Ayatolljahso and the Frequent Flyer Muslims

Post 9/11 humor allowed

       Maz Jobrani, Tissa Hami, Bryan "Preacher" Moss

     Shazia Mirza, Azhar Usman, Jamel Debbouze

     Maysoon Zayid, and Ahmed Ahmed

Margaret Cho - Honorary Assassin
By Ayatolljahso

Because someone has to say it...

What Margaret Cho has in common with Muslim comedians is funny. KOS writes: "If you're lucky enough to have Cho play a gig near you, you really need to catch it. I love that woman!" Click on pic for assassin dates.

'Allah Made Me Funny' Highlights
Contributions of American Muslims

American Muslim standup comedian Azhar Usman, who has been touring across the U.S. and Canada as one of the headlining comics on the "Allah Made Me Funny - Official Muslim Comedy Tour," wasa featured on ABC NEWS Nightline with Ted Koppel. The program takes an in-depth look at one man's hopes and challenges as an American Muslim comic in post-9/11 America, underscoring the importance of the ever-present cultural hurdles faced by minority groups throughout U.S. history-acculturation, assimilation, and Americanization. According to comedian Azhar Usman, "Muslims in the media today are generally seen in an unfavorable light. The Nightline story is a move in the right direction as it highlights some of the positive contributions of American Muslims. Since 9/11, the Muslim culture has been defined by assumptions and stereotypes that only work to enhance cultural gaps and misunderstandings. We are reaching out as a matter of self-determination and self-definition, rather than letting others define us." He added, "We are of course indebted today to community advocacy organizations like CAIR that work tirelessly with the media to make such positive coverage of Muslims possible." According to Arsalan Iftikhar, National Legal Director for CAIR, "The history of American standup comedy is inextricably linked to the history of the American civil rights struggle. From Dick Gregory, to Lenny Bruce, to Richard Pryor, Azhar Usman and the 'Allah Made Me Funny' tour are taking their cues from the very best of the American comic tradition." 'Allah Made Me Funny - The Official Muslim Comedy Tour' launched in May 2004 and has landed in over 30 cities across the U.S. and Canada, has received international and national media attention including the BBC, Washington Post, TIME, Newsweek, Atlanta Journal Constitution, LA Times, King Magazine, numerous ABC, NBC and CBS affiliates, as well as Comedy Central's "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart." For more information on the tour, please visit www.allahmademefunny.com.

Flying While Muslim
By Ayatolljahso

Did you hear the one about Cat Stevens?

As posted on The Geeze: Yusuf Islam got popped in the U.S. when some of the old and untrue Israeli dirt about him "supporting terrorism" stuck. No mention of an Israeli connection in the Larry King interview with Yusuf last week on CNN, although he was required to do a little song and dance about his nee-yah (intent). Yusuf may have the last laugh if he chooses to sue the John Ashcroft Department of Justice and Homeland Security for Patriot Act abuse.

Comedy is Serious Business for Shazia Mirza
By Ed Bradley (CBS)

She's been called the world's only female Muslim stand-up comedian, which sounds like a joke in itself. But for Shazia Mirza, comedy is a serious business.

In Britain, where she was born, Mirza has overcome the prejudices of both Muslims and non-Muslims to become a leading figure on the stand-up comedy circuit.

And far from hiding her religion, she makes a point of emphasizing it by the clothes that she wears whenever she goes on stage.

Muslim women traditionally wear the hijab or headscarf as a sign of modesty. It's supposed to make them anonymous. But for Mirza, it's become her trademark, and it's made her famous.

It's what this 27-year-old unmarried Muslim wears, not just when she goes to the mosque, but also when she performs in the male-dominated, beer-swilling world of British stand-up comedy.

Correspondent Ed Bradley reports.

With her dry wit and deadpan delivery, Mirza doesn't spare herself or her predominantly white audiences:

"I'm really pleased to be here tonight actually because my dad has let me out for the night. So I'm not going to stay long. Actually, he's picking me up in 10 minutes. He thinks this is a library."

