Matt Wright Rising East

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15. Work that wasn’t published - Scientology article

For this last piece of work (as of the agreed upon deadline for submission of work) I am including another piece that was not published and that was an article I did on Scientology. 

The reason this wasn’t published isn’t similar to the others but rather because, even though I submitted it a week or so before the deadline, there just was not enough time to look through it and edit it where necessary with the Rising East editor. Although in saying that it could well go up on Rising East at a later date.

I’m happy with the way this story turned out although it was a little different to how I’d anticipated it. Upon ringing the institution first to ensure I could come in I was told that I’d be able to have a interview with a member of staff. After getting there and being given a tour I was told I couldn't interview or even take notes. 

So I unfortunately wasn't able to ask any questions I’d previously prepared. However I still got enough information (including pictures) for a decent article. I was able to take one or two small notes on my phone and immediately after getting out the building I took out my note pad and began to note everything I could remember from my time in there while it was still fresh in my memory. 

I chose not just to get the tour and walk around the building but also undertake a ‘Scientology personality test’. Of which I’ve included in my article. 

I feel as though this article gave me a great chance to not necessarily indulge in ‘under cover reporting’ but certainly get a grasp of what reporting is like from areas and with groups who may necessarily be happy with your assessment.

If I could change anything about this piece i’d probably have tried to push the questions a little bit more, although that would have been difficult and I’m not sure how much they’d have allowed before ending the interview all together.

Scientology. 

A faith that the majority of folk when quizzed wouldn’t even consider to be a legitimate religious path, yet there I was, in a large building, plastered - almost obnoxiously so, with the word ‘Church’.

The introduction to Scientology is unlike almost any other religion that one could experience. Before discovering anything about them they must first discover information about you.

Your full name, phone number, age and even your full address.

All taken rather cheerfully by an elderly gentleman on the reception desk.

Of course one of the first things you learn about Scientology is that you are more than welcome to learn more about the faith, providing they have the answer in a video format.

Yes video. Scientology if nothing else appears to live up to its namesake and make good use of technology to clarify its message.

With an entire floor of its considerably expansive Church dedicated to what can only be described as something similar to an interactive museum tour on lsd, Scientology demonstrates it is a faith with considerable funds to spare.

If you’re a sucker for luminous logos and images bordering on gaudy (as I can’t help but admit I am) then you should experience a Scientologist church at least once in your life for the experience.

Typically an introduction to Scientology will take an entire day, following the exchange of information and ensuring that you’ve not brought any recording equipment with you (this was the only faith that requested I didn’t take notes) then you head on up to the orientation room and are told to wander freely examining the different exhibitions.

I am able to catch the Scientologist that escorted me upstairs watching me, through the reflection, as I sit in front of an introductory video however.

The complexity of the Church can be seen clearly in the video and visual displays. There is an extraordinarily complex system of hierarchy organised in such a way that it may not even appear that there is a structure of influence.

This, in my opinion, seems to have been intentionally created in such a way.

The Church, spread out into many different departments, with many different positions, all seem to have influence over the others and with that it could be seen that this prevents any real modification of Church belief or doctrine as it is simply impossible to organise any wide scale change.

Following the introduction you are lead to an exam room to undertake a free ‘personality test’.

Walking into the exam room I couldn’t help but notice a rather larger room filled with around 5 or 6 men taking a test in complete silence as a young, quite attractive, young woman walks around marking papers.

It only adds to the sense of bizarreness that this is quite unlike other faiths.

The exam itself is of considerable length, you almost feel as though you’re filling out a driving theory test.

Then, generally speaking, your exam is ‘marked’ by a trained Scientologist.

The questions themselves nothing to complex, ‘do you find yourself often being depressed about noting particular, ‘would you say sometimes you don’t confine in people’.

Questions that are almost reminiscent of a low-grade fair fortune teller.

The ‘fortune teller-ness’ continues as the Scientologist reads your results in such a way they tell you information you’ve already told them.

‘Your test results show you’re sometimes a bit lazy..’

Well they probably would. As I indicated that in the test.

