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Defining Islamophobia

By Alice Aslan - posted Thursday, 8 January 2009


In his opinion piece “What’s wrong with Islamophobia” in On Line Opinion recently, Professor Nick Haslam, an academic psychologist, suggests that the term “Islamophobia” along with homophobia and xenophobia are misleading and inappropriate terms. Based on psychological research, he argues that prejudices are “not individual pathologies”, and not born out of emotions such as fear and anxiety, but are “collectively shared and organised phenomena”. Therefore describing such social phenomena as “phobia” equates it with mental disorder.

First of all, English dictionaries describes “phobia” not only as fear and anxiety, but also as aversion and dislike. Also Islamophobia is not meant to be a psychological term that examines individuals’ emotions and attitudes towards Muslims and Islam. Although it might sometimes draw on psychology, it is mainly an anthropological/sociological term that points to contemporary racism against Muslims. If we remember that all racism is born out of specific social, political, economic and historical circumstances, Islamopobia embodies all these complex issues.

After World War II, it became unacceptable worldwide to discriminate against migrants and minorities based on their race. And since the 70s a new form of racism emerged in Western societies that legitimises discrimination against migrants based on their cultural differences. (Stolcke, Verena (1995) “Talking Culture: New Boundaries, New Rhetorics of Exclusion in Europe”, Current Anthropology, February 1995, Volume: 36, No:1.)

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From an anthropological/sociological perspective, Islamophobia is a new form of cultural racism that refers to the marginalisation and exclusion of Muslims based on their cultural and religious differences. (Birt, Yahya (2006) Notes On Islamophobia.) The term “Islamophobia” was coined in English around 1991 when a religious-political revival began to emerge in the Muslim world with the end of the Cold War, and when around the same period Muslim minorities became more politically active and more visible in Western Europe.

Social anthropologist Pnina Werbner suggests that Islamophobia contains “a very post-modern kind of fear”. (Werbner, Pnina (2005) “Incitement to religious hatred-legislating for a new fear?, Anthropology Today, Volume 21, No:1, February.) This is the fear of the spread of political Islam, which is generally known as “Islamism”, in Europe and in other Western countries, and the fear of the triumph of Islamism over democratic, liberal and secular values.

It is feared that Islamism might eventually destroy the progressive outcomes of the Reformation and the Enlightenment, and erase all the rights and values that the permissive societies in the post-modern Western world enjoys today such as anti-essentialism; cultural relativism; tolerance of difference; freedom of speech; secularism; separation of state and religion; sexual permissiveness; human rights; women’s rights; homosexual rights; minority rights.

In the end, Islamic theocracy and religious law sharia might replace the liberal and secular democracy making the free individuals of Western societies suffer under the iron fist of mullahs, Muslim religious leaders.

Werbner underlines that racism is an incapacity to cope with resemblance as well as difference. In a similar vein, Islamophobia does not only arises from the differences of Islam; but in Western societies, the political Islam conjures up the domination of the Church over the soul and its stranglehold over the body for centuries in European history.

Islamism evokes the ghost of puritanical Christianity and its constant attacks on the permissive society; the Crusaders; European sectarian wars; the Inquisition; moral crusades. Thus the opposition to Islam and Muslim minorities in Europe and in other Western countries is in fact resistance to the return of puritanical Christianity and the Church - metaphorically the Grand Inquisitor- which the Europeans struggled against for a long time and made tremendous sacrifices to overthrow, in the form of political Islam.

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Islamophobia is a unique form of racism since Muslims, who are perceived as a Trojan horse that might help Islamism conquer the Western societies from within, are feared across classes and nations unlike in other main types of racisms in the West such as the racism against Blacks and Jews.

Although Blacks and Jews are perceived as a threat mainly among the uneducated working class and lower middle class, the fear of Muslims is not confined to only these parochial classes. It also overtakes the intellectuals and elites in Western societies. These intellectuals and elites displace their fear of Islam on all Muslim minorities with the discourse they generate against Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism, despite the fact that most Muslim migrants appreciate and enjoy the rights and freedoms in the West and do not share the fundamentalist Islamic views.

Such an anti-Islam discourse constructs an image of the Muslim folk Devil as the Muslim religious fanatic and the Muslim violent terrorist - which Pnina Werbner calls “the Islamic Grand Inquisitor”- who is aggressive, upfront and morally superior unlike the so-called subservient Blacks and assimilated Jews. And Islamophobia unites intellectual elites, consumerist masses and the real violent racists against this very different post-modern Muslim folk devil.

I agree with Professor Nick Haslam that we should be careful not to stigmatise people who criticise Islam and Muslims as Islamophobic. But on the other hand if most of the criticism about Islam comes down to “Islam is evil and violent”, then then we need to be critical of this.

Criticism and free speech are very important and should be encouraged for social progress. Lack of criticism leaves people vulnerable to political manipulation; for instance most people in Western societies succumbed to political manipulation and supported the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. But as a society we all need to understand what criticism really means. Saying that “there are such and such human rights violations in such and such Muslim countries” is criticism that can open up productive debate. But saying that “Islam is evil and violent” is essentialism that means “evil” and “violence” are essence of Islam, and consequently everything and everyone related to Islam is evil and violent. This essentialist statement blocks any conversation and debate.

Any philosophy or religion can turn into an authoritarian and violent ideology and regime in the hands of the wrong people who seeks endless power and dominance over others. For example, mostly Christian democratic Western societies invaded Afghanistan and Iraq in the name of human rights and killed over a million people. But we do not say democracy, human rights and Christianity are evil and violent.

Furthermore, Islam is compatible with democracy and human rights like any other religion. In fact, the results of a largest survey to date of Muslims indicate that majority of over one billion Muslims from different cultural, ethnic, linguistic and geographic backgrounds condemn religious fundamentalism and terrorism, and value democracy and freedoms such as the freedom of speech in the West. (BBC News Online (2008), Most Muslims “Desire Democracy”.)

And when we look at the contemporary global political picture, what encourages and legitimises terrorism and use of violence in the world today is the state terrorism, or the disproportionate use of power if you like, by the US and powerful states like Israel in the name of self defence and the international community that watches this in silence.

Unlike Professor Nick Haslam, I believe we should not shy away from using the term “Islamophobia” as well as homophobia and xenophobia. The discourse on Islamophohia and the term itself does not aim to stigmatise people as Islamophobic, but like the term “racism” it helps us recognise and understand a specific social problem and tackle it head-on.

What blocks any dialogue and debate is essentialist statements about Islam and Muslims rather than the use of the word “Islamophobia”. Through ongoing discussion at public platforms, we need to convince people that essentialist expressions are not criticism. In this society that has contributed to the destruction of Muslim societies in the Middle East, Muslims are a minority like Indigenous Australians, Asians, Jews, homosexuals and others; and essentialist beliefs like “Islam is evil and violent” leaves them vulnerable to discrimination and shuts them out of the society.

Most important of all, we always need to remember that in this society everyone has something to say, and every culture has something to offer.

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About the Author

Alice Aslan is an artist, thinker and activist passionate about arts, culture, ideas, justice and wildlife.

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