Fireman Sam embroiled in Islamophobia row after character 'treads on Koran page'

www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/fireman-sam-embroiled-in-islam...

An episode of children’s programme Fireman Sam in which a character appears to tread on a page from the Koran has been withdrawn over accusations of Islamophobia.

In a show called Troubled Waters, Elvis the firefighter slips on some pieces of paper while carrying a tray of hot drinks. 

One of the sheets flies past the screen and seems to be a page from Islam’s holy book, dealing with punishments for non-believers.

Miqdaad Versi, from the Muslim Council of Britain, tweeted: "Have no idea what went through the producers' minds when they thought this was a good idea #baffled."

Twitter user BirdsOfJannah wrote: “Islamophobia in @FiremanSamUK? Why are there Quran pages on the floor & flying over the place?”

Another wrote: “Children's program Fireman Sam stepping on the Quran. SHAME on this program for promoting hatred against Muslims!”

The episode has now been withdrawn from Channel 5’s streaming site and producers HIT Entertainment apologised "unreservedly" to viewers.

The company, which produces shows including Bob the Builder, Pingu and Thomas the Tank Engine, added that it had cut ties with the animation studio involved with the episode.

A spokeswoman said: "It has been brought to our attention that in an episode of Fireman Sam (Series 9, Episode 7), an image of the Koran is briefly depicted. 

“The page was intended to show illegible text and we deeply regret this error. We sincerely apologise for any distress or offence it may have caused.

"We will no longer be working with the animation studio responsible for this mistake. In addition, we are taking immediate action to remove this episode from circulation and we are reviewing our content production procedures to ensure this never happens again.

"Again, we apologise unreservedly to our viewers."

The programme first aired on October 8 in 2014 and was available to watch online at any time on the My 5 video on demand service

I was at the Mushwara last Saturday and something was discussed.

It was discussed that in the fast moving world, Mushwara needs to be done and a response formulated from the Wifaqul Ulama Public Affairs Team. This will take time, effort and deliberation. Sometimes two issues will clash.

1. There will be times when team will overreact.
2. There will be times when team will not react
3. There will be times when team will chose not to react.

Laymen will just see a lack of reaction on certain matters and point it out that Wifaqul Ulama didn’t react to XYZ, at other times laymen will point out that Wifaqul Ulama reacted too quickly.

The scoping of what the Team will react to and not react to is being done. In the background the new website is being created and new head of Public Affairs will be making his policies public soon.

All in all, no matter what is done there will always be issues which will be missed, under or over emphasised. Organisations with million Dollar budgets have these issue, let alone Volunteers.

Such is life.

Hope is to get better and better under the new leadership structure.