.... ‘Sensitive’ and ‘contextualised’ reporting about Muslims may sound like a cause that any right-minded individual would support. But as Policy Exchange’s meticulous research shows, what is being demanded by, for example, the Muslim Council of Britain is instead a kind of media apartheid, under which Muslim communities are reported on according to rules and conventions not applied to others; where work by non-Muslim professionals is judged by different standards from those who claim to follow the faith; and where those standards would be policed by self-appointed community leaders such as the MCB, sitting in judgment like a modern-day Lord Chamberlain.
.... What is exceptionally disappointing is the surrender of those who should know better — including Ipso, the press regulator — to some of these regressive trends. Of course, it is vital for writers to hear the views of everyone involved in a story, if they are willing to share them. However, this has never meant assuming that all members of an ethnic or religious group share the same perspective.
And still less should it lead to editors putting a veto in the hands of self-appointed community spokespeople, or ‘media monitors’ — in effect a religious thought police, which might not seem out of place in Turkey or Saudi Arabia, but which should have no function in the UK. [The Spectator] Read more
