Whose prophet? The BBC respond

Further to this post, I note that the BBC have responded. In fact they responded on the 17th September but I managed to miss posting about it. My original complaint was quite short:

'The BBC yesterday and today have once again been regularly referring to 'the Prophet Muhammad', why?

Muhammad may well be "the Islamic prophet' he is not however the Christian prophet, the Jewish prophet, the Hindu prophet or indeed the prophet in the eyes of any other religion. Jesus is not referred to by the BBC as the Messiah or even the Christian Messiah so why do the BBC refer to 'the Prophet Muhammad'?'

This is the BBC's response:

'Dear Audience Member

Reference CAS-1678260-3SLYJ7

Thanks for contacting us about BBC News.

We understand you feel it’s inaccurate for the BBC to refer to Muhammad as a ‘prophet’.

This issue has been addressed at the following link which you may find of interest:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/newswatch/ukfs/hi/newsid_4760000/newsid_4762700/4762772.stm

Nevertheless we understand the strength of your comments and we'd like to assure you that we’ve registered your complaint on our audience log. This is a daily report of audience feedback that’s made available to many BBC staff, including members of the BBC Executive Board, channel controllers and other senior managers.

The audience logs are seen as important documents that can help shape decisions about future programming and content.

Thanks again for taking the time to contact us.

Kind Regards

Kevin Freeburn
BBC Complaints
www.bbc.co.uk/complaints

 NB This is sent from an outgoing account only which is not monitored. You cannot reply to this email address but if necessary please contact us via our webform quoting any case number we provided.'

Ah the pleasures of receiving a standard form brush-off, albeit with a link. Here's what I found at the link:

'As the publication of the Danish cartoons continues to reverberate around the world, NewsWatch - and our sister radio programme, Feedback - has received a number of complaints about the terminology used by the BBC to describe the story.
Several dozen people have been in touch to ask why the BBC is using the word prophet. "You do not apply titles of honour to other religious figures, so why do it for Muhammad?" wrote Samuel Green.
Bruce Grant said: "I am a Christian and I cannot find any reference to this prophet in my Bible."
Josef Serf commented: "Muhammad is not considered a prophet by 80% of humanity."
And in Patrick Hall 's view: "You're half way toward endorsing a religion."
In the interests of fairness, said some people, Jesus Christ should always be referred to as Our Lord, or the Son of God. On the other hand, some Muslim viewers objected when the word prophet was not used. So what is the BBC's rule on this?

It seems that there's no hard policy, but a recommendation that the phrase "the Prophet Muhammad" is used to avoid any confusion about which particular Muhammad is under discussion. The head of BBC Radio News, Stephen Mitchell, was asked whether a double standard was operating when he appeared on Feedback on Radio 4.
"No, it's not the case. I think the reason for the use of the term "the prophet" is simply for reasons of clarity. There are a lot of Muhammads we could be referring to in news stories and we're being quite specific about which one we are talking about", he said.
However, some people suggest use of the expression "the Islamic prophet Muhammad" might have avoided any unnecessary offence. Stephen Mitchell agreed that this might be more accurate but there's no policy on this.

He said: "It's an issue for different outlets on different platforms talking to different audiences. If any editor or programme-maker wishes to elaborate on the title, he or she is free to do so as long as we think of the audience first - which is what we need in order to convey the information, to make as much sense of the story as we can."'

Let's look at that key section:

'It seems that there's no hard policy, but a recommendation that the phrase "the Prophet Muhammad" is used to avoid any confusion about which particular Muhammad is under discussion.'

 What tosh, if we heard that there was an issue of Muslim anger because of cartoons of Muhammad, I think that we would understand that it was 'the Islamic Prophet Muhammad' and not Muhammad from the local Iranian restaurant.However is people really are that stupid that they need to be told that it is 'the prophet Muhammad' not just any Muhammad then surely adding the word Islamic would help these people to know whose prophet Muhammad is.

Let's look at the last sections of that article as well:

'However, some people suggest use of the expression "the Islamic prophet Muhammad" might have avoided any unnecessary offence. Stephen Mitchell agreed that this might be more accurate but there's no policy on this.

He said: "It's an issue for different outlets on different platforms talking to different audiences. If any editor or programme-maker wishes to elaborate on the title, he or she is free to do so as long as we think of the audience first - which is what we need in order to convey the information, to make as much sense of the story as we can."''

That is nonsensical, apparently using 'the Islamic prophet Muhammad' might be more accurate but the BBC don't have a policy on this. Why not? Surely the BBC are meant to be as accurate as possible. If the BBC do indeed 'think of the audience first' then surely giving more information is serving that audience better. As above, adding the word Islamic would surely help people 'make as much sense of the story' as possible.

My response to the BBC has been submitted:

'The link you provided me included this: 'It seems that there's no hard policy, but a recommendation that the phrase "the Prophet Muhammad" is used to avoid any confusion about which particular Muhammad is under discussion.' No, if we heard there was Muslim anger because of cartoons of Muhammad, I think we would understand it was 'the Islamic Prophet Muhammad' and not Muhammad from the local Iranian restaurant. If you think people really are so stupid that they need to be told it is 'the prophet Muhammad', not just any Muhammad, then surely adding the word Islamic would help these people to know whose prophet Muhammad is.

The last sections of that article were also illogical: '...some people suggest use of the expression "the Islamic prophet Muhammad" might have avoided any unnecessary offence. Stephen Mitchell agreed that this might be more accurate but there's no policy on this... "It's an issue for different outlets on different platforms talking to different audiences... as we think of the audience first - which is what we need in order to convey the information, to make as much sense of the story as we can."''

So using 'the Islamic prophet Muhammad' might be more accurate but the BBC don't have a policy on this. Surely the BBC are meant to be as accurate as possible. If the BBC do 'think of the audience first' then surely giving more information is serving that audience better. Thus adding the word Islamic would  help people 'make as much sense of the story' as possible'

 Apologies for the slightly poor English but it was hard to condense into the limited characters that the BBC allow. I await the BBC's response.