Viewers were left outraged last night after a British woman posing as a Muslim was subjected to vile abuse as she walked past her local pub.
Katie Freeman was targeted by drinkers while disguised in a hijab as she took part in an explosive new documentary on Channel 4 called My Week as a Muslim.
The 42-year-old was taunted in her hometown of Manchester by punters, including one who asked if she planned to ‘blow them up’, in the same week that a terror attack rocked the city.
However Katie, a former ‘ban the burka’ campaigner, also came in for criticism for claiming early on in the programme that Muslims did not ‘dress British’.
As part of the documentary, Katie spent seven days living with with Saima Alvi, 49, and her family.
Katie said she felt ‘sickened’ by the taunts outside the pub and viewers agreed those responsible should be ‘ashamed’.
But others claimed it was Katie who should feel embarrassed, after she initially struggled to accept Saima’s way of life.
One scene saw Katie explain that she did not think her Manchester-born host ‘dressed British’, prompting viewers to brand her ‘ignorant’.
Just 10 minutes into the hour-long programme, one viewer posted: ‘This woman is so awful I can barely watch it.’
Cameras followed Katie as she grappled to integrate with the community – including during a stint as a chaperone on a ‘date’ between two young Muslims looking to marry.
By the end of the documentary she had become friends with her Muslim hosts, and was left convinced that white and Muslim Brits need to put on a ‘united front’ in the face of adversity and terrorism.
The positive outcome also prompted tweets from viewers who praised Channel 4 for creating an ‘eye opening’ show.
My Week as a Muslim saw Katie move in with Saima Alvi, 49, and her family to live life according to Islamic customs, and also experience some of the prejudices they face in a culture of Islamophobia. The filming schedule for the documentary overlapped with the Manchester terror attack.
Saima helped her to dress in a hijab and modest clothing to look like a devout Muslim woman.
The most shocking incident in the documentary saw Katie walk home past her local pub only for locals to begin shouting anti-Muslim abuse at her, asking if she was going to blow them up.
An outraged Katie was left visibly shaken by the incident, saying: ‘That’s what they have to put up with all the time don’t they? What harm am I doing walking down there? Absolutely no harm.
‘And what did they [mean] about blowing things up and stuff like that? F***ing idiots. It just sickens me the stuff they’ve shouted to me but it’s only a few days isn’t it? I can take this [the hijab] off and go back to being Katie and they probably wouldn’t even make a comment would they?
‘For Saima if she came here and her family came here they’d have that abuse all the time wouldn’t they? It would be relentless.’
At the beginning of the documentary Katie admitted her prejudices about Muslims, confessing that she had once left a shop because her daughter was left ‘frightened’ when a woman wearing a burka entered.
She said at the start: ‘Banning the headdresses and burkas, I think it would make a lot of people feel a lot happier, a lot safer. I wouldn’t want to sit next to them because I’d automatically assume they’re going to blow something up.’
Katie took part in the experiment in a bid to learn how it feels to be a Muslim in modern Britain, in an age of terrorist attacks and rising instances of anti-Muslim hate crimes.
The programme previously drew criticism online after it emerged before it aired that Katie would be given a makeover to look Pakistani; a process that involved darkening her skin and wearing a false nose and teeth.
Her changed appearance made life difficult for Katie, who began experiencing abuse while out and about, particularly in the aftermath of the terrorist attack on Manchester Arena, which killed 22 people.
The documentary shows Katie and Saima watching the news about the attack unfold on TV together, as Katie found herself wanting to pull out of the experiment for her own safety for fear of being attacked.
However it still took Katie a while to understand Muslim traditions.
