Sarah Haider gives a really good talk. Here she is talking about “Islam and the Necessity of Liberal Critique”…and I agree so much with what she says.
She really pins down a current problem: that even those of us who think Christianity and Islam are bad ideas have difficulty treating them with equal antipathy. On the left, we hold back on our criticisms of Islam, for reasons. And she does a fine job of articulating those reasons.
One important point is the “difficulty of separating criticism of an idea from hatred towards the people holding it”. It’s quite clear in my head that, as she says, the “primary victims of Islamism are Muslims”, and that to help Muslims, we ought to be helping them break free of a patriarchal and intolerant religion, but at the same time that feels damned patronizing. She also mention Western guilt at the legacy of colonialism — that we feel we have no right to critize brown people, and that’s true. But as she also points out, the Enlightenment is not the posession of the West, and that there have been a great many liberalizers and reformers within Islam who have been working (often for too short a time before they are murdered) with the Muslim world, and we ought to be supporting them.
Another concern she mentions, and this is one that worries me a lot, is the “fear that the truth will empower the worst of us”. While we aspire to oppose the idea of Islam while supporting the humanity of Muslims, there are among us people who are literally opponents of the right of Muslims to even exist. I do not want to be confused with Pamela Geller or the gun fondlers holding a “freedom of speech” rally while holding guns. We are polarized: one side wants to give people autonomy and respect their choices, even their bad ones, while the other wants to nuke Iran. It makes it even more difficult to point to the evils of the Qu’ran when doing so is cheered by militarists and anti-immigrant forces that wants to use the wickedness of religion selectively, to oppress non-Christians.
It also doesn’t help that there are people on the left, our allies, who are so concerned with defending the rights of Muslims (which I support!) that they overlook the crimes provoked by Islam, to the point that, for instance, supporting Charlie Hebdo is regarded as evidence of Islamophobia. That’s nonsense. I can condemn the murders of cartoonists, and the fact that I do not add any kind of qualifying “but” does not make me Pam Geller’s fellow traveler. It means that I reject any and all excuses for violent intolerance.
But, as Haider asks, “can we not stand against all oppressions, stand for equal rights while simultaneously working against bigoted narratives within religion?” I think we can. It’s just hard and requires walking a narrow tightrope. It does mean, of necessity, that us white Western opponents of Islamic idiocy do need to add careful qualifiers when speaking about Islam that are not necessary when discussing Catholicism or Protestantism.
That’s OK. There is an unavoidable asymmetry in our relationship to the various world religions. It should not prevent us from making that liberal critique of religions outside our shores.
walking the
tight ropeknife’s edge.There’s no tight rope, or knife’s edge: there’s a labyrinth of distorting mirrors; the problem is that sectarian supremacists like Geller never have, and never will be honest about their endgame (which can be summarized as “Anyone who isn’t us is an enemy, and enemies must be beaten into craven submission or, if their prove to resilient to bullying, slaughtered, their corpses used as an example“) and will coat their illiberal goals in liberal soundbites.
*sigh* She is pushing the idea that Islamophobia is not a real thing. Well, what else do you call the fear that many far-right European people have, that people, who are descendants of people who come from Islamic countries, are somehowactively trying to take over the West and make it into an islamic state.
Yes, Islamophobia is often misused, but it is a real thing, and is closely tied with bigotry.
Other than that, she makes some good points.
I condemn the murder of cartoonists. And I’d have condemned the terrorist attack on Charlie Hebdo equally if Charlie Hebdo had been an FN publication. So unreservedly condemning the murders does not require announcing that “I’m Charlie”.
That’s a lot of strawmanning she does.
No, people who pointed out that muslims were targeted be CH and people who pointed out the racism of Fench society were NOT saying that they “understand that the shooters would feel provoked.” They were not trying to raise sympathy for them. The were the ones raising the important quetsions of how come that two young French men felt so alienated by the society they grew up in that they would end up as terrorists.
In the recent weeks girls in France and Beligium have been sent home from school for, brace yourselves, wearing long skirts.
You are allowed to guess what religion they had.
I wish her good luck with Maher, Dawkins and Harris.
I’m sure many accusations of Islamophobia are spurious and knee-jerk reactions. But Islamophobia absolutely is a thing. In the US, it’s a core belief of the Religious Right. In western Europe, it goes on top of the usual xenophobia that, say, Orthodox Serbs have to deal with.
Some actually were saying that.
But I’m pretty sure none of them were on the left. The one or two cases I deeply remember were distinctly right-wing – and distinctly Christian, too.
…and “deeply” should have been “dimly”. I’m dim today myself, must be the heat and some grass pollen or something.
People who “pointed that out” were promoting execrable bullshit. Charlie Hebdo did and does not target Muslims. It targets Islamists, and them far less than it targets, for example, Christianity.
http://michael-balter.blogspot.com/2015/02/was-charlie-hebdo-obsessed-with-islam.html
Information about Charlie Hebdo is widely available on the web, for anybody who gives a shit about honesty.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/01/11/1357057/-The-Charlie-Hebdo-cartoons-no-one-is-showing-you#
@3 Kristjan Wager
Would the majority of the so-called Islamophobes accept the children of immigrants if they weren’t Muslim? How have the xenophobic right-wingers treated immigrants from predominantly Christian societies, like Mexico or Poland? I’ll never forget that schadenfreude-laden story of the Egyptian Coptic Christians who went to protest against Muslims and had the crowd turn on them.
