ASTU 100 M02 1st Year CAP Seminar: UBC Blogs

In the Saudi Arabia episode of Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj, a comedy talk show on Netflix, Minhaj, who is an Indian Muslim, talks about the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Muhammad bin Salman (MBS), and the murder of The Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi was assassinated at the Saudi Arabia consulate in Istanbul Turkey for being critical of Saudi Arabia. During the episode, Hasan Minhaj uses comedy and sarcasm while talking about these serious issues mostly to diffuse the tension and give the show a more light hearted feel.

When talking about the murder of Khashoggi, Minhaj talks about the trope that “Islam is inherently violent”. The journalist was said to be murdered in a very inhumane and violent way by men who were sent out by Muhammad bin Salman. And when the backlash of the assassination hit, MBS was confused about the outrage. Another mention about how Islam is inherently violent is about how Muhammad bin Salman became the Crown Prince, according to the New Yorker, “MBS became Crown Prince after his predecessor and cousin, Mohammed bin Nayef was subjected to excruciating pain until he abdicated the throne.

Minhaj also talks about the trope that “Islam is a monolithic religion”, how Islam is viewed as ‘one’. Islam is practiced in dozens of countries around the world and there are 1.5 billion people around the world who practice Islam. Minhaj states that Saudi Arabia only makes up 2% of the Muslim population, but everytime they do something wrong, it reflects poorly on all Muslims around the world and they have to suffer as well. Like when the news broke out that MBS had sent out men to assassinate Khashoggi, it painted a bad picture for Muslims, because non Muslims would believe that all Muslims think like Khashoggi, and therefore all Muslims are violent.

Throughout history, political satire has found itself at odds with mainstream news media. However, the tension built between the two proves less a matter of attacks ad hominem and more a series of critiques on how each mode, structurally, conveys information to their viewers. Whereas comedy shows (and their hosts) are rather transparent in their political and moral leanings, news sources have embedded information in a more subtle manner, a phenomena best encapsulated by Stuart Hall’s concept of “Encoding” and “Decoding.”

Hall posits that producers and consumers of mass communication can interpret a media event differently based on, among other things, the frameworks of knowledge present at both ends. For instance, cultural context or specialized knowledge, whether added or lacking, greatly affects the message transmitted from the media object at hand. As a result, different “meaning structures,” or understandings and takeaways from a media object, are created by both producer and consumer, whether intended or unintended.

But when meaning structures are curated by media outlets to specifically transmit a message or idea, as often ridiculed by political satirists, the process of making the news becomes less a mere subtlety and more an insidious act.

Let’s take Patriot Act‘s commentary on news coverage of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohamed Bin Salman (MBS).

Patriot Act, like other political satire shows, uses clips from news outlets to situate the viewer within the story at hand. However, in the Saudi Arabia episode, media outlets themselves became the story due to their apparent lack of integrity while reporting on MBS.

While the episode was written in the wake of the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, host Hasan Minhaj was quick to point out instances where the media has idolized MBS. For example, Minhaj poked fun at how numerous outlets praised MBS for lifting the ban on women driving, noting how it contradicted the “progressive-minded, benevolent” image that had been cast upon the Crown Prince. In addition, Minhaj presented the coverage of MBS’s “Charm Offensive” with American business moguls on “respected” business-oriented TV networks such as Fox Business and CNBC as an example of how appropriate context and knowledge can impact one’s understanding (and the resulting ramifications) of news events.

While Patriot Act and Fox Business may serve a different clientele, the former gained a more holistic understanding of MBS by including context regarding the Crown Prince’s power grab and Saudi Arabia’s intervention in Yemen. To cite Giltrow, news media, as with all forms of media, “remembers” and “forgets” certain aspects of a story to promote a certain angle (41). However, by skewing with the viewer’s frame of knowledge, news outlets convey conflicting views of the same individual, whether for  financial gain or agenda-setting purposes.

(Expanded post available here.)

In the “Saudi Arabia” episode of the Netflix series Patriot Act, Hasan Minhaj, who identifies himself as an American Indian Muslim, used a satirical approach to discuss the social and political issues in Saudi Arabia. Throughout the episode, he tackles about the murder of Saudi Arabian journalist Jamal Khashoggi and the relation and involvement of the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Muhammad Bin Salman in this case. Minhaj’s method of conducting his talk has allowed his audiences to stay engaged with his speech and better understands the Islamic trope of “‘Muslim minds’ being irrational”.

