Journalism

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Funny Muslims: New York Times runs a humorless advance on a comedy festival

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One funny thing about the planned Muslim Funny Fest is that such things are still considered news. The New York Times introduces the idea as if it doesn't go back more than a decade.

Another funny thing is that the story has so few funny things.

"We should be able to tell our own story, and our story is that Muslims are hilarious," Negin Farsad, one of the organizers, says in the story. Unfortunately, they don’t get to show much of it here.

The article also strains at the seams trying to advance the comedy festival and tell of efforts to publicize it in bus and train stations. One topic is funny; one is not.

A quarter of its 17 paragraphs is on the tussle with the city over ads that Farsad and co-organizer Dean Obeidallah want to post on its bus and train stations. Only in the fourth paragraph, in fact, does the Times get to the news of the three-day Funny Fest festival, set to start July 21.

Then it segues into Obeidallah's background and how he met Zayid. They founded the New York Arab-American Comedy Festival back in 2003, focused more on ethnicity but still related to Muslim Americans. They produced a semi-serious documentary, The Muslims Are Coming!, back in 2013.  It was to advertise that film that they wanted to advertise on buses. Also to counter what they considered anti-Muslim ads by the American Freedom Defense Initiative, the group that sponsored the Draw Mohammed contest in Texas.

This section has what humor the story offers. The Times quotes one of the posters the comedians wanted on the buses -- "The ugly truth about Muslims: Muslims have great frittata recipes." They also say they won't censor any Funny Fest comedians who want to "talk about the fact that you love bacon sandwiches." That's pretty much all the laughs here.

Now, it's true that the organizers use humor for serious reasons:


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SIL missionaries, jungle Indians unexpectedly steer a Jewish reporter toward home

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SIL missionaries, jungle Indians unexpectedly steer a Jewish reporter toward home

Want to write about religion in a pluralistic society? Then get comfortable with people who believe differently -- very differently -- than you.

Godbeat veteran Mark I. Pinsky, now an author based in Florida, wrote about this process in his fine book, "A Jew Among the Evangelicals: A Guide for the Perplexed." Pinsky's tale is an excellent introduction to working successfully with a religious subculture quite different from your own. It's must reading for anyone serious about religion reporting.

My own Jew-among-the-evangelicals story unfolded quite differently. I was reminded of it by the recent death of the well-respected evangelical Christian missionary and writer Elizabeth Elliot.

Her life was dramatically altered by the death of her first husband, Jim Elliot, one of five missionaries associated with the Summer Institute of Linguistics (known today as SIL International) killed in 1956 in Ecuador's Amazon region by a group of Huaorani (also spelled Waorani) tribesmen they hoped eventually to convert.

I remember reading about the incident in Life magazine, a mainstay in my childhood home. As I recall, the article was occasioned by a converted Huaorani woman touring the United States with the Billy Graham crusade team. I was fascinated by the story and it stuck with me over the years.

Until 1974, that is.


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New York Times seeks political (as opposed to pastoral) content of Wedding at Cana

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The Pope Francis guy is still traveling around down there in South America and, gosh dang it, he keeps preaching sermons. Isn't that unkind of him?

These sermons, of course, mix commentary about Catholic teachings and life in the public square -- as if the pope was arguing that faith and life are on the same level, as opposed to real life being on the ground floor in the created order, with religious truth claims either (a) locked in a private closet or (b) mysterious things that are stored, with God, in an attic above our heads (perhaps one without a pull-down ladder, even).

Once again, I am not arguing that journalists have to believe what the pope believes. I am not arguing that they need to produce sermon summaries or evangelistic pamphlets. I am saying that, in order to accurately cover him, journalists need to understand that this man is not delivering political stump speeches as he stands at pulpits next to altars at which he will celebrate the Mass.

Pope Francis is preaching. The faith elements are part of the content, not words that create an irrelevant frame for the real news, which by definition has to be about politics.

This conflicts, as I said the other day, with the "mainstream journalism Grand Unified Theory" stating that "no matter what the pope cites as his reasons for visiting a land or region, he is actually there for political reasons. He is there in an attempt to impact the lives of real people through political ideas or actions (as opposed to through sacraments, biblical truth, etc.)."