Prejudice specifically against Muslims certainly exists, but the whole inception of the Islamophobia term was intended to take a liberal, humanist agenda (fighting against racism for all) and twisting it into a sectarian and often regressive agenda (protecting expressions of the Muslim faith). I’ll talk about anti-Muslim prejudice, but I’m not going to use that stupid word for it.
Yeah. About that. You came to the wrong place if you’re looking for a commentariat that cares about more about honesty than about Jacobin ideological purity. Or, rather, you came about three years too late.
preceded by
That’s actually something Emmanuel Todd pointed: basically, while Charlie itself was and remain an anticlerical publication which rejects the kind of cultural determinism favored by actual islamophobes, a non-negligible chunk of the people who proclaimed loudly that they were Charlie were, well, little more than hypocritical sectarian supremacists (which Todd nicknamed “Zombie Catholics”) who opportunistically pretended to be appealed by the slaughter of a redaction they, themselves, deep-down, loathed in order to make themselves look like principled secularist while they bash minorities and immigrants plebeians they want to forcefully keep at the bottom of the food chain.
…
Then Todd had to ruin his own argument by going all hyperbolic and pretending that this very real (and non-negligible) group of impostors made a majority of the people who expressed support toward Charlie Hebdo.
Oh well…..
A. R #10
Remember the Thunderdome?
I can’t help but think this discussion about any religion would be more beneficial if we all recognized that matters of faith and conscience cannot be readily enforced. If I don’t believe in the same supernatural being or creed as you do, what can you do? Make me believe it? You can swindle me, fool me, seduce me, prey on my own indolence, etc, but you can’t make me believe something I don’t want to believe. Trying to make me believe something say, by force, may get me to profess what you want but you will have simply induced me to lie out of self-preservation. A new believer has not been created, there is no faith.
Thus has it always been among religions whose more fervent adherents cannot accept what conscience is. The genius of the separation of church and state is the recognition that the power of the State should never be used to compel matters of belief.
@ tigerprawn
“The genius of the separation of church and state is the recognition that the power of the State should never be used to compel matters of belief.”
And where do you find separation of church and state? Europe, perhaps? Because it is no longer found in America.
It sucks to be ex-Muslim in non-Muslim societies like America. Thanks to the fucking Gellers of the world, you’re pressured from one side to choose your words wisely and tone down your criticism and from the other side to shut the fuck up and stay invisible for your safety. It is practically impossible for people like Haider, Heina, Ali Rizvi, Muhammad Syed, and myself to be “Islamophobic”. It’s about as likely as it is for an ex-Christian American to be a danger to the Christian population. An oppressed group can itself be an oppressor.
Here’s a scenario: Christians are a heavily oppressed minority in Pakistan. Imagine if you were an ex-Christian in Pakistan and were constantly being stepped on by the Christians in your family and community. Imagine trying to speak up against the incessant hate hurled towards you and your fellow atheists to realize you have to watch your words because Pakistani liberal activists might say you’re contributing to the anti-Christian climate. And there would be nothing you can do about it, because that anti-Christian hatred really would be there. But none of it would be due to you. You’d find yourself under pressure from people who should be your allies. America doesn’t have a huge group that oppresses Christians. If it did, only then would American ex-Christian atheists would know how this feels.
Her opening sentences and this:
are spot on. It hits so close to home. I know exactly what she’s feeling when saying that. And this is how almost all ex-Muslims in the U.S. feel. It’s frustrating and quite depressing at times.
Kristjan Wager, #3
This is a Pakistani-born ex-Muslim who had to go through the struggle of freeing herself from Islam and Muslim prejudice and then had the courage to speak up and offer help to others struggling in the same system. She’s a hero. The Pakistani strain of Islam is one of the most and coercive and most alienating religions out there to be an atheist in. I live through it every day. I’m one of those she speaks of who is deep in the closet (to everyone but my siblings and two other relatives). I have no identity when I’m interacting with everyone else save them. Where is she “pushing the idea” that “Islamophobia” is not a real thing? You think that’s her thing? Seriously, that’s very offensive.
To expect us to be as concerned with Islamophobia while we’re constantly fucked over and punched down on by the Muslims around us is a little like wanting innocent Muslims in the West to condemn or apologize for terrorist attacks. They aren’t the cause of it and the people asking them to apologize are not being their friends. Likewise, Haider is not a contributor to Islamophobia (no matter what fucking tone she uses), and you’re not being an ally when you see her describing the rock and a hard place scenario we’re in and treat her like she’s Sam Harris calling for torture. It is not my number one priority that people on the right and asshole atheists are anti-Muslim. I oppose it (I’ve done it here many times) but I will not let it muddle the situation as it exists for us ex-Muslims. Anti-Muslim bigotry should NOT be a reason for ex-Muslims to feel frustrated about people who should be their allies. If a group emerges that mistreats Christians in America, this would be no reason for an ex-Christian to stop openly opposing the variety of Christianity-based offenses that they have to suffer through.
