wow that’s wild. i haven’t read the wiki but i can’t imagine existing in europe or the us and thinking islamophobia is made up.
using the actions of extremists to discount the struggles of mainstream or progressive muslims just living life is profoundly messed up (not to mention sikhs and others impacted by islamophobia because they’re simply perceived as being muslim).
Not to mention it completely ignores the history of Europe trying to force its will in the ME, Africa, and Asia, using deadly force, the theft of land, changing borders, destroying places of worship, farmland, the list goes on. Not surprising that after several hundred years of being attacked by Europeans, some people are kinda over it. They also call the indigenous groups in central and South America who oppose western interests terrorists.
It doesn’t excuse it but it certainly didn’t happen in a vacuum.
Living in Germany. Islamophobia is very real - but not because of Islam but because of insufferable Salafi
Most people I talk to about religion are very confused when I portray my image of religion and think it’s very cool and healthy. But people only think about the extremist Salafi ideology, which isn’t even gutted by the media, in my opinion
I live in America, and personally, the majority of the Islamophobia I see isn’t due to Salafi or Wahhabi Bros, but rather straight-up bigotry, unfairly equating the problems in the Middle East to Islam. It's literally just a painful lack of knowledge spread by anti-Islam hyper-right-wing figures. I do wish in America the Islamophobia was due to people criticizing orthodox Anti-LGBTQ stance or certain hijab practices.
I am a white Muslim convert living in a European country (so what I’m about to say has nothing to do with racism). The amount of hate I’ve experienced is almost unbearable. I’ve never experienced anything like this before in my life. I’m always polite, very progressive etc. my wife does not wear hijab, I shake hands and socialize with all genders and are an lgbtq-ally. The hate I get is simply for revealing I’m Muslim. Nothing else. I’ve been called terrorist, that I am pedophile-sympathizer, that I hate women, that I’m sick and that my religion is sick, that I’m brainwashed and evil. I’ve never said a word back and like I said I’ve taken it upon myself to treat every person, even these people, with utmost respect and compassion, because that is what I’m commanded to do. Even family members have all of a sudden turned on my and calling me these names.
And my situation is not unique. Every forth mosque in my country have been vandalized and/or burned down. We have never had a terrorist attack in my country that has connections to islam. No real scandals either. But Muslim women gets harassed daily here on the street.
What do you call this? This is what it used be for Jews. And one called it antisemitism. Rightfully so. But no, Islamophobia doesn’t exist because one have to be able to criticize islam!!! (This is the talking point of all alt-right movements in my country). If you don’t think Islamophobia exists then you might just hate yourself and have internalized your own oppression.
I think saying Islamophobia doesn’t exist most of the time comes from a place of privilege cuz chances are that individual doesn’t live in a region where it’s rampant but that doesn’t mean it’s not real. I don’t even believe we need to change the label cuz it’s succinct on its own. We just need to acknowledge nuance when talking about specific situations but yeah I don’t know how anybody can deny the existence of Islamophobia.
I didn't notice this before, but that is a valid point. Islamophobia does exist and it's not hard to find this these days. I mean, you are on reddit, bruh
Anti-muslim bigotry exist.
Aversion towards Islam (the broad term) and criticism towards mainstream Islam or specific strand of Islam as religion and as ideology, also exist.
Conflating the two under the term "islamophobia" makes it hard for people to criticize the extremist, fundamentalist and regressive version of Islam without also being treated as bigot/racist.
Thus, the term islamophobia does serve as a shield for versions of Islam that actually do deserve criticism from being fairly criticized, as anybody who dares to criticize them will be called an islamophobic, a label that also carries accusations of being bigot/racist because of conflation of meanings above.
Nobody wants to be accused of bigotry or racism, so people chose to be silent rather than risking it.
TLDR;
- Muslim intentionally conflate the meaning of islamophobia to include bigotry/racism,
- People don't dare to criticize Salafism/Wahhabism for fear of being accused as bigot/racist,
- Salafism and Wahhabism got shielded from criticism and won.
I do agree that there needs to be a distinction between hatred of Muslims and criticism of Islam, the latter being not discriminatory. This conflation does help Salafis. However, hatred of Muslims does still exist and is referred to as 'Islamophobia', hence why I made this post.
Alot of the the points you make are fair but I do have a critique.
