who took our hospitalities and killed us with our pants down..don't have me with you in a room alone...
Enemy in season 1: Balkan thugs
Enemy in season 2: An arab-american alliance of terrorists
Enemy in season 3: A british spy gone mad.
It's about time 24 got a bit more "realistic"
Just watch -- it will turn out that the real villains are WASPs, probably conservative defense contractors. CAIR should relax.
CAIR and Hollywood = enema of the American people.
Thank you for showing this picture. As sickening as it is to see, too many people have forgotten exactly WHY we are doing what we're doing around the world today.
IMHO this pic needs to be posted EVERYWHERE periododically to remind people.
9/11 - I Will NEVER Forget.
Maybe it was some Laplanders and their reindeer..
And, you know that Karl Rove will be in the thick of things.
CAIR condemns '24'-but it won't condemn Islamic terrorists
Anyone suprised?
Republic of Texas kooks? What the hell does that mean?
Republic of Texas kooks? What the hell does that mean?
I'm not the first to say this, but who cairs?
There is no such thing as a moderate Muslim. If a Muslim is "moderate", believe you me, his/her kids won't be.
No arguement there. What's the matter with the Republic of Texas?
It's clear that the Arab-Americans aren't really the ones behind this season's 24 plot. I suspect it will end up being some Halliburton-like company, somehow trying to profit from the meltdown of nuclear reactors around the country.
I, for one, was glad that 24's plot was more realistic this season by using Muslim terrorists. Too bad it won't last.
I was referring to the guys who holed up down in Ft. Davis in 1997 with hostages that had made their own car liscense tags, said they didn't have to pay state or federal taxes and were claiming they couldn't be tried in any U.S. court becasue they considered themselves "prisoners of war".
Thos are the "kooks" I'm referring to.
Is that also on the CAIR website?
When Hooper did finally say something it was along the lines of "The event was just awful, stop picking on Muslims, let us teach you about Islam."
"Event" was his word. To the best of my memory the words I used to report his statement are accurate. His statement was on CAIR's web site. In fact, he even urged Muslims to use the "event" to teach about Islam.
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