Simply put, this is about lived experiences. If you don’t have the frustrating life experience of having to navigate between Islamic hatred hurled at you and anti-Muslim sentiments against your oppressors (and at yourself because bigots are idiots), you simply won’t have a firm understanding of how this feels. I appreciate when people like Giliell call out anti-Muslim bigotry, but she doesn’t misconstrue a very socially active and aware ex-Muslim’s point as being “there’s no such thing as Islamophobia”.
At the very least, being an ally means listening. When an ex-Muslim is describing her own experience and telling you that the Islamophobia charge is a problem for us, there’s a very, very high chance she knows what she’s talking about. You need to realize that you actually have a privilege here. If you openly and honestly speak against the problems that the practice and followers of Christianity cause in the U.S. you don’t have a single niggle in the back of your mind that you’ll come across as a bigot. We don’t have this luxury.
This is also a very good point. I hate that term. I use it every now and then if it’s already being used in a conversation for simplicity but anti-Muslim bigotry is the correct term that people should be using. The word Islamophobia gets used against us by some Muslims.
I personally don’t care if liberals don’t criticize Islam (or criticize it rarely). I’m not one of those who brings the charge of being “soft on Islam” to never-Muslims who don’t want to inadvertently contribute to the anti-Muslim bigotry around them. I completely understand why red flags would go up for a never-Muslim atheist who cares about social justice when Islam is being criticized. But do not bring up anti-Muslim bigotry in spaces where ex-Muslims are voicing their concerns. That’s the last thing we need. It feels like a ‘what about the menz’ to us. Legitimate men’s issues exist, but they are not due to feminism. Anti-Muslim bigotry exists, and we are the last group who is contributing to it. Please don’t bring it up in discussions where ex-Muslims are speaking against Islam.
Fantastic comment, Saad. A lot to digest in that.
And stay safe.
My take: a) lots of people are bigoted against all Muslims and forms of Islam (Bill Maher and Sam Harris are happy enough to call for racial profiling: that’s bigoted!). And, b) foundational religious texts *are* a contributing factor in the resulting mayhem. Sort of like a religion’s initial conditions: the world would’ve been a different place if the writers of the New Testament didn’t write Jews as complicit in the crucifixion of Jesus. Likewise, what’s written in the Koran (I assume death to apostates) factors in.
But religions can overcome those things and reform (no less Islam than Christianity): problem is the bigots who, right now, preach misanthropic ideas. For example: sure, the New Testament has a passage or two condemning same sex relations. And that *should* be criticized. But, Christians have taken a wider view of passages before (they had to change their religious support of segregation). The problem is that there are humans who hate gay people, for their own terrible reasons. They have that hatred, and *then* they thump through their bibles for support. Well, the bible is 2000 years old: of course it will oblige!
@Saad:
You’re awesome. Thank you.
I’ve been in the room with Jewish women who spoke about how religiously-justified Jewish sexism made it impossible for them as girls to get their rapists to stop raping them and to get support as rape victims. Saying that you’re a victim of your father’s rapes or your rabbi’s rapes very often gets met with intracommunity charges that you can’t talk about that shit because anti-semitism.
Think about that. Would you ***ever*** lecture any of those women “Jew-o-phobic” and contributing to unjust oppression for finally, as adults, having the ability and making the choice to publicly stand against sexist theocratic judaism that enables rape?
The harms Saad is describing don’t necessarily include rape (though demographically, it’s inevitable that somewhere some muslim has raped an ex-muslim on the basis of punishment for reconversion), but so fucking what?
Would we really spend the time to take to task a woman who said that Jew-o-phobia in the sense of a thing that is created by Jews raped as girls saying, “Holy fuck: don’t rape me, don’t rape the Jews that are currently girls the age I was then, and don’t you dare tell me that you can’t engage in rape prevention because anti-semitism,” doesn’t exist because when you think about Jew-o-phobia differently there’s a sense in which it does exist and her language as a Jew protesting theocratically justified rape and incest isn’t sufficiently careful and nuanced for such a potentially volatile topic? Is that how we would spend the thread under that hypothetical youtube video?
What about the fundamental dynamic being described is so different that we can’t apply to our analysis of one of these situations the lessons we’ve learned from the other?
Islamophobia as alternately and ably constructed here by some [Kristjan Wager, Giliell, and David Marjanović certainly, perhaps also others I’ve missed] *is* a thing.
But how did this thread become the right place to talk about it?
Are you all really asserting that Haider is failing to understand what’s going on and needs our wisdom to set her on the better path to ending bigotry against ex- and current muslims?
Would we think that was the right response to the Jew attacking the rape of Jewish girls and asserting that the Jew-o-phobia frame isn’t helping?
Somehow I think that’s not very likely.
Setting yourselves up to say “It’s all because of those racists” is not a useful contribution nor does it ever seem to lead towards any interesting insights from the european left, besides suggestions to throw more money at a select few particularly large ethnic groups, and calls to fight the ghost of the super powerful and influential racist cabal in Europe.
Brace yourselves… fundies and idiots in general annoy innocent bystanders when they feel like it, until the state presumably catches up with them. Or was it…. a successful mission by the racist conspiracy to deny education to non-native people! Or Arabs, or non-arab muslims. Holy crap is there no end to their powers?!!? Blarghlblargh THE FACISTS ARE COMING, THEY HAVE PREPARED THE TRAINS again !!!111oneeleven.