But if you are lacking drive in some areas of your life, Scientology has the solution.

For a fee you can sign up for a course to help you with your life’s issues, as the men in the aforementioned room were most likely taking part in.

As my test showed that I often lack the ability to say no.

‘I think you need to sign up for this course to learn how to say no more often’ I was informed.

‘No thank you.’ I replied.

And as I left the Church of Scientology. I couldn’t help but notice that it was the only Church I’ve ever attended that had a card reader on an evangelizer’s desk.

That seemed to sum up, at least my, Scientologist experience.

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14. St George’s day article

This was a difficult article to write because of the sentiments of people involved and as well as that its an incredibly difficult subject to fit into a relatively small (about 600 word) article. How do you sum a national identity into such a short piece? Well that was my problem with this article.

I look back at this and feel as though in some parts I’ve rambled and other parts I’ve not spoken long or eloquently enough to be entirely honest. 

All in all the point of this article I suppose was to make a case for the idea that St Georges day isn’t a horribly bigoted event nor is it something we should just shrug off as irrelevant. I was trying to make the case that English civic nationalism needs to emerge similar to how Scottish civic nationalism has north of the border, lest the far-right take advantage.

I suppose I have somewhat managed to do that is in article but something I’m a little annoyed I didn’t work in were some solid statistics. Specifically statistics that say white English (by a large majority) call themselves English before British but the reverse is true for ethnic minority English. And that this really does need addressing as a discussion of why this is should begin the public sphere.

So if I was to write this article again I’d certainly include something about that.

http://risingeast.co.uk/for-harry-england-and-st-george/

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13. Hindu Temple article

Now this article went a little differently as to how I was expecting it to be entirely honest. 

When searching for a East London Temple to visit I found one in Ilford, however I discovered when looking it over that it was in fact funded by the VHP or Vishwa Hindu Parishad. This is a right-wing (some say extremist) Hindu national group based in India. 

So upon learning this I intended for my interview with one of the employees of the temple to focus mainly on their funding and ask some probing questions as to whether or not it was acceptable to receive funding from such a group however plans changed quickly when I began my interview. 

It may not be the most journalistic of reasons as to why. But I just felt the lady I was speaking to was so nice and so helpful I just couldn't raise the subject. We spoke for a good few hours and she was more than happy to answer anything I asked, took the time to explain things in a simplistic way, asked things about me and gave be a lot of Indian sweets and things as a bonus. I just felt she was to nice to upset basically.

If I was to do this story again I would try to ask a few questions about the funding. I perhaps should have brought up the topic during our phone call before my visit to ensure she’d be comfortable with it. But that is what I would change, again I suppose morals and ethics had to be considered with this story as well in that sense.

http://risingeast.co.uk/drop-in-whenever-you-like/

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12. Gandhi statue article

I can immediately pinpoint what I would change about this article and that is getting a photo..

Whilst the article itself strays from solely discussing the statue its still the major focal point of the story and as such it really does need a picture to go along with it. 

What I’m happy about with this piece was my linking it to East London, similarly to the Miliband Wales speech. I was fortunate enough to have recalled that Gandhi stayed in East London during his British visit and was able to use that as my main argument for the misplacement of the statue outside Parliament, 

But again if I could change anything I would certainly get a photo of the statue but also one of Kingsly Hall in Poplar, which is where Gandhi stayed during his trip.

http://risingeast.co.uk/east-is-best-for-half-naked-fakir/

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11. Judaism article  - commissioned

I’m again very happy with the way this article turned out and consider it to be a partly commissioned piece because I needed a female to take notes from the superior genders perspective.

Men and women were segregated during the service and as such women receive a considerably different experience, I wanted notes of that to work out whether I needed them in my piece and commissioned Jasmine to take them for me.

I suppose the first thing about what I could have / would have changed here is that I would have made greater use of the Rabbi’s knowledge. Whilst I got chatting to and have great conversations with several members of the congregation (which is a key part of the article) I never got the chance to have a proper talk with the Rabbi and ask him some questions about serving the historic East London Jewish community.

