"The BBC is full of Liberals afraid to mock Islam" Roger Bolton.

[Childrenofthestones]

Roger Bolton confirms what Muslims, Christians and just about anyone with half an eye has known for a long time.

"Regarding the BBC Mr Bolton said it had got to a point where audiences thought it was ?fun? to mock Christianity but would not dare laugh at jokes about Islam"

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...teran-BBC.html

Try mocking Jews and see what happens, it's not just Islam the media is very careful with.

I think there is a difference between mocking a religion and laughing at yourself.

There is a big difference between a film that is spreading lies about islam and citizen khan.

Parts of citizen khan I found funny, I think its good to laugh at yourselves, however I think maybe the concept of laughing at yourself is a very British thing? Just like I found Olympic opening ceremony amazing, and like a journey reflecting my life from childhood to youth etc and others hated it and didn't get it, some will understand laughing at yourself and others won't, as they come from cultures which don't.

I think if you make a film attacking something people believe to be sacred, like that jerry Springer opera or the recent films about Islam which I haven't watched, then you have to expect a reaction.

So some lunatic killed someone, there are millions of other Muslims who didn't, but Islam will be judged on the one?

I agree no religion should be mocked, no one likes their views laughed at, no one likes arrogant people saying they are right and you are wrong.

I'm sure there's a bit in the Koran that says to you, your god and to me mine.

Why the need to belittle others?

Sun have you never seen Curb Your Enthusiasm, Seinfeld and in the late 70s Agony? There are others but it's a small demographic so not tons of stuff on the telly.

I can't list all the films and Jewish stand ups telling jokes which rely on the audience's recognition that Jews can be overly interested in money, status and possessions and have overbearing mothers and weak fathers.

I watched the Iranian Omid Djalili mercilessly mocking the audience at a Jewish man's 60th birthday. Some of them were highly offended but most took it in good part, not least because the birthday boy was roaring his head off and his brother was Djalili's agent.

'no-one likes their views laughed at'. Tough. A religion or any viewpoint that is so weak it can't survive a little gentle humour is pretty pathetic, IMO.

Are we allowed to laugh at Scientologists and their martian bishops, or are they off-limits too?

But (no offence) Islam seems a lot more scary the way it's portrayed in the media - haven't people been killed or fatwas issued over comic books and the like

I have a pic on my pc of a woman answering the door to two people and they are saying 'have you found Jesus?' and you can see Jesus is hiding behind the curtain in her living room

I think that's not offensive but quite funny. But I think if you had similar about Mohammed (the last one I heard about was a picture of Mohammed saying something about people not havin a sense of humour) you can get people threatening violence all over the world from extremists!

I don't know if that really is the case but that's the way the (biased) media portrays it!

Oh and Maureen Lipman went from Agony to the BT ads. My school friends and their dads adored them. Every one of them knew a Beattie. Often because they were living with her.

I don't see why you shouldn't mock religion and agree that people are wary of mocking Islam.

But is the answer to allow other religious groups to violently protest about jokes like some Muslims do?

Religious zealots hold a lot of influence in the United States. They happen to be Christian.

Jews are allowed to mock Jews, others are frowned upon for doing so generally.

The Scientologists are a little scary edam

There was an innocent thread on here congratulating Katie Holmes on divorcing Tom Cruise and it was quickly almost derailed by someone posing as an ordinary Tom Cruise fan but who was clearly a Scientologist.

I was impressed that it happened so quickly. I think they communicate by telepathy.

Besides there's a big difference between saying have you noticed how all bankers are Jews and saying Jesus was the son of god oh come on he was just illegitimate.

Difference between joking about cultural stereotypes and customs and long held beliefs that people live their lives by.

Have you a link to that limited? Now THAT would be interesting

sun that's true. If I came from a background of thousands of years of persecution starting with mockery going up to mass extermination I'd probably be a bit sensitive too.

But self-mockery amongst Jews exists and thrives. In fact there's a whole strand of comedy devoted to it. They're called Jewish jokes.

Sorry, kayano a quick search brought up this from the same time but I don't think it's the right one but it does have 666 posts though. I'm scared now

I suggest you guys go on you tube and look up baba Ali, or Allah made me funny, or watch that bbc3 muslim comedians show, there are plenty of Muslims laughing at themselves, baba Ali actually makes a few of the points in citizen khan.

But I know probably few of you will actually do that as you like to stick by your view that Muslims believe you can't laugh at yourself and if anyone dares make a joke there will he a fatwa against them.

SunWukong. Jews get mocked all the time as do Christians, but it mostly isn't reported in the mainstream media as it is so commonplace. They tend not to go around threatening to kill the mocker. The most they do is make a formal complaint or write a stern letter, as do most Christians. It is only Islam whose followers think they have a right to silence debate and legitimate criticism through violence and intimidation.

LMAO at 666 messages!

Nailik - I think the reason people think that is its the way the media portray it, even of it isn't correct. The fact remains that there are a handful of extremists who will murder someone over a cartoon they had nothing to do with.

No one said all Muslims were like that at all

Baba Ali cultural parents

Baba Ali, that's not hijab

Orwellian, if you look at my links you will see Muslims laugh at themselves all the time and is common place, look at the amount of baba Ali videos, the amount of views, the years it has been going on, but hasn't been reported in media, why is this?

And didn't the majority of Muslims right stern letters? Or in fact the same letter with different names?

nailak I do think Muslims can laugh at themselves but Muslim comedy isn't a mainstream thing so i guess that's why it doesn't get wide audiences. Perhaps Citizen Khan isn't all bad. They made a lot of the same jokes in East Is East but better.

Plus people believe people who tell them that they're going to be beheaded for giggling.

Like all Stewart Lee's routines it's long. But his point is that stupid people confuse health and safety legislation with religious groups taking offence.

And don't forget four lions, complete with jihadi nasheeds etc,

Some of the baba Ali vids have well over half million views, in you tube world that is a wide audience, considering people will be putting it on their own blogs etc.

orwellian some Christians do try stifle debate and legitimate criticism here.

But I agree they don't often threaten to kill you. They don't need to when popular newspapers conflate being British with being Christian and arrogantly assume we all share their views.

In the US Christian politicians pass laws banning freedom of choice. I thought that was something only the Taliban did.

I was trying to remember the title of Four Lions.

Right, so the media is too scared to mock Muslims...

but not too scared to show countless negative portrayals of Muslims in both film and tv and virtually no positive ones (Reel Bad Arabs is fascinating reading on this matter)

Not too scared to throw around tabloid nonsense about Muslims banning x, y & z (like the classic Winterval story) that turn out to be untrue.

And the great British public is also not too scared to mock Muslims, although I'd class being told to "go back home" and "you should be shot" (both of which have been said to me) as slightly stronger then mockery.

As for the talk of Arab dictators being better, my family are currently in Syria and you have no idea how distasteful I find that statement.

The current unrest in certain countries may have been sparked by a film, but like many riots, there is an underlying cause, in this case the socio-economic deprivation, widespread youth unemployment and people's frustration with this, that they are now able to voice. In Libya, there have now been large protests condemning the violence, which strangely haven't received as much media coverage. But hey, I'm sure that a dictator who televised live executions of students, was a much better leader for them, right?

So the media might be supposedly afraid to mock Islam, but it is extremely fond of portraying Muslims as a monolithic, homogenous mass, which is far more harmful.