Monday 27 August 2012

Citizen Khan: to grow darker?

click to go to Adil Ray's website
BBC1’s new comedy Citizen Khan, written by and starring starring Adil Ray (right), was laugh-out-loud, and followed the tried-and-tested formula of a paterfamilias who thinks he’s in charge while his family get things done the right way behind his back. To strengthen the link to middle-class sitcomland, Kris Marshall from My Family starred as mosque manager Dave.

So why was it on more than an hour after the watershed?

My guess is because in the first episode when Khan, a "self-appointed community leader" in the "capital of British Pakistan", forgets to book the mosque for his daughter’s wedding, he is accused of racism by Dave because the "real" mosque manager – "the brown one" – is absent.

The accusation sounds uncontroversial, but it flies in the face of the BBC’s leftist assumption that only white people can be racist. Also, there’s been a reluctance among non-Muslim defenders of Islam to own up to Dave’s defence: that everybody is born Muslim. Perhaps because this is a comedy show, the corollary wasn’t mentioned: that any member of any other religion is an apostate, and the punishment for apostasy has been, in the past and present, death.

The BBC can’t have been happy commissioning this show; seeing Muslims as "ordinary people" contradicts the leftist view that "Islam has spread peace, culture and learning around the world over the last 1,400 years."

Bhavna Limbachia as Alia Khan: go to programme webpage
What troubled me was Bhavna Limbachia’s (admittedly brilliant) portrayal of daughter Alia Khan as a Westernised girl (left). While wanting Pakistanis to integrate, I’m conscious that the Pakistani parents of Shafilea Ahmed were recently convicted of her murder because of her rejection of their culture in favour of integration. A similar character portrayed in a comedy so soon after the conviction risks accusations of bad taste.

Is this why Limbachia portrays Alia as hiding her blonde highlights under a traditional headscarf? Will further episodes grow darker? I'll be interested to see how Citizen Khan develops.

Gerry Dorrian
300 words

Resources

Citizen Khan Series 2 - 300 words

Click to go to the Citizen Khan website

Click for Mr Khan comedy clips

Click to hear Adil Ray talk to presenter Noreen Khan on BBC Asian network

29 comments:

  1. No doubt, if only other Pakistani girls were that sexy! A total babe

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    1. She's not Pakistani you thick shit.

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    2. plus the real muslim cover them self to keep their beauty for their husband not to sell around to the first guy!

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  2. She's a bonnie lassie; I don't know where Bhavna Limbachia comes from, but many Pakistani women are very pretty, and it's a shame for them that when they come over here for a new life beard-and-burqa imperialists want to put bags over their heads.

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    1. beauty is one of the paths to hell covering that beauty is meant to try and stop that beauty from corrupting the person.

      beauty like everything else is just a test

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    2. Anonymous, that view is being increasingly challenged, not just in the West but in Islamic countries. There's a healthy resistance to Shariah law, including enforced wearing of the full veil, in both Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, to name but two.

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    3. i wear my scarf no one forced me and other women. if they want to put scarf is up to them and trust me there are plenty that doesn't so if you dont know plz keep comment to urself. greeting from a converted muslim once catholic!

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    4. Shariah Law is your own interpretaation of Islam it has nothing to do with the Govt.The Burka is optional and mainly an arab cultural thing because of the weather, men wear a similar viel and even the Queen of Englands daughter in law wore won on her Wedding Day.


      Despite Americas best attemps, muslim women will not be become skanky californian sl88ts. Even in non muslim countries women dont go around half naked, its only in some western countries with no morals that htat happens.

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  3. why would anyone want to murder their daughter? I have had three kids and never once have I wanted them dead because my brother dissapproved of them

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  4. She's Indian, a Guji Hindu

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  5. You guys are reading into this rubbish too much!

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  6. i went out with bhavna back in school days, we went out for 11 month, shes a guji punjab girl, we use to call her bhavnanjab, bless she made it big well done

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  7. It is absolutely fantastic.

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  8. " A similar character portrayed in a comedy so soon after the conviction risks accusations of bad taste. "

    The author is clearly clueless. This is far more common than you think and so the character was probably based on observations the writers made on real families rather than imitating a single story they read about on a newspaper.

    As for the show itself, I know for a fact from observing my friends that there were quite a few scenes strict Muslims would object to vehemently. As for me I'm loving the sitcom and find it absolutely hilarious and can't wait for the next episode.

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  9. she is fit yes, I watched it, It wasnt that good but not as bad as many are saying some funny lines, no belly laughs, The other asian women on the show are quite fit too.

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    1. 'seriously? One of them is an old woman and the other girl is not fit either.

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  10. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  11. The BBC can’t have been happy commissioning this show; seeing Muslims as "ordinary people" contradicts the leftist view that "Islam has spread peace, culture and learning around the world over the last 1,400 years."

    This is the leftist view? Strange. I thought I was a leftist of the highest order, one of the ones that seems to annoy certain people by simply existing. Yet I don't think this. Islam as by scripture doesn't seem peaceful or seem to promote much learning. I think it's good to see them as ordinary people.

    I'm liking Citizen Khan. But I understand your concern about the portrayal after the murder.

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  12. I think the BBC should have had someone Muslim playing Alia as she is Indian as does not know the values of a Muslim. Also they take the jokes Much too far for comfort. But I have I admid she is very pretty.

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  13. I didnt like episide 6 at al bcuz the way they kept talkin bout cross eyed ppl dt Is mean

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  14. Are you cross eyed you son of a beotch lol

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  15. its a racist TV Show, the BBC has at least 4 tv shows, where the muslim characters everything they do ie their main identiy is their religion and all storylines revolve around their religion.
    The BBC always portrays muslims as being devout and then becoming party mad alcholics its a cultural assault on muslim and portraying them all as weak and strict nazi parents who control kids, and the kids just cant wait to be free

    such a TV show that depicted jews as loving money would never have been shown. The BBC is not Leftist its hates muslims and academic investigiations have found the BBC has a clear Pro British Establishment War Bias

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  16. the BBC is actually very pro Muslim. A big mistake as that religion is totally evil. With child marriage, polygamy, beheading, chopping of hands and feet for theft, stoning for homosexuals and adulterers that are rarely ever men, misery and poverty everywhere that its evil hand touches. Get real and see what Islam and in particular sharia law is really about, it is no picnic.

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  17. You've heard a few things here and there about Islam, created your own assumptions, did no real research into the reasonings etc, no research into other religions, and have made up your mind. Lol. Definitely not the brightest in the class are you. I actually feel sorry for you. Hopeless.

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  18. BBC are quite insulting Muslims to be honest. Eastenders, citizen khan etc. Islam is not about drinking, murdering, being gay, faking it to your families that you pray. Those that do that are not Muslims because they clearly don't know the value of the religion. She is a pretty girl but she has given herself a bad impression even though it is acting. To be honest as someone said above they should have got a Muslim girl to play Alia's role. That would have been embarrasing for her and her family to behave like that in public. It's a shame that in this country we have so much access to education yet the scences that are shown lack education.

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    1. what a disgusting remark about such a lovely young lady

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  20. racist a$$hole

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