To absolutely no one’s surprise, the tragedy of Samuel Paty’s brutal murder has taken on ludicrous proportions and dimensions in the past week. Just as we expected it would. The tragedy and affront to decency and secular values was quickly picked up by political interests, gutted for diplomatic gains.
Needless to say, France hasn’t been happy about the murder of the school teacher. But in lieu of the French nationalists making noise, the centre-liberal president Macron decided to go on the offensive and declare that “islamists want our future”, and held fast that France would not cede their freedom of expression in the face of terrorism. Needless to say, the Muslim world got miffed, with his Turkish rival Erdogan going so far as to tell Marcon to get his head checked.
Now; French goods are being pulled from stores across the Muslim world in a knee-jerk reaction to not just Macron’s statements, but almost also in opposition to criticism of the murder. And an already acrid relationship between the NATO-allied Turkey and France has taken a sharp turn for the worse.
Last week, I said my piece of what place I think religion should have in a developed society. I made it clear what sanctity I think religion should have in the public discourse. Which is to say, as a tl;dr, none. France, and in large parts all of Europe, have no laws against blasphemy. If you can’t accept that, or think that your particular religion deserves special treatment, I’m sorry to say that I think you can fuck right off. And if you think you should try and enforce your make-believe laws through violence in a nation that doesn’t respect them, then I think you can fuck right off with a lead slug rattling around in your brain cavity.
But there is a choice of word (assuming it’s not just a twist in translation) from the French president, who battled the nationalist and xenophobe Le Pen with tooth and nail just three years ago, that I find highly problematic. Namely, the word “islamist”.
What is that? What is an islamist? According to definitions far and wide, it’s someone who supports a Muslim political agenda. Someone who promotes Muslim values and laws as part of the public framework of a country. A fundamentalist, one might say. In essence, an acronym of “Islamic fundamentalist”.
So what’s my problem? Well, take a look at how that term “islamist” has been used. By whom it has been popularized. By European nationalists. By Orange Hydra supporters world-wide. By the likes of Netanyahu and Benny Gantz to promote their subjugation and occupation and militarization of whatever’s left of Palestine. By the BJP in India to rally antagonism against the Muslim minority in the supposedly secular country. By people that labour to demonize the Muslim population any- and everywhere.
Who cares! It’s just a word, right! What harm can a word do? I’ll tell you, a simple word can make or break anything. And in the simple shortening of the dual concept of “Islamic” and “fundamentalist”, into a single cohesive unit; the “islamist”, political interests have quite literally bridged that divide. In an effort to erase it. To ignore it. To remove whatever distinction there is between being a Muslim and being a fundamentalist. Which, I will have you know, is not necessarily the same thing. Plenty of Muslims should not be considered fundamentalists. Just as a whole lot of fundamentalists out there aren’t Muslim. As previously mentioned, just look at India’s BJP or the galvanized evangelicals of the USA. And yet “Bhuddist-ists” or “Christianists” aren’t words.
Maybe that is not how the word was intended once. Maybe that’s not even what Macron intended in his heated speech. But it is definitely how many, many people will interpret it. How many people have interpreted it. How people will imagine it. How people will internalize it.
At the end of the day, the term “islamist” is intended to cast every Muslim under the same wheel. Whether an agitated user, like Macron, is aware of it or not. It is a popular acronym that has sort of gotten away from the decent discourse and grown into a beast that ignores and obfuscates a very important distinction. A distinction that I think we should be very careful to observe. Because if we do not, we will inevitably bundle a wide spectrum of people together under a unified and vilified umbrella. We will equate the violent fundamentalist and terrorist with the simply old-fashioned and inflexible, that have a hard time adjusting to new social norms, and even with the non-religious who share a culture and ethnic identity with the archaic believers. By disregarding this very important distinction, we will treat them all as enemies of secularism in secular states. And in so treating them, we shall inevitably also make them all the enemies of secularism. And it is utterly inconceivable to me how anyone who truly believes in “liberté, egalité, fraternité” would want that.
/Sebastian Lindberg 27/10-2020
WastedWords 