Tough call.
In related news, the kind with facts, some research from the Dutch government showed that 60% of the jihadi’s that went to fight, already had to deal with “psychosocial problems” before they left. Had experienced not having a place to sleep before, 1 in 5 also has mental health issues among which schizophrenia. Most of them were low-educated or didn’t get a diploma at all, but often did have a criminal record.
More here:
http://www.researchgate.net/publication/275642945_Behavioral_Problems_and_Disorders_among_Radicals_in_Police_Files
There is a fascinating interplay between the scriptures of religious groups, political realities and the social convictions of the believers. What stays the same is the ability for any charismatic guy to call attention to any particular parts of scripture or interpretations thereof, and gain a following that has no time for logic or reason but who are nevertheless convinced.
The rest is just fluff on the side, Christians attitudes flipped on slavery, flipped on racism, flipped on interracial marriage, they will keep flipping either way with plenty of poor rationalizations as political reality requires or allows. Don’t assume there’s a brake that prevents backsliding.
Criticism of religious systems does seem to resemble hostility from the Right, but minus the contempt for the people themselves.
I think that ‘Islamophobia’ both exists and does not exist, entirely depending upon what is being criticized and for what purpose. Saad and Crip Dyke wrote at length about just this phenomena, if I interpret accurately, though with different angles.
Christians, Jews, Hindus, Jehovahs Witness, and yes, even Muslims have been and are now attacked, harassed, driven out of towns by mobs — or killed by the same mobs, usually a ‘Right Wing’ or competing sect of one type or another and pricelessly because of that religious identity — just for being ‘other’, foreign, ‘suspicious’. Shall I list all of the pogroms?
And it is also a fact, as Sarah Haider points out, that the highest count of victims is found among the members of those communities (willing or not) of the same Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Jehovahs Witness, Mormon, and Muslim communities: The institutional and doctrinal sexism, the apologetics for pedophilia, the openly sectarian wars, the shaking down of peasants of their belongings in exchange for promises of eternal rewards.
I think that contempt for and against people may be the single most important distinction to make.
Thank you for explaining that, Saad.
Saad, just thank you. And you are awesome.
I rarely comment but, Saad, you rock! Thank you for your comment.
I don’t comment all that often, either, but thanks, Saad—that was a great comment.
@Amateur:
Absolutely. I don’t have anything like a ***basic*** understanding of Islam, like one would get from a “World Religions” survey course in university. Much less anything like an insider’s decades-long perspective. I’m just trying to use what I know to understand Haider and Saad.
Exactly, CD.
You are, to coin a phrase, “using what you know, to understand”. That is, I think, what it means to empathize while offering a critique from experience. That is, demonstrably, I think, the exact opposite of the contempt I happened to speak of.
Were I to be a recently ex-Christian looking for a sane critique, as I once was, with respect to the complicated interrelated problems of bigots, sexual politics, othering, and token-behaviour-morality, and so on, I could ask for nothing more than sympathetic understanding from people just attempting to use what they know — as opposed to, say, folks demanding some sort conformity to what they pretend to “know to be true” — like, the Gellers and Condells [*] of the world.
One doesn’t have to have that insider’s, decades-long perspective to identify what is false! That is the false and inverse meta-narrative of special salvation. One does need, however, to work from experience, to identify contempt, and recognize the value and social utility of empathy.
[*] fun fact: I suddely blanked on his name and only had to enter “british atheist anti-muslim hate speech” in a search engine
The thing is, fundies do not want to enforce belief, they want to enforce behavior. It doesn’t matter to them whether you’re obeying neurotic clerics because you fear God or because you fear their pretorian guard: what’s important is that you obey
***
On the contrary, it’s perfectly possible: take all the authoritarian self-proclaimed “brights” who decided that their lack of religious belief “demonstrate” their inherent intellectual superiority over the religious believers. They quite obviously hold their former co-religionists in contempt and would be rather harmful toward members of their former tribe if they were in charge.
Of course, this type of worldview still won’t protect them from being potential target for people like Geller & co, since her & her ilk’s hostility stems from ethnicity-based animosity, nor have much opportunity to express itself in authoritarian polities.
@ zibble #9
I’ll talk about anti-gay prejudice, but I’m not going to use that stupid word (homophobia) for it.
I’ll talk about anti-women prejudice, but I’m not going to use that stupid word (misogyny) for it.
I’ll talk about anti-trans prejudice, but I’m not going to use that stupid word (transphobia) for it.
I’ll talk about anti-Jewish prejudice, but I’m not going to use that stupid word (anti-Semitism) for it.
Uh huh.
@Giliell, professional cynic -Ilk- #5
Here in Belgium a lot of pupils are sent home for clothing infringements. A lot of girls for having “bikini shoulder stripes”. Of course those don’t make it to the press. Now you can find there are problems with the dress code in Belgian schools, but it seems a bit one sided to only complain when moslim girls are sent home for breaking the dress code but not other girls or even boys.
It targets everybody.
