Islamic Propaganda, Turkish drama, and Muslim Role Models
How often is it that we see bearded outwardly practicing religious
Muslims as protagonists in film rather than as evil violent fanatical
antagonists? Can we culturally engineer popular entertainment in which Muslims
are seen as the protagonists?
Kids, growing up, idealize Batman, Superman, Captain
America, Hulk, Spiderman and Ironman, and as a result, view the 'heroes' of
today as people who fit that archetype, i.e unislamic, clean-shaven, angry,
dominant, buff, hard, independent, powerful, rich, aggressive, engaging in illicit
relationships with women outside of marriage, not taking no for an answer, and
generally violently enforce justice. Often, we are influenced/brainwashed to
the point that we believe that the hardest, most aggressive, most relentless, and
manliest of men are those in American prisons. Some hypothesize that ideals
that are found in film influence kids to the extent that it actually promotes
real and violent crime.
In the mainstream film industry, also, the antagonists are
usually delusional dogmatic individuals (which, to them includes Muslim
terrorists, Nazis, and the Joker). This ubiquitous association of ‘Muslim’ with
‘antagonist’ conditions the audience to believe that religious Muslims are
unwanted by society, evil, and deserve punishment. This leads kids to
subconsciously believe that in order to be a hero celebrated by society, they
can’t be a practicing Muslim; being a practicing Muslim is therefore
stigmatized.
If the protagonist was a religious Muslim, which we don't normally
see, then the audience would normalize the association of 'protagonist' with 'Muslim'.
The generation who would watch these films as a kid would recognize that a hero
that is celebrated by society practices Islam and is masculine.
Although Islamic films do exist, often times they are
religious overkill. They may pretend comedy, secular activities, male-female
interactions, and females as a gender do not exist. As a result, generally,
older religious individuals would appreciate the film rather than younger
rambunctious kids, Whatsapp moms, or non-practicing teens. My mother loves
Indian drama because of the color and costumes and the family politics, my
father likes action movies because of the fighting scenes, and I appreciate
film because of their implicit themes and clever cinematography.
Fortunately, I think I have found (approximately) that film!
The Turkish TV series, Diriliş: Ertuğrul (Resurrection:
Ertugrul), is set at a time where the Muslims are disunited, post-Salahudin, during
the Crusades. Although that is the setting, the main story is how this adventurous
young handsome Muslim prince eventually leads his tribe to form the Ottoman
Empire. The show has (mostly halal) romance, lots of family politics, humor,
suspense, lots of color and costumes, a complex story line, and references to
Ibn Arabi!
The show is in Turkish of course, but on Netflix, there
should be Arabic audio (or English) and English subtitles. If you want to watch
it with your family, I would make sure the kids are with their parents as there
is some violence/suggestive themes in it.
I want to talk about what I liked about the show so far as a
side note. I like how they demonstrate how women and men, at a societal level
and at an individual level, mahram and non-mahram, interact with each other
within an Islamic society. I believe that this is something that definitely
needed to be demonstrated and even I learned much. I like how Islam plays a
deep role in the characters decisions and even in irreligious activities. I
like how when the Muslim protagonist fights, it is not seen as initiating unjustified
mischievous drunk violence as generic religious Muslim antagonists do, but
rather our protagonist fought in a true struggle between good versus evil; it rediscovers
true jihad. I like how it implicitly shakes up the concept of a playboy prince
charming and makes this 'ideal prince' as Islamic, principled, respectful, and
full of self-restraint. I also like how the dresses of the women were realistic
according to the time and place; in the Arab lands, some women wore the niqab
and in the Turks’ lands, women wore a lenient head-covering.
I highly recommend this show and hope to see boys in neighborhood
running and yelling "Allahu Akbar" on their hobby horses and finally
realizing that they are the good guys!
Below is a podcast about the TV show with The Mad Mamluks
featuring Mohamed Ghilan