The sequence began with Minhaj talking about the murder of the Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, which has led to a change in western countries’ perspectives towards the Saudi Arabian Crown Prince. Prince Salman, also known as MBS, was seen as a “reformer” of the Arab world to the western countries for his act of lifting the ban that made it illegal for women to drive in Saudi Arabia. After learning Salman’s unapologetic attitude towards the murder of Khashoggi, western countries began to think that Salman isn’t really the “reformer” that they thought he was. Nevertheless, Salman’s actions were not a surprise to the Muslims and the Saudi Arabians. They have already known that Salman was not the “reformer” and they were the ones that were actually trying to push back against MBS, not the western world. This portrays the trope of “‘Muslim Minds’ being irrational” because of the Muslims and Saudi Arabians’ “irrational” way of thinking that contrasts the western world. Minhaj further justified this trope by showing the video of the Muslim female driver rapping about legally driving. He then mocks the video with the flaws that he has found in the video such as the cleanliness of the car, the car brand and how the driver has never once driven the car the in the video. Minhaj has joked about a serious issue that has affected Saudi Arabian women for years and the fact the audience has found it funny has served as justification to the trope of “‘Muslim minds’ being irrational”.

The way he mocked the video of the female driver video was effective. Although this type of behavior would most likely be classified “rude” in western society, this method has definitely helped to bring some laughs out of the audiences which attract their attention and kept them engaged within the topic, which I believe is his intent when he decided to incorporate the video as a comedic factor. And I also believe that the way this trope was responded has revealed the cultural differences between the western countries and the middle eastern countries’ contrasting respond to the same issue.

In the second segment of the “Patriot Act’s” episode: “Saudi Arabia”, the host Hasan Minhaj makes reference to the unfoundedly held ideas about Indian Americans—in which they are mostly regarded as committed professionals. Nonetheless, Minhaj challenges these ideas by listing and showing videoclips of prominent Indians (such as Raj Shah and John Kapoor) who have recently faced serious legal issues. Throughout this segment, Minhaj employs mockery and satire in order to ridicule the ostensibly quintessential Indian American stereotype. I think that the usage of these resources allows for Minhaj to shed light on critical affairs—which regularly generate extreme controversy when publicly addressed—while moderating most audiences’ possible reactions.

Moreover, it can be inferred that by juxtaposing the more positive Indian people’s conventional image with several case studies (which conflict with this image), Minhaj attempts to showcase the fallacies underlying stereotypes—which in the case of muslims often give the religion a negative connotation. By showing these two starkly contrasting kinds of Indian people—the doctors as criminals and the stereotype of Indians as good doctors—Minhaj is able to denaturalize commonly held auspicious ideals about Indian people. This polarity evidently depicts the unreliability of stereotypes. Thus, it obliquely contemplates the untrustworthiness of muslim stereotypes.

Furthermore, in the last part of the episode, Minhaj shows a video which presents a few Indian American children who have been influenced by the behavior of the prominent Indian Americans —mentioned at the beginning of this post—and who have consequently decided to quit their future as honorable professionals and follow these individuals’ dark footsteps. I think that this video effectively communicates the absurdity of stereotypes. Since the scenario that it depicts is irrational because children are unlikely to have obscure intentions—kids are frequently used as symbols of innocence and purity. Lastly, Minhaj’s dual identity—both, as a muslim and as an Indian American—qualify him to comfortably address the one sided conjectures of each subject (his religion and nationality respectively). Thus, enabling Minhaj to maintain a fair standpoint. Altogether, these features withdraw significant biases from the presenter—Minhaj— and give room to a more balanced critique and analysis of the subject matter—muslim and Indian American stereotypes.

