The West's phobia of Islamophobia
On HBO’s “Real Time,” Bill Maher and author Sam Harris were making the case “that liberals need to stand up for liberal principles.”
Maher pointed to such principles as freedom of religion and speech as well as equality for women, minorities and homosexuals. “These are liberal principles that liberals applaud for but then when you say in the Muslim world, this is what’s lacking, then they get upset.”
Harris added that, “I would argue the liberals have failed us. The crucial point of confusion is that we have been sold this meme of Islamophobia where every criticism of the doctrine of Islam gets conflated with bigotry towards Muslims as people. That is intellectually ridiculous.”
Guest panelist Ben Affleck interjected, “So you’re saying that Islamophobia is not a real thing.”
“I’m not denying that some people are bigoted against Muslims as a people and that’s a problem,” Harris replied.”
“That’s big of you,” Affleck shot back.
When Maher asked Affleck why he was getting so hostile about the issue the actor replied, “It’s gross, it’s racist, It’s like saying you’re a shifty Jew.”
Harris presented to Affleck an analogy of concentric circles. At the centre, jihadists who believe in martyrdom, wanting to kill apostates. Outside of them, Islamists, just as convinced of martyrdom, and wanting to foist their religion on the rest of humanity, but choosing to work within the system, working to change governments, in large part by using democracy against itself. Those two circles, according to Harris, constituted about 20% of the Muslim world. Outside of them he placed conservative Muslims, who deplore ISIS, but have reactionary views about human rights, about women and homosexuals, that are deeply troubling.
Affleck continued to bow his head in a kind of disdainful forbearance as this was explained by Harris, as if it were an expression of bigotry, rather than a perfectly reasonable sociological and demographic analysis. Why?
To quote Christopher Hitchens, responding in Vanity Fair to the Danish cartoon incident, which saw protests throughout the Muslim world in early 2006, (and its times like these you really miss Hitchens) “…the shady term ‘Islamaphobia’ is going to be smuggled through our customs. Anyone accused of it will be politely but firmly instructed to shut up, and to forfeit the constitutional right to criticize religion. By definition, anyone accused in this way will also be implicitly guilty. Thus the ‘soft’ censorship will triumph, not from any merit in its argument, but from its associations with the ‘hard’ censorship that we have seen being imposed over the past weeks.”
Much of the West now has an irrational phobia of Islamaphobia.
An argument frequently made recently is that mainstream Islam is loudly condemning ISIS, but the media isn’t covering it. Indeed, there has been a fair amount of public condemnation from Muslim religious authorities, organisations and councils:
The head Shia and Sunni religious leaders in Iraq have all condemned – and called for war against – ISIS.
Saudi Arabia’s highest religious authority has condemned the armed groups Islamic State and al-Qaeda as apostates.
Iyad Ameen Madani, the Secretary General for the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, representing 57 countries, distanced Islam from the actions of ISIS, saying they “have nothing to do with Islam and its principles that call for justice, kindness, fairness, freedom of faith and coexistence.”
Representatives from both the Sunni and Shia groups in the UK met at the Palace of Westminster and relayed their message that the militant group does not represent the majority of Muslims.
The 100 Sunni and Shiite religious leaders produced a video denouncing the Islamic State, saying they wanted to “come together to emphasise the importance of unity in the UK and to decree ISIS as an illegitimate, vicious group who do not represent Islam in any way.”
Slamet Effendy Yusuf, executive council chair of The Nahdlatul Ulama, one of the largest Islamic organizations in the world, said, “The public have to be critical. This is not about [establishing] a Caliphate [Islamic State]; but [a group] working for its own cause and gains from a sectarian issue.”
Secretary Abdul Mu’ti of Muhammadiyah, an organization with 29 million members, said ISIS does not represent Islam.
The International Union of Muslim Scholars spoke out against ISIS’s expulsion of Christians in Mosul. The group claimed the rejection served to “violate Islamic laws, Islamic conscience and leave but a negative image of Islam and Muslims.”
The Arab League Chief denounced acts committed by the Islamic State in Iraq as “crimes against humanity,” demanding that they be brought to justice.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, the largest Muslim group in the U.S, called ISIS “un-Islamic and morally repugnant.”
The Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) released a statement condemning “the barbaric execution of American Journalist James Foley by ISIS.”
This is all commendable; but its far too top down. Senior clerics, organisation spokespeople, executive council chairs…there is an eerie disconnect between their rhetoric has not translated to mainstream populist expression.
The media lauded the representatives of both the Sunni and Shia groups in the UK meeting at the Palace of Westminster and relaying their message that the militant group does not represent the majority of Muslims; but isn’t it just as fair to criticise the minuscule turnout, relative to the size of the community and the magnitude of the current events that prompted the gathering in the first place? 2,660,116 Muslims live in England, 5% of the population, according to results from the United Kingdom Census of 2011. Europe’s population was 6% Muslim in 2010 according to the Pew research center.
Surely it is reasonable to expect some marches – mainstream Muslim community demonstrations, congested streets, banners with boldly humanist slogans proclaiming tolerance and rejecting extremism, Muslims of all ages, from the professional and working classes, mothers pushing babies in strollers, members of religious youth groups, the nominally as well as the devoutly religious, expressing a collective rejection of the perversion of the Muslim faith by ISIS, and solidarity with the bereaved, and the forces of moderation and tolerance.
The Danish cartoon controversy produced mass demonstrations in Iraq. In Egypt, thousands of protesters demonstrated in cities across the country. Some 3,000 protesters marched through Malaysia’s largest city, Kuala Lumpur. In Pakistan, there were labor strikes, and 5,000 people protested in Islamabad. In Bangladesh, more than 5,000 Muslims demonstrated in Dhaka. There were a multitude of similar protests elsewhere, including London, where hundreds of British Muslims gathered outside the Danish embassy, holding placards bearing slogans including “behead the one who insults the prophet” and “free speech go to hell”.
Yes, there are tens of thousands of decent and courageous Muslims taking on ISIS in military engagements everyday, risking their lives to express such values; but what about the multitudes away from the front lines?
Why is it unreasonable, or culturally insensitive, or an act of false equivalence to point out the general absence of marches and peaceful demonstrations of solidarity, of moderate Muslim rejection of extremism and the perversion of real Islam, on at least one tenth the scale, world-wide, of the demonstrations in reaction to the publication of offensive cartoons in a Danish newspaper?
FROM: http://sheppardpost.com/
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