On October 10, 2006, an Islamic website posted a message alerting Muslims to what it claims is a new insult to Islam. According to the message, the cube-shaped building which is being constructed in New York City, on Fifth Avenue between 58th and 59th Streets in midtown Manhattan, is clearly meant to provoke Muslims.
Emphasis mine: an unnamed Islamic website somewhere has a message that asserts something dumb. And what possible reason is there for broadcasting it? In essence, MEMRI is nutpicking :
... the moronic practice of trawling through open comment threads in order to find a few wackjobs who can be held up as evidence that liberals are nuts. It's both lazy and self-refuting, since if the best evidence of wackjobism you can find is a few anonymous nutballs commenting on a blog, then the particular brand of wackjobism you're complaining about must not be very widespread after all.
MEMRI habitually applies the same method to muslims. Their methodology is suspiciously selective. MEMRI's selection bias results in disproportionate influence on mass media, public opinion, and ultimately even policy. Marc Lynch observes that MEMRI essentially conceded that they engaged in selective quoting in the past, and this latest smear attempt suggests that they haven't changed their stripes.
MEMRI quotes an unnamed "Islamic website" which could be anything ranging from a jihadi forum to a punk's blog. They provide no link or context or replies to the message. The result? The technical media, normally apolitical, swallows the bait. "Muslims are offended by Apple Store" says Jason D. O'Grady of ZDNet. Muslims? Can O'Grady identify a single offended muslim? The Register jumps in with "Apple's Store is an 'insult to Islam'". It is? Who speaks on behalf of Islam that the store is an insult? Ars Technica asserts "Apple Store 'provokes' Muslims.". Which muslims were provoked?
Where is the outrage? Islamoyankee observes that muslims don't hate macs:
I must confess though, that I live close by and go on pilgrimage there at least once a month and play with the toys. I know of no one who is offended by this thing (except for the fact that the elevator only seems to work 50% of the time). But of course, as you can see by some of the comments on Jason's blog, MEMRI has achieved their goal of de-humanizing Muslims as thoughtless brutes.
And that is precisely MEMRI's goal. Muslims are brutes; they are orcs. Muslim-baiting has already been legitimized and I am afraid that we will yet see much worse.
Nightstudies,
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't matter to Aziz if MEMRI has been correct on one million things and this is their first flaw since they are criticizing Islam and muslims; also, it does not matter to Aziz that CAIR has terrorist links since they are defending muslims. Once you get to know Aziz you discover his extreme tribalist thinking, he is nothing more than a well-spoken islamic supremacist