Pure Muslim Girl, Dirty White ****

Over recent weeks both The Oldham Times and The Oldham Chronicle have been pushing a story of high abortion rates in Oldham. Quite why this is news, or what the news actually is, is at first unclear. Though both publication's articles provide repeated and unchallenged airtime to pro life anti abortion groups, whilst consistently failing in providing an alternative liberal perspective any ink time, neither newspaper comes out and outright stigmatises women. Instead, they just create a fertile space for others in the town to wade in.

Based on the subsequent discussions in the various Muslim led online spaces in the community, I’m starting to wonder if both of these local papers are trying to target the town’s growing Islamist audience. What next? A Sharia section maybe? Unfortunately, and in all seriousness, intentional or otherwise, what these papers are doing is actually far mar dangerous than reinforcing the deep rooted prejudice towards White young women in Muslim communities.

Jumped on almost immediately by the yobbish, Islamist, pro vigilante 'street patrol' and anti Jewish Facebook group Oldham News & Media - a Pakistani led, pro Cllr Arooj Shah, pro Labour Party platform, this page ran with a school boy headline making reference to 'strap up'. Unnoticed to most people, what followed was the entrenched prejudices embedded across sections of the Muslim community towards White women.