Now, to its credit, the New York Times team attempted, the other day, to cover a sermon while leaving some of the religious language intact. There is even a biblical reference in there! Here's the lede:


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Thank you, Los Angeles Times, for delving deeper into that Ten Commandments case in Oklahoma

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Twenty-plus years ago, the first major federal trial I covered for The Oklahoman involved a dispute over a religious symbol on an affluent Oklahoma City suburb's official seal.

This was the lede for the May 25, 1994, front-page story that I wrote:

Residents' perception of a Christian cross on Edmond's city seal emerged as a key issue Tuesday in the first day of a federal trial to determine the symbol's fate.
A Unitarian-Universalist minister and three other plaintiffs testified passionately about their disdain for the cross on the seal, which they contend reduces non-Christians to second-class citizens.
But defense attorney Burns Hargis pressed plaintiffs about their backgrounds, questioning whether they could be considered "average citizens. " Hargis, representing the city, sought to portray the Rev. Wayne Robinson and other plaintiffs as overly sensitive.
Robinson, minister of Edmond's Channing Unitarian-Universalist Church, found his background and his motives under particular scrutiny.
Hargis questioned Robinson about his "love-hate relationship with Christianity," noting the minister's Christian background as a Pentecostal Holiness and Methodist minister who once served in a leading role under Oral Roberts.
"You used to love it, now you really hate it? " Hargis said, in reference to Robinson's views on Christianity.
U.S. District Judge David Russell is hearing the case.

After the trial, the district court judge ruled that the seal depicted the city's history and did not violate the constitutional prohibition against government establishing a religion. However, an appeals court later overturned that ruling. The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the case, forcing the removal of the cross.

I was reminded of that case in reading a welcomed Los Angeles Times follow-up on a more recent court decision in Oklahoma: 


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Shocker! Press discovers that QB Russell Wilson is still a traditional Christian believer

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Good grief. Have we really reached the point where journalists are shocked, shocked that traditional Christian believers strive to follow 2,000 years of doctrine asking them to hold off on sex until after they have taken their wedding vows?

Or, are the world-weary journalists who cover pop culture (that includes sports, most of the time) predestined to roll their eyes when really hot superstars -- in multiple senses of that word -- affirm traditional doctrines on sex when asked awkward questions in public?

Call it Tim Tebow syndrome, for obvious reasons.

In this case, the man on the hot spot is the unusually composed quarterback of the Seattle Seahawks. I give you the elite journalistic work of professionals at People:

Russell Wilson ended months of speculation about whether he is dating Ciara during an interview with Pastor Miles McPherson at San Diego's Rock Church on Sunday. But the bigger surprise from the interview was the news that the couple is abstaining from sex for religious reasons.

"I said to her -- and she completely agreed -- 'Can we love each other without that?' " the Seattle Seahawks quarterback, 26, said in the interview. "If you can love somebody without that, then you can really love somebody."


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More deaths from Boko Haram: AP and other media step up reporting

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The new round of Boko Haram attacks in Nigeria has gotten fast-reacting coverage from the Associated Press, a testament to the new attention mainstream media have been paying to Muslim extremists.

AP's story is taut and sweeping. In classic wire service style, it packs the horrific summary into the lede:

JOS, Nigeria — A day of extremist violence against both Muslims and Christians in Nigeria killed more than 60 people, including worshippers in a mosque who came to hear a cleric known for preaching about peaceful coexistence of all faiths.
Militants from Boko Haram were blamed for the bombings Sunday night at a crowded mosque and a posh Muslim restaurant in the central city of Jos; a suicide bombing earlier at an evangelical Christian church in the northeastern city of Potiskum, and attacks in several northeastern villages where dozens of churches and about 300 homes were torched.

The article also recaps the violence of the past week -- a week that saw 300-plus deaths at the hands of Boko Haram. It notes that the group has become an affiliate of the Islamic State in Syria. It even names two targeted houses of worship: Yantaya Mosque in Jos and the Redeemed Christian Church of God in Potiskum.

The well-sourced story quotes eight people, including a police official, an emergency coordinator, a community militia leader, a spokesman for the U.S. State Department, and witnesses on the street. The latter have some of the most gripping detail, like a man who had just gotten takeout from a restaurant that was bombed: "The restaurant was destroyed, and we saw many people covered in blood. We can't believe that we escaped."