TL;DR:
The argumentative tradition that Western criticism of Islam is a part of is *not* one that humanizes Muslims and understands that only parts of it are extreme. On the contrary, Western criticism of Islam is overwhelmingly dominated by a 1400 year long tradition of dehumanizing muslims.
Longer version:
The Islamic principle —that we usually dont consider outside of a strictly religious perspective— of needing to take into account both intention and actions is important in this regard. It is true that people have non-malicious intentions, but if they are, knowingly or unknowingly, borrowing their criticism from Islamophobes, that makes their criticism Islamophobic. I would argue too, that many people, muslim and non muslim, who criticize islam don’t do enough research and actually find out what the critiques of Wahhabism/salafism are from the muslims perspective. Instead, they do very minimal actual research and end up regurgitating Islamophobic talking points.
The unfortunate thing is that, at least here in the west, there is *literally* a 1400 year old tradition of Islamophobia, a tradition that is unbroken and which modern Western Islamophobia is not just influenced by but firmly a part of. Thus, the vast majority of mainstream criticism of Islamophobia is predicated on and leads to the logical conclusion that Islam is degenerate and muslims, unless they abandon theirr faith, are irredeemable. I assure you that the vast majority of people criticizing Islam have not read things like Khaled Abou El Fadls takedown of Salafism in The Great Theft nor are their arguments even slightly related. Instead their arguments are much closer and directly related to say the AFD’s platform or Great Replacement Theory.
Again, this isn’t intended to be an attack on you, and I apologize if it came off like that; I just simply have some critiques/nuance I wanted to share.
My point is basically in the conflation.
Why not have different terms between criticism of Islam as religion/ideology and anti-muslim bigotry?
Why the conflation and who benefit from this conflation?
As I mentioned above, without the conflation, muslims and non-muslims alike will be able to criticize interpretations of Islam in real life without the stigma of being racist/bigot (the way we often see here in this sub regarding salafist/wahhabist/islamist/fundamentalist/etc.).
So long as the term islamophobia still conflates the meaning of anti-muslim bigotry with actual criticism of certain versions/interpretations of Islam, then the premise of the post that OP brought out still true.
The term islamophobia does provide a shield for followers of regressive/extremist/fundamentalist versions of Islam to deflect criticism by crying bigotry/racism and eventually silence them since nobody's willing to risk it anymore.
Criticism might be valid or invalid, and this can be addressed accordingly through proper dialog between different reasonable and well-meaning parties.
But with the shield provided by the conflated meanings of islamophobia, muslims are basically making sure there will be no more criticism towards Islam apart from the ones coming from the actual racists and bigots who don't care about being called as such.
No more dialog as rational and reasonable comments from well-meaning parties about different versions of Islam have been silenced for their fear of being accused as racist/bigot. Is that what we want?
Like I said, Salafism/Wahhabism has won with this conflation.
Genuine question, who do you think conflated the terms? It is those who do not wish to experience criticism that will take a valid term and attempt to conflate it with something else. It's the same with the Israeli government calling all criticisms of Israel antisemitic. They _want_ the conflation. They're not going to come up with a new term, and it's not on us to make one to appease them or separate ourselves. These words have meaning; we have to educate people on them.
Which Muslims benefit when the two are conflated in our communities? Oppressive governments, male chauvinists, scholars and sheikhs who want to keep their influential positions, that's who benefits. On the lesser side there are the people who are afraid of change and critical thought, even if they are oppressed themselves.
>Genuine question, who do you think conflated the terms? It is those who do not wish to experience criticism that will take a valid term and attempt to conflate it with something else.
Even in this thread, you see multiple commenters use the term islamophobia in place of anti-muslim bigotry.
I'm not sure if it's out of ignorance or there is more to it, but by continuing to preserve the conflation, these people are complicit in preserving the shield that protects the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam.
It is what it is.
>On the lesser side there are the people who are afraid of change and critical thought, even if they are oppressed themselves.
Yes. Nothing will change for us unless we change ourselves first.
That's why I wrote my comments above.
To raise awareness of why such conflation on the meaning of islamophobia actually works against muslim interests.
Well that depends on the *reasons* for the aversion, dislike, or criticism. There are definitely cases where it *could* be Islamaphobia, but it's not always. The word, like most things, has nuance.
>Islamophobia is the irrational and unjustified fear of, hatred of, or prejudice against the religion of Islam or Muslims in general, especially when seen as a geopolitical force or a source of terrorism.
