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Digging deeper into the Tashfeen Malik mystery: 'Another day, another slaughter'?

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For the past few days, Tashfeen Malik has been the flavor of the hour in press reports about the San Bernardino shootings as folks have slowly realized it was her who was the radicalized element in this murderous couple. It appears that the wife converted her husband. As tmatt said very early on of this case, it was likely that, "all roads lead to Saudi Arabia."

Here’s what the Los Angeles Times had right up top on Sunday:

Tashfeen Malik, the 29-year-old female shooter in the deadly San Bernardino rampage, was a onetime "modern girl" who became religious during college and then began posting extremist messages on Facebook after arriving in the U.S., a family member in Pakistan told the Los Angeles Times.
The family member, in Malik's hometown of Karor Lal Esan who asked to not be identified, said Malik's postings on Facebook were a source of concern for her family.
"After a couple of years in college, she started becoming religious. She started taking part in religious activities and also started asking women in the family and the locality to become good Muslims. She started taking part in religious activities of women in the area,” the family member told The Times.
"She used to talk to somebody in Arabic at night on the Internet. None of our family members in Pakistan know Arabic, so we do not know what she used to discuss," the family member said. The family speaks Urdu and a dialect of Punjabi known as Saraiki. 

If you look up at the bylines, you see three reporters and a dateline of Islamabad. Somehow they found the village this woman was from, got a translator and dug up the relatives.

Read further down in the story, and you’ll see they’re quoting from a Pakistani TV channel, from BBC, various friends at their San Bernardino mosque, the family attorney, a Pakistani who lives near Karor Lal Esan who claimed he knew the family well and that they were “extremist;” plus anyone else the Times could dig up.

What resulted was a lengthy narrative with three lead reporters and 31 contributors.

Yes, 31.


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When Donald Trump proposes banning Muslims, five crucial sources to quote

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I keep thinking Donald Trump will smile like the Devil and admit his entire presidential campaign is an elaborately orchestrated "Punk'd" prank on the American public.

Until then — and as long as The Donald remains, somehow, a serious Republican contender — journalists must take him and his crazy statements/antics seriously.

The latest from The Onion — er, The Associated Press:

MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. (AP) — Donald Trump called Monday for a "total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States," an idea swiftly condemned by his rival GOP candidates for president and other Republicans.
The proposed ban would apply to immigrants and visitors alike, a sweeping prohibition affecting all adherents of Islam who want to come to the U.S. The idea faced an immediate challenge to its legality and feasibility from experts who could point to no formal exclusion of immigrants based on religion in America's history.
Trump's campaign said in a statement such a ban should stand "until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on." It said the proposal comes in response to a level of hatred among "large segments of the Muslim population" toward Americans.
"Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in jihad, and have no sense of reason or respect for human life," Trump said in the statement.

Here at GetReligion, we advocate a traditional American model of the press in which reporters quote key sources, refrain from editorializing (such as calling Trump an idiot, as a blogger like me might do) and letting readers judge the facts for themselves.

In the case of Trump's Muslim proposal, here are five crucial voices that news reports would do well to reflect:


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So journalists, are 'conservative' Muslims practicing a 'conservative' form of Islam or not?

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One of the advantages of being, well, a journalist who is a bit on the old side is that you remember debates and discussions in the past that resemble arguments taking place in the present.

So flash back several decades with me to the era known as the Cold War. One of the topics debated in the first newsrooms in which I worked was how to use the terms "liberal" and "conservative" when talking about Communists, especially in the Soviet Union.

Editors decided that the more socialist, the more Communist, the more Soviet people were, the more "conservative" they were. They were "conservative" Communists, even though "socialist" and "Communists" are normally words that describe a form of political liberalism. They were "conservative" liberals because they were resisting change to the Soviet system.

People who wanted change in the old system, thus, were "liberals," even if these changes would take their nation away from socialism/Communism.

The key, of course, was that "conservative" was bad and "liberal" was good.

With that in mind, let's move to the current debates about the violence in San Bernardino and, in particular, the following passage from a piece in The Washington Post, which included remarks from the father of Syed Rizwan Farook:

On Sunday, Italian publication La Stampa published an interview with Farook’s father, also named Syed, in which he said his son had harbored anti-Semitic animosity. Reached at his son Raheel’s home on Sunday morning, the elder Farook said his views differed from those of his son.