"Now, I don't drink alcohol. It's against my religion to drink alcohol, but my English friends, they always seem to have such a great time when they go out. They get drunk. They wake up in the morning and say, 'I had a brilliant time last night. Where did we go again? Who is the father of my child?' I want to be drunk, I want to cry, fall over and roll down the street. It looks like so much fun."

Mirza says that on stage, she just tells the truth about how she sees and feels about the world: "I tell the truth about my experiences and my life."

She once said that she didn't make jokes about sex because, as a devout Muslim woman, she didnšt know about that. "I never make jokes about sex because I've never had it, and that's true," says Mirza. "I've never actually gone on stage and made up a story just because I thought it was funny. There would be no point in me being a stand-up if that was the case."

Born in Birmingham, England, to first generation Pakistani immigrants, Mirza says that from a young age she knew what she wanted to do with her life. But it wasn't a career choice that went down well in the community where she was raised.

"All the adults would ask the kids, 'What do you want to be when you grow up? What do you want to be?' And all the kids were really well-trained. They'd all say, 'Well, I want to be a brain surgeon, I want to be a dentist, I want to help all the sick kids in Africa,'" recalls Mirza.

"And when they'd say to me, 'What do you want to be?' I'd say, 'I want to be an actress, I want to be on the stage.' And my dad would go, 'Leave the room. You've showed us up, leave the room.' And it was really seen as a shameful thing to say in front of people in the community, 'I want to be on the stage.'"

As a good daughter, Mirza followed her parents' wishes, and after earning a degree in biochemistry, she became a teacher in London. But in the evenings, she secretly enrolled in drama school, and was soon making a name for herself on the stand-up comedy circuit in the city's pubs and clubs.

In the summer of 2001, she even played that Mecca of British entertainment, the London Palladium. But then came the event that threatened to put an end to her career before it had barely begun.

"When 9/11 happened, I thought I'm never going be able to do stand-up comedy ever again. Nobody's going to want to hear comedy from a Muslim woman after 9/11," says Mirza. "There was so much hatred towards Muslims that I just thought, I was scared to go on stage."

But three weeks later, in a club in London's Soho, Mirza decided to confront the problem head on: "I went on stage and said, 'Hello, my name's Shazia Mirza, at least that's what it says on my pilot's license,'" says Mirza.

"I remember people gasping, going, 'Ah!' So they were really shocked and then they laughed. There was so much tension in that room when I'd walked on that people were actually quite relieved that they could laugh."

The pilot's license joke went around the world and was translated into a dozen languages. Mirza was asked to perform in Europe, Japan and in the United States. She even used that line in her act when she came to America.

"Most of the people in the audience laughed, but there was an American man on the front row, sat right in front of me and he just put his head in his hands like that and he started shaking his head," recalls Mirza.

"And I saw him afterwards and he said, 'My sister died in the World Trade Center.' And I said to him, 'I'm not making jokes about the people that died. I condemn what happened, but what I'm trying to say is that not all Muslims are terrorists.'"

But not all Muslims appreciate Mirza's attempt to defuse religious and cultural tensions. Some send her vicious emails calling her a prostitute and a disgrace to her religion. And when she came to London's Brick Lane neighborhood, to take part in an Asian comedy show, the conservative Muslim community who live here certainly didn't see the joke.

"I had only done the first two lines of my act and there was a group of Bangladeshi boys in the audience. They jumped up onto the stage and they grabbed me by the neck and they pushed me off the stage," says Mirza.

Did she consider giving up stand-up comedy because of that? "Yeah, I was so scared, actually, that I was scared to go home that night," recalls Mirza.

"For about two weeks afterwards, I was scared to be in the house by myself because I thought that they would come after me and get me. But then, I started doing whatever I wanted to do."

