Apropos of a new video discussion with Brigitte Gabriel published on Jihad Watch, a long-time Jihad Watch regular who calls himself "Alarmed Pig Farmer" got right to the heart of what's the matter with Brigitte:
… speaking about the elephant in the room, and it is radical Islam.
Alarmed Pig Farmer commented:
[QUOTE]
No it ain’t. It’s Islam. The use of the adjective radical, apparently mandatory even for those who are knowledgeable and correct on Islam, will one day be proved a key to Sharia taking over the free world. The truth about Islam has to be publicly confronted sooner or later, so why not now?
When someone can show me how Islam is moderate and thus is a thing that can be radicalized, then I’ll accept the adjective radical.
[END QUOTE]
Back in September of 2008, in my essay here titled Asymptotic vs. Holistic Analysis: a clarification, I analyzed the Brigitte Gabriel problem in more detail.
And lest I be pointing out the obvious, the term "radical" is not the only qualifier used by various & sundry analysts out there (both in the Counter-Jihad and out, as well as numerous folks sort of straddling the boundary with one foot in, one foot out). "Islamism" is another one, favored by Sam Harris (because his Muslim partner Maajid Nawaz has whispered it in his ear as sweet taqiyya); while "Wahhabist" and "Salafist" are other equivalents. "Extremist" of course is yet another. Then we have Robert Spencer's apparent favorite, "political Islam" (also used with discomfitting alacrity by Ayaan Hirsi Ali). Oftentimes one analyst or another will string together two or more qualifiers, just to ensure extra padding by which to insulate Islam and most Muslims from our condemnation.
More broadly, what all these qualifiers do (whether or not it's the intent of the respective user) is split Islam into two. Why would anyone want to split Islam into two? The simple answer is, to protect the mainstream Islam of all the seemingly harmless Muslims of the world, by relocating all problems borne of "extremism" -- of human rights violations, geopolitical disorder, and terrorism -- into some "extremist" truncation, thus sparing most Islam per se from our condemnation. The deeper motivation, then, is readily visible: to protect innumerable (many? most?) Muslims. How many Muslims are being protected remains vague, but for many (including some in the Counter-Jihad) it seems to be a majority. The point is, there is an anxiety to avoid condemning vast numbers of Muslims who seem to be innocent (i.e., they aren't currently exploding, stabbing, shooting, etc.).
Alarmed Pig Farmer commented:
[QUOTE]
No it ain’t. It’s Islam. The use of the adjective radical, apparently mandatory even for those who are knowledgeable and correct on Islam, will one day be proved a key to Sharia taking over the free world. The truth about Islam has to be publicly confronted sooner or later, so why not now?
When someone can show me how Islam is moderate and thus is a thing that can be radicalized, then I’ll accept the adjective radical.
[END QUOTE]
Back in September of 2008, in my essay here titled Asymptotic vs. Holistic Analysis: a clarification, I analyzed the Brigitte Gabriel problem in more detail.
And lest I be pointing out the obvious, the term "radical" is not the only qualifier used by various & sundry analysts out there (both in the Counter-Jihad and out, as well as numerous folks sort of straddling the boundary with one foot in, one foot out). "Islamism" is another one, favored by Sam Harris (because his Muslim partner Maajid Nawaz has whispered it in his ear as sweet taqiyya); while "Wahhabist" and "Salafist" are other equivalents. "Extremist" of course is yet another. Then we have Robert Spencer's apparent favorite, "political Islam" (also used with discomfitting alacrity by Ayaan Hirsi Ali). Oftentimes one analyst or another will string together two or more qualifiers, just to ensure extra padding by which to insulate Islam and most Muslims from our condemnation.
More broadly, what all these qualifiers do (whether or not it's the intent of the respective user) is split Islam into two. Why would anyone want to split Islam into two? The simple answer is, to protect the mainstream Islam of all the seemingly harmless Muslims of the world, by relocating all problems borne of "extremism" -- of human rights violations, geopolitical disorder, and terrorism -- into some "extremist" truncation, thus sparing most Islam per se from our condemnation. The deeper motivation, then, is readily visible: to protect innumerable (many? most?) Muslims. How many Muslims are being protected remains vague, but for many (including some in the Counter-Jihad) it seems to be a majority. The point is, there is an anxiety to avoid condemning vast numbers of Muslims who seem to be innocent (i.e., they aren't currently exploding, stabbing, shooting, etc.).
The psychological motivation behind this is powerfully fueled by two fears:
1) A fear of the colossal dimensions of a problem of hundreds of millions of fanatics all over the globe, and increasingly inside the West, including seemingly nice people in our midst assumed to be akin to espionage agents aiding and abetting the terrorists.
2) A fear of our own innate white Western "bigotry" and "racism" becoming aroused and activated by the massive circumstance of having to suspect, criticize, condemn and consider violating the rights of innumerable Brown People.
For many, this prospect of these twin fears is simply too frightening to contemplate; so
better to construct an alternative explanation -- that whittles the problem down to manageable proportions -- and that, thus, is more comforting
and less alarming.
This Two Islams meme (in its various forms) remains perhaps the most common and most resilient way for people (whether in or out of the Counter-Jihad) to resist the paradigm shift from Islam to Muslims.