As i say though, I was able to make good use of the congregation and chatting away with the men and women certainly helped me have a better understanding of the service and as such write a better article.

http://risingeast.co.uk/elderly-orthodox-welcoming/

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10. Canary wharf article

I’m very with the way that this article came together. I feel as though I actually did a very decent job of linking what was said in Wales directly to East London, as sometimes it could be rather difficult ensuring there was a strong enough East London link to warrant the story.

I particularly like the opening to the piece making reference to the fact is was Valentines day at the time of the speech.

Before I wrote the piece and even during writing it I really didn't want it to turn into a ‘Labour vs Tory’ piece and attempted to stay as apolitical as possible. I feel as though, reading it back, by in large I was able to accomplish that goal although another pair of eyes may differ and I’d certainly take any criticism on it that stems from that.

Something I could have defiantly have done for his story would have been to get a picture of Canary Wharf to accompany it. That would have certainly made it stand out more on the site (and just about every story should come with a picture anyway most of the time). This wouldn't have been particularly difficult and would've added a small extra to the story. But as for the article itself, I’m happy.

http://risingeast.co.uk/fenced-off-wealth-power-tax-havens/

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9. Charlie Hebdo reaction piece - commissioned

This article is another that I would consider to be a commissioned piece. This article was my way of salvaging those previously mentioned (and some seen) interviews from my previous post. 

My partner who I worked with on this, Jasmine, wrote up some of the notes that we took with interviewees and I then edited those in order to use them in the full article.

I’m happy with the piece because of the timely manner in which we got it done but also with the way we were able to use those interviews we’d done and make good use of the considerable number of hours we’d put into this story. 

We interviewed a good number of people from different backgrounds and that was better represented in this written piece than it would have been in the video so I’m happy with that.

http://risingeast.co.uk/wake-charlie-hebdo-level-headed-londoners-keep-calm-carry-getting-along-together/

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8. British Islam article

For this article I attended a debate held by the British Humanist society for a discussion of how atheists and Muslims can live together in London (specifically East London).

This article I quite heavily changed from the original so I will include in this blog the original article I wrote and link to how I edited it and proceeded to get it published on Rising East.

When I originally wrote the article I attemped to create a write up of the evenings events and build a picture for those who were not there. The problem with this of course was that there was simply to much discussed in what was about 3 hours between the panel to sum it up into one article.

I actually had a bit of trouble editing it down but on discussion with Rising East editor - Andrew Calcutt. I chose what I considered to be not only one of the key speeches of the night but also most interesting and that was something said by a African Imam in relation to how to create a ‘British styled Islam’ or as he called it ‘Fish n’ Chips Islam’. 

I thought that was an interesting route to take and changed my piece quite heavily to accommodate that. 

So here is the link to my edited article that was published  - 

http://risingeast.co.uk/can-islam-british-fishnchips/

And below the original piece before I changed it.

“To thine own self be true”

The phrase that sat firmly overhead the panel at the Conway Hall was a theme that ran throughout the evening as the British Humanist Society hosted an event entitled ‘How can humanist and Muslim Londoners live & work together?’

The event, that the chair of the evening Alom Shaha – a Brit of Bangladeshi origin and atheist, claimed was “the first of its kind in London and hopefully not the last” was heavily subscribed to starting timely at 19:00pm.

The panel itself consisted of Muslims from different schools of thought including both Shia’s and Sunni’s but it certainly could be open to criticism for failing to include much more conservative Muslims, of which make up a significant proportion of the British Muslims population.

“There was not a pressure to be seen practising Islam in the 50’s and 60’s like today” claimed Yasmin Rehamn in response to a spread of ‘hard-core Islam’. “I now feel as though I have to justify myself just for being a Muslim. Partly because women are hit hardest from anti-Muslim stereotypes. There are four schools of Islamic thought not one Sharia yet the media lumps all Muslims together.”

A point contradicted by a Shia member of the panel Huda Jawad. “There are actually 5 schools of Islamic thought! You like most Sunnis haven’t counted the Shia school of thought!”

