Sadly Disappointing at Genuine Entertainment

I'm not all that keen on television, since most of what appears there falls into the commodious category of drek. Total waste of time. Although we did see most of a presentation last night entitled "The Fog of War", and watched, fascinated, as a 85-year-old reconstructed Robert MacNamara, Minister of Defense under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson held forth on his views of the horrors of war, morality (within war situations), human fallability, happenstance and the nuclear nightmare.

I had seen a few advertisements now and again for a new situation comedy hosted by CBC: "Little Mosque on the Prairie" and thought how intriguing was the concept, the idea behind the new programme, and whether it might live up to any potential for entertaining while educating its viewers. We made an especial effort to be around to watch the first installment of the series, an initial eight in total.

I don't regret having watched it, but do very much regret that not only did it not live up to my expectations (that coy title!) but it did not, after all, offer good entertainment, nor did it educate me. It did make an effort to tweak my nose, to entice me to laugh, to bring me to an elemental understanding of what it assumes I don't know, but it failed, and failed miserably. And that's truly a great pity.

While it's possible that the succeeding issues of the series may improve, I doubt it, since the value of the initial installment is that it will so impress its cautious-but-hopeful watchers that they will feel compelled to watch the series to the last delicious episode. It had the potential, the idea was good, some of the cast isn't bad, but the introduction was dismal and doesn't promise on the basis of what was offered, to improve substantially.

How can it, when the premise of the series is that Muslims and non-Muslims are destined to dance suspiciously around one another, demonstrating the kind of spontaneous ignorance that can only be attributed to true imbeciles. Mind, the imbeciles are mostly in the non-Muslim camp, and we're pretty good at chuckling about our inane stupidities, but there's an unevenness here to the cadence and in the end the joke is on the producers.

We can poke gentle fun at the bigots among us, as long as they aren't die-hard, and susceptible to change when the errors of their ways are amply demonstrated. As in how could anyone in their right minds resent the presence of people with a different cultural/religious/social background, once they discover that the issues that keep us apart are not all that remarkable and can be handily overlooked with the realization that these are people whose aspirations and needs are no different than our own.

The episode clearly delineates those in the average population whose intransigence in refusing to accept a long-recognized fact of Canadian life; an amiably heterogeneous population as beyond the pale, separating them from those who sincerely and generously accept the enriching qualities of embracing differences and valuing our common humanity. The characters are beyond gauche, too rigidly stereotypical of the worst type of bigot to make a point.

This verges on ignorant slapstick comedy; there is no subtlety, no cleverness in the script and character development, only full-blown rejection one of the other. There is no true resemblance to the Canadian acceptance of pluralism which in itself has more than ample opportunities for amusing mischaracterizations and misunderstandings. This show tries too hard to make its point, and the point it makes is that we're kind of well, stupid.

We're not. There is a troubling divide among some elements of the Muslim and the non-Muslim population but it is by no means universal. There are those within the Muslim population as well as within the non-Muslim population who will be resentful and angry at what they perceive as the others' associations, lack of empathy, lack of civic responsibility, and despite the circumstances where the world has been temporarily turned on its head as a result of religions' political rigidity and growing belligerence, they are in a minority.

Did the producers and writers feel that if they treated the subject with more mature subjectivity, maintaining the comic aspect of human beings' propensity to attribute miserable devices to one another in contrast to our own sterling qualities, they would fail? In the end they have failed, for insulting our intelligence, for bringing to the small screen a tepid portrayal of the solitude of suspicion and fear in a truly ham-handed manner.

Too bad, so sad. Perhaps another, more talented attempt.