I recently came across an article by Rana Elmir, the president of the Michigan chapter of the ACLU, in which she explains why, as a Muslim, she refuses to condemn Islamic terrorism. It is, without a doubt, the most disappointing and frustrating thing I’ve ever read by a moderate Muslim. Replete with mealy-mouthed excuses, false victimhood and mind-boggling denial of one’s moral and civic responsibilities, it is the epitome of the attitude that non-Muslims fear the most in the Islamic response to Islamic terrorism.
She writes:
As an American Muslim, I am consistently and aggressively asked — by media figures, religious leaders, politicians and Internet trolls — to condemn terrorism to prove my patriotism.
I emphatically refuse.
A religion’s followers are the only people who will ever carry out acts in its name. As such, they are the only people with the power to set an example about how one should act when acting in the name of the religion. In the pursuit of civilized values, which we should all fight for, it is necessary to make sure that religions promote civilized values as well, and if they don’t, to marginalize them out of existence as much as possible. Followers of a religion, being people, have the responsibility to advance civilized values where they can, and given that they are the only ones who have the power to shape their religion to ensure that it does this, they have the responsibility to condemn the evils that their religion produces.
If you refuse to condemn something, you probably don’t think it’s something that should be condemned, which means you probably don’t have much of a problem with it. Now, I don’t believe that this is true for Elmir. I believe that she believes that Islamic terrorism should be condemned (which makes her refusal to do so all the more ridiculous). But she should not be surprised when many people think that she doesn’t have a problem with it as a result of her explicit refusal to condemn it. When she encounters accusations of being a terrorist sympathizer as a result, I won’t have any sympathy for her.
Make no mistake: The terror imposed by those who sympathize with Daesh (an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State militant group), al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, al-Shabab and other groups is just as foreign to me as the terror advanced by mostly white men at the alarming rate of one mass killing every two weeks in this country.
Therefore, just as I have never been asked to condemn Dylann Storm Roof’s attack on parishioners of a historic black church in South Carolina, Robert Dear’s attack on a Planned Parenthood facility, the murder of 20 children at Sandy Hook Elementary School, or the slaughter of moviegoers in Colorado or Louisiana, I will not be bullied into condemning terror perpetrated by psychopaths who misrepresent and distort Islam for their deranged purposes.
Her inclusion of atrocities committed by non-Muslims provides me with a very good opportunity to highlight that Muslims are not alone in being expected to condemn atrocities committed by people who share a relevant attribute. Liberals rightly demanded that conservatives condemn the Charleston church shooting, as it was motivated by far-right ideology. Liberalsrightlycondemnedconservatives for the latter’s ambivalence about, or even approval of, the Planned Parenthood shooting. The Sandy Hook shooting is obviously reviled by every person with half a shred of decency, and often attributed to problems with some white men. And there is some truth in that. I believe that blame based on race is misguided (indeed, some people think white people should wage war on themselves for just existing), but I also think that blame based on hyper masculinity is accurate. I am a white man, and I condemn the Sandy Hook and Aurora shootings. Liberals regularly point out that conservative rhetoric inspires right-wing domestic terrorism, and expect conservatives to condemn it. There are more good examples: 25 LGBT rights groups condemned, within hours, the August 15, 2012 Family Research Council shooting. Liberals rightly condemned conservatives for not doing the same following the May 17, 2013 hate crime shooting of gay man Mark Carson. Atheistsweremorescrutinised, after the Chapel Hill shooting, and we weren’t victims because of it. I wholeheartedly condemned it, and so did other atheists (although it doesn’t appear to have been a hate crime).
Everyone is expected to condemn violence committed by people who share a relevant attribute. The idea that “we don’t ask other people to condemn violence” is a myth. Liberals call out conservatives when they fail. Muslims are not being singled out for this responsibility to condemn. And I do want to be clear that certainly not all Muslims take Elmir’s attitude. (For example, Hamas and Hezbollah don’t.) But I do see this attitude from some other Muslims enough to concern me.
Not surprisingly, nativist rhetoric and policies targeting American Muslims always start with the same feral calls for condemnation.
Let me back up here for a second:
I will not be bullied into condemning terror perpetrated by psychopaths who misrepresent and distort Islam for their deranged purposes.
Not surprisingly, nativist rhetoric and policies targeting American Muslims always start with the same feral calls for condemnation.
