MUSLIMS ON BENEFITS AND THE BRITISH PRESS

PAUL BAKER

WHO BENEFITS?

Research on news representation of Islam

Awass (1996) American news articles characterise Islam as being associated with fundamentalism and terrorism, and as a threat toWestern security. Dunn (2001, 2004) and Dunn et al (2004) such reporting represents an accumulation of anti-Muslim feeling: “once Muslims were constructed as different, as alien and treacherous, they could then be treated as non-citizens” (Dunn 2001: 306). R. Richardson (2004) Muslims in the UK have been pushed to the margins of society, due to systematic discrimination and continuing negative media portrayals. J.E. Richardson (2004) given a choice between a positive and negative term (e.g. debate vs. clash), journalists almost always use the negative term for reporting on MuslimsAkbarzadeh and Smith (2005: 4) “…recurring language used to describe Islam and Muslims (such as ‘Islamic terrorism,’ ‘Muslim fanatics’) can come to be representative of all Muslims and Islam as a religion.”

The incremental effect of discourse

‘A single text on its own is quite insignificant: the effects of media power are cumulative, working through the repetition of particular ways of handling causality and agency, particular ways of positioning the reader...’ Fairclough 1989: 54

‘Repeated patterns show that evaluative meanings are not merely personal and idiosyncratic, but widely shared in a discourse community. A word, phrase or construction may trigger a cultural stereotype.’Stubbs 2001:215

The corpus

Via Nexis UK, a 170 million word corpus of British press articles from 1998-2009 which contain reference to Islam or a related topic

Alah OR Allah OR ayatollah! OR burka! OR burqa! OR chador! OR fatwa! OR hejab! OR imam! OR islam! OR Koran OR Mecca OR Medina OR Mohammedan! OR Moslem! OR Muslim! OR mosque! OR mufti! OR mujaheddin! OR mujahedin! OR mullah! OR muslim! OR Prophet Mohammed OR Q'uran OR rupoush OR rupush OR sharia OR shari'a OR shia! OR shi-ite! OR Shi'ite! OR sunni! OR the Prophet OR wahabi OR yashmak! AND NOT Islamabad AND NOT shiatsu AND NOT sunnily

Newspapers

Left-leaning Right-leaning

Popular (broadsheet)

The Mirror + Sunday Mirror

The Sun and The News of the World (Sunday only)The Star and Sunday StarThe Express and Sunday ExpressThe Mail and Mail on Sunday The People (Sunday only)

Quality(tabloid)

The Guardian and The Observer (Sunday only)The Independent and IOS

The Daily Telegraph and Sunday TelegraphThe Times and Sunday TimesThe Business

Why focus on a socio-economic topic?

(1) they are different, (2) they do not adapt, (3) they are involved in negative acts (4) they threaten our socio-economic interests. (van Dijk 1987: 58)

4 primary stereotypes of Muslims(1) having fabulous but undeserved wealth (they have not earned it), (2) being barbaric and regressive, (3) indulging in sexual excess (4) the “violent Muslim” Karim (2006: 119-20)

4 topics of racist discourse

Why focus on a socio-economic topic

Pilot study (Baker 2010) of popular/quality keywords

Common R1 collocates of Muslim are fanatics, extremists, militants – examination of context revealed they were often associated with benefit claiming

Abu Hamza and Omar Bakri identified as keywords in the popular press – again, associated with benefits.

Research Questions

In what ways are Muslims on benefits written about in the British press?

Have there been any changes over time?

Which newspapers help to set the agenda? Which newspapers follow the agenda? Which newspapers counter the agenda?

Are there differences between types of newspaper?

Identifying a subset of relevant stories

A set of terms chose through introspection. Sample of articles read to identify missed terms

Final search term:scroung*/dole/handouts/benefits/welfare

Some terms were interchangeable:

HOOK-handed cleric Abu Hamza is to sue welfare bosses for thousands of pounds in extra state hand-outs, The Sun can reveal. Hamza, due in court next month on incitement to murder charges, reckons he has been fiddled out of benefits worth £200 a week for nearly three years.

(The Sun, December 21st, 2004)

Method

Corpus split into 144 sub-sections – 1 newspaper + 1 year per section. Sunday editions combined with dailies.

Using WordSmith 5, concordances carried out on the search term for the sub-sections.

Examples which referred to Muslims on benefits (specific or general) noted (as opposed to Bob Dole).

