According the this week's issue of TV Guide [not online], the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has protested the portrayal of a traitorous Arab-American family on FOX's "24." Near as I can tell, they feel that it is unrealistic that Muslim residents of the US would ever engage in terrorist acts, and that such a portrayal is a libel of all such residents.
The thing that bothers me is why FOX even listened to this drivel. Must we be relegated to endless repetitions of 4th and 5th Reichs when the world has clearly moved on. But apparently they did, and have altered the scripts somewhat as a result. Sigh.
How pathetic. CAIR should be thanking Fox for producing a show about terrorism that made it through three full seasons without having a Muslim as the heavy. Season 2 was especially P.C., with all the viewers first thinking Reza the Arab was an evil terrorist about to marry that innocent blonde chick Marie Warner, only to find out that Marie was the terrorist and Reza was clean.
Posted by: Xrlq at February 1, 2005 10:26 PMFools. Dont they realize that they can only use stereotypes like crazed vietnam vets, Right wing nazis and abusive christian repressed homosexual fathers who really hate their rich suburban lives to tell stories?
What ever happened to standards in Hollywood?
xrlq--
The heavies in season two turned out NOT to be terrorist Arab states, but instead evil businessmen trying to start a "war for oil." Pure coincidence, that.
Posted by: Kevin Murphy at February 2, 2005 08:29 AMFrank--
The next-door-neighbor in "American Beauty" kind of fits all of those categories, no?
Posted by: Kevin Murphy at February 2, 2005 08:33 AMyes - along with high praise from Hollywood. I found it a two hour parade of poorly thought out sterotypes that were an inch deep in character. You could predict the plot of that movie in the fist 5 minutes.
Can you imagine the outrage had the "bad guy" been in one of the protected groups in any way?