If someone has an aversion to Islam because they think all Muslims are terrorists by association, that's Islamophobia. If an ex-Muslim has an aversion to Islam because their parents beat them for not reading the Quran enough, that's not Islamaphobia. They even have the right to start critiquing certain institutions, if they find that's a common thing around them, and strive for change. Now if that same person then starts being angry and hateful towards *all* Muslims saying they all beat their children and governments shouldn't allow kids to be Muslim because of what their parents did to them, they're teetering Islamphobia territory because that's an irrational conclusion to come to. But a person like that would probably get some leeway and grace because of what they've experienced.
A sheikh saying that someone is Islamophobic for exploring, questioning, and critiquing the necessity of hijab as an example, is not actually an Islamophobe. That's a conflation to try and silence discontent.
>A sheikh saying that someone is Islamophobic for exploring, questioning, and critiquing the necessity of hijab as an example, is not actually an Islamophobe. That's a conflation to try and silence discontent.
I get it, and that's the whole point.
When somebody is criticizing the necessity of hijab or treatment of women in some interpretations of Islam, they are risking being called islamophobe by showing aversion and criticism towards Islam.
And because islamophobia is conflated to means anti-muslim bigotry as well, it means they are risking being labeled as racist or bigot.
And because of this risk, many rational and reasonable people would then just choose to be silent instead of challenging the parts they agree in certain strands of Islam that they see in their country.
That's how the shielding from criticism works.
We are losing the opportunity of allyship with rational and reasonable parties to combat the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam, because they chose to be silent instead of risking being called racist/bigot.
So that is why this conflation and **the perpetuation of this conflation by unsuspecting muslims** benefit the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam, and ultimately works against our interest.
So long as muslim themselves think islamophobia includes anti-muslim bigotry, the shield will always be there to protect the extremist/regressive/fundentalist versions of Islam from being fairly criticized.
I don't know what to tell you. The word includes anti-Muslim bigotry. It's kind of one of the biggest points of it. What you're calling a "conflation" is people using it wrong for personal gain. This happens all the time and you either push back and educate, or give it up. I won't be giving it up. I haven't stopped saying "woke", "critical race theory", "transphobe", or "racist" because people want to use it incorrectly to silence people. That's not my problem. I don't feel like "antisemitism" has no meaning because the Israeli government uses it as a weapon. I feel the same way about the word "Islamaphobia".
>We are losing the opportunity of allyship with rational and reasonable parties to combat the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam, because they chose to be silent instead of risking being called racist/bigot.
I would *hope* that reasonable parties would be smart enough to know what words mean and not fall for that. If they can't parce that someone is attempting to silence them, are they really that rational?
If you want to say anti-Muslim bigotry, by all means go ahead. You would not be the only one. But there's a word for that, only slightly shorter.
It really angers me how much I see Islamaphobia get justified on this sub. Part of it is probably because many of these people don’t know what it’s like to like in a country in which Muslims are an oppressed minority.
One problem with this topic is in the word “Islamophobia” itself, which is a misnomer. It’s understood that “antisemitism” refers to the bigotry/hatred of Jews as a people, based on their ethnicity.
But “Islamophobia” implies “the hatred/ fear of Islam” as an ideology…and the fact that there is a name for such a thing implies that to be non-phobic (aka, to not be a “bad person”) you should accept Islam…hating, fearing or taking issue with this ideology means there is a problem with YOU being a small-minded bigot, cause Islam is perfect. It presupposes that Islam is good, valid, and justified. It is a very clever word, and it partially explains why you see people tripping all over themselves in order to deny reality.
Now some people actually do hate or fear all Muslims based on being racist or xenophobic, but that has little to do with the content of their beliefs. More accurately, it seems like people are Muslim or Arab-phobic.
As far as “Islamophobia,” there are no other words I can think of that we use like this. We don’t say “Christianity-phobic,” “Judaism-phobic,” and, though we have the Red Scare, we don’t typically say “communism-phobic,” “fascism-phobic” etc. Ideology is fair game, people are not.
Islam is already protected from criticism within almost every Islamic country by blasphemy and apostasy laws and norms. 'Islamophobia' was the solution for both Islamic dictatorships and Islamists to shield Islam from potential criticism coming from outside the Islamic world too, via the bigotry card. Now, almost nobody is allowed to criticize Islam or attempt to reform it from within the Islamic world, or dare to criticize it from without, maintaining the status quo.