Qualitative analysis identified trends over time

Quantitative Results

98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 Total

Express NA 0 0 9 5 71 54 194 60 52 127 62 634Sun NA NA 7 31 4 56 61 85 78 41 80 60 503Mail 4 10 6 30 7 59 8 104 47 29 57 47 408

Star NA NA NA 12 0 18 20 22 15 15 24 23 149Mirror 3 0 0 14 4 6 3 30 14 2 8 1 85

People 0 0 1 6 0 17 4 4 11 14 0 0 57

Telegraph NA NA 0 8 1 4 1 4 3 1 19 4 45Times 0 0 0 11 2 9 0 14 0 6 0 0 42Business NA 0 0 0 0 0 0 9 0 0 0 0 9Guardian 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 3

Observer 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1Independent 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0Total 7 10 14 121 23 241 151 467 229 160 316 197 1936

Change over time (quantitative)

Early tabloid fears (before 9.11)

Some data from The Star and The Sun not available

Daily Mail has 64.5% of references from 1998-2000

Benefit receivers often referred to “in passing”:

Three of the other four are seeking asylum, including Yasser al-Serri, 35, unemployed and receiving benefits. (Daily Mail, March 31, 1998)

9.11

121 citations in 2001 (most from September onwards)Only 23 citations in 2002First peak in 2003 (241 citations).

Bin Laden was the initial focus...‘We can find bin Laden in days, say guerillas’ (Telegraph, October 3rd,

2001).

But as the months passed by...You may remember Tone's confident answer to the question: 'Will you

catch Bin Laden?' - 'Yes . . . of that I have no doubt.' It then turned out - funny how information about this operation trickles out in dribs and drabs - that we could be facing an army of 10,000 Al Qaeda fanatics, maybe even double that number, prepared for a bitter guerilla war. (Daily Mail, March 21, 2002)

Decline of interest in Bin Laden

The replacement villains: Abu Hamz and Omar Bakri

“After the Express revealed Hamza's benefits -including three types of disability handouts, income support, housing benefit and help with fuel bills - the cleric launched an extraordinary attack on the system that funds him.” (The Express, January 23, 2003)

“THIS EVIL SCROUNGER MUST BE DEPORTED -RIGHT NOW” “While pocketing state benefits he preaches evil against us.” (The Express, January 18th, 2005)

A formulaic discourse structure

1 identify the subject via reference to his extremist views or terrorist activities:

MUSLIM extremist who advocates indiscriminate terror bombing

EVIL hook-handed Muslim cleric Abu Hamza

that a Muslim cleric linked to the Madrid bombings

THE mastermind behind the July 7 bombings

RANTING Muslim cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed

Bakri a father of six and grandfather of four

PREACHER of hate Abu Izzadeen is today exposed

A formulaic discourse structure

2. Emphasis on the benefits:no less than GBP 424 a week or

GBP 22,000 a year in benefits

collect handouts each week including invalidity

benefit , rent allowance, £290 a week income support and child support.

who has £180,000 in his bank account, has lived on

benefits in London

rake in more than £25,000 a year in welfare

BENEFITS

who sponged £ 300,000 in benefits - has also spent more than £100,000 kitting out the four-bedroom apartment.

claiming disability benefit to get a 28,000 car, complete with satellite navigation system

who has cost taxpayers tens of thousands in

benefits

2. Metaphoric verb processes describing obtaining money

Emphasis on large amount of money: showered with benefits, cream in benefits, let them roll in

Emphasis on drain to society: leech off, sponge

Emphasis on greed: pocket, milk the system

Suggestion of illegality: pull off a handouts coup

Negative characteristics of Abu Hamza

Adjectives: appalling, barmy, dangerous, rabble-rousing, ranting, notorious, firebrand, despicable, hate-filled, evil, poison-tongued, vile

Nominals: scum, hatemonger, extremist, militant, terrorist mastermind, prophet of poison, hate preacher, renegade

Verb processes: connived, conned, incited, gloated, infuriated, masterminded, taunted, trumpeted

Gradually expanding the focus

LURKING behind this burkhah is Muslim grandmother Hansa Patel who swindled 30,000 in benefits - then dodged prison by pleading illness.

Daily Star, April 6th, 2005

After all, in real life, the misfit from Glasgow has never had a proper job, preferring to make a career out of indolence funded by dolehandouts of £57.45 a week. At the ripe old age of 37, he can already look back on 21 glorious years of continuous unemployment.

