Islam is a religion, and like any other faith, it is internally diverse. Islamism, by contrast, is the desire to impose a single version of Islam on an entire society. Islamism is not Islam, but it is an offshoot of Islam. It is Muslim theocracy.
In much the same way, jihad is a traditional Muslim idea connoting struggle—sometimes a personal spiritual struggle, sometimes a struggle against an external enemy. Jihadism, however, is something else entirely: It is the doctrine of using force to spread Islamism.
President Barack Obama and many liberal-minded commentators have been hesitant to call this Islamist ideology by its proper name. They seem to fear that both Muslim communities and the religiously intolerant will hear the word “Islam” and simply assume that all Muslims are being held responsible for the excesses of the jihadist few.
I call this the Voldemort effect, after the villain in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books. Many well-meaning people in Ms. Rowling’s fictional world are so petrified of Voldemort’s evil that they do two things: They refuse to call Voldemort by name, instead referring to “He Who Must Not Be Named,” and they deny that he exists in the first place. Such dread only increases public hysteria, thus magnifying the appeal of Voldemort’s power.
The same hysteria about Islamism is unfolding before our eyes. But no strategy intended to defeat Islamism can succeed if Islamism itself and its violent expression in jihadism are not first named, isolated and understood.
It is as disingenuous to argue that Islamic State is entirely divorced from Islam as it is to assert that it is synonymous with Islam. Islamic State does indeed have something to do with Islam—not nothing, not everything, but something. That something is the way in which all Islamists justify their arguments using Islamic scripture and seek to recruit from Muslims.
The urgency of making these distinctions should be apparent to everyone.
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I'm glad this distinction is being seen and explained.
ReplyDeleteI think it's key to creating a policy that will work without marginalizing those muslims who are wanting to assimilate and adapt to Western ways.
There are some good people among them. We just have to find a good way to deal with the bad ones.
Look When the wall came down the globalist needed a new boogeyman. guess who got nominated? they have been funding supporting training and equipping these jihadists. Whose only purpose is to create turmoil in this country. To further impose restrictions on freedoms and America sovereignty. yall better wake the hell, up Democrats and Republicans are in on it. most likely Donald whom I assume is not a player will be taken out of the picture as was anyone else seeking to impose the true Republic as outlined in the Constitution
ReplyDeleteThey are funded by our reliance on buying their oil since the oil companies lost control of the middle east, if not for that they would be grubbing in the sand and killing one another when not abusing their women and children.
DeleteDitto, 512
ReplyDeleteI hope everyone reads the article completely.
ReplyDeleteJust as those who want to polarize this country into poor and rich by eliminating the middle class, these extremists want to remove the moderate Muslims.
Hating all Muslims is what they want from the West, a "See? We told you so." The other end of, "Oh, let's not pretend it's so bad" of our administration is naive and stupid.
Glad this fellow called out both sides and the damage they are doing.