It’s like South Park or Family Guy: it goes to great lengths to make sure it offends everyone to the exact same amount – and believes that’s actually a good thing.
As I said: they get the usual amount of xenophobia (which is bad enough), without the added fear of “maybe they’re all terrorists and want to conquer the world”.
Did the crowd even know there’s such a thing as a Coptic Christian, and did they notice what was being protested against?
Right there in the video where she says “Islamophobia is a meaningless term” just because it’s a more or less deliberate confusion of several issues and because most accusations are themselves bigoted?
…Kristjan nowhere said such a thing. ~:-|
Kristjan nowhere said “that’s Haider’s point”. It’s one thing she says, and he pointed that out – while explicitly agreeing with at least “some” other things she says.
Because it was mentioned. It’s possible to have several discussions in the same thread; we’ve often done it before.
It would be rather surprising if a speech of 38 minutes would only have a single topic! Why shouldn’t we talk about all of them?
I, for one, am criticizing one sentence – out of 38 minutes – for falling a bit short of larger reality.
That’s all!
I’m a scientist – I’m a professional nitpicker!
…I don’t have time right now to check if I correctly remember Ayaan Hirsi Ali as saying some really authoritarian things that would fit this picture.
*culture shock*
…But why would long skirts be against a dress code? What sense does that make?
David Marjanović, #31
This is her acknowledging the existence of anti-Muslim bigotry. The term Islamophobia is a problem for us. That’s what she’s saying when she calls it a meaningless term.
Xe accused her of saying there’s no such thing as Islamophobia [anti-Muslim bigotry]. Being accused of denying a problem exists is pretty close to being accused of contributing to it.
Yeah, and you’ll find a feminist woman somewhere who says genuinely misandrist stuff too. Calling her out should be reserved for a different space, not in the same space where other feminists are complaining about not being able to speak comfortably against their oppressors. Hirsi Ali’s support for force against Muslims does not overlap with the ex-Muslim experience. We don’t want bad things to happen to Muslims. We’re the ones on the defensive with respect to our very own families. A lot of us are invisible to them. This is not the Hirsi Ali situation.
Is it the “Islamophobia is a meaningless term”? Then you’re criticizing your incorrect interpretation of it.
Give me one reason why our interaction with, criticism of and opposition towards the Muslims that we live amongst should have to be run through a different filter than any other atheist speaking against the religious problems in their societies. Go to right wingers and the anti-Muslim atheists if you want to speak against that bigotry. Ex-Muslims should be free to choose our tone and our message about Islam and Muslims, just as women should be free to do so about misogyny and black people should be free to do so about white society and police behavior.
We’re not anywhere near being Islamophobic. The situation is similar to a triangle. Ex-Muslims are one point of the triangle. The second point is Muslims. The third point is people like Geller. I don’t want to be mixed in with either. I should have an open identity of my own. If we are to mix in with the broader atheist and secular society in America, we have to be trusted. We shouldn’t have to start with disclaimers before we start telling our stories or criticizing Muslim practices that we have to put up with day in and day out. The default stance a never-Muslim atheist takes when listening to an ex-Muslim should not contain an iota of caution against anti-Muslim bigotry (unless and until the speaker gives you a reason). This is how it is for the many atheists when they vent about Christian culture and this is how it should be for us when we talk about Muslims and Islam.
And, b) foundational religious texts *are* a contributing factor in the resulting mayhem.
Yes, but they’re not the ONLY contributing factor, nor are they even the MOST IMMEDIATE contributing factor. To understand the most important contributing factors to ANY sort of mayhem, you really have to look at the history and social, economic and political conditions of the affected people (Muslim or otherwise). That’s something most Islamophobes — particularly Sam Harris and his simpleminded fanboys — simply refuse to do.
Yes, there’s a lot of hate and violence in the Muslim world; and yes, there’s a lot of words in the Quran that at least seem to call for and justify the hate and violence. But the connection between those two facts is not at all direct or even close — there’s a lot of really complex circumstances in between them, and if you’re not willing to get a grip on all that complex stuff, then you’re probably not smart enough to be participating in this debate at all.
@Saad #32
I try to figure out where I stand in this debate. I think I was leaning towards kristijan, Giliell and Davids position but you made some good points that made me think.
I have never been a Muslim. Still people assume that I am (or at least that I am an “ex”) because of my name and my North African ancestry. So I get at least a some of the fall-out of anti-muslim bigotry. I think I therefore understand partially where you come from on a personal level (however and different from you, this is due to the way I am perceived and not who I am).
I see the difference between someone like you attacking Islam, someone like Ayaan Hirsi Ali or if it is someone like Geller. I somewhat feel strongly that if people say things that fan bigotry, intentionally or unintentionally, we have to say something. We seem not to have any disagreement when it comes to people like Geller on that point.
I find the example of Ayaan Hirsi Ali more difficult already. She says a lot of things that are straight out wrong or at best totally one-sided. I think if someone makes the right point but for the wrong reasons or faulty arguments, these arguments should be called out, independently who made them. I am not entirely sure too which extent we disagree on that point.
The third case and your main point I find most difficult. Because language can cause unintentional harm even if things are said that might be legitimate. At the same time I understand your frustration and you gave some good examples from other areas (feminism, anti-semitism).
