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.