Islam-Muslims

, , ,

Los Angeles Times cheers on Muslim women, instead of reporting

, , ,

The way the Los Angeles Times reports on a new women's-only mosque, you'd think it was a story on secular feminism in the early 1970s.

Women in authority? Check. Breaking tradition? Check. Bonding with sisters? Check. Shaking loose from males to find themselves? Check.  

Women wait for the call to prayer, marking the launch of the nonprofit Women's Mosque of America in downtown L.A. Tradition separates male and female congregants at most mosques; the women's mosque forbids men from attending.  
Female-only mosques may exist in China, Chile and India, but Muslim leaders say this could be the first in the U.S.

You can almost picture the fist salute and hear "Right on, sister!"

Sure it sounds interesting: a mosque run by and for women, in a worship service usually dominated by males. (Although it's more daring in a more controlled society like China, as my review last September noted.)

But in telling the story of the new mosque, the Times plunders the western lexicon of social cliches story. Participants "foster bonds of sisterhood." Some call the experience "liberating." They also, of course, feel "empowered":

The call for female empowerment in the Muslim community has been growing for years — a response aimed at combating an often-misguided view of Islam, experts say.
"One of the major ways that Islam is 'othered'— one of the major stereotypes — is how they treat women," said Ruqayya Khan, chairwoman of Islamic studies at Claremont Graduate University. "But there is a rich history of women in Islam, and it's often kind of sidelined or buried."

So eager is the Times to herald this giant leap for womankind that it misses a fair number of basic journalistic elements. One is the rule: "Don’t raise questions that you don’t answer."


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , ,

Memory eternal: Human-rights activist and, yes, Christian journalist Kenji Goto is gone

, , , , , , ,

First there was the beheading of Haruna Yukawa, a military consultant who had -- by all accounts -- lived a unique, if not troubled, life leading him the Middle East as a military consultant. Now, it certainly appears that veteran journalist Kenji Goto has also been beheaded, on video.

Who is Goto? What is the media reporting about his life? As I noted in my first post on this topic, the force at the heart of Goto's life and work depends on the publication that you read. If you look in conservative and Christian media, you will see language similar to the following from the Christian Broadcast Network:

The slaying of Goto, a devout Christian and  freelance reporter whose work focused on refugees, children and other victims of war, shocked this country, which until now had not become directly embroiled in the fight against the militants.
 
"I feel indignation over this immoral and heinous act of terrorism," Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told reporters after convening an emergency Cabinet meeting. "When I think of the grief of his family, I am left speechless," he said. "We are filled with deep regret."

Was this simply an issue of Christians mourning the loss of a fellow Christian, who just happened to be a veteran and respected journalist? Well, maybe not.

Consider the following material -- a lengthy passage from the English-language website of The Japan Times:


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , ,

Circumcision: When, how, who, what, why? And what about secular laws?

, , , , , ,
Circumcision: When, how, who, what, why? And what about secular laws?

JOHN ASKS:

When did circumcision start and how was God involved? How did its use evolve to today’s practice?

THE RELIGION GUY ANSWERS:

In the Jewish faith, ritual circumcision of males (bris) to remove the foreskin of the penis has been a requirement ever since God designated it as a “sign of the covenant” with Abraham (Genesis 17:10-14). So God has been “involved” for some 4,000 years now.

Anthropologists tell us that circumcision was practiced long before Abraham, across the globe from pharaonic Egypt to aboriginal Australia. It was often a tribal “rite of passage” at puberty, and not the Bible’s sign of commitment to God performed on eight-day-old newborns. The “why” of circumcision prior to biblical times is uncertain. Macmillan’s “Encyclopedia of Religion” says contemporary experts dismiss the theories that it originated to mark captives, attract women, enhance sexual pleasure, aid hygiene, test bravery, or symbolize submission to elders or the cutting of bonds with mothers.

