A Muslim media watchdog is accused of trying to silence legitimate journalism by filing politically driven and baseless complaints against media content it disagrees with.
Andrew Gilligan and Dr Damon Perry outline their findings in a new report, Bad Faith Actor: A study of the Centre for Media Monitoring (CfMM), which can be downloaded here. The CfMM claims that UK media—especially newspapers—are a major driver of “Islamophobia.” But the authors point out that of the many complaints CfMM has submitted to the press watchdog IPSO, only one has ever resulted in a correction.
The CfMM, which is linked to the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), has made several controversial complaints, such as:
- Arguing it was “misleading” to describe ISIS executioner Mohammed Emwazi (“Jihadi John”) as a terrorist, since he hadn’t been formally convicted;
- Including factual coverage of Islamist terror attacks in its statistic claiming 60% of media output is “Islamophobic”;
- Targeting GB News and journalist Charlie Peters for reporting accurately on the ethnic background of grooming gang members;
- Objecting to fictional TV portrayals of Muslim characters who drink, reject the hijab, or are gay.
This kind of lobbying risks censoring a wide range of viewpoints—including dissenting Muslim voices. Since its founding in 2018, CfMM has gained access to influential figures, such as BBC News content director Richard Burgess, who spoke at its parliamentary event in June.
Gilligan and Perry criticise CfMM’s questionable research methods and its efforts to obscure its ties to the MCB. In response, a CfMM spokesman dismissed the report as “a politically motivated hitjob” full of “inaccuracies, distortions and smears.”
Publication of the report coincided with the 20th anniversary of Islamist suicide bomb attacks on London’s public transport.