Trying to figure out where I stand I wondered if the problem is that it is not such a simple dichotomy (i.e. for some it is ok, for others it is not to say certain things).
On one hand I assume there are things that you would find ok to call out even if expressed by an ex-muslim (I think you somehow admit this when saying for example that “Hirsi Ali’s support for force against Muslims does not overlap with the ex-Muslim experience.”). On the other hand it is also a question how the criticism is placed. If I disagree with you on the use of a term, it does not necessarily mean that I invalidate your whole personal experience. To take up your example:
First, I fear it is often not easy to have these spaces clearly delimited. Second, do you think it is ok for anyone to say in that case “I think X is misandrist and not helpful while the point made is a legitimate one, important and should indeed be the focus of the discussion”? That is how I would have tried to solve the dilemma so far. If you think not, do you in effect argue for complete “rhetorical immunity” in certain spaces for certain groups?
@David Marjanović #31
If your question was not meant to be sarcastic: This case is in fact probably a good example of how “objective” rules are used to discriminate against specific groups.
(Source: BBC)
The psychology of any human being is a complex thing, swayed and determined by myriad factors, but I’m concerned with the way such broad concepts like “social, economic and political conditions” are wielded so effortlessly by some as a kind of exculpatory phenomena. We are all slaves to “social, economic and political conditions” (whatever they may be) but these should only be trotted out as a means of plotting wider psychological trends (e.g. how the average person may or may not be expected to react given certain conditions) rather than as justifications for individual acts. I’m not going to get all Sartrean here, but I think even in the most adverse conditions we still retain the possibility of choice in all our reactions, no matter how circumscribed that range of choices may be. In examining what may motivate someone to act with indiscriminate violence against the world, we should of course take all available factors into account, but that involves much more than vague handwaving in deference to the prevailing “social, economic and political conditions”. In the case of the Charlie Hebdo shooters, of course we need to take into account the sense of alienation and economic disenfranchisement they may have felt, but that begs the next question: were they more alienated or disenfranchised than all other Parisians? Do all alienated and disenfranchised Parisians react to their plight with such violence? If not, how are we to treat these “social, economic and political conditions” as motivational factors? At what point should we take into account issues of individual volition and conscience – including those derived from prevailing religious norms – as well?
The problem with socio-economic explanations of behaviour, in my view, is that they often carry with them the unfortunate implication that there are some people who simply lack the adequate agency to have chosen – and to therefore be held accountable – for what they have done. They are mere marionettes, passive victims, jerked this way and that by the vicissitudes of history. That, I think, is a little bit dehumanising. If you asked the Charlie Hebdo shooters – or any other perpetrator of nominally “religious” violence, for that matter – why they did what they did, their answers will be couched in quite coherent, heavily-moralised rhetoric drawn from the religious milieu from which they emerged: why do we not take these claims seriously? If someone believes they have acted morally, in deference to their understanding of their religion, why do we not believe them? Why do we have to presume that they must have been pushed into desperate acts, completely against their will, by vague social forces that differ, clearly, from case to case? Religious violence has been a common factor across all demographics – from the poor and rich, the minority and majority, the free to the subjugated – so what’s the most pertinent factor we should examine? Furthermore, isn’t this somewhat insulting to believers? To suggest that the spectres of vaguely intuited social forces burn with greater luminescence upon the conscience that the almighty spirit of God? Is it really too outlandish to suggest that the only common element in all religious violence is – in however corrupted a form – religion itself?
@Raging Bee #33
Yep, I agree. I was trying to point out that that’s were some confusion might lie. There are people who criticize Islam who are prejudiced against muslims. That there are legitimate reasons to criticize Islam’s foundational texts might muddle things up; some people (cough, Sam Harris and Bill Maher) then take advantage of the later when doing the former.
Absolutely: there are far more important factors at play. And it’s much easier to criticize text than deal with the societies where all this is actually taking place.
@David Marjanović:
I’m with you on the picking of nits. My feelings on this thread are generous towards everyone, but I had the benefit of coming in after Saad and thus starting from a different perspective. I think if I had come in before that, I might have come in just to drop a comment largely agreeing with/supporting you.
I think a bit differently now.
If there’s one place where I might help, would it be useful if
was rewritten
If it’s meaning has been rendered incoherent, there certainly a very legitimate sense in which
is true. I actually think that’s the sense intended by Haider.
Do you object to that expression?
I’d say that the problem isn’t the term. A word is just a collection of sounds we give meaning to.
I see and understand the problem: Conservative and islamist muslims throw that term around whenever somebody criticises Islam or their behaviour. They are using to therm to deflect criticism, hiding behind the very real discrimination muslims are suffering.
Do you think this would be different if everybody stopped using “islamophobia” and used “anti-muslim bigotry” instead? Sure, it would describe the thing more accurately, but I think as soon as it got hold the same reactionary forces would use it instead.
The language of social justice is constantly apropriated by reactionaries. Just look at how CHS uses feminist terms.
Or think about “antisemitism”. Something that is real, and horrible, and deadly. Also something that gets thrown at you for suggesting that maybe turning Gaza into rubble isn’t quite a humanist action.