And Mirza did whatever she wanted to do when she appeared last summer at the Edinburgh International Arts Festival.

"Now, are there any Muslims in here tonight," said Mirza in front of a multi-cultural audience. She then joked about a pilgrimage she made to Islam's holiest site.

"Last year, I went to Mecca to repent my sins, and I had to walk around the black stone. All the women were dressed in black, you could only see their eyes. And I felt a hand touch my bottom. I ignored it. I thought, 'I'm in Mecca, it must be the hand of God.' But then it happened again. I didn't complain. Clearly, my prayers had been answered."

Does Mirza think that there's anything in the Koran that prevents her from being a stand-up comedian?

"No, I don't. I don't believe that what I'm doing is wrong at all. Islam gives women a lot of power, and it gives women a lot of freedom as well," says Mirza.

"And I'm sure that, you know, Prophet Mohamed, peace be upon him, he laughed, everybody laughed. I mean, how are you gonna get through life if you don't laugh? ... I'm sure that God has a sense of humor. I hope he finds my jokes funny."

But there was one subject that Mirza found no laughing matter, and that was telling her parents about her new career and the world in which she now lived.

What did she do? She didn't tell them at all. In fact, the first inkling her parents had that their daughter was no longer a teacher was when they saw her on a TV comedy quiz show.

"And my dad said, 'I'm so proud of you. You was on the game show last night,' and I don't think he quite realized that actually I was a stand-up comedian, and I didn't just happen to arrive on this game show," recalls Mirza. "Then I started to appear on TV more and more, and I think it suddenly began to dawn on him that there's something not right here. How can she be a teacher and be appearing on the TV at the same time? And I think for a long time, he was in denial about it."

So when 60 Minutes invited ourselves to the Mirza family home in Birmingham for a Sunday lunch party, we were surprised to find that Mirza's father, Ayaz, now claims to be one of his daughter's greatest fans.

"Well, we really feel quite privileged really," says Ayaz Mirza. "I'm glad she hasn't gone into any other profession." Then, he says to his daughter, "So, you must give me credit that I have readily accepted the change."

As for Mirza's mother, Sarwat, her main regret is that her daughter hasn't yet found a husband. And it's a situation that makes her the butt of many of Mirza's jokes.

"Single, Muslim men in Britain. And in it, it has height, weight and size of beard -- all the most important things in a marriage. But my mum's so desperate now, she says, 'Look, get a white man and convert him.'"

Mirza says her mother has a "massive" list of good Muslim men for her: "Initially, she used to tell the boys that I was a teacher, and I used to get loads of offers for marriage. And it's funny, because now when she does tell boys and their parents that I'm a comedian, they don't even get to meet me. They say, 'We're not interested.'"

Mirza says, however, that her husband would have to be a Muslim. The only exception? "I would only marry George Clooney if he converted to Islam," says Mirza. "That'd be all right."

Mirza's mother doesn't know who George Clooney is until Shazia tells her hešs a Hollywood film star. "Oh, right," says Sarwat Mirza. "Well, I don't mind."

"You're desperate now," says Shazia, laughing. "You don't care. Anything will do."

But after everything she's been through to get this far, the difficulty of finding a husband doesn't deter Mirza from the career that she's always dreamed about.

Drawing on her experiences as a single Muslim woman traveling around the world, she continues to challenge the prejudices and preconceptions of her audience on stage:

"I got on the plane to Denmark dressed like this, and this woman refused to sit next to me. So I said to her, 'I'm going to sit on this plane and blow it up. And you think you're going to be safer three rows back?'"

"I do want to do something different. I want to do something challenging and I want to take risks, but above all I want people to be entertained," says Mirza. "I want them to laugh. Because the only way of talking about some issues sometimes is through humor." MORE

Yusuf's Islam should be showcased, not shunned
By Rannie Amiri - YellowTimes.org

What kind of power, / What kind of demon is this / Who kicks me out in shame, / With every word he says / What kind of majik of majiks.

