Enemies of Reason Poundshop potshots at the media moral maze.

Khartoum characters

As you'll know, I'm no fan of the religious nutjobs who sentenced a British teacher to jail for letting her class name a teddy bear Mohammed.

But some of the shots being aimed by the tabloids and other press at the people of Sudan are of the cheapest variety, and smack of 'Let's have a laugh at the silly blacks in Bongobongoland'.

News websites, incapable it seems of checking their facts before chucking stories onto the web - well, if we get it wrong, never mind, every single person we've misled will check again later and read the same updated story - had a right old picnic over details of protests about the teacher's punishment. Many put the brakes on soon after, including the BBC, when it became clear that the calls for Gillian Gibbons to be killed, while true of some of the crowd, were misrepresenting a protest that might not even be representative of the population at large in the first place.

Let's look at the British media's sensitive handling of the protest.

Guardian:

Newspaper pictures of Gibbons were burned on a makeshift stage at the heart of Martyrs Square. One protester was seen making a stabbing gesture with his sword. A group of men shouted: "She must be killed by the sword."

One person making a stabbing gesture becomes

More than a thousand Muslim demonstrators in the Sudanese capital called for her to be shot or stabbed for insulting Islam after her pupils called a teddy bear Muhammad.

Shot or stabbed? Couldn't they make up their minds? Maybe they meant shot and stabbed. Wait, stabbed first, then shot. No point stabbing someone after shooting them is there? Or poisoned as well? And set on fire?

That's 1,000 people (well men, to be specific, and we know the reasons for that) out of a city population of 1,000,000. A tenth of one per cent, much of that whipped up by organisers and joined in by all and sundry, not all of whom were violent or had violent intentions. Sigh. But if it's the uppity blacks calling for murder of a white, we'd better make it sound as bad as possible! Let's see how the Sun's coverage compares to the Guardian's.

KNIVES OUT FOR GILLIAN: Thousands demand teddy teacher be shot

It's thousands now, is it? Blimey, these protests in Bongobongoland grow fast, don't they? (Still, at least the Sun subs got the subjunctive right, which is more than you can say for the Telegraph drones earlier in the day who said the crowd 'demand teacher is shot'.)

And on and on:

THOUSANDS of people, some carrying knives and sticks, have marched on the capital of Sudan calling for the teacher jailed for naming a teddy bear Mohammed to be shot. The marchers - amassing outside the presidential palace in Khartoum - are claiming Gillian Gibbons' 15-day jail sentence is too lenient and that she should be put to death.

Just shot, not stabbed this time. So why carry knives and sticks? To shoot her with? Hmm, sticks. Not exactly a weapon of mass destruction. Am I wrong to think they're trying to suggest spears? Anyway, there's one picture that keeps getting used in all the coverage, as well: of a single geezer with a big knife. No-one around him seems armed, but we've found one of the swarthy varmints tooled up, so let's make sure that picture's used nice and big! Just like the quotes from the wire services, the most shocking images get used time and time again.

Another bit of the wires here from the Mirror:

Abdul-Jalil Nazeer al-Karouri, a well-known hard-liner, told worshippers: "Imprisoning this lady does not satisfy the thirst of Muslims in Sudan. But we welcome imprisonment and expulsion. This an arrogant woman who came to our country, cashing her salary in dollars, teaching our children hatred of our Prophet Muhammad."

Why quote such a fucking idiot in the first place? He's clearly intellectually sub normal. Teaching hatred? Who except an imbecile believes that? And why represent the feelings of the Sudanese with the biggest nutter you can find? It's like asking Ian Paisley for his views on the new Pope.

Right, noseclips on, I'm going in. The Hate Mail:

MOB BAYS FOR HER BLOOD. Spitting hatred, thousands of hardline Islamists called for British teacher Gillian Gibbons to be shot yesterday.

Is it just me, or is there something curiously funny about the Mail attacking someone for 'spitting hatred'? Thousands called for her to be shot, though. And the evidence?

They streamed out of mosques in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, shouting: "Kill her, kill her, kill her by firing squad."

You mean to say the Mail had reporters outside various mosques in Khartoum waiting for the reaction? Hmm.

Ever tolerant of our Muslim friends, the Express opts for

KILL HER. Up to 10,000 Muslims took to Khartoum’s streets shouting: “Kill her, kill her by firing squad.” Armed with clubs, swords and axes, the mob burned her photograph because she allowed pupils to call a teddy bear Mohammed.

Ten thousand is it now? And where did the clubs, swords and axes come from?

But hang on, this is Web 2.0. Where's an ill-informed shite comment from a blethering idiot?

We went over there to teach these heathens a bit of civilised society and what happens? They throw it back at us.

Thank you, 'Zeigfried'.

Look, I despise those who use religion to oppress others. I hate religious states enforcing horrible medieval laws because a Big Green Book told them to. I despise the idea of basing law and justice around the twisted interpretation of ancient texts that haven't kept pace with science, reason or enlightened values. And it makes me sick to think that relgio-fascists can take a grip around a nation state, suffocating democracy, common sense and justice. It is a crime against humanity.

But you might as well stick a bone through the nose of the Sudanese and paint them next to a cooking pot the way the British scum tabloids are depicting them. It's lazy caricaturism of the worst kind, twisting agency reports into your own agenda. It ignores the truth, or doesn't care about it. It depicts a thousand protesters as a lynch mob, ignoring the 999,000 people in Khartoum who maybe took a different view. It's outdated, rubbish, racist stereotyping of the very worst kind, which we should have seen off years ago. And it stinks just as badly as the disgraceful treatment given to Mrs Gibbons.

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