What is "Islamophobia," anyway?
Robert Spencer
In an article
yesterday, the journalist and Islamic apologist Stephen Schwartz defined
"Islamophobia" this way:
Notwithstanding the arguments of some Westerners, Islamophobia exists;
it is not a myth. Islamophobia consists of:
• attacking the entire religion of Islam as a problem for the world;
• condemning all of Islam and its history as extremist;
• denying the active existence, in the contemporary world, of a
moderate Muslim majority;
• insisting that Muslims accede to the demands of non-Muslims
(based on ignorance and arrogance) for various theological changes, in
their religion;
• treating all conflicts involving Muslims (including, for
example, that in Bosnia-Hercegovina a decade ago), as the fault of
Muslims themselves;
• inciting war against Islam as a whole.
While there may be by this definition some Islamophobes in the world,
the definition actually obscures more than it reveals. Does the labeling
as “Islamophobic” the practice of “attacking the entire religion of
Islam as a problem for the world” mean that it is Islamophobic to focus
attention on the Qur’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet as motivations for
terrorist activity? If so, then jihad terrorists worldwide are themselves
“Islamophobic,” for as we have seen, they routinely point to jihad
passages from the Qur’an and Hadith to justify their actions. Nor is a
frank discussion of the doctrine of Islamic jihad equivalent to saying
that the “entire religion of Islam” is a “problem for the world: no
one is saying that tayammum (ablution with sand instead of water)
or dhikr (a dervish religious devotion) or other elements of
Islam pose a problem for the world.
Defining as “Islamophobic” the condemnation of “all of Islam and
its history as extremist” is similarly problematic — and not just
because of the sloppy imprecision of the word “extremist.” Jihad and
dhimmitude are and always have been part of Islam. Yet no religious
commandment of any religion has ever been uniformly observed by its
adherents, and no law has ever been universally enforced. Jews and
Christians in Islamic lands were able at various times and places to live
with a great deal of freedom; however, this does not contradict the fact
that the laws of the dhimma always remained on the books, able to be
enforced anew by any Muslim ruler with the will to do so.
Likewise, it may be “Islamophobic” to deny “the active existence,
in the contemporary world, of a moderate Muslim majority,” but this also
is beside the point. The existence of a moderate Muslim majority is not a
question of “Islamophobia” or lack thereof, but of fact. But it is a
fact that is very hard to ascertain with certainty -- not least because of
the problem of definition: it’s useless to affirm that there is a
“moderate Muslim majority” without clearing up the meaning of the word
“moderate.” What makes a moderate Muslim? One who does not and never
will engage in terrorist acts? That would make moderates an overwhelming
majority of Muslims worldwide. Or is a moderate one who sincerely
disapproves of those terrorist acts? That would reduce the number of
moderates. Or is a moderate Muslim one who actively speaks out and works
against the jihadists? That would lower the number yet again. Or finally,
is a moderate Muslim one who actively engages the jihadists in a
theological battle, trying to convince Muslims on Islamic grounds that
jihad terrorism is wrong? That would leave us with a tiny handful.
Notwithstanding that fact, however, it would be silly for anyone to
treat “all conflicts involving Muslims…as the fault of Muslims
themselves,” or to incite “war against Islam as a whole.” To go to
war with Islam as a whole — grizzled sheepherders in Kazakhstan and
giggly secretaries in Jakarta as well as bin Laden and Zarqawi — would
be absurd and unnecessary. But what does Schwartz really mean by saying
that those who would advocate “war against Islam as a whole” are “Islamophobic”?
Would that include among the Islamophobes those who recognize that Islamic
jihad has been declared against us and advocate resistance to that jihad?
All this indicates that “Islamophobia” is virtually useless as an
analytical tool. To adopt it would be to allow oneself to submit to the
most virulent form of theological equivalence, and to affirm, against all
the evidence, that every religious tradition is equally capable of
inspiring violence. It would be to deny the very sensible observation of
the eminent atheist (and, late in life, theist, but not Christian)
philosopher Antony
Flew (thanks to Daniel): “Jesus is an enormously attractive
charismatic figure, which the Prophet of Islam most emphatically is
not.” To recognize this is not base theological one-upmanship, but a
step toward the recovery of realism in the analysis of Islamic jihad, and
of a sense that in Western civilization there is something worth
defending.
Even worse than all this, however, is the way the charge of
“Islamophobia” is used to silence opponents of the jihad ideology --
as has been illustrated abundantly at Jihad Watch and Dhimmi Watch.
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