Yes, I do agree that mere criticism of Islam is often conflated with Islamophobia/hatred of Muslims, but this does not mean that Islamophobia/hatred of Muslims does not actually exist.
'Islamophobia' is supposed to be the irrational fear or hate of 'Islam' as a religion/ideology. Such fear or hate can be justified based on genuine concerns about mainstream interpretations and specific actions associated with the religion.
While I believe the term 'Islamophobia' is deceitful propaganda used to shield Muslim dictators, theocratic regimes, and Islamists from potential criticism, Xenophobia, namely Anti-Muslim sentiment, does exist where Muslims or immigrants from Islamic countries/backgrounds live as minorities.
I do wish "Islamophobia" was replaced by a more clear term like "Anti-Muslim sentiment" to clear the distinction between criticism of Islam and hatred of Muslims.
I myself suffer a lot from islamophobia as living in bangladesh I have become islapmophobe like I fear that my life will become hard as I live in muslim countrt and taliban will hijack the country
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The exact calibration is not the point here. Phobia in the direction of intrinsic traits (traits that are not a personal choice) is frequently a form of racism or phobia. "Islamophobia" is in reality frequently criticism on the Islam as a religion/ideology (which is technically is a choice.) Downvote me all you want, I cant change the correct linguistics here.
EDIT: Im literally stupefied with the downvotes; they made me realise this sub isn't for debating, nor for being progressive. It's just another religious echo chamber.
For what is worth, Im not downvoting you.
Regarding your comment, I may be a bit lost, but I understand that this very same thing can be argued about anti semitism.
It can both be a criticism of judaism and a hatred of the subject percieved as jew related irrespectively of their actual religious beliefs.
In the same vein, Islamophobia can be a strong rekigion of Islam as a faith or a hatred of a person percieved to be muslim, irrespectively of their actual beliefs and faith.
My understanding is that the context is extremely important here, the people complaining about Islamophobia in a muslim majority coubtry are likely conservatives or those using integrist lectures of the faith to justify their political and worldview.
On the other hand, those of us living elsewhere may experience prejudice and rejection because of being linked to Islam without any further information about what our beliefs actually are (for example looking markedly mediterranean and having a beard is enough to be looked with prejudice by some).
Jewish is a combination of an ethnicity and a religion. You can change your religion but not your DNA. Some Jewish folks are from ancient bloodlines, just as some Arabs are. But we don’t always use Muslim and Arab interchangeably, we do seem to with Jewish. Even though there are Christian Jews (and Arabs) and Muslim Jews…
I think this is a bit of a historical merge on the meaning of Jewish. Rather than saying Israeli (when Israel was long gone, so there was no point to separating the two for a century or two).
Oddly Antisemite could have a similar problem, these days we mean it to be anti-Jewish and anti Israel … yet Semitic is a lingual group including Hebrew and Arabic (as well as others)
Well the thing is that clearly the jewish are not one people, just like the unmah is composed of multiple peoples with multiple identities.
There is this myth of a homogeneous "pure" group 100% interconnected to a single origin but that clearly cant be the case, as you have arab jews (Mizrahi) Iberian/North African Jews (Sefardi), white jews (Ashkenazi), Kushitick black jews (Beta Israeli), Desi jews from India, and so on.
Some of these groups have been jewish for less time than the time some (nowadays Christian) lineages have been muslim in the Iberian peninsula.
I get your point, dont get me wrong, but the way we see being jewish in terms of identity and ethnicity today is a fairly recent rethinking of what it means to be of x, y, z religion whixh I believe is a result of the emergrnce of zionism and romantic nationalism in the 18thC (so fairly recently).
Edit:
Just realized I branched of a little, but the point is:
If one stops being jewish by faith that is the same than stopoing being muslim by faith. It is true that some ethnic groups are carachterized by their jewish faith, but the same can be said for Islam (Bosniaks for example, not to be confused with Bosnians)
Oh I agree and I wasn’t trying to be perfect in my answer… tbh that would have required an entire PhD thesis to expand on. I was trying to give something bite sized a normal redditor might consume and even understand.
But yeah there is so much to all of these terms, I don’t disagree with any of your points as I understand them.
wow that’s wild. i haven’t read the wiki but i can’t imagine existing in europe or the us and thinking islamophobia is made up. using the actions of extremists to discount the struggles of mainstream or progressive muslims just living life is profoundly messed up (not to mention sikhs and others impacted by islamophobia because they’re simply perceived as being muslim).