Where have my brothers gone, / Why I don't see them about / They're all around him now. / And keeping me out / What kind of madness, of madness / "Go on and let him in, he's only asking for / A simple job to do and nothing more" they said.

Cat Stevens, "Majik of Majiks"

By now, we are all aware of the ridiculous circumstances which led to the detention and eventual expulsion of Yusuf Islam from the United States after he landed on a September 22 flight from the United Kingdom. Best known as 1970's pop icon Cat Stevens, he converted to Islam, both in faith and name, in 1977. Although the recent events still remain murky, the official explanation provided by the Department of Homeland Security was that Islam's name was found on a "no-fly list." The department's Undersecretary for Border and Transportation Security, Asa Hutchison, pathetically sought to clarify the matter by saying Islam's name was on the list due to "a connection to some type of terrorist activity."

Overlooking the fact that those who detained him felt safe enough to request his autograph, Yusuf Islam was deported for fear he posed some (yet unspecified) threat to the general public. The Bush administration wasted no time in reminding us that Israel had also denied him entry in 2000 for allegedly giving money to Hamas. The spin which followed, therefore, was that Islam may be funneling money to terror groups in the Middle East and elsewhere through his organization and charitable works.

As such, let us take a look at them.

His charity, Small Acts of Kindness, has been active in reducing poverty in war-torn regions, such as the Balkans and parts of the Middle East, and in promoting education-based initiatives. Always vocal in his condemnation of the 9/11 attacks (as well as the massacre in Beslan and beheadings in Iraq), half of all proceeds from his latest boxed set have been allocated to the September 11 Fund. A rekindling of his music career of old was warmly greeted by fans when he performed at an AIDS benefit concert sponsored by Nelson Mandela in South Africa last November, while proceeds from the re-release of his famous song "Peace Train" were sent to help Iraqi children affected by the war. He was most recently in the United States this past May, on an apparently unhindered journey, to meet with officials from the government's own Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.

Hardly what I would call the resume of a terrorist.

Islam's expulsion ironically came shortly before the release of an October 4 poll by the Washington-based advocacy group, the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). This sought to assess the perception of Muslims and the Islamic faith in general among ordinary Americans. According to the results, one in four hold anti-Muslim views, such as believing the religion advocates violence and hatred. The same number agreed with the statements: "Muslims teach their children to hate;" "Muslims value life less than other people;" and Muslims want to "change the American way of life." On a positive note, two-thirds believed that "the people who use Islam to justify violence are misinterpreting its teachings." Overall, however, negative images of Islam and Muslims were 16 times more prevalent than favorable ones.

If one heard any of the interviews Islam gave after his ordeal, it would not have taken long to appreciate the sincerity and devotion the man has toward fostering greater understanding and communication between peoples. "My dream is to be able to build a bridge between the Islamic world and the non-Islamic world," he said. "Some of the problems that we have now are because there's a lack of a voice for that majority of people who stand in the middle, looking for peace."

An articulate spokesman for a religion that has been hijacked in many ways by certain extremist groups, you would think the Bush administration would court eloquent, internationally respected figures such as Islam in an attempt to minimally salvage the United States' dismal standing among Muslims.

This is not their intention or objective, though. Rather, it is to continue justifying an ever-increasing erosion of civil rights, allegedly needed to fight the "war on terror," by raising a specter of guilt based solely on nationality or religion. The CAIR poll numbers indicate they are headed in the right direction.

If the public can be convinced that Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam represented a genuine danger to public safety, branding him an extremist and terrorist threat worthy of deportation, rest assured they can do almost anything to anybody.

Baby, what a wild world it is sure to be.

Rannie Amiri is an independent observer, commentator, and exponent of issues dealing with the Arab and Islamic worlds. Thanks to YellowTimes.org. Also see a backgrounder on The Geeze link.