The evening was of course dominated by talk of the Islamic State and fundamentalist Islam. Dr Mamadou Bocoum, a Senegalese Muslim and board member of the Sharia Council of the United Kingdom called for the need of true “fish and chips styled Islam in the UK”. He went on to expand “fish and chips style Islam is what I like to call British Islam. An Islam fused with strong British values of liberty and respect for all. We need to stop the tide of Muslim youths turning to ‘chicken tikka styled Islam’ (Islam with its roots in the sub-continent, predominantly Pakistan but also Bangladesh).

“Whoever controls the media controls the view of Islam. And right now the media is soley shining the spotlight on ‘chicken tikka Islam’. This is an inaccurate view of what is happening in British Islam. Also this ‘chicken tikka Islam’ that has been spreading not only in the UK but around the world brings far more problems than religious extremism. I myself have suffered racist abuse I would say directly because of it. It spreads the notion that a black African man like myself cannot truly know the Quran. Racism exists within some Mosques more than the outside community. Asian Muslims do not want a black Imam”

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7. Upcoming Apocalypse article

This article was an interesting one to do and I think I did a much better job with this than I had with the Lord Neuburger article. Whilst writing this piece I was able to keep to a theme much more effectively than the Supreme Court article.

Looking at this article now I suppose that I had ethical considerations to take into account when writing this. Religion of course is a deeply personal affair (which is one of the reasons it took my interest so strongly throughout this module) so with that in mind I strongly wanted to ensure that I represented the opinions and views given as this talk accurately, as recordings were not allowed I was forced to rely on my notes.

I tried to get a good picture of not just the event but the Mosque in general by not just listening to the talk but also speaking to some of the men in there about the place and Islam in general. 

The young men I spoke with seemed not only devout, but quite optimistic about their futures. It was clear they were interested in speaking to me about their faith and how it helps them become better people, I tried to include this in the general vibe of my article. 

http://risingeast.co.uk/living-well-last-hours/

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6. March for free education article

For this article I worked with a another member of our course and as such consider it a joint piece.

It was certainly different from the type of articles I’d done previously and that is reflected in the work.

We covered a (primarily) student protest campaigning for free university education however there were certainly splinter groups there with their own campaigns and demands including some, rather aggressive, anarchists.

Ferdia being the more experienced photographer took the leading role in gathering pictures and video. I did attempt some of my own but in comparison with his it would probably have been considered rather lackluster. 

I attempted to compensate for this by taking a leading role in the writing of the piece, although it did need some changes I’m quite happy with my written article to accompany the video.

If there was anything I could change about this looking back, I’d have taken it as more of an opportunity to leave my comfort zone and attempt some video work. It may not have been perfectly done but it would have been interesting to do none the less. I’d have also have probably interviewed more people separately to ask for their thoughts on what was going on, particularly after the somewhat violent turn the protest took outside of Parliament,

http://risingeast.co.uk/marching-free-education/

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5. Tower Hamlets poverty article

For this article I reported on information released by leading charities that the East London borough of Tower Hamlets was one of the leading areas for child poverty in the UK.

What I like about this story is again that I wrote it in a timely manner. I believe looking back that the information that I based this piece on was only released a day or two before publication meaning that it was done in time to be relevant.

Having lived in Mile End, in the middle of Tower Hamlets, the previous year I feel there is probably more I could have potentially added to this article because of my knowledge of the area.

I am happy with the write up of the statistics though and feel as though it’s a pretty easy read (which I believe is what journalistic articles should be). But as I say, looking back. I’d add more of my own knowledge of the area, maybe even extend it to a feature piece.

http://risingeast.co.uk/dickensian-poverty-hipster-street/

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4. Silicon roundabout article

This article was really an example of me finding my feet as it were with Rising East. I hadn't quite settled in yet to my role as ‘Religious editor’ (although I would do a few stories that were not focused on faith) 

For this story I headed out to the Silicon Roundabout, which is supposedly at the heart of London’s tech boom. 

If there was anything I’d change about this story I’d probably do a bit more research heading in. I had a basic understanding of the area and what it was all about but I most definitely didn't have an in-depth knowledge of the subject.

