“Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.” This is a proposed definition urged on the Government by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims. Let’s ponder it for a few moments.
Some people who hate Islam or Muslims or both are undoubtedly racists. But are all of them? We don’t believe so, for two main reasons. First, some are members of the same race – if that is quite the right term here – as very many Muslims themselves. It would not be easy to postulate a racial difference between, say, a Hindu and a Muslim originating from the Punjab. Second, others clearly detest Islam or Muslims for religious reasons, not racial ones.
We believe that hating Muslims is always wrong and hating Islam completely unreasonable. Then again, much hangs what one means by Islam. Like Judaism and Christianity, its fellow Abrahamic religions, Islam is a vast, multi-faceted, complex faith.
This site has always maintained that a distinction can and should be drawn between Islam and Islamism. The first is a great religion, the majority manifestation of which, throughout its history, has been the traditional, classical variety. The second is a politicised variant – a kind of bastard child of Salafist practice and western technology. ISIS are at one of its scale and the Muslim Brotherhood at another. On our view, one should be phobic about it. [ConservativeHome] Read more
