At this festive season, I am touched to read on the BBC that sales of Halal Turkeys are booming “as they enable Muslims in Yorkshire to join in the festive season.” Turkey – the true meaning of Christmas, right? Thank god (Allah) that the BBC have the resources to bring us this kind of insight, well worth the license-tax.
INCLUSIVITY
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Will Halal Rent Boys help the BBC staffers to enjoy the Christmas season?
Wow. They’re really tying themselves in knots with that one, aren’t they?
Great, they’ve managed to shoehorn a report about Muslims into the festivities.
But doesn’t this mean that Yorkshire Muslims are celebrating Christmas, instead of being mortally offended by the merest hint of it, as the new establishment tells them to?
To everyone at Al Beeb: Do it like the turkeys do and get stuffed.
Er, guys? This is actually a very good thing, if true.
And a UK Google does show it to be, in part, true.
Here’s the usually awful BBC again:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/1724177.stm
…and here’s an online shop where it’s sold..
http://trustedplaces.com/review/uk/london/food/1u62f7o/muslim-halal-live-chicken-and-poultry
Now in there are also stories about withdrawn halal turnkey salami and parents objecting to halal turkey being served for Christmas dinner and some objections to halal slaughtering methods, but..people: I don’t think this is BBC bias.
If some Moslems are joining in, to some extent, with the Christian host culture -even if it’s only a few of them – then it’s better than the more newsworthy head-hacking, train-bombing, daughter-killing, clitoris-cutting Jew-hating kind.
All I want for Christmas in this area is for our Moslem neighbours to choose to live a peace with the rest of us,as many indeed do. And if the dream of integration is that Moslems fit in, then having a Christmas dinner is a damn good way to start, for crissake. This is the exact opposite of imaginary Moslems demanding that nativity plays be banned from schools.
It may be exaggerated (there’s not a lot elsewhere on the web on the pure Christmas halal meals schtick) or overstated at worst, but telling a truthful story [if it is indeed true] about actual, bona fide ‘moderate’ Moslems is a small sign of hope at Christmas – which is part of what the holiday is about.
Along with peace on earth and goodwill to all men.
So it’s not really bias. In fact it’s mostly like, well, journalism.
Mostly.
So peace on Earth and goodwill to all men, especially British Moslems tucking into their halal turkey, sprouts and parsnips, and just living their lives alongside everyone else.
We could do with more like these in Britain. As distinct from there people in the land of the Volvo..
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2008/12/2008121917174435262.html
Has anyone considerd this from the turkeys point of view?
I think the problem is that the word “festive” implies that the Muslims are “joining in” the Christian festival, which is presumably not the case.
Joining the seasonal celebrations or something might be more appropriate which is what I’ll be doing as I have no intention of going near a church and every intention of hammering the pub.
Happy Xmas
Hmm this one could be b-BBC cherry picking,though we do have to have a wide range I suppose.
All of my Muslim colleagues at work have indeed wished me merry Xmas – no joke.
Hmm also I think the BBC are being genuine- turkeys are nothing whatsoever to do with Xmas -like Easter eggs are nothing to do with Easter .
The report though shows not bias, but ‘let’s get Muslims into this story’ at any cost. It could have reported that people from India and Pakistan in northern towns are eating turkey. And that our none turkey eating poles are also trying it in huge numbers also – or it could have binned the report.
I’m contradicted and confused now.
Ha
Merry Xmas
but surely ‘let’s get Muslims into this story’
but surely ” ‘let’s get Muslims into this story’ at any cost” would be a bias, no? (determined to shed a good light, social cohesion vs journalism?)
sorry about first attempt – ‘puter froze, next thing i knew, incomplete comment was published
further, has anyone noticed any stories about hindus, sikhs or any other non-christian groups celebrating?
I think North Northwester has it right on this one. This is the kind of assimilation that ought to be condoned, which is the exact opposite of what the BBC usually pushes.
There’s even a Muslim guy educating the BBC that Social Cohesion works both ways. This ought to be part of the orientation course for all new Beeboids.
But why did the Beeboid female need to add that they were “putting aside their differences”? Useless editorial comment.