Although the article itself is quite short I’m somewhat happy with it. It reflects my journalistic impressions of the area more so than the companies that apparently take residency there. 

http://risingeast.co.uk/put-con-silicon-roundabout/

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3. Work that was not published - Commissioned video piece . Charlie Hebdo reaction

This is another piece of work I did for Rising East that was not published, it was also a commissioned piece.

I commissioned a colleague from my course to assist me in the interviewing and filming process. It was her job primarily to do the interviewing and I would work on the camera, unfortunately that is not how it turned out.

Both new to the technical side of of filming we didn't anticipate the sound quality of the video. 

We did spend a considerable amount of time finding suitable individuals to interview (we were looking for East London’s Muslims reactions) and the interviews themselves were generally quite good, but we just couldn't improve the sound quality enough to make it suitable for Rising East.

Looking back at this, it did give me a chance to commission some work and as well that actually learn how to perform, and do, some basic editing. This was a first for me and I certainly learnt the very basics. Just for that I’m happy with the piece. 

But also this was an example of getting a story and reacting to news much quicker than I had in the past, especially when compared to the Choudry piece. 

I also wrote a short piece to accompany the video, but again, it obviously wasn’t used. 

I did however make use of the interviews themselves for a separate longer written piece as you will see later on in this tumblr blog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYI2KHXn43g

Islam and a liberal Europe – contradiction or a peaceful reality

The murder of several European journalists followed shortly by the execution of shoppers at a kosher market in France by Islamic extremists has led to further scrutiny, warranted or unwarranted of Islamic communities. We headed out to Stratford in East London to speak to Muslim Britons about their reaction to the atrocity.

What we found was that there was a clear divide of opinion from within the Muslim community. Whilst some individuals felt as though the response was not only abhorrent but an affront to Islam, others, whilst not necessarily justifying the attacks, felt as though by insulting the prophet and Islamic faith one could only be expected to illicit an angered response.

Regardless of personal opinions over the massacre it is clear that public opinion on Islam and the Muslim community is now at focal point in terms of coverage by the media. This naturally effects East London disproportionately with over 40% of England’s Muslims living in London and the majority of them living in East London boroughs such as Tower Hamlets and Newham.

We also encountered a considerable amount of reluctance from the public to speak with us regarding the attacks. This could be a sign of the growing fear from within the Muslim community of the spread of Islamophobia in wake of the killings. With even the communities and local government minister Eric Pickles including in his controversial letter to Islamic leaders information on how to report Islamophobic attacks to the police.

Whatever the case it is apparent that Islam and its place in a liberal society will continue to be debated for the foreseeable future and East London will no doubt be at the heart of that debate.

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2. Work that was not published - Lord Neuberger piece

Another piece of unpublished work I wrote for Rising East would be an article relating to a speech given by the head of the UK’s Supreme Court - Lord  Neuberger.

The talk took place at our universities Stratford campus but I thought at the time (and looking back, still do) that the talk was important enough and being delivered by a sufficiently influential man that it negated the fact it might just have been seen as a ‘uni article’, as in something taking place at our university that required little travel effort. 

The article itself isn’t poorly written although looking over it I can certainly see why it wasn’t published. 

It is just to ‘all over the place’ or ‘zig zaggy’. Whilst I’ve reported accurately on what happened that evening, including one or two things that could be considered controversies. I’ve failed with keeping with a central theme. 

I’ve introduced the ‘four E’s’ the Supeme Court President spoke about but I was unable to stay with that theme throughout the piece.

If I could change anything about this piece, I’d certainly try and create more of a consistency throughout the work. 

Lord Neuberger article

The four E’s. The most important happenings in UK and English law at the moment according to Lord Neuberger, the President of the UK supreme court.

Education, ethnicity, the European Union and the European Court of Human rights.

Speaking at an event hosted by the University of East London’s ‘Civic Engagement programme’ which according to Patrick Hassan-Morlai, the director of the Universities law clinic, seeks to ‘engage members of the public and local community and get students involved with society by offering law advice on a pro bono free basis, in association with local solicitors, for residents’.