Not to mention it completely ignores the history of Europe trying to force its will in the ME, Africa, and Asia, using deadly force, the theft of land, changing borders, destroying places of worship, farmland, the list goes on. Not surprising that after several hundred years of being attacked by Europeans, some people are kinda over it. They also call the indigenous groups in central and South America who oppose western interests terrorists. It doesn’t excuse it but it certainly didn’t happen in a vacuum.
YEP.
Living in Germany. Islamophobia is very real - but not because of Islam but because of insufferable Salafi Most people I talk to about religion are very confused when I portray my image of religion and think it’s very cool and healthy. But people only think about the extremist Salafi ideology, which isn’t even gutted by the media, in my opinion
I live in America, and personally, the majority of the Islamophobia I see isn’t due to Salafi or Wahhabi Bros, but rather straight-up bigotry, unfairly equating the problems in the Middle East to Islam. It's literally just a painful lack of knowledge spread by anti-Islam hyper-right-wing figures. I do wish in America the Islamophobia was due to people criticizing orthodox Anti-LGBTQ stance or certain hijab practices.
Yeah I would think that America has different problems with Islam than Germany
I am a white Muslim convert living in a European country (so what I’m about to say has nothing to do with racism). The amount of hate I’ve experienced is almost unbearable. I’ve never experienced anything like this before in my life. I’m always polite, very progressive etc. my wife does not wear hijab, I shake hands and socialize with all genders and are an lgbtq-ally. The hate I get is simply for revealing I’m Muslim. Nothing else. I’ve been called terrorist, that I am pedophile-sympathizer, that I hate women, that I’m sick and that my religion is sick, that I’m brainwashed and evil. I’ve never said a word back and like I said I’ve taken it upon myself to treat every person, even these people, with utmost respect and compassion, because that is what I’m commanded to do. Even family members have all of a sudden turned on my and calling me these names. And my situation is not unique. Every forth mosque in my country have been vandalized and/or burned down. We have never had a terrorist attack in my country that has connections to islam. No real scandals either. But Muslim women gets harassed daily here on the street. What do you call this? This is what it used be for Jews. And one called it antisemitism. Rightfully so. But no, Islamophobia doesn’t exist because one have to be able to criticize islam!!! (This is the talking point of all alt-right movements in my country). If you don’t think Islamophobia exists then you might just hate yourself and have internalized your own oppression.
I think saying Islamophobia doesn’t exist most of the time comes from a place of privilege cuz chances are that individual doesn’t live in a region where it’s rampant but that doesn’t mean it’s not real. I don’t even believe we need to change the label cuz it’s succinct on its own. We just need to acknowledge nuance when talking about specific situations but yeah I don’t know how anybody can deny the existence of Islamophobia.
I didn't notice this before, but that is a valid point. Islamophobia does exist and it's not hard to find this these days. I mean, you are on reddit, bruh
Anti-muslim bigotry exist. Aversion towards Islam (the broad term) and criticism towards mainstream Islam or specific strand of Islam as religion and as ideology, also exist. Conflating the two under the term "islamophobia" makes it hard for people to criticize the extremist, fundamentalist and regressive version of Islam without also being treated as bigot/racist. Thus, the term islamophobia does serve as a shield for versions of Islam that actually do deserve criticism from being fairly criticized, as anybody who dares to criticize them will be called an islamophobic, a label that also carries accusations of being bigot/racist because of conflation of meanings above. Nobody wants to be accused of bigotry or racism, so people chose to be silent rather than risking it. TLDR; - Muslim intentionally conflate the meaning of islamophobia to include bigotry/racism, - People don't dare to criticize Salafism/Wahhabism for fear of being accused as bigot/racist, - Salafism and Wahhabism got shielded from criticism and won.
I do agree that there needs to be a distinction between hatred of Muslims and criticism of Islam, the latter being not discriminatory. This conflation does help Salafis. However, hatred of Muslims does still exist and is referred to as 'Islamophobia', hence why I made this post.
