Wall Street Journal
>THE DAILY FIX
>By CARL BIALIK AND JASON FRY
>
>A British Muslim Boxer
>Becomes Unwitting Symbol
>July 28, 2005 12:16 p.m.
>
>In his first professional fight two weeks ago,
>18-year-old lightweight Amir Khan won in under two
>minutes.
>
>Mr. Khan, who already has an Olympic silver medal, is
>the next great hope for British boxing, John Rawling
>writes1 in the Guardian: "It took Amir Khan just one
>minute 39 seconds to underline what we already knew,
>that he is the most exciting talent to arrive in
>British boxing for years and that he was too big, too
>strong, too fast and too technically proficient for
>David Bailey."
>
>Mr. Khan is also a Muslim in Britain whose big bout
>came just nine days after 52 people died in bombings
>police said were carried out by four Muslim men. Mr.
>Khan didn't shy away from the inevitable questions
>about the bombings. He entered the arena as the
>patriotic song "Land of Hope and Glory" played ("By
>Freedom gained, by Truth maintained, Thine Empire
>shall be strong"), carried a union flag with the word
>"London" emblazoned on it and dedicated his victory to
>the everyone affected by the bombings. "Khan, whether
>he likes it or not, has become Britain's most
>high-profile Muslim sports star and he was pressing
>all the right buttons," Mr. Rawling wrote.
>
>
>Others also commended Mr. Khan for his show of
>support. "It is a gloriously appropriate piece of
>timing for a nation that has suffered a series of
>horrors at the hands of northern British Muslims,"
>Simon Barnes wrote3 in the Times of London, before the
>fight. "Khan will be out there with his hopes and his
>fears and his fast, fast hands -- so delightfully
>matched to his fast, fast brain -- and he will be
>unambiguously cheered by all sorts of people. The idea
>that the phrase 'British Muslim' embodies some kind of
>contradiction will be forgotten as good guy takes on
>bad guy in the delightful trivialities of sport."
>
>And the Muslim Al-Ahram Weekly said the bout's timing
>"seems almost divine." Mr. Khan, the paper wrote4, is
>the ideal mix of Muslim religion and British culture:
>"He attends his local mosque, reads the Qur'an and
>expects to enter into an arranged marriage in time. He
>also supports his local football team, cites fish and
>chips as his favourite food, while his dad wears a
>union jack waistcoat."
>
>This is undoubtedly a happy story (except for poor Mr.
>Bailey), but the troubling implication is that if Mr.
>Khan were other than that ideal mix, then that, too,
>would be meaningful and somehow reflect on British
>Muslims. The danger of making too much of one
>sportsman's positive public character is that it
>invites generalizations about less-admirable athletes,
>and courts danger when icons prove to be less than
>perfect.
>
>Perhaps that's why the Guardian's Richard Williams was
>troubled by Mr. Khan's show, decrying "the crude
>exploitation of his ethnic background." Mr. Williams
>added5 that "Amir Khan is a terrific fighter, an
>intelligent young man and a very welcome addition to
>the landscape. But when Land of Hope and Glory blared
>out over the public address system as he entered the
>hall, it was impossible to suppress the thought that
>somebody is looking on his arrival less as a chance to
>soothe fears and ease tensions, than as just another
>marketing opportunity."
>
>Nonsense, writes Mr. Khan's promoter, Frank Warren, in
>a rebuttal in the Guardian, saying the idea for the
>ring entrance came from Mr. Khan's family. "The Khan's
>are quite rightly very proud of their origins and are
>also proud to be British Asians," Mr. Warren writes.
>