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Is thinking it a ““fallacy that Islamism is nothing to do with Islam” and that radical Islamism could be “Koranically justified”” now regarded as a thought crime? Because if so I am totally guilty of it - & so are plenty of Muslims I’ve read & spoken to... independent.co.uk/news/uk/politi…
"If Islamic State is indeed to be categorised as a phenomenon distinct from Islam, it urgently needs a manifest and impermeable firewall raised between them. At the moment, though, I fail to see it." newstatesman.com/politics/2015/…
'Islamism' seems to serve the purposes of a theological bad bank: a word that enables liberals to pretend that any doctrine or manifestation of Islam of which they disapprove isn't actually Islam at all. Which is a pretty arrogant form of cultural appropriation, to put it mildly.
It's like attributing the crusades, the Inquisition & opposition to abortion to 'Christianityism', and saying that none of them had anything to do with 'real' Christianity.
This is the whole point. There's no such thing as 'real' Christianity - or 'real' Islam. Religions are bandwidths. To distinguish 'real Islam' from something called 'Islamism' is just a liberal form of takfir.
When people say ‘Islamism’ has nothing to do with Islam, what they’re often talking about is Salafi-Jihadism. This is THE book to read on the subject: what’s distinctive about it, & why - although only a sub-division of Islam - it is Islamic for all that.
My review of @ShirazMaher’s essential book: newstatesman.com/culture/2016/0…