We also have that very same discussion about “homophobia” and “misogyny”. We are all aware that homophobes aren’t actually afraid of gay people and are not suffering from a clinical condition like claustrophobia. And most misogynists will be quick to point out that they have wives and daughters and mothers and that they really don’t hate women.
+++
The problem I see with Haider isn’t her use or discussion of the term, but that she lauds the very people who have been criticised long and often, by the very people here among others, for their decisive anti muslim bigotry (if you prefer that term): Maher, Dawkins, Harris, Hirsi Ali. Those people are not actually just criticising Islam and harmful politics and practises. Those people actively fuel hatred and bigotry against muslims and “anybody who could conceivably look muslim.”
BTW, in very good news, the islamic conservative party of Erdogan has just lost big in the Turkish elections. Instead of getting 2/3 of all seats as they thought they would so they could change the constitution Russian style to make Erdogan more powerful, they lost their absolute majority of seats and liberal parties were the winner.
Giliell @ 38:
Obviously, every situation is deeper than the word[s] used to describe it, but I think the main consideration here would be whether or not losing Islamophobia would be helpful to the majority of ex-Muslims. If actively losing that term in favour of one which requires more thought would help in the long run, then it’s worth considering and doing.
Caine
Absolutely! I’m not invested in words per se. They change, they change meaning, connotations and stuff. I’m interested in the concepts behind them. “It’s harmful for a very marginalised minority” is a very good argument.
@ Giliell #39
Hurray! Anything that drags the Overton window leftwards and secular-wards is spiffing as far as I’m concerned.
Giliell, #38
This I agree wholeheartedly with. It would be better if ex-Muslims would stop using bigots like Harris to make points. I think they do so because these people are world famous and would help get attention to the topic from never-Muslim atheists. But we shouldn’t really need them, because 1) Dawkins, Harris and Maher know jack shit about life under a Muslim system compared to ex-Muslims, and 2) the fight against Islamic oppression of secular people has to be led by ex-Muslims/reformist Muslims. It’s like if a famous white man was trying to be the main voice against racism and unknown black activists would just keep quoting him in their speeches to make their points. We need someone with the fame of Dawkins or Harris of our own. I know we’ll get there eventually. Our progress just lags frustratingly behind.
On the term Islamophobia:
Accusations of hating Islam and being ashamed of your heritage is something we face from Muslims regularly. This is particularly the case with the parent-to-child situation. This charge isn’t fair but they feel justified to use it, because after all, we are criticizing both Islam and the cultural heritage we come from. The anti-Muslim bigot accusation they can’t really use against us, because then they’d be accusing us of mistreating Muslim human beings. And they know we don’t do that. That’s all there is to it. People can keep using the term if they like, it just makes me cringe a little bit.
I don’t know. A lot of the dress codes don’t make a lot of sense to me, but noone seems to question those. What sense is there in spaghetti schoulders straps being against the dress code?
The respons of the school is that the dress code doesn’t mention long clothing pieces in any way. But there is a rule that clothing can’t impede mobility.
@ Saad, I wanted to thank you for showing there is a better term in place of islamophobia. “Anti-muslim bigotry” is spot on, and much more accurate. I have always hated “islamophobia” because the term itself implies those who criticizes the content of Islam are Islamophobes. It also tends to be a conversation stopper when it is hurled at another party in a debate. I think one can criticize Islam without being an anti-muslim bigot. Here is my vote that we start to use that in place of Islamophobia, when it is justified.
Well, the AKP may not be as powerful as it once was, but since its likely coalition partner is going to be the fucking Grey Wolves, I wouldn’t call it a victory for the liberal side.
Saad
Thanks for that perspective. I only looked at the larger picture and not at the intra-family aspect
I actually never really liked the word “islamophobia” as it is true that it can be easily used against legitimate critique. Ironically, I started to use it as an alternative to calling out specific racism that these days so often comes disguised as alleged critique of Islam. I grew tired of getting sidetracked every time with the “but Islam is not a race…” discussion. Thinking of it I have almost given up on the term “Islamophobia” too as it triggers the same kind of standard response by now. A response that admittedly at this point I do also answer more by reflex than real engagement.
“Anti-Muslim bigotry” as an expression does not work that well in German unfortunately.
@David Marjanovic #31
No, it doesn’t. Assert your opinion as confidently as you want; the facts are otherwise. I provided a link to an English-language blog that reproduces a graph by two sociologists who looked at CH’s covers over a period of 10 years. You obviously didn’t read it.
It contradicts your assertion.
http://michael-balter.blogspot.com/2015/02/was-charlie-hebdo-obsessed-with-islam.html
Here’s the original piece by sociologists Jean-François Mignot and Céline Goffette. It’s in French (I don’t speak French, so all I know about their article is what I’ve seen discussed on Anglophone blogs.)
http://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2015/02/24/non-charlie-hebdo-n-est-pas-obsede-par-l-islam_4582419_3232.html
Thumper: Who Presents Boxes Which Are Not Opened wrote:
I tend to dislike the word because it makes it seem like the religion of Islam is the party primarily harmed by the behaviour being tagged with that term rather than the adherents (i.e. people). The other terms you mentioned are more people orientated.
Regardless, I don’t take issue with others using the term, and this will probably be the only time I really bring it up. I only avoid it myself, because I don’t want to conflate harm to an ideology with harm done to people.
