"Yes, you can stay in this stable because Islam welcomes all faiths"

A proud moment

Given the recent Eastenders plot line involving Nancy and her nice Muslim boyfriend Tamwar storyline - where (so far) Tam has got to deliver a nice-if-somewhat-truncated verse from the Koran on one episode and Nancy has praised Islam for giving Tam "simplicity, peace and answers" on another episode - let's engage in a little Boxing Day fun and imagine a Christmas Eve Eastenders episode showing a Nativity play, involving the children of Albert Square. How would that turn out?

Something like this maybe?:

Mary: I'm tired. I need to sleep.
Joseph: Don't worry, Mary! We'll get a room at Bethlehem. There's a B&B over there. Let me see if there's anywhere for us.
Innkeeper 1: No.
Innkeeper 2: No.
Innkeeper 3: No.
Joseph: All the rooms are full.
Mary: Why don't you ask that innkeeper over there? See if he has free wi-fi? What did he say?
Joseph: Yes, you can stay in this stable because Islam welcomes all faiths.
Mary: A stable?!
Joseph: The one with the bright shining star above it.

That, if you didn't see it, is exactly what did happen. When 'Mary' asked 'Joseph' what the innkeeper said, 'Joseph' did indeed reply, "Yes, you can stay in this stable because Islam welcomes all faiths".

Now, that turned out to be a little tweak to the script by a Muslim Eastenders character, who was shown enjoying her little triumph before the camera showed the other parents beaming on, blithely accepting this little moment of pro-Islamic 'agitprop'. 

No Eastender heckled. No one cried, 'Oi, leave it ahhhtt!!'. No one even pointed out that Islam wasn't actually around at the time of Mary and Joseph - and wouldn't be around for another 600 years either.

What that Eastenders character did is precisely mirrored by what the Eastenders writers who wrote that scene were doing. They were doing to their audience (the BBC audience) just what their character was doing to her audience (the audience at the nativity play). They were cheerfully propagandising on behalf of Islam and hoping everyone would beam on, blithely accepting the Eastenders writers' own little moment of pro-Islamic 'agitprop'.

As our reader Gareth notes (and a big hat-tip goes out to him for pointing this example of BBC bias out to us), this was broadcast on the same day that three more Muslim countries (Brunei, Somalia and Tajikistan) banned Christmas celebrations to protect Islam.