“He was going towards [conservatism],” he told reporters through the gate of the home. “His views were conservative, my views were liberal.”


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Oh my God, NBC News needs to print correction about story on U2's return to Paris

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Picky, picky, picky.

Guilty as charged, especially when it comes to the details of life on the religion beat. Anyone who knows about the day-to-day work done by journalists know that when it comes to writing, editing and the Associated Press Stylebook, we think that God is in the details. You could also say that the gods are in the details, if you wish to do so.

Yes, it's that time again. Time for another look at that journalism trend that your picky GetReligionistas have discussed quite a bit (click here for a classic Bobby Ross, Jr., post) in recent years -- the strange tendency for some journalists to ignore AP style when it comes to references to God.

So let's head right over to the journalism bible (lower-case "b") where we find this:

gods and goddesses
Capitalize God in references to the deity of all monotheistic religions. Capitalize all noun references to the deity: God the Father, Holy Ghost, Holy Spirit, Allah, etc. Lowercase personal pronouns: he, him, thee, thou.
Lowercase gods and goddesses in references to the deities of polytheistic religions. Lowercase god, gods and goddesses in references to false gods: He made money his god.

So with that in mind, let's look at a strange passing reference in an NBC News report about the return of U2 to Paris, for concerts that were cancelled amid safety concerns after the recent massacre there.


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Does The New York Times worry about terrorists, or just folks who worry about terrorists?

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"Chaotic," "apocalyptic," "aggression," "angrily demanded," "seethed with disgust" -- these loaded terms are all in a New York Times editorial about Republicans.

Unfortunately, in this case we are not talking about something called an editorial. The Times team called it news coverage.

"After San Bernardino Attack, Republican Candidates Talk 'War'," proclaimed the headline summarizing the GOP reaction after the recent shootings in San Bernardino, Calif. And when was the last time you read "bellicosity" in an news article, outside of a direct quote?

The rising tide of bellicosity gripped the Republican presidential field, as the initial restraint and calls for prayers that followed the shootings gave way to revelations that the massacre may have been inspired by the Islamic State.
Senator Ted Cruz of Texas seethed with disgust for Democrats, declaring, “This nation needs a wartime president.”
“Whether or not the current administration realizes it, or is willing to acknowledge it,” he added, “our enemies are at war with us.”
Their language was almost apocalyptic. Jeb Bush described the looming threat of “Islamic terrorism that wants to destroy our way of life, wants to attack our freedom.”
He gravely added: “They have declared war on us. And we need to declare war on them.”

We read more slant in the obligatory talking-head observers.


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Social drinking, Wednesday night youth sports and Southern churches' waning influence

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Not everybody drives a truck. Not everybody drinks sweet tea. Not everybody owns a gun, wears a ball cap, boots and jeans. Not everybody goes to church or watches every NASCAR race. — "Southern Comfort Zone," song by Brad Paisley

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I'm not sure what to make of a just-published Associated Press story making the case that the once-dominant influence of churches in the South is waning.

On the one hand: Duh.

I mean, haven't we all read enough about the "Rise of the Nones" to know that a societal shift has occurred?

On the other hand: I'm not certain that the small town of Sylacauga, Ala., allowing Ruby Tuesday's or O'Charley's to sell beer on Sunday afternoon is a sign of the End Times — or the best example of churches losing their dominance.

The top of the AP story:

SYLACAUGA, Ala. (AP) -- Prayers said and the closing hymn sung, tea-drinking churchgoers fill Marble City Grill for Sunday lunch. But hard on their heels comes the afternoon crowd: craft beer-drinking, NFL-watching football fans.
Such a scene would have been impossible just months ago because Sunday alcohol sales were long illegal in Sylacauga, hometown of both the actor who played TV's Gomer Pyle and the white marble used to construct the U.S. Supreme Court building. While the central Alabama city of 12,700 has only one hospital, four public schools and 21 red lights, the chamber of commerce directory lists 78 churches.
Yet few were surprised when residents voted overwhelmingly in September to legalize Sunday alcohol sales. Churches lacked either the heart or influence to stop it.
That shift is part of a broad pattern across the South: Churches are losing their grip on a region where they could long set community standards with a pulpit-pounding sermon or, more subtly, a sideward glance toward someone walking into a liquor store.