This is the false victimhood that I mentioned in my introduction. Elmir thinks calls for condemnation are feral bullying. They’re not. At the moment, Islam is responsible for far more social ills in the world than any other religion. It’s not even close. No other religion systematically punishes apostasy with death, or punishes blasphemy with death, or is as misogynistic, homophobic and anti-semitic as Islam is. This is not inherently, automatically true, but it is true for today. Now, I know that there are so many integrated Western (and non-Western) Muslims who understand that, even if it makes them uncomfortable. I don’t want them to feel bad. But if they do, well, we’ve got bigger things to worry about.
The whole reason the Western world started making so many concessions to Islam in the first place, as opposed to any other minority religion, is 9/11. We were worried that Muslims would feel bad, or that they would be discriminated against (and this is deplorable, and I condemn it), so instead of honestly dealing with the problems it was causing, we ignored them. That’s right. A religion acting far more dangerously than any other religion caused us to be more kind to it, not less. (I am not at all advocating being less kind to Muslims, but we should be more critical of Islam than other religions.) This has to stop. The human rights of people who are being persecuted and butchered in the name of Islam have to take priority over the feelings of Muslims, just like the human rights of women killed by domestic violence has to take priority over the feelings of men.
Asking us to apologize for violence that has orphaned generations of Muslims has the perverse effect of re-victimizing us by erasing our humanity and experiences. There is no other acceptable scenario in which the media, politicians and even our president would urge and expect victims to apologize publicly and rout out the ideology that contributed to their own persecution.
Elmir employs a sneaky and clever, but wilfully dishonest trick here: conflating condemnation and apology. The two are very different. Condemning is expressing strong disapproval for anything. Apology is expressing regret for something you have done. Now, I know that many bigots think that Muslims should apologize for Islamic terrorism, and they’re absolutely wrong. But condemning is morally necessary from any Muslim who has a platform to do it.
The part about “re-victimizing” is really, really disappointing, but I’m glad she was so explicit that she believes in it. Do calls for condemnation deny that Muslims are human? Do they claim that their experiences haven’t happened? Of course not. She’s right to note that Islamic violence kills far more Muslims than non-Muslims, but the victims of such violence are the people who were killed, not the people who share the religion of the perpetrator. And considering that she has written earlier that Islamic terrorism is “foreign” to her, I had hoped she would reach the logical conclusion of that observation, which is that she can’t be the victim of it. Unfortunately, it was not to be. For people like Elmir, when a Muslim commits a terrorist attack, no matter who is targeted or killed, Muslims are the real victims.
Since 2000, the majority of terror attacks have occurred in five countries — Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria and Syria, all Muslim-majority countries.Close to 90 percent of the victims of Daesh are Muslims. A 2009 studyconducted by the Combating Terrorism Center (CTC) at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point concluded conservatively that al-Qaeda has killed eight times as many Muslims as non-Muslims.
Muslims across the globe are not threats. They are threatened.
And here we get into excuse making. Because I care about Muslim lives, I want Islamic terrorism to cease. I want Muslims to be free from the oppression that their own religion produces. That will only ever be achieved when we address this problem honestly, not by playing the victim. I’m not quite sure why Elmir thinks the fact that more Muslims than non-Muslims are being killed by Islamic violence is a reason to not condemn it. If you care about Muslim lives, and I do, it’s all the more reason to condemn it. I’m sure she cares about Muslims, but emotionally instinctive responses, even when intended to lessen another’s suffering, are not always or automatically the right way to achieve that.
She then lists a series of terrible anti-Muslim incidents that I wholeheartedly condemn. I’m not going to include them in this diary, because there’s too much to include that’s not my own work. I will make these two observations about them, though:
1. The best way to stop anti-Muslim attacks is to stop Islamic brutality.
2. Non-Muslims are not the victims just because non-Muslims were the perpetrators.
Sadly, as Muslims, we contribute to our own oppression by erroneously believing that if we just apologize, then the anti-Muslim rhetoric will end. And it never does. Condemnation becomes our admission of guilt, and we indirectly concede that terror is borne of us, and, therefore, we must atone and condone policies that criminalize us to prove “we have nothing to hide.”
Certainly I don’t agree with the denial of civil liberties in the wake of terrorism. And certainly some anti-Muslim bigots will never be satisfied, no matter how much Muslims condemn violence. CAIR was attacked by the right-wing not just in spite of condemning the San Bernardino shooting, but