@ #50
“I don’t want to conflate harm to an ideology with harm done to people.”
How do you harm an ideology?
tomh wrote:
By showing it’s premises to be false? Between anti-blasphemy laws and those that demand respect for their beliefs, there is a lot of people who believe their ideas can be harmed.
But I’m also not completely naive. Obviously plenty of xenophobia hides by pretending to be cultural/religious/etc criticism.
@ ck
I’ve always defined Islamophobia as anti-Muslim bigotry, to borrow Saad’s phrase. In the same way that homophobia, in common useage, is bigotry against homosexuals or people who are perceived as homosexuals, Islamophobia is bigotry against Muslims and people perceived as Muslim.
It’s never occurred to me that some people may view it as denoting harm to an ideology. I guess I don’t see ideologies as capable of being harmed in any meaningful sense of the word, and even if they were it would be entirely unimportant to me. But there are people out there who care very much about “harm” to ideologies, so perhaps some people do interpret the phrase to mean that? It doesn’t make any sense to me, I’m afraid.
@ Lady Mondegreen: wait, so you are refuting a claim about CH with a study that you can’t read? Have you examined the study’s methodology? How they collected and then analyzed their data? The soundness of their conclusions? I don’t read CH, but I doubt you do either. Lets stop pretending to be sure of things we can’t be sure about.
@ Thumper, #53
The problem arises when people conflate criticism of the content of Islam with bigotry against muslim people. Islamophobia has been used to mean both things.
“that us white Western opponents of Islamic idiocy do need to add careful qualifiers when speaking about Islam that are not necessary when discussing Catholicism or Protestantism.”
I agree with most everything in this post except for this sentence. Islam is not a race. The only possible thing that could lessen any particular Muslim critique would be if the person were “Christian”, and I don’t imagine that describes too many people in here. “White” and “Western” should’t matter.
Idiocy is idiocy, and the color of the person exposing that idiocy matters not one whit. The religion of that person, however, does have some relevance.
I also disagree with this: “there are among us people who are literally opponents of the right of Muslims to even exist.” You may not agree with Pamela Geller’s rhetoric or her methods, but it outright lying to suggest that she promotes or condones Muslim genocide. PZ got a lot of crap from Christians for desecrating a cracker and nobody here thinks he’s an anti-White Christian bigot. Muslims don’t have a cracker but they do have an insane prohibition on drawing Mohammed, so that’s what she did. Similar stunt, exposing the same idiocy.
Doubtless she would find much common ground with Haider – and may of the commenters here – on the larger issues. So would Harris or Maher or Dawkins or Ali, and, Saad notwithstanding, none of those people are bigots.
One other point I agree with Saad on – “the fight against Islamic oppression of secular people has to be led by ex-Muslims/reformist Muslim.” A minor quibble first – Islam oppresses other religions as well as the secular, a fact which also must be reformed. But this reformation by necessity will come from within the religion – a nearly impossible task as decentralised as it is. Christians had their Peace of Westphalia moment centuries ago, and here’s hoping that when a similar moment finally arrives for Muslims it will be preceded by a lot less warfare and killing.
Based on what has been going on in the Middle East for the last quarter century as well as the potential for nuclear warfare I’m not optimistic.
In the meantime, the religion (Islam) is doing some real harm and those of us that oppose honor killing and genital mutilation and want to promote freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and human rights shouldn’t have to check to see what color our skin is before speaking out about those things.
Tom Weiss:
No one said that. Geller does spew a ton of hate, and advocate war, and many absurd conspiracy theories, but that’s not the same thing, and so far, I can’t find any example of anyone here, except you, saying they are the same thing.
No. Not at all.
There may be some issues on which we might find common ground with Geller, but at the level of “the larger issues” Geller is so wrong her approach to thinking about other people actually disgusts me.
Tom Weiss
Doing this
<blockquote>paste copied text here</blockquote>
Results in this
It makes comments with quotes easier to read.
Naaaaaaaah, she merely advocate ethnic cleansing and/or, depending on her mood, systematic disenfranchisement of people based on their grandparents’ religion.
@lemurcatta #54
Did you bother to check the Michael Balter link in Lady Mondegreen’s #49 post?
If you had, you might have found the chart (in French but readily understandable) and some supporting comments (in English), make your “Lets stop pretending to be sure of things we can’t be sure about.” both snarky and unnecessary.
Is there a transcript of her speech somewhere? I can watch the video, but I’d like to save the text itself if possible.
@AthesitPilgrim
Unbelievable. The smugness of this place never ceases to amaze me. Yes, I did indeed follow that link and I looked at the graph. Are you aware how easy it is to manipulate graphs and misrepresent data? Have you ever seen the huge body of literature (started by French sociologists and philosophers, I might add) on how science (and social science) is a human enterprise and subject to biases? While I have no idea how the linked study was conducted (could have been above the board and well done), it is horribly poor form to use science you don’t understand in support of your arguments (or in Lady Mondegreen’s post, the argument itself). In science, we do not readily accept a paper’s findings without first at least doing a cursory glance at how the investigators conducted their study.
You do not get to mine one graph from a paper and start making claims about reality with it