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Christmas wars come to University of Tennessee: Hey! Check these crucial facts!

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What we have here is a collision between several different kinds of stories that are all hot, right now, in the mainstream press. It's also important to know that this crash is taking place in one of the most intensely religious parts of the United States -- right here in my own stomping grounds of East Tennessee.

First of all, there is the whole "war on Christmas" element of this story, since it centers on a clash between acceptable "holiday parties" and unacceptable "Christmas parties."

Then you have another episode in the current national wave of "trigger warning" controversies on public-university campuses, with the assumption that some forms of speech and symbolism -- take Santa Claus, for example -- are automatically offensive and should be strictly controlled.

However, at the heart of the story is a serious church-state issue linked to the idea of religious believers having "equal access" to space in the tax-dollar-supported public square. Hold that thought.

Oh, right, this story also comes on the heels of a controversy about the University of Tennessee embracing gender-neutral pronouns. Just about the only thing missing from this drama is some hook linked to NASCAR or UT Volunteers football.

So here is where things started off, with a post on the website of the campus Office for Diversity and Inclusion called “Best Practices for Inclusive Holiday Celebrations in the Workplace." It didn't take long -- hello Fox News -- for this to grow into Republican calls for the resignation of UT Chancellor Jimmy Cheeks.

Pretty soon, folks on both sides are calling each other "extremist" and "ridiculous." Here's a sample from the memo that includes the key points:

* Holiday parties and celebrations should celebrate and build upon workplace relationships and team morale with no emphasis on religion or culture. Ensure your holiday party is not a Christmas party in disguise. ...


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Your weekend think piece: Scribe lets God respond to The New York Daily News

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So what kinds of thoughts pop into your mind when you are watching a newscast, after some kind of tragedy, and the anchor-person ends a report by saying, "All of our thoughts are with the families involved in this event," or words to that effect.

The key buzz word, of course, is "thoughts." In some parts of America, anchor-people still dare to say "thoughts and prayers."

Either way, here is what I usually think when I hear that: "Really?"

Cynical? You betcha. This brings me, of course, to this week's media storm about The New York Daily News cover -- in the wake of the San Bernardino massacre -- with the infamous "God Isn't Fixing This" banner headline. Click here for Julia Duin's post on the "prayer shaming" debate that followed that piece.

The key, of course, was whether one took the headline as a shot a God, a shot at Republicans who issued statements about praying for the victims (as opposed to calls for gun-control legislation) or as both.

Lots of folks, this week, asked why I thought the Daily News ran that headline. I immediately thought about the numbers in the Pew Forum report that put the "nones" -- the growing number of religiously unaffiliated Americans -- in the news. You may recall that one implication of that survey was that a coalition of secularists, "nones" and our nation's small cohort of religious liberals was now the largest constituency group in today's Democratic Party.

Clearly, Democrats -- with the media that service them -- need to please that base, from time to time (just as Republicans have to worry about the concerns of the very religious). Might the Daily News leaders (who desperately need someone to fund their newspaper) have been courting that audience?


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What questions must reporters ask, when faith and violence are twisted together?

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What questions must reporters ask, when faith and violence are twisted together?

This may seem like a bit of a reach, but does anyone out there remember the story about the mad, misogynic gunman at the Planned Parenthood facility in Colorado Springs? Does the name Robert L. Deal, Jr., ring any horrible bells? How about Pastor Garrett Swasey?

Yes, at the time Issues Etc. host Todd Wilken and I were recording this week's "Crossroads" podcast (click here to tune that in), the Colorado Springs story was still being discussed -- a lot. We spent much of our time discussing the religious angles of that event and, in particular, what kinds of questions mainstream reporters needed to be asking if their goal was to find facts that would or would not link Deal to any particular religious group or tradition, let alone the mainstream pro-life movement.

While we were recording, Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik were on the run after attacking Farook's co-workers at a holiday party at the San Bernardino County Health Department.

You will not hear about that in this podcast. However, you will hear us discussing PRECISELY the kinds of questions that reporters are now asking about the forces that may or may not have shaped the lives and worldviews of Farook and Malik.

What kinds of questions could possibly apply to both Deal and to this terrorist couple in San Bernardino? Well, questions like these.

How did they spent their time and money?


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