Somebody, please reassure me that this is a repeat… http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00gksx4
BBC: science and islam
“…he uncovers a diverse and outward-looking culture, fascinated by learning and obsessed with science.”
I just wish you could the say the same about today’s muslims.
jack
That is indeed bias- do so e researh on why his Muslim medicine was dropped in the 19th century!
Oh the BBC and it’s sins.
Merry Yule
And I don’t know what Chanukah is but happy that also.
:-))
@David P (USA)
If this story is even true then in itself it’s not a bad thing.
But it does not represent the reality of how muslims behave in northern Britain – there is no mass conversion to a british way of life.
I would file it under the usual heading of “weekly puff-piece for muslims with zero news value”.
Last week it was a muslim painter (artist not decorator). The week before I think it was a muslim who sang songs.
Next week… muslim goes shopping.
Don’t panic – they’re Islamic
Jack Hughes | 25.12.08 – 9:09 am |
I would file it under the usual heading of “weekly puff-piece for muslims with zero news value”.
When you put in that context, I understand what you’re saying. But I just consider this one to be unique in that it’s not a secular issue.
At least there hasn’t been any outcry from angry Muslims about showing one of their own engaging in filthy Christian rituals. That’s got to count for something.
Jack Hughes:
“If this story is even true then in itself it’s not a bad thing.
But it does not represent the reality of how muslims behave in northern Britain – there is no mass conversion to a british way of life.”
True, Jack, there is no mass conversion to a British way of life – in terms of becoming Christian [now a small minority if you consider regular churchgoing]. There do seem to be a lot of Moslems who just seem to want to get along. What some of them ARE converted to is the nine-to-five and the home-owning thing and getting away with as much Islam – or as little – as they think they can.
Our Christmas lunch thing is as much a national custom as it is a Christian one, and therefore it represents integration, though not assimilation -the distinction is important for people of goodwill which I take the posters here to be.
As I am a freedom-lover, I don’t want UK Moslems to leave their faith, and only peripherally to change or limit the content of its doctrines [Islam needs a hell of an ideological clean-up and some people are doing it as we post..
http://theyrejokingarentthey.blogspot.com/2008/12/raw-courage.html%5D
but just getting along is fine.
Neither Mrs. Northwester nor I are Christians but we still do Christmas – it is the ‘done thing’ – and we do it because, well, it’s what you do at Christmas. And fun. And we’re doing it along with millions of our countrymen. And so are some Moslems. Good. And good on the BBC [chokes, gags, crosses heart] too, for showing a good example.
The ‘moderate Moslems’ (in fact Moslems who ignore or eschew huge swathes of violence and bigotry in Koran, Hadith and Sira) need the encouragement to know that they are not alone and not hideously outnumbered by the mainstream and orthodox fundamentalist crazies.
This little example of not being alone might cheer them up, bring them a little closer to walking into their mosques and saying ‘Hang on, beardie. I don’t fancy killing my neighbours, so how about a reformation?…’
@NNW
Thanks for your reply on this thread.
It’s interesting seeing different views on this subject. Many on this site would agree with some of the apocalyptic scenarios suggested by Mark Steyn and others. They see most of europe going the way of the Lebanon with muslims eventually outnumbering the indigenous people with disastrous results. Not even the muslims are happy as they drag a once-civilised society down to arab levels of dysfunctionality.
Then there are the Pollyanna types in the political elite who admire our multiculty experiments from a safe distance.
Then there are ordinary people who maybe know a few asians at work and think they’re OK – but never seem to get close up to them. Living parallel lives, I guess.
I don;t suppose this middle group get very excited about the subject – so you tend to hear from the polarised views.
A big part of the problem is that the political elite don’t see much of ordinary life. Instead they rely on the meejah – eg the BBC – to be their eyes and ears.
When the meejah themselves join in with the pollyanna tendency and only print nice stories, fluffy stories, anodyne puff-pieces then the politicos get more and more out of touch.
Gordon Brown’s children will not be starting at primary school as the only white children there. Rowan Williams does not get jostled by asian troublemakers on his way to evensong. Mark Thompson does not have rude neighbours who don’t even speak english.
Mark Thompson does not have rude neighbours who don’t even speak english.
Well, if he doesn’t at home, he certainly does at the office.
Behead turkeys who insult Islam!