A certain comedian has gained quite a bit of fame in recent times. She is Saloni Gaur, a mimicry artist who has made a name for herself through her caricature of an average Muslim woman. She calls her caricature Nazma Aapi and recently, she has found herself in the midst of a raging controversy. She was accused of Islamophobia and reducing the image of Muslim women to ‘illiterate, abusive and savage’. The accusations came after she offered her take on the Arnab Goswami versus Sonia Gandhi (Antonia Maino) saga while posing as Nazma Aapi.
The Print recently published a defense of Nazma Aapi, authored by one Shubhangi Misra, where it was said that accusations of Islamophobia, although it is a very real real thing, has become lazy and tired criticism these days. “We need to come up with better terms we don’t like,” says the author. In the opinion piece, Shubhangi Misra further explained how it was just comedy and caricature and mimicry often employs the skill of exaggerating certain cliches in order to make people laugh.
That, however, hasn’t gone too well with Islamists on social media who are now outraging against the author of the article and The Print for coming out in support of Nazma Aapi. Sidrah, a known Islamist troll, attacked The Print for allowing two non-Muslim women to decide what ‘Islamophobic’ is. According to her, the caricature is a “manifestation of ignorance and peak privilege” and the character isn’t harmless as is being claimed. Firstly, Sidrah appears to believe that only Islamists get to decide what is ‘Islamophobic’ and secondly, even a harmless caricature isn’t harmless since an Islamist does not believe so.
According to others on the social media platform, Saloni Gaur has ‘appropriated’ the identity of an ‘oppressed section’ of society and she is lying about the ‘spitting’ part. It isn’t clear what is the lie in there as it is well documented that members of the Tablighi Jamaat did spit on doctors, police, the administration and basically, anywhere and everywhere. It is not fake news, these are facts even if it does not suit the victimhood narrative of the Islamists. But as it so happens, even that is being branded fake news by trolls on social media.
If u are neutral in situations of injustice, u hav chosen d side of d oppressor. 🙂@salonayyy don’t appropriate identity of an oppressd section specially when u straight up lie about dem(about spitting) & can’t stand against their oppressor. Joke is on u if u think that’s satire
— Nabiya Khan | نبیہ خان (@NabiyaKhan11) April 28, 2020
Vidya Krishnan, a supposed ‘health journalist’, who is more interested in politics and does not have as much expertise on healthcare itself criticized Saloni Gaur as well. She too claims that the comedian does not get to decide what is Islamophobic and hopes that she will ‘rethink’ this.
Saloni, you don’t get to decide if the content is Islamophobic. There is a lot of literature on this kinda satire- that mocks the minority but is well intended.
— Vidya (@VidyaKrishnan) April 28, 2020
Pls read about Apu/Hank Azaria where Indians were rightfully upset at the racist sketch of Apu. I hope you rethink this
All of this just goes on to capture perfectly the nature of Islamists. It does not matter to them if a particular individual or entity, such as The Print itself, has been toeing their line ninety-nine times out of hundred. They are still going to complain about the one time that they did not and accuse them of siding with the enemy. It does not matter how ridiculous their proposition is, if an entity refuses to bend to their will, then it will immediately be dubbed an enemy.
To be clear, The Print in the past has gone out of its way to appease the Islamist mob. Even in the wake of the Wuhan Coronavirus pandemic, Shekhar Gupta’s portal attempted to portray the IT Cell of the BJP as the real villain even while whitewashing the perverse conduct of the Tablighi Jamaat which was single-handedly responsible for spreading the virus across the length and breadth of the country. In the past, it has also spread the ‘righteous Jihad‘ narrative. Yet, it was not enough. A single instance of demonstrating the presence of a spine was enough for Islamists to accuse them of siding with the enemy.
It does go on to show that it doesn’t matter the number of times an individual or entity bats for the Islamist cause, just one instance of lapse is enough for them to be discarded. It is not the first time that something of this sort has happened. Arfa Khanum Sherwani, who has gone so far as to accuse the nurses accusing Jamaatis of sexual harassment of lying, was brutally trolled on social media by Islamists for wishing people a Happy Dussehra, a Hindu festival. India Today journalist Rahul Kanwal, who has a complicated relationship with truth, to put it mildly, received a ton of hate for exposing the contribution of Islamists in the spread of the Wuhan Coronavirus.
What has become clear by now that Islamists will never be satisfied unless there is total submission to their cause. They demand the same submission to the cause of Radical Islam as the average Muslim demonstrates towards the prophet and Allah. The minutest of deviation will not be tolerated. The submission must be total and complete, there is no scope for a single lapse. As The Print has discovered today, so have others in the past and more will in the future. But those whose brains have been addled by a single-minded political agenda will not shy away from doing what they have always done: Whitewash the crimes of Islamists. Because at the end of the day, Islamists are their ideological allies and ideological alliances triumph every logic.