Citations:
Minhaj, Hasan.“Patriot Act: Saudi Arabia”.Netflix.(2018) https://www.netflix.com/watch/80239279?trackId=155573560

Through the use of news footage from public scandals and a dose of energetic satire, Hasan Minhaj explores how Saudi Arabia’s shifting political landscape has impacted relations with America in his Netflix Original Series Patriot Act. To conclude the first segment, he bluntly states that Western coverage of Mohammed Bin Salman orchestrating Jamal Khashoggi’s death has only further tarnished the world’s view of Muslims. Turning to the Indian side of his identity, Minhaj adds that “people love Indians” because they are generally seen as ambitious students and successful professionals. However, he is quick to point out that many Indians have been at the centre of public scandals throughout the news—from politicians and entrepreneurs to media contributors and commentators. He names such people as John Kapoor, Bobby Jindal, and Dinesh D’Souza, who have all garnered bad press, overturning the commonly held view of Indians as the “benevolent scholar.”

In the background, news clips report on Kapoor’s various crimes, Jindal’s budget cuts, and D’Souza’s controversial statements, giving insight into how the media portrays these figures. For example, it highlights the irony of Jindal cutting funding to both education and healthcare in addition to the portraits of him with an unrealistically light complexion. A picture is painted both literally and figuratively of Jindal as a white American who targets, as Minhaj points out, the two very institutions where Indians are stereotyped to seek careers, creating a sharp duality between identities conceived as “American” and “Indian.”

After examining the cases of these three men, the camera pans in and Minhaj mockingly suggests that those previously named are “trailblazers.” A video then plays in which young Indian students express the pressure they feel to succeed. Upon learning of the infractions of the public figures above, they regain hope in their ability to challenge stereotypes by following in the footsteps of wrongdoers instead. The absurdity of this alternative brings out the absurdity of stereotypes in general, whether they are positive or negative misrepresentations: safety in one identity is as problematic as vulnerability in another.

By placing this segment after his discussion of the Khashoggi case, Minhaj shows that heinous offences are not exclusively characteristic of one population. Even Indian Americans, who are often esteemed for their contributions to academia and medicine, are capable of transgressions. This drives home the point that the “good” and the “bad” are not so clearly distinguishable. Evil has no face, but it is often painted with one anyway. These misconceptions are all rooted in learned fears and are then blown out of proportion through media representation and circulation. If the media’s false depictions of Muslims, Indians, and all other populations facing discrimination amend themselves, then likely, so will global attitudes.

In the “Saudi Arabia” episode of the Netflix original show Patriot Act, the host, Hasan Minhaj discusses the role of Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi as well as the various Indian Americans who have “gone over to the dark side” in American media. In this segment, While he covers the corrupt hijinks of John Kapoor and other well known Indian Americans, he also examines the skewed representations of Indian Americans in the media and the suffocating effect of stereotypes.  As he jokes that “Trump employes more Indians than any show on television”, Hasan uses comedy and satire to not only discuss corrupt Indian American individuals but also the effect that the imbalance of media representation has on stereotypes about Indian Americans.

Hasan makes many cultural references to common stereotypes surrounding immigrants that contrast the actions of the individuals he talks about. He references things such as the pressure to succeed academically and the tendency to be in respected professions in a playful way that mimics the way that Indian Americans are reduced to a set of traits. While he assures us that “Americans love Indians” and that the stereotypes don’t tend to be necessarily bad-natured, Hasan lays out that the way groups of people are pigeon-holed leaves a lasting influence on a population. At the end of the segment, a skit featuring children getting influenced by media portraying John Kapoor and other individuals illustrates an exaggerated idea of how constraining some media representation of minorities can be. If the only Indians on TV are corrupt criminals and politicians, then what harm does this do to the stereotypes surrounding them? Where are the positive representations that break down the ideas that “a Raj” can’t be cool? The stylised skit shows just how absurd the generalizations of minority groups in media is.

Both the first segment on Muhammad bin Salam and the second on Indian Americans touch on the prevalence of stereotyping and generalization in society and how the media reinforces it. While Indian people have faced generalizations about being studious or hard-working, Muslims have been consistently overrepresented as violent and extreme. Only 2% of Muslims are Saudi Arabian and yet it seems that in the media, all Muslims have been painted with the same trope of violence and irrationality. Hasan Minhaj, who identifies as both Indian and Muslim, has a personal understanding of these issues and by discussing them side by side, he compares and contrasts the damaging representations in media.

