Is This Racist?

Or rather, is ‘Muslim Driving School’ (currently showing at 10pm Tuesdays on BBC2). Okay, so I haven’t watched it yet, which puts me firmly into the ‘I know very little about this, but I’m going to act like I’m an expert bracket’ (kind of like what much of the media did about a certain Brass Eye episode). For me it just brings up some questions, or rather one question to be precise, namely:

Do Muslims drive differently to other groups in society?

I learned to drive sixteen years ago. Since that time I’m pretty certain I’ve shared the road with Muslims from time to time. Yet, never have I thought to myself, ‘Ah-ha – just by looking at that car, I can instantly tell it’s being driven by a Muslim!’ To me the whole premise merely goes to propagate the myth that minority groups should be treated differently.

And why a driving school? What were the producers doing to come up with this idea? Were they sitting around a bar in Soho drinking overprice cocktails with two hats on the table. One containing pieces of paper with, ‘Jews, Homosexuals, Mormons, Catholics’ and so on. In the other hat a bit of paper with, ‘bricklayer, soldiers, traffic warden,’ etc. Then they just picked two out and, hey presto, they had a brand new programme!

Maybe after Muslim Driving School has finished they can do a sequel, ‘Pagan Driving School,’ then the year after, ‘Hindu Driving School,’ followed by, ‘Buddhist Driving School,’ until every single minority group has been covered. That way we could see just how every different section of society drives in minute detail. Then the world will be a better and more enlightened place.

I guess it's not racist, just stupid. If you want to see real racism, just goto the IMDB's message board for Disney's The Princess and the Frog