Lord Neuberger said, ‘some diversities are obviously easier to manage than others – for example – sex and race are easy to identify, we can see clearly if we’re lacking in diversity in regards to those. But other diversities such as ensuring we have people from perhaps difficult social backgrounds is much harder to do’

He continued ‘we all know that inequality is bad but why is it bad? Well it is inherently unfair, inequality in public institutions can risk people’s confidence in those institutions and it also risks not finding the best people for the job’.

But it wasn’t all bad news as Lord Neuberger commented ‘homophobia at least isn’t that much of a problem in the legal world. I certainly haven’t seen it in recent years.’

The event itself was an undeniable success for the university cramming well over 200 members of university students, staff and the general public into a main lecture hall at the Stratford campus, opened by Princess Margret in September 2013.

However the evening wasn’t without controversy. In response to questions surrounding the UK’s place in Europe, political feeling towards Wikileaks chief Julian Assange and prisoners right to vote (issues on which he himself cast a vote) the head of the Supreme Court claimed an entirely apolitical stance, refusing to voice his opinion, as that ‘wouldn’t be right for the head of the UK’s Supreme Court to become publically political’. Much to the amusement of some but to the annoyance of others.

He did go so far as to comment on the importance of the judiciary in keeping the executive in place however.

‘Britons are not aware of how privileged we are because unlike the continent we haven’t been invaded in 1000 years. We haven’t had a fascist dictator grab power or indeed even a political revolution. We should be proud of that; but also aware that the continent will see things differently to us because of it.’

The Lord choose to end his, often light-hearted, talk with what could be described as a warning to the British people.

‘True tyrannies are places where private citizens cannot get access to an independent judiciary to enforce their rights. The rule of law is essential to a free democracy and as such the role of lawyers is as well’.

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1. Work that was not published - Anjem Choudary piece

For my first blog post I’ve chosen to start with the first piece of work I did for Rising East, which was an article about Anjem Choudary, the radical preacher.

Looking back at the article I don’t believe there was anything inherently wrong the work itself, although it certainly wasn't anything extraordinary or even to the level of the work I would go on the write throughout the year. 

The primary reason that it wasn't published was essentially because I got around to writing the article too late. The arrest I’m writing about occurred on the 25th of September but I didn't write the piece til a few weeks after. 

If there was anything I’d change about this article, I’d probably add more detail to it but certainly I would get around to writing this piece (or a wider reaction piece) much quicker. As I did for some stories later on in the module.

East London terror arrests

Anjem Choudary the radical Islamist preacher based in Tower Hamlets has been arrested as part of a nationwide police investigation into counter terrorism.

The arrests which occurred on the 25th of September saw 9 men taken into police custody under the backdrop of the British parliament’s decision to enter into a bombing campaign on the alleged Islamic State in Iraq.

Choudary, one of the most notorious preachers in Britain for his outspoken extremist views, was one of the key leaders of the, now banned, Al-Muhajiroun organisation. Choudary has since attempted to re-establish the organisation under several different names to avoid prosecution.

A lawyer by trade the activist has always been careful as to not cross the line into any kind of potential ‘hate speech’ when giving lectures and talks on his political or religious views. However he was investigated by the Met in 2006 for alleged remarks made against the then Pope Benedict. No charges were brought.

Abdul Rahman a local businessman, community activist and practising Muslim from Tower Hamlets has said of the arrest, “Anjem Choudary does not represent the majority views of the London Muslim community [or] the British Muslim community.

“He is the type of man who purposefully misrepresents the peaceful religion of Islam for his own financial and personal gain. He has no authority to speak on the Quran.”

Choudary has been largely criticised by the mainstream British Muslims community for being a figure of controversy and hate. Salma Yaqoob the former leader of Respect Party and a British Muslims has said of Choudary “He is a bigot whose goal in life is to provoke division. He engages in these provocations because he is deeply hostile to any coming together of Muslims and non-Muslims”.

Of the 9 men arrested in connection to the police raids 8 were charged in London and one individual was taken into police custody in Stoke on Trent. The ages of the men vary from 22-55.