My liberal colleague Neal Hebert wrote a column Oct. 18 in which he asked that we should stop using the word “Islamofascist.” His arguments were common among liberals today. First, they always find some way to accuse conservatives of being racists. Then, they identify the term “Islamofascist” as a tool of war propaganda, used only to restrict deeper thought on the subject. While America is fighting a war against a determined evil, liberals want to make sure we call them by the politically correct name. Good for them. I’m not questioning their patriotism, but how does focusing on what we call terrorists going to help make America safer? The term Islamofascism is one of many ways to describe terrorist networks like al-Qaida. Islamofascism is an accurate picture of both the terrorists’ ultimate goals and methods coupled with their religious justification.
Islamofascism is an ideology that seeks a global theocracy under the dictatorship of a caliph. Everyone will be converted to their extremist interpretation of Islam, and any one who resists will be killed in the name of Allah. These extremists, however, do not represent the basic beliefs of Islam, and their message and methods resemble Nazis more than Muslims. Their goals are almost a mirror image of Hitler’s dreams of world domination and extermination of the Jews, except their justification claims to be rooted in Islam rather than German nationalism.
How is “Islamofascism” a racist term? It isn’t. The term has nothing to do with the ethnicity of our enemy, nor should it. The term is a fusion of Islam – which is a religion and not a race – and fascism. Most of the terrorists are ethnically Arabic, but the membership of al-Qaida and similar networks is not exclusively Arabic. The focus of the word is fascism, which is used to describe the terrorists’ methods and goals.
How does the phrase “militant fundamentalist Muslims” more accurately describe who we are fighting? It doesn’t. Our enemy is indeed militant and claims to be Muslim, but their breed of Islam is not fundamentalist. The fundamentals of Islam are faith, worship, charity, sacrifice and pilgrimage. Islamofacism has interpreted Islam as not only a religion but an entire political and economic system as well. They have twisted the meaning of holy war into a tangible fight against infidels when the concept of jihad is supposed to be an internalized battle within the human conscience.
How does labeling al-Qaida and similar organizations as Islamofascists stop thought? It doesn’t. Islamofacists are the enemy we are facing in the 21st century, and any terrorist network who shares its goals qualifies for this label. It does not “stop thought” to call a bike rider a “cyclist” or call a ball player an “athlete.” There are many different words or phrases that can be used to describe certain people or ideas. Demanding the use of only certain words in the name of political correctness is what stops thought. Labeling everything said by conservatives as racist or ignorant is more likely to prevent our readers from “thinking messy thoughts.”
How is the term “Islamofascism” offensive? Finally, a question that requires a complex answer. It can be offensive to certain people, but that is not enough cause to ban the word. “Moderate” Muslims are offended by Westerners who associate the terrorists with Islam because they claim that the Islamofacists do not practice “true” Islam. I have not read the Qu’ran, so I couldn’t say who is Muslim and who is heretical, and neither should liberals make such a decision for me. Liberals want us to separate the terrorists in al-Qaida from the religion of Islam so that the name of Islam is not tarnished. What about Christianity in America? Liberals rarely, if ever, stop to disassociate abortion clinic bombers from “true” Christianity and they are hypocrites for it. There are many different sects of Islam, Christianity and any other major religion, and it is not for me, an agnostic, to differentiate the true followers from the infidel.
I don’t care what you decide to call them – Islamofacists, radical militant Muslims, Islamic extremists or whatever description fits. The fact is, while the terrorists’ ideology does not accept every aspect of fascism, they do adopt a great deal of it and have justified their actions through Islam.
—–Contact Michael Schouest at [email protected]