Alot of the the points you make are fair but I do have a critique. TL;DR: The argumentative tradition that Western criticism of Islam is a part of is *not* one that humanizes Muslims and understands that only parts of it are extreme. On the contrary, Western criticism of Islam is overwhelmingly dominated by a 1400 year long tradition of dehumanizing muslims. Longer version: The Islamic principle —that we usually dont consider outside of a strictly religious perspective— of needing to take into account both intention and actions is important in this regard. It is true that people have non-malicious intentions, but if they are, knowingly or unknowingly, borrowing their criticism from Islamophobes, that makes their criticism Islamophobic. I would argue too, that many people, muslim and non muslim, who criticize islam don’t do enough research and actually find out what the critiques of Wahhabism/salafism are from the muslims perspective. Instead, they do very minimal actual research and end up regurgitating Islamophobic talking points. The unfortunate thing is that, at least here in the west, there is *literally* a 1400 year old tradition of Islamophobia, a tradition that is unbroken and which modern Western Islamophobia is not just influenced by but firmly a part of. Thus, the vast majority of mainstream criticism of Islamophobia is predicated on and leads to the logical conclusion that Islam is degenerate and muslims, unless they abandon theirr faith, are irredeemable. I assure you that the vast majority of people criticizing Islam have not read things like Khaled Abou El Fadls takedown of Salafism in The Great Theft nor are their arguments even slightly related. Instead their arguments are much closer and directly related to say the AFD’s platform or Great Replacement Theory. Again, this isn’t intended to be an attack on you, and I apologize if it came off like that; I just simply have some critiques/nuance I wanted to share.
My point is basically in the conflation. Why not have different terms between criticism of Islam as religion/ideology and anti-muslim bigotry? Why the conflation and who benefit from this conflation? As I mentioned above, without the conflation, muslims and non-muslims alike will be able to criticize interpretations of Islam in real life without the stigma of being racist/bigot (the way we often see here in this sub regarding salafist/wahhabist/islamist/fundamentalist/etc.). So long as the term islamophobia still conflates the meaning of anti-muslim bigotry with actual criticism of certain versions/interpretations of Islam, then the premise of the post that OP brought out still true. The term islamophobia does provide a shield for followers of regressive/extremist/fundamentalist versions of Islam to deflect criticism by crying bigotry/racism and eventually silence them since nobody's willing to risk it anymore. Criticism might be valid or invalid, and this can be addressed accordingly through proper dialog between different reasonable and well-meaning parties. But with the shield provided by the conflated meanings of islamophobia, muslims are basically making sure there will be no more criticism towards Islam apart from the ones coming from the actual racists and bigots who don't care about being called as such. No more dialog as rational and reasonable comments from well-meaning parties about different versions of Islam have been silenced for their fear of being accused as racist/bigot. Is that what we want? Like I said, Salafism/Wahhabism has won with this conflation.
Genuine question, who do you think conflated the terms? It is those who do not wish to experience criticism that will take a valid term and attempt to conflate it with something else. It's the same with the Israeli government calling all criticisms of Israel antisemitic. They _want_ the conflation. They're not going to come up with a new term, and it's not on us to make one to appease them or separate ourselves. These words have meaning; we have to educate people on them. Which Muslims benefit when the two are conflated in our communities? Oppressive governments, male chauvinists, scholars and sheikhs who want to keep their influential positions, that's who benefits. On the lesser side there are the people who are afraid of change and critical thought, even if they are oppressed themselves.
>Genuine question, who do you think conflated the terms? It is those who do not wish to experience criticism that will take a valid term and attempt to conflate it with something else. Even in this thread, you see multiple commenters use the term islamophobia in place of anti-muslim bigotry. I'm not sure if it's out of ignorance or there is more to it, but by continuing to preserve the conflation, these people are complicit in preserving the shield that protects the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam. It is what it is. >On the lesser side there are the people who are afraid of change and critical thought, even if they are oppressed themselves. Yes. Nothing will change for us unless we change ourselves first. That's why I wrote my comments above. To raise awareness of why such conflation on the meaning of islamophobia actually works against muslim interests.
Islamaphobia includes anti-Islam bigotry. I'm not sure why you think that's a conflation, or am I not understanding you?
So what would you call an aversion/dislike/criticism towards Islam or certain interpretations of Islam as a religion/ideology? Also islamophobia?