Netflix’s talk show, Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj often spread global news and discuss some of the most serious topics around the world. Its host, Hasan Minhaj often use a hilarious but sarcastic way to present those global issues. Especially, in the episode “Saudi Arabia”, Minhaj discuss the news of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident, journalist for The  Washington Post. In that episode, not only he analyzes what role does the Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman plays in this case but also he discuss some of the tropes that people are overly using when involving Islam events.

Hasan Minhaj delivers a common Islam trope in the end section of the episode, “Saudi Arabia is only the 2% of the entire Muslim population, but everytime Saudi does something wrong, Muslim around the world, have to live the consequences.” Obviously, whatever the Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman  has involved in the murder case of Jamal Khashoggi, it brings new bias and stereotypes against Arab world and its people. Minhaj later mentioned, people are relating some of the violence action with “Saudi Style”. This example reminds me of one of the trope that we discussed in the lecture, “Islam is inherently violent”.  The Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman is known to the global as a “reformer”. He contributes his effort to the Arab world and dedicated to “reform” it. But the involved of serval violent cases suddenly crashes the figure that he has established especially when the news mentions the violent death of Jamal Khashoggi and how MBS house arrests his mother and torturing Mohammad bin Nayef, his predecessor, subject to excruciating pain until he abdicated the throne. These examples drags global attentions and not only the world is criticizing Muhammad bin Salman but also criticizing the entire Muslim community.

There are many other tropes that Minhaj discussed in the episode, the reason that my blog post focus on this one is because “Islam is inherently violent” is one of the most important and common one above others. It delivers negative impression and affection. Not to mention that its exists often because of one person’s crime, in this case, it’s Muhammad bin Salman.

In the “Saudi Arabia” episode of Patriot Act, Hasan Minhaj discusses and analyzes the role of Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman (otherwise known as “MBS”) in the murder of Washington Post’s columnist Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi was a “well-known journalist and critic of the Saudi government” (BBC News) who was murdered and dismembered on October 2nd, 2018 in Turkey. Minhaj uses comedy, sarcasm, and comparisons in order to make such heavy information easier for the audience to process.

Minhaj engages with common tropes and stereotypes about Islam throughout the episode. In the second segment of the episode, he discusses commonly held ideas of immigrants. The main target being career paths. He uses a mock inspirational commercial in which children come up with alternatives to the stereotypical career paths due to “terrible Indians” (Mahaj in particular mentions: John Kapoor, Bobby Jindal, and Dinesh D’Souza) being shown in the media. He, in a somewhat incredulous and joking fashion, calls them “trailblazers”.  So they no longer have to be doctors or pharmacists, they can be “so much more”.

Minhaj mainly uses sarcasm as his main comedic tactic. Sarcasm, in today’s society, is a common and effective way to get a comedic point across. It emphasizes the incredulity and ridiculousness of an idea by stating it as though it’s a fact. Saying something in a sarcastic manner is usually an efficient way to get the message across. The effectiveness of Minhaj’s sarcasm in the episode is evident, especially with the use of the mock inspirational commercial. In my opinion, the effectiveness of Minhaj’s response is one that is easy for people to remember and therefore easy for people to spread. If the information is delivered in a more serious and formal manner, people remember it less unless they pay deliberate attention. Using comedic tactics allows the information to be divulged in comedic and quippy chunks that are easier for people to remember and spread to a wider audience (ex. friends, family, etc).

Minhaj identifies as both Indian-American and Muslim. But most of the segment is spent discussing issues in Islam, especially after Khashoggi’s murder. I believe the focus of this was intentional as the issue of Khashoggi’s murder was major news and allowed him to divulge even more information about the religion itself and how the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia is not a good representative. I think the effect of placing the commonly held ideas of immigrants in the second half of the episode allows viewers to consider the first half more heavily. It shows that the main topic and concern of the episode was Khashoggi’s murder the Crown Prince’s involvement as a pressing issue that should be discussed.

