Talk:Innocence of Muslims

Comment

When did you first find out the name of the movie, "Innocence of Muslims"? (It condemns Islam/Mohammad.) For me, it was this Internet-path: [1], [2], and then I found the movie name in the Wall Street Journal article about the 100 Jewish American backers, producer working in Southern California, and picked up by the infamous Karan-burning minister in Gainesville, FL. [3] "The violence that it caused in Egypt is further evidence of how violent the religion and people are and it is evidence that everything in the film is factual," said one movie supporter.— Charles Edwin Shipp (talk) 09:58, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

All of that is POV. One could claim that Roman Catholicism is a faith of violence due to violent events around the world over movies critical to the Roman Catholic Church or the Pope. One can cherry pick tens of thousands of things to support POV without it being a full NPOV article. One could also cherry pick and POV a claim in the KKK article that the KKK is part of and backed by Baptists. It would be NPOV, inflammatory and untrue.Wzrd1 (talk) 13:46, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

They could ... if that had ever happened. But since it doesn't ... In any case I agree with the people below. Things that are properly attributed and don't give undue weight are perfectly fine. As for the KKK and Baptists it is a fact that the KKK considers itself Christian, and it is probable that there are a lot of Southern Baptists in the KKK just based on numbers. You are right that that would not necessarily mean that the leadership in the denomination currently support the KKK. But there is a difference between Wikipedia saying something and saying that someone influential said something. Both would be an assertion of facts, but in the latter case the only verification needed is did that person really say it and does including it in the light of the rest of the article give undue weight to one point of view. Rifter0x0000 (talk) 16:16, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

It is not a breach of NPOV to include polemical comments about a topic, so long as they are attributed to the person making them so that the reader can place them in their proper context. If some have seen the reaction to this film as evidence of the truth of its premise it is not a breach of NPOV to mention that. Credulity (talk) 15:19, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Although it's true that comments can be included, they have to be given appropriate weight -- giving WP:UNDUE weight to one position or comment is POV even if the comment is properly-sourced. "Bob from Anchorage thinks this movie sucks!" is not appropriate, say, if Bob is just a random person whose opinions have no reason to be relevant; "Roger Ebert thinks this movie sucks!", on the other hand, would be worth including because he's a respected professional whose opinion influences and reflects something bigger. --Aquillion (talk) 15:57, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

I have neither the time nor the knowledge of Wikipedia to edit this page directly, so I'd like to direct somebody who does know about these things to these two articles indicating that news about this film may not be reliable despite the many newspapers reporting the same exact story. http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/09/12/161003427/what-we-know-about-sam-bacile-the-man-behind-the-muhammad-movie

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/09/muhammad-film-consultant-sam-bacile-is-not-israeli-and-not-a-real-name/262290/

These are "politically opposed" news organizations and I think provide a true Neutral POV.

Page protection request

In light of the events of Libya, this page should probably be locked for the time being... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.119.21.235 (talk) 11:35, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Its obviously worth monitoring, but I don't think we've reached that point yet. -- Q Chris (talk) 13:15, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

It's weird, I would have thought there would be a much faster response to this page after the attacks in Libya. But all in all, there seems to be an effort to avoid mentioning this film by the media. --Angelus Delapsus^Talk 14:53, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Please let's not protect the page unless and until it becomes necessary! Credulity (talk) 15:19, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

There's no want for links on Google News (which in fact is linking directly to this article) Wnt (talk) 17:07, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Given the popularity of this page and the almost unmanageable frequency of edits it is now receiving I'm leaning more toward protecting it in some form now, particularly as we have IP editors removing information that is both sourced and attributed to the person supplying it, as in this edit. Credulity (talk) 17:47, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Serious discussion of points brought up in the movie

As a person who doesn't know anything about the history of Mohammad, it would be good to know if there is in fact any support for the stuff in the movie in the historical record / Quran (with citations), or if it's just all completely made up. There seems to be a serious lack of NPOV analysis of the content of the film itself in the media at this point. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.174.134.189 (talk) 14:49, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

I don't know anything about this movie, but if you want a documentary on Islam, PBS did one as part of their Empires series, called Islam: Empire of Faith — 99.135.197.210 (talk) 14:59, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

