“We must not allow Draconian political correctness and the cult of Islamophobia to impede debate on New Fundamentalism”

In Britain, like our cousins in the United States, we pride ourselves in our freedom of self-expression. National debate is characterized by an inclusive and liberal marketplace of ideas that encourages the co-operative spirit of discussion. We have become so inured to this privilege that we take its very existence for granted. Extremely rarely, in fact, do we have cause to defend it.

In the last decade, the UK has found itself caught in a web of appeasement of a new wave of religious fundamentalism. There exists a danger that soon discussion over issues of sharia law, faith schools, and Islamic attitudes to women and homosexuals will be no longer deemed acceptable in the public sphere. Religious fundamentalism will go by unchallenged out of fear of violating the Draconian orthodoxy of political correctness, coloured and regimented by the multiculturalist invention of ‘Islamophobia’.

First conceived in 1997 by the Runnymede Institute, a UK-based pro-multiculturalist lobby, ‘Islamophobia’ is a neologism which purports to mean ‘irrational fear or hatred of the Islamic religion and Islamic people’. Since the September 11^th terrorist attacks, the word has gained parlance, and while the concept may appear outwardly benign, its ever-growing usage has steadily become synonymous with political opportunism and fundamentalist apologia.

At present, the task of opposing these radical wedge-tactics is an onerous and often ineffectual affair. But the muted responses of the political left are as much a cause for consternation. Religious watchdogs like Runnymede, who routinely hand-out gagging orders to anyone who expresses concern over the activities of minority faith-groups, act under liberal aegis. And these conditions exist, in part, due to the success of the multiculturalist lobby in toxifying the system of free debate by declaring any resistance as inherently reactionary. The malevolent handiwork of the burgeoning ‘Islamophobia cult’ it would seem has succeeded in its goal of stigmatizing all criticism of Islam as cultural ignorance.

But who are the ‘Islamophobes’? One serial offender is Pat Condell, a comedian turned web pundit, known for his anti-religious views and opposition to Islamism. Condell has been said to embody the new breed of “crypto-fascist in atheist’s clothing” alongside the likes of Sam Harris, the American writer accused of using atheism as a subterfuge for neoconservative interventionism. Condell has iterated that he is an anti-theist and critic of Islam, and not a racist, and repudiates allegations of Islamophobia by claiming that his opposition is an entirely sensible response to how modern-day Islam presents itself.

But Condell is not alone in his being censored by this new order. The vanguard of the international anti-fundamentalist movement, which includes eminent journalist and essayist Christopher Hitchens and Booker Prize winning author Salman Rushdie, have received fervid opposition from groups such as the risible, quasi-Orwellian ‘Islamophobia Watch’. Rushdie himself co-signed a petition entitled ‘Together Facing the New Totalitarianism’ which included eleven other distinguished signatories from the academic world, denouncing “Islamophobia” as ‘wretched concept that confuses criticism of Islam as a religion and stigmatisation of those who believe in it.’ But just why is objection to radical religion suddenly the new face of supposed bigotry?

One of the more unfortunate consequences of the popular usage of ‘Islamophobia’ is how the separate phenomena of Islam and radical Islam have become conflated and distorted. Under the tenets of ‘Islamophobia’, to take issue against radicalism is to demonize all moderate practitioners of the faith. Even attacks on the plainly unsavoury aspects of Koranic doctrine (it’s attitudes towards women’s emancipation and homosexuality, etc.) have been disregarded as intolerant bully-tactics.

Backlash against the word’s usage has been, justifiably, omnipresent. Within months of the Runnymede Institute first conceiving the term it faced devastating rebuke by secularist critics. Many have addressed, foremost, the semantic issues engendered by labelling criticism of religion as racism, since ‘Islam’ denotes a belief system and not an ethnic group. But there is another glaring issue at hand. If something is designated ‘Islamophobic’, it must be, according to definition, an ‘irrational fear or hatred’ – which smacks of chauvinism. Surely, when all criticism is inherently ‘irrational’ then the very essence of our democracy evaporates into the ether. The fulcrum of this is simple: when radical Islam cannot be legitimately criticized, we are powerless to its effects.

So, it would appear that “Islamophobia” is everything the closet fundamentalist could wish for: a delusory, emotive, fallacious, and vindictive word that violates every identifiable cornerstone of free speech. Never has the very abuse of language been so devastating to our ability to engage in democratic debate.

At present, we have reached an epoch in the history of the West where the question of fundamentalism is particularly sensitive. The attacks on New York ten years ago have irrevocably informed American views (and vicariously the views of the West) on Islam and fundamentalism. The more diplomatic responses to the tragedy have been for us not to overreact. However, ten years after 9/11, and no closer to resolving the terrorist threat, it appears we may have in fact under-reacted.

The lack of action to combat the looming spectre of religious fundamentalism is undoubtedly the cause for this common complaint. What has become ever apparent in the last decade is that this is neither the product of ignorance nor of apathy. The climate of acceptable opinion is so that should one voice objection to Islamic totalitarianism they be branded a bigot. With this in mind, it would not be entirely inappropriate to say that Islamophobia as a concept is an effective form of intellectual terrorism, serving as a fitting compliment to the violent extremism that it enables.

Of upmost importance now, however, is what can and must be done. Firstly, we cannot allow the false promotion of the idea that the progenitors of radicalism are somehow not part and parcel of the wider Islamic community. Defenders of free speech must counter the growing acceptance of ‘Islamophobia’ as a socio-political phenomenon and instead promote the correct assertion that, by placing a cap on free debate, advocates of ‘Islamophobia’ are indirectly assisting extremism. Instead of stonewalling discussion on Islam with maudlin repetitions on media bias and ‘Islamophobia’, moderate practitioners of faith ought to be encouraged to participate in the war on fundamentalism – after all, it is in their own interests.

If leaders of the Islamic community set out resolutely to isolate the destructive minority within modern-day Islam, instead of reiterating the useless tautology that “most of us aren’t extremists” (well, duh), then perhaps those of us who aren’t ashamed to censure terrorism would no longer need court the stereotype of being cantankerous, right-wing ‘Islamophobes’.

By developing a cult around ‘Islamophobia’ and attempting to deflect all opposition to radical Islam as veiled racism, certain Muslims have succeeded instead in widening the gulf between Islam and the rest of the world – least of all by generating the public perception that Muslims are refusing to play a role in confronting religious extremism.

The overarching fact being, on the subject of fundamentalism, the perceived ‘culture war’ between Islam and the secular world is illusory: eradicating extremism should be the common goal of all in a civilized society. And if this latest breed of political correctness disapproves then maybe that’s a good sign we ought to collectively jettison it.

Izzy Scrimshire

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