Hassan Minhaj uses humor as a powerful tool in his show ‘Patriot act’ to talk about topics ranging from Drug Pricing, Indian election, Amazon, Censorship ban in China etc. In the episode titled “Saudi Arabia,” Minhaj talks about the Saudi Crown prince Muhammad bin Salman and his involvement in the death of Jamal Khashoggi, a columnist for The Washington Post who was assassinated at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul on 2 October 2018. Through this episode, Minhaj talks about how Muhammad bin Salman uses “strong-arming, coercion and detaining people” as go-to moves to get what he wants. For instance, from putting his mother on house arrest as she was against his plans, to Arresting 100’s of people who were rivals or critics of his, including his own cousins, in a power grab.

In the second segment, Minhaj speaks briefly about Indian Americans in the American media landscape. Firstly, pointing out names such as Nikki Haley, Raj Shah, Ajit Pai, all Indians, who are now under the Trumps administration. This showing that Indians are loved worldwide and are seen primarily as people in the field of Lawyers, doctors, and engineers. Minhaj quickly turns the narrative with humor to show the Indians who have “joined the dark side” or Indians who have committed major crimes. He brings up multiple examples, such as, John Kapoor, a Pharma entrepreneur who bribed doctors to prescribe potent opioid to non-cancer patients or Former governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, who destroyed a billion dollar state budget surplus. Even while talking about prolific criminals, Minhaj uses his sense of humor with references stemming from his own Indian background to lighten the situation in what otherwise is a very pressing story. Throughout the show, you can see how the audience develops a relationship with Minhaj and become more comfortable with his edgy sense of humor.

Identifying as both Indian American and Muslim, Minhaj had plenty of personal opinions on both segments he spoke about. I believe the Indian American story being presented after the Khashoggi case definitely lays more emphasis on the story and shows how the media often portrays the Indian stereotype as perfect and capable of no wrong and the aggressor is usually shown as being a Muslim. I believe he’s humorously and informatively shown how media influence can have a major impact on how the rest of the world sees and thinks about other cultures and countries.

Does it ever sound like old news when you hear about authoritarian rule in an Islamic nation? As news coverage by Western media has perpetuated this framing of Islam, there is an implication that the West promotes ‘democracy’, while Islam incites ‘terror’. In an episode of Hasan Minhaj’s political comedy show Patriot Act, the government of Saudi Arabia and its crown prince, Mohammad bin Salman (MBS), are put under fire by Minhaj for running an autocratic regime under the facade of reform. However, at the same time, Minhaj reveals that the ‘West’, namely the United States, is just as complicit in paving dictatorship in the Middle East, rather than condemning such a regime.

One of the issues that Minhaj raises in the “Saudi Arabia” episode is how Western media outlets and prominent figures have praised MBS’s platform of social and economic reform – which included lifting the ban that prevented women from driving in Saudi Arabia. Minhaj criticizes the favourable publicity that MBS received while visiting the United States, which included meetings with Jeff Bezos and Oprah Winfrey. By emphasizing how MBS was “greeted like a rockstar”, Minhaj draws attention to the way the West idolizes figures who promote democratic principles.

However, Minhaj then rejects MBS’s ‘reformer’ image, by underlining his regime that has increased imprisonment and executions of activists, rivals, and critics, while instigating conflict in Yemen. Here, Minhaj displays the statistic that 18,000 airstrikes have been launched by Saudi Arabia to Yemen, claiming that is “almost” as many as the 26,000 airstrikes ordered under the Obama administration. By showing the first statistic, Minhaj reinforces the trope of an Islamic country inflicting ‘terror’ within its own region. Yet, by using the statistic for the United States’ airstrikes in comparison, Minhaj applies this ‘undemocratic’ image to the West as well, and on an even greater scale. In emphasizing the word ‘almost’, he is likely suggesting that, in other words, Saudi Arabia has reached a level of atrocity that is ‘almost’ comparable to that of the United States’. Because Minhaj doesn’t explain this dynamic, it appears that he makes a subtle assumption about his audience: that they already reject the trope that the West spreads democracy.

Later, when Minhaj discusses how American tech companies have accepted money from Saudi Arabia, he intends to reveal a hypocrisy in the Western ideology to spread democracy – rather than refusing to condone the Saudi Arabian injustices, American powers will make exceptions if it serves their own interests. Thus, while the trope of Islam spreading terror isn’t quite rejected in this episode, the idea of the West spreading progressive ideology is shown as a mere facade – albeit one the audience is likely already aware of.