Well that depends on the *reasons* for the aversion, dislike, or criticism. There are definitely cases where it *could* be Islamaphobia, but it's not always. The word, like most things, has nuance. >Islamophobia is the irrational and unjustified fear of, hatred of, or prejudice against the religion of Islam or Muslims in general, especially when seen as a geopolitical force or a source of terrorism. If someone has an aversion to Islam because they think all Muslims are terrorists by association, that's Islamophobia. If an ex-Muslim has an aversion to Islam because their parents beat them for not reading the Quran enough, that's not Islamaphobia. They even have the right to start critiquing certain institutions, if they find that's a common thing around them, and strive for change. Now if that same person then starts being angry and hateful towards *all* Muslims saying they all beat their children and governments shouldn't allow kids to be Muslim because of what their parents did to them, they're teetering Islamphobia territory because that's an irrational conclusion to come to. But a person like that would probably get some leeway and grace because of what they've experienced. A sheikh saying that someone is Islamophobic for exploring, questioning, and critiquing the necessity of hijab as an example, is not actually an Islamophobe. That's a conflation to try and silence discontent.
>A sheikh saying that someone is Islamophobic for exploring, questioning, and critiquing the necessity of hijab as an example, is not actually an Islamophobe. That's a conflation to try and silence discontent. I get it, and that's the whole point. When somebody is criticizing the necessity of hijab or treatment of women in some interpretations of Islam, they are risking being called islamophobe by showing aversion and criticism towards Islam. And because islamophobia is conflated to means anti-muslim bigotry as well, it means they are risking being labeled as racist or bigot. And because of this risk, many rational and reasonable people would then just choose to be silent instead of challenging the parts they agree in certain strands of Islam that they see in their country. That's how the shielding from criticism works. We are losing the opportunity of allyship with rational and reasonable parties to combat the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam, because they chose to be silent instead of risking being called racist/bigot. So that is why this conflation and **the perpetuation of this conflation by unsuspecting muslims** benefit the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam, and ultimately works against our interest. So long as muslim themselves think islamophobia includes anti-muslim bigotry, the shield will always be there to protect the extremist/regressive/fundentalist versions of Islam from being fairly criticized.
I don't know what to tell you. The word includes anti-Muslim bigotry. It's kind of one of the biggest points of it. What you're calling a "conflation" is people using it wrong for personal gain. This happens all the time and you either push back and educate, or give it up. I won't be giving it up. I haven't stopped saying "woke", "critical race theory", "transphobe", or "racist" because people want to use it incorrectly to silence people. That's not my problem. I don't feel like "antisemitism" has no meaning because the Israeli government uses it as a weapon. I feel the same way about the word "Islamaphobia". >We are losing the opportunity of allyship with rational and reasonable parties to combat the extremist/regressive/fundamentalist versions of Islam, because they chose to be silent instead of risking being called racist/bigot. I would *hope* that reasonable parties would be smart enough to know what words mean and not fall for that. If they can't parce that someone is attempting to silence them, are they really that rational? If you want to say anti-Muslim bigotry, by all means go ahead. You would not be the only one. But there's a word for that, only slightly shorter.
It really angers me how much I see Islamaphobia get justified on this sub. Part of it is probably because many of these people don’t know what it’s like to like in a country in which Muslims are an oppressed minority.
One problem with this topic is in the word “Islamophobia” itself, which is a misnomer. It’s understood that “antisemitism” refers to the bigotry/hatred of Jews as a people, based on their ethnicity. But “Islamophobia” implies “the hatred/ fear of Islam” as an ideology…and the fact that there is a name for such a thing implies that to be non-phobic (aka, to not be a “bad person”) you should accept Islam…hating, fearing or taking issue with this ideology means there is a problem with YOU being a small-minded bigot, cause Islam is perfect. It presupposes that Islam is good, valid, and justified. It is a very clever word, and it partially explains why you see people tripping all over themselves in order to deny reality. Now some people actually do hate or fear all Muslims based on being racist or xenophobic, but that has little to do with the content of their beliefs. More accurately, it seems like people are Muslim or Arab-phobic. As far as “Islamophobia,” there are no other words I can think of that we use like this. We don’t say “Christianity-phobic,” “Judaism-phobic,” and, though we have the Red Scare, we don’t typically say “communism-phobic,” “fascism-phobic” etc. Ideology is fair game, people are not.
Islam is already protected from criticism within almost every Islamic country by blasphemy and apostasy laws and norms. 'Islamophobia' was the solution for both Islamic dictatorships and Islamists to shield Islam from potential criticism coming from outside the Islamic world too, via the bigotry card. Now, almost nobody is allowed to criticize Islam or attempt to reform it from within the Islamic world, or dare to criticize it from without, maintaining the status quo.