I don't think referring everyone to a TV documentary is much use. The point is to compare the claims made in the film against scholarly perspectives on Islam. We need to know what is in the film, in detail, and whether the claims it makes stand up to scrutiny. Is there reliable evidence for the claims it makes about Mohammad? This is something the article desperately needs to include, so that readers can determine what kind of film this is from among the following options:

• A pack of lies designed to defame Islam and its founding prophet by dishonest means
• A propaganda piece that presents factual information but in a one-sided way calculated to provoke a particular response, or takes liberties where there is uncertainty about the true history
• An objective documentary presenting well backed-up historical facts, such as an independent scholar of Islam might endorse as factual and presented in a detached manner
• Some combination of the above, or something else

Credulity (talk) 15:19, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

• Agreed - this is a huge hole in the article. We need to say what the film is and what it's about and lay out the context before we get to the "Reception" section. Wnt (talk) 15:52, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

• • Since the movie is unreleased and there are just a couple of "trailers" on YouTube, it is a little hard to do. But from those trailers, it looks nonsensical and just a farce. --65.51.209.126 (talk) 15:57, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Actually, it's not all nonsense - see Aisha. But it will be best to look for sourced commentary. Hopefully Jones will arrange a way to see this one the Web for free. 8) Wnt (talk) 17:03, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Just what are you referring to when you state see Aisha? You seriously think you can glean the just of the 2+ hour film by what you see in a "trailer"? How many "trailers" have you seen in your life that when viewed in the actual movie, have a completely different context, or was actually not the view of the person stating it but rather the person explaining someone else's comment? Trailers often "skew the view" in order to drum up an audience that would not normally be interested in the subject of the movie. It would also seem the people editing here and on the actual Wikipedia article are almost certainly flying by the seat of their pants and using entirely too much information picked from hearsay or just as bad, people who have neither seen the trailer nor the movie making some mighty bold accusations. A prime example is the very title of this talk "Serious discussion of points brought up in the movie" the title and the subsequent postings are all made by people who admitted they have not seen the movie! --75.17.200.3 (talk) 18:05, 12 September 2012 (UTC)Donotsave Testedits

Read Aisha and tell me whether Muhammad was what we, in modern terms, would call a "pedophile", or not. Wnt (talk) 18:35, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

I think the reason we are having this discussion is that information on the actual content of the full movie is badly lacking. Hardly anyone in the world seems to have actually seen the whole thing. Given that, it is quite difficult to say anything about its accuracy! Credulity (talk) 19:03, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately, every single event portrayed in the film is true, or has a reference in early accounts of the life of Muhammad. Being controversed by later commentators is another issue. For example, he had a conversation with a donkey, that the latter told him his name is Ya’fur, is well documented. The issue with Maria has several versions, of course the reaction of the other wives is exaggerated.--Connection (talk) 19:55, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Availability and screenings

As it stands, the article does not make clear if the full film has been released or shown anywhere. Is it available online, or is the trailer/extract all that can be seen by the general public? Has it been shown privately to the likes of the Qur'an-burning pastor, or has it received limited public screenings by him or others like him? Did the people in Libya and Egypt who reacted violently to news of the film do so on the basis of information from people who had seen it, or just heard rumours about its contents? This all needs to go in the article. Credulity (talk) 15:19, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Why don't you add it? BlueSalix (talk) 15:30, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Why don't I add what? The information I've said I don't have? Credulity (talk) 16:29, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

The information you apparently think the rest of us have and are hoarding. BlueSalix (talk) 19:16, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

The author posted a trailer on Youtube [4] - also another excerpt [5] (I haven't checked to see how much that overlaps) - it's of course entirely possible that it's copyrighted and not legally available in full length. Wnt (talk) 15:53, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

According to the filmmaker, it was shown only once to a nearly empty theater [6] --65.51.209.126 (talk) 16:21, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, I've added that to the article! Credulity (talk) 16:29, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Two videos

I changed the article's external link that pointed to the trailer to point to the video page on Bacile's YouTube channel. I did this because there are two videos:

• "The Real Life of Muhammad", uploaded 1st July 2012.
• "Muhammad Movie Trailer", uploaded 2nd July 2012

Both appear to be extracts from the film and the only parts of the film available on the web at this stage. The article as it stands seems to talk in terms of a single video, perhaps blurring these two together. We probably need a bit more info to tease out the distinction between the two, whether one or both received wide circulation in Egypt and Libya, etc. Credulity (talk) 16:40, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

