News anchors override factual rebuttals to enforce the Islam-is-misogynist frame
Evidence
A nine-minute interview with religion scholar Reza Aslan on CNN featured a news ticker at the bottom with the question: Does Islam promote violence? Anchor Alisyn Camerota began the program by stating that while defenders of Islam insist that it is a peaceful religion, “others disagree” and point to the “primitive treatment in Muslim countries of women and other minorities.” Co-anchor Don Lemon, who is African American, nodded as she spoke, signaling his overall agreement with her framework. Aslan, visibly surprised by this question, responded that the conditions for women in Muslim-majority countries vary. While women could not drive in Saudi Arabia, in various other Muslim-majority countries women have been elected heads of state not once but several times. Before he could complete his sentence that the United States had yet to elect a woman as president, Lemon interrupted: “Be honest though, Reza, for the most part, it is not a free and open society for women in those states.” — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 271
Categorization
Category: Factual Claims
- CANDY: A CNN anchor cut off Reza Aslan mid-sentence on women leaders because the US has not yet elected a woman president — neatly invertible trivia.