Telegraph

Muslim makes bin Laden a laughing matter (Filed: 18/10/2001)

SHAZIA MIRZA is fast becoming the world's most wanted Muslim woman. She is highly sought after because she tells jokes about Osama bin Laden.

As Britain's only Muslim woman known to be performing stand-up comedy, Mirza, 26, is becoming a favourite with comedy club promoters and radio discussion programmes.

Demand for the Birmingham-born comic is also now coming from two countries at the heart of international events: America and Pakistan.

In America, she has been asked to appear on Oprah Winfrey's television programme and take part in a benefit event to raise money for families of the victims of the World Trade Centre attack.

In Pakistan, where her parents were born, she is wanted for a one-woman show in Lahore. In another career boost, she collected a Young Achiever of the Year prize in this week's GG2 Leadership and Diversity Awards, which recognise success stories within the Asian community.

Mirza, who has been in stand-up comedy for little more than a year, wears a Muslim scarf when performing and speaks with a distinctive deadpan drawl. She says she is a moderate, devout Muslim, placed between two cultures and able to cast a critical, as well as a forgiving, eye on both.

"The whole point of my act," she said yesterday, "is to help reduce Islamophobia in Britain. The reason it took off was that no one had really heard what it's like to be a Muslim woman here.

"There were so many stereotypes. I talked about my life and I allowed people to laugh along with me." The white, male-dominated world of stand-up, so often inhospitable to women comedians, swiftly took her to heart.

"A lot of Muslim men think that it's not the place for a woman to stand on stage in front of a drunken crowd trying to make them laugh. But actually Islam gives women a lot of power.

"We're not all as oppressed as the women in Afghanistan. Just by standing on stage, I'm liberating women and some men clearly fear that means they'll lose the upper hand."

Since September 11, she thought no one would want to listen to her at all. "I cancelled gigs for a week afterwards and on the first night I went back on stage, there was so much tension in the air; people were scared to laugh.

"I could see everyone thinking, 'Is she going to address the situation?' It wasn't until two weeks later that I did. I came on and said: 'My name is Shazia Mirza - at least that's what it says on my pilot's licence.' They stood on their feet and applauded."

Since then, the former bio-chemistry student, who taught physics after leaving university, has expanded the amount of material she devotes to the crisis.

"You have to attack ignorance with humour," she said. "We're not all fanatics. I tell audiences how they can distinguish me from Muslim terrorists: they have bigger moustaches than I do."

She finds Osama "bin Liner" absurd, but the attempts to catch him farcical. "I was amused by comments made by his son that when he gets angry, he becomes invisible.

"He has led a ridiculous life. And now this one man has got the whole of the West running after him trying to get him out of a cave. It's quite funny when you think about it."

-- Anonymous, October 17, 2001

Answers

"Take bin Laden....please."

-- Anonymous, October 17, 2001