Daily Mail, May 27th, 2006

So the courageous young men who are battling in Helmand Province are on basic pay of just £16,500 a year, yet Afghan single mother Toorakai Saiedi is given £170,000 a year in state benefits to live in a mansion in west London.”

The Express, July 29th, 2009

New ways of scrounging

Now husbands can get benefits for every wife... THE right of men to claim welfare benefits for each of their multiple wives has been endorsed by the Government. The decision by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) means that each of the estimated 1,000 polygamous partnerships in Britain, mainly Muslims, is nowrecognised formally by the state but only if the weddings took place in countries where the arrangement is legal. (The Daily Mail, February 3rd, 2008)

...we showered houses and benefits on those who made it to our shores, legally or otherwise. But while we may be a soft touch, we are not so soft in the head as to allow the claim by four Muslim immigrants that we pay for them to transport their spouses' bodies back to their home countries for burial. An appeal court judge had to tell them in legal language what everyBriton would have told them in far more basic words: You must be joking. (The Star, March 24, 2006)

The “other” villain

...if Bin Laden was discovered living above a kebab shop in Finsbury Park, he'd be given indefinite leave to stay, showered with benefits and given access to the best 'yuman rites' lawyers taxpayers' money could buy. (Daily Mail, February 20th, 2009)

The people whose uncontrolled, bloated welfare state gives handouts to hate-merchants and leaves widows pleading for means-tested dole, claim to be the guardians of justice. (The Mail on Sunday, August 7th, 2005)

Britain’s welfare state

too big: belching, swollen, bloated, vast, enormous, expensive, over-stretched, sprawling, monster

too kind: cushy, generous, compliant, cosseting, lax

and inefficient: creaking, wasteful, uncontrolled, hopeless, abused

Legitimation strategies

The point about columnists in newspapers is that they express their own opinions... What [Robert Kilroy Silk has] done is taken various things that irritate him and put them all together but they are his own opinions. He’s not actually attacking all Muslims. He’s just attacking the ones he doesn’t like... The column clearly represented a named columnist’s personal view and would be seen as no more than his own robust opinions.

The Press Complaints Commission

Letters

DAVID Blunkett has ordered a benefits blitz on Islamic hate clerics who sponge off the state.

(The Daily Express, August 17th, 2005)

SO, David Blunkett is to have a blitz on Muslim clerics who sponge off the state ("Benefits blitz on the hate preachers", August 17).

(Daily Express, letters, August 18th, 2005)

Text Maniacs

‘BLAIR: I'LL THROW OUT THE MUSLIMS WHO PREACH HATE; PM WARNS FANATICS OF NEW LAWS ON WAY’ (The Star, August 6th 2005)

WELL DONE TONY BLAIR NOW DELIVER THE GOODS CLERICS PANICKING ALREADY COS NO MORE HANDOUTS (The Star, August, 8th 2005).

‘The credit crunch could be a blessing in disguise. All the poles and muslim scroungers will go home if theres no money left to give out!’ (The Star, September 18th, 2008)

The Quality press: The Observer

RACISM LATEST: BAK IN STONEAGE

(The Observer, November 2nd, 2008)

DO U FEEL PROUD?

‘where in koran does it say jihadists should scrounge 25k a year of benefits?’

(The Observer, December 7th, 2008)

The Guardian

Of course it's a nuisance that Qatada is on benefits, and I'd have preferred to see him limit himself to off-brand loo paper. But if you want to talk about depressingly misdirected public funds, you'll find rather more has been lavished on things like son of star wars than on keeping this troublemaker in a rented semi. (The Guardian, July 12th 2008)

The Telegraph

INVESTIGATORS discovered £180,000 in a London bank account held by a radical Muslim cleric accused of fomenting and financing terrorism. Sheikh Abu Qatada, who lives on benefits in Acton, west London, had his assets frozen at the weekend after appearing on a Treasury list of people suspected of "committing or providing material support for acts of terrorism". (Telegraph, October 18th, 2001)

The taxpayer will also fund at least £12,000 per year in benefits for Qatada, his wife and five children, even though Qatada was once found to be carrying £170,000 in cash when he was stopped by police.” (Telegraph, June 18th, 2008)

Conclusion

Negative discourse led by popular right-leaning tabloids, and expanding over time.

Are these stories news-worthy? The Express makes 634 references to Muslims on benefits whereas The Independent makes none. Who is right?

Use of terminology – receiving benefits vs. scrounger

Do what extent do stories about Hamza etc generalise to all Muslims?

Who benefits?

Thank you

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