Jewish surgery and ceremonial are commonly the work of a specialist known as a mohel. The operation is traditionally required for adult converts as well as infants born in the faith. Though liberal Reform Judaism dropped that mandate in 1893, some of its rabbis continue the tradition. Note that any male born of a Jewish mother is deemed a Jew, even if he is not circumcised.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , ,

Your video think piece: 'Getting religion' is crucial when covering complex, even violent news stories

, , , , , , ,

I am in the middle or writing a pair of "On Religion" columns about the recent "Getting Religion" conference in Westminster, England, led by the Open University and the Lapido Media network that promotes religious literacy in the press and in diplomatic circles. Click here to read the first of those Universal syndicate columns, if you wish:

However, the main thing that I wanted to share with GetReligion readers -- especially working journalists -- is this video that was shown as part of the conference. No, I wasn't there (my final semester here at the Washington Journalism Center was starting right about that time), but I certainly wish that I could have gone.

What was the general thrust of this event? Here are some crucial background quotes, the first drawn from published remarks (.pdf here) by Richard Porritt, a former top editor at The London Evening Standard and the British Press Association wire service.

Let this soak in, as a statement about UK media (and elsewhere):

A journalist who is not confident about the facts is dangerous. And with a specialism like religion mis-reporting can lead to widespread misunderstanding. For too long religious affairs -- as editors deem fit to call the specialism -- has been a job palmed off on reporters. It is a role that has traditionally been dodged by the cream of the newsroom for specialisms thought to be more glamorous or hard-hitting. But there is no more vital role in a modern society cluttered with half-truths and myth surrounding religion.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , ,

Yo, Washington Post editors: Do faith issues matter to the Islamic State death crews? Maybe they do ...

, , , , , , , , ,

Once again, we are seeing the dreaded orange jumpsuits on our television screens during the news. Once again, it appears that we have an Islamic State video threatening the lives of hostages, if a Western power does not give the terrorists what they want.

This time, it's Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe who is facing the threats made by the YouTube-seeking terrorist with the British accent.

And who are the two hostages? What are there stories and, this time around, will journalists dig into the poignant details?

In The Washington Post, readers were told early on:

Japanese officials declined to discuss whether they would consider paying for the release of the hostages: journalist Kenji Goto Jogo and self-styled military consultant Haruna Yukawa.

The Post team doesn't tell us much about Goto, but is truly interested in the details of the story behind the "self-styled" -- what a loaded term -- military consultant.

Goto, 47, a well-respected Japanese journalist, was last heard from Oct. 24. He had told friends he was traveling to Kobane, a flashpoint town on the Turkish-Syrian border, but it is unclear exactly where he was kidnapped while covering Syria’s multiple conflicts.

And Yukawa? That's another story:


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , ,

For Supreme Court, it's all about that Muslim beard — or was religious liberty case really about Hobby Lobby?

, , , ,

Did you hear about the U.S. Supreme Court case involving a Muslim inmate's right to grow a beard for religious reasons? 

In case you missed it, justices ruled unanimously Tuesday in inmate Gregory Houston Holt's favor.

From The Washington Post:

Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., writing for the court, said Arkansas prison officials had violated a federal law passed to protect religious practices from policies set by state and local officials.
Alito said the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act does not require a prison to grant religious exemptions simply because a prisoner asks or because other prisons do. But he said Arkansas officials offered no evidence that a short beard presented security risks or could serve as a hiding place for contraband, as the officials once argued.

Most of the media coverage — from CNN, The New York Times and others — seems pretty straightforward.

But give The Associated Press and the Post extra credit for explaining the prisoner's religious reasoning.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Where will various religions stand in the same-sex marriage church-state showdown?

, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Where will various religions stand in the same-sex marriage church-state showdown?

The U.S. Supreme Court’s April hearing and June ruling on same-sex marriage will be historic for the nation’s religions as well as for partisan politics, law, and society. There’s sharp division in this case among faith groups, and sometimes within them, so reporters will want to carefully monitor the inflow of religious and moral arguments as “friend of the court” briefs are filed in coming weeks.

The court defines two issues: Does the Constitution’s “equal protection” clause require that all states issue same-sex marriage licenses? Does the same clause require that a state recognize all marriages lawfully licensed by other states?

An implicit issue: whether judges or state legislatures and voters have power over contested social policies.

