In response to an article that they consider to be the the most Islamophobic and xenophobic they have read in a long time, Muslimah Media Watch has published a biting satirical guide to writing about Muslims. Among the list of rules for journalists covering Muslims are:
Always assume a Muslim woman needs to be saved, and write accordingly.
Always be confident that you know everything there is to know about Islam, and that you understand it better than most Muslims do.
Everything Muslims do has to do with Islam and Islam alone. Their cultural background and its possible influences in their lives must be ignored.
Another rule they provide reads as follows:
Always remember that Muslims are not real Canadians (or Americans, British, etc.)
For example, when Warmington writes about the need for a “proper gravestone,” he quotes Ms. Geller, who says that this need “appeals to basic humanity” (basic humanity, of course, is a core Canadian and American value, as is the presence of “proper” markers of graves). As we know, many Pakistanis don’t have headstones, and as such don’t have much basic humanity, and therefore are not really Canadians. Same goes for the idea of “normal dignity”; any conceptions of dignity that fall outside of mainstream Canadian conceptions are surely abnormal and un-Canadian.
Read the full satirical piece here, and the article the provoked it here.