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'God is my gun,' says woman quoted in superficial Reuters story on church security

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This was the headline on a recent Reuters story on church security in America, post-Charleston:

In some U.S. churches, guns are the answer to a prayer

But are guns really an answer to a prayer?

Or does that title foreshadow a superficial, cliché treatment of the subject? 

You decide:

JACKSON, Mich. —The Sunday service was winding down, but before it ended, Bishop Ira Combs led the congregation of 300 at the Greater Bible Way Temple in prayer. The shootings that killed nine people in a Charleston church could not happen here, he reassured his flock.
"If they had security, the assailant would not have been able to reload," Combs declared. "All of us here are not going to turn the other cheek while you shoot us."
As he preached, Combs was flanked by a man on each side of the pulpit, each armed with handguns beneath their suit coats. Other members of the church's security team were scattered among the crowd. Congregants did not know who was armed and who was not — an undercover approach that is part of the security plan.
"We aren't looking to engage people in violence, but we are going to practice law enforcement," Combs told Reuters before the service. "And we are going to interdict if someone comes in with a weapon."


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Louisville Courier-Journal offers a case study in biased media coverage of same-sex marriage

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Here at GetReligion, we advocate a traditional American model of journalism — one that relies on a fair, impartial reporting of news.

Last week, I highlighted the difficulty that some media organizations experienced applying that concept to the U.S. Supreme Court's 5-4 decision in favor of same-sex marriage:

After I wrote that post, I came across a Louisville Courier-Journal story that epitomizes the biased nature of many reports on this subject.

Let's start at the top of this puffy profile of a Baptist pastor who supports same-sex marriage:

The Rev. Jason Crosby, a controversial local Baptist gay rights advocate whose church was kicked out of the Kentucky Southern Baptist Convention last year for agreeing to officiate same-sex marriages, spent the weekend celebrating.
"This has been more of an emotional journey for me than I'd ever have imagined," said the Rev. Jason Crosby, the pastor of Crescent Hill Baptist Church, one hour after the Supreme Court ruled Friday in the favor of allowing same-sex couples to legally marry across the country. "I can't even begin to imagine how elated people must be feeling today, after the grueling times they've endured."
Crosby said four couples got in touch with him — within minutes of the historic ruling Friday — to ask if they could marry in the church, 2800 Frankfort Ave. "I'm thrilled we've opened the door to more joy. We've opened the floodgates to celebrate the love that people find in different ways."
Crescent Hill is one of two Baptist churches in Louisville that were dismissed from the Southern Baptist Convention for their welcoming position on homosexuals last year. Constant in his position despite the rejection and hatred from his own churchmen, Crosby started conducting gay marriages last November.

Did you catch that last sentence?: Constant in his position despite the rejection and hatred from his own churchmen ...

Hatred? 


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Gag-rule drama: Oregon 'Sweet Cakes' story needs fresher, in-depth treatment

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On the heels of the Supreme Court’s June 26 5-4 ruling legalizing same-sex marriage in all 50 states comes a ruling by Oregon’s state labor commissioner lowering the boom on a couple who refused to bake a wedding cake for two lesbians in early 2013.

This is a really interesting church-state story and numerous readers have email your GetReligionistas asking when we would deal with it. Once again, the goal is to look at the coverage of this issue, not the issue itself. Let's give that a try.

Here is how The Oregonian worded it:

The owners of a shuttered Gresham bakery must pay $135,000 in damages to a lesbian couple for refusing to make them a wedding cake, the state's top labor official said Thursday.
State Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian ordered Aaron and Melissa Klein to pay the women for emotional and mental suffering that resulted from the denial of service. The Kleins had cited their Christian beliefs against same-sex marriage in refusing to make the cake.
Avakian's ruling upheld a preliminary finding earlier this year that the Kleins, owners of Sweet Cakes by Melissa, had discriminated against the Portland couple on the basis of their sexual orientation.
The case ignited a long-running skirmish in the nation's culture wars, pitting civil rights advocates against religious freedom proponents who argued business owners should have the right to refuse services for gay and lesbian weddings.

I looked at a previous story by the same reporter on April 24 and here’s how the lead sentence ran there:

The lesbian couple turned away by a Gresham bakery that refused to make them a wedding cake for religious reasons should receive $135,000 in damages for their emotional suffering, a state hearings officer says.

Notice the crucial difference?


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