Religious proponents of marriage change are confident of Supreme Court victory and likely to file briefs. They include liberal Jews, Unitarian Universalists, and the Metropolitan Community Churches (whose primary ministry is with gays, lesbians, bisexuals and the transgendered), along with organizations of atheists and humanists.  Defending traditional marriage  are the the leaders of the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, evangelical and conservative Protestants, some African-American Protestants, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (“Mormon”), Orthodox Judaism and Islam.

But what about the so-called “Mainline” Protestants who’ve lately been shifting -- especially at the level of pulpits and church boards -- in favor of gay couples?


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , ,

Preacher Terry Jones -- yes, him again -- on burning scriptures, crispy fries and free speech

, , , , , , , , ,

Want to take an interesting and, frankly, rather surprising trip to the front lines in the post-Charlie Hebdo wars over the First Amendment?

Well, the Washington Post offered exactly that in its recent feature story updating the tale of the Rev. Terry Jones -- he isn't granted "the Rev." in this story for some strange reason -- the Florida preacher globally known for trying to burn Korans. The video above is a flashback, of course, to a previous blast of coverage.

What did Jones do to merit coverage, once again? The lede is dead perfect:

BRADENTON, Fla. -- As the week began, there was Terry Jones, infamous burner of Korans and the No. 2 target on an al-Qaeda hit list, in plain sight at a Florida mall. Around the world, millions were mourning victims of the massacre in Paris who included another target on the hit list, the editor of Charlie Hebdo, but Jones was at the food court in DeSoto Square running his french fry stand.
The canned music, the display at Vitamin World -- this was the landscape of America’s most brazen offender of Islam, working the counter at Fry Guys Gourmet Fries with a 9mm strapped to his ankle. ...
The 63-year-old preacher has faced hundreds of death threats. He’s got a $2.2 million bounty on his head from the Islamist group Jamaat-ud-Dawa. But until the attacks in Paris, few knew he had just opened a business at a struggling mall on U.S. 41 in Bradenton. When fears of global terrorism were once again stoked, Jones moved back into crusade mode. Fry Guys became a strange pulpit of defiance and chili cheese dogs, and people came to see him for both.

Let me be clear: Other than labeling Jones a "fundamentalist" and moving on, this article isn't all that interested in why the man does what he does and believes that he believes. However, it does offer a surprisingly evenhanded slice of life involving people who are attracted to his public agenda.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , ,

Your weekend think piece: Concerning the ratio of Paris coverage to that of Boko Haram

, , , , , , , ,

I am not a Calvinist, but it became very clear this past week that my "think piece" entry this weekend was predestined to be about this question: Why did the Charlie Hebdo massacre receive so much more coverage than the massacre of thousands of Christians and moderate Muslims in Nigeria?

On Twitter, I tried to point this out with a simple appeal: #IAmANigerianChristian. There weren't many takers.

How bad was this latest wave of death and destruction by Boko Haram? By the end of the week, GetReligion readers were sending in URLs about the fact that the best way to assess the damage was through satellite images. Check this out in The New York Times:

DAKAR, Senegal -- Thousands of buildings were burned, damaged or destroyed in northern Nigerian towns in recent days when Boko Haram militants stormed through, using scorched-earth tactics against civilians, according to a new analysis of satellite images by human rights groups.
In a succession of attacks, fighters from Boko Haram, an Islamist insurgent group that has gripped northern Nigeria and battled the government for years, have swept through a cluster of villages along the shores of Lake Chad in a “systematic campaign of arson directed against the civilian population in the area,” according to Human Rights Watch.
About 57 percent of one town, Doro Gowon, the location of a now-destroyed military base, appears to have been leveled, probably amounting to several thousand residential and commercial structures, Human Rights Watch said.
Amnesty International, which has also analyzed the satellite images, said Thursday that about 3,100 buildings in the town had been damaged or destroyed, demonstrating a “deliberate attack on civilians whose homes, clinics and schools are now burnt-out ruins.”

How bad was it? Eventually, journalists were so tired of hearing questions about the imbalance between the coverage of these two big stories -- almost always framed as lots of coverage of white, French secularists vs. minimal coverage of black, Nigerian Christians -- that some journalists began to fight back.


Please respect our Commenting Policy