The two seem very similar. The wide circulation was from a two-minute clip aired on Egyptian TV (!!!) which I've referenced. I don't get why it's OK for an Egyptian TV station to air it but our ambassador can be killed for allowing it - in fact, my feeling at this moment is that these simultaneous September 11th attacks on our embassies were planned by Al Qaida and this July video is just a flimsy excuse, and if it weren't this maybe it would be that the Dallas Public Library kept a Koran on the bottom shelf by people's feet. Alas, I have yet to find a source for that... Wnt (talk) 17:06, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

I also want to know more about the chain of events that led from the creation of an obscure film by an Israeli Jew in the United States to attacks on the US embassies in Egypt and Libya, because it is by no means obvious that the one would lead inevitably to the other. I hope with time we can find out, and make clear in this article:

• Exactly which bits of video were given wide publicity/dubbed into Arabic/shown on Egyptian TV and when all this happened
• What kind of responses/denunciations these clips received from prominent figures there
• Public response in Egypt and Libya, and public impressions about who was behind the film and how many people in the USA or elsewhere have seen it
• Who the embassy attackers were and what precisely they gave as their motivation

I'm not sure speculating about whether the videos were an excuse for something is helpful, nor is talk of "our ambassador" and "our embassies". I hope we can report on this affair as neutrally as possible, giving readers the ability to come to sound judgements about the content of the videos and the nature of the film's connection to the attacks. Thanks for your work along these lines. Credulity (talk) 17:23, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Al Jazeera and the NYT have both stated that Coptic blogger Morris Sadik was (apparently solely?) responsible for bringing the film and its trailer to the attention of the Arabic-speaking world. However, it seems likely to me that it would have happened sooner or later, and many elements of the film shown in the trailers seem deliberately inflammatory. It is, I believe, a form of intentional trolling that is having an effect as such. —Cupco 17:26, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

The ambassador was killed by a mob, not state action. The trailer is legal in general, except to the extent that disparaging and depicting Muhammed is considered illegal by state religious authorities. If I remember correctly, there is such a wide divergence of opinion on that question even within the Muslim world that it hasn't been codified very often. Also, when the act of disparaging Muhammed is illegal, the resulting media is probably only evidence of that act and not strictly illegal even among those who say producing it was. I am way out of my league here and would welcome opinions from those who have more certain knowledge on these subjects. —Cupco 17:38, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Or perhaps not a mob. The possibility of coordinated attacks is now being investigated.[7] Wrong article to add that here, though. —Cupco 19:32, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Conversation with a donkey

I found a reference in Time that leads me all the way back to Al-Bidaya wa'l-Nihaya, which is what Zakaria Botros says has that conversation between Muhammad and the donkey shown in the film. In Arabic Wikisource appears to carry it at [8]. I tried Google translate to search each section for "donkey", and found nothing worth speaking of, but that's an uncertain method. Also Google translate says "50% complete" but I don't know if that's the amount covered or the proofreading quality. Does anyone know Arabic who can find if there's such a narrative in this work or not? (Or, can anyone tell if an English version is available somewhere?) Wnt (talk) 18:38, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Filmmaker

Sam Bacile may or may not be the filmmakers real name. However he claims to be a 56 year old real estate developer. The comment that there is "no evidence of a Sam Bacile around 50 years old living in California or having a real estate license...or participating in Hollywood filmmaking" is nonsense. How can anyone say that there is no evidence of a 50 year old Sam Bacile living in California? There is no central database of names, and 50 isn't 56. A real estate developer is a property owner, not real estate agent, so of course he would have no real estate license. He is an independent filmmaker, so there wouldn't be any record of Hollywood filmmaking. I suggest that this pointless and inaccurate sentence be removed.203.184.41.226 (talk) 20:06, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Is the movie even real?

Several media sources analyzed the film and are reporting that Innocence of Muslims may not exist at all. They state that the trailer appears to be scenes from several films with key words dubbed over. Here are the sources I have so far.

1. http://www.buzzfeed.com/rosiegray/inflammatory-anti-muslim-movie-may-not-be-a-real 2. http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/09/muhammad-film-consultant-sam-bacile-is-not-israeli-and-not-a-real-name/262290/ 3. http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/383624/20120912/sam-bacile-innocence-muslims-steve-klein-islamic.htm

Perhaps we should add that in? Thanks. --130.108.169.41 (talk) 20:29, 12 September 2012 (UTC)