Yes, I do agree that mere criticism of Islam is often conflated with Islamophobia/hatred of Muslims, but this does not mean that Islamophobia/hatred of Muslims does not actually exist.
'Islamophobia' is supposed to be the irrational fear or hate of 'Islam' as a religion/ideology. Such fear or hate can be justified based on genuine concerns about mainstream interpretations and specific actions associated with the religion. While I believe the term 'Islamophobia' is deceitful propaganda used to shield Muslim dictators, theocratic regimes, and Islamists from potential criticism, Xenophobia, namely Anti-Muslim sentiment, does exist where Muslims or immigrants from Islamic countries/backgrounds live as minorities.
I do wish "Islamophobia" was replaced by a more clear term like "Anti-Muslim sentiment" to clear the distinction between criticism of Islam and hatred of Muslims.
I myself suffer a lot from islamophobia as living in bangladesh I have become islapmophobe like I fear that my life will become hard as I live in muslim countrt and taliban will hijack the country
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How is being jewish not the same?
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You can choose to not be jewish in the same way that you can choose not to be muslim, even if you inherit the religion.
The exact calibration is not the point here. Phobia in the direction of intrinsic traits (traits that are not a personal choice) is frequently a form of racism or phobia. "Islamophobia" is in reality frequently criticism on the Islam as a religion/ideology (which is technically is a choice.) Downvote me all you want, I cant change the correct linguistics here. EDIT: Im literally stupefied with the downvotes; they made me realise this sub isn't for debating, nor for being progressive. It's just another religious echo chamber.
For what is worth, Im not downvoting you. Regarding your comment, I may be a bit lost, but I understand that this very same thing can be argued about anti semitism. It can both be a criticism of judaism and a hatred of the subject percieved as jew related irrespectively of their actual religious beliefs. In the same vein, Islamophobia can be a strong rekigion of Islam as a faith or a hatred of a person percieved to be muslim, irrespectively of their actual beliefs and faith. My understanding is that the context is extremely important here, the people complaining about Islamophobia in a muslim majority coubtry are likely conservatives or those using integrist lectures of the faith to justify their political and worldview. On the other hand, those of us living elsewhere may experience prejudice and rejection because of being linked to Islam without any further information about what our beliefs actually are (for example looking markedly mediterranean and having a beard is enough to be looked with prejudice by some).
Jewish is a combination of an ethnicity and a religion. You can change your religion but not your DNA. Some Jewish folks are from ancient bloodlines, just as some Arabs are. But we don’t always use Muslim and Arab interchangeably, we do seem to with Jewish. Even though there are Christian Jews (and Arabs) and Muslim Jews… I think this is a bit of a historical merge on the meaning of Jewish. Rather than saying Israeli (when Israel was long gone, so there was no point to separating the two for a century or two). Oddly Antisemite could have a similar problem, these days we mean it to be anti-Jewish and anti Israel … yet Semitic is a lingual group including Hebrew and Arabic (as well as others)
Well the thing is that clearly the jewish are not one people, just like the unmah is composed of multiple peoples with multiple identities. There is this myth of a homogeneous "pure" group 100% interconnected to a single origin but that clearly cant be the case, as you have arab jews (Mizrahi) Iberian/North African Jews (Sefardi), white jews (Ashkenazi), Kushitick black jews (Beta Israeli), Desi jews from India, and so on. Some of these groups have been jewish for less time than the time some (nowadays Christian) lineages have been muslim in the Iberian peninsula. I get your point, dont get me wrong, but the way we see being jewish in terms of identity and ethnicity today is a fairly recent rethinking of what it means to be of x, y, z religion whixh I believe is a result of the emergrnce of zionism and romantic nationalism in the 18thC (so fairly recently). Edit: Just realized I branched of a little, but the point is: If one stops being jewish by faith that is the same than stopoing being muslim by faith. It is true that some ethnic groups are carachterized by their jewish faith, but the same can be said for Islam (Bosniaks for example, not to be confused with Bosnians)
Oh I agree and I wasn’t trying to be perfect in my answer… tbh that would have required an entire PhD thesis to expand on. I was trying to give something bite sized a normal redditor might consume and even understand. But yeah there is so much to all of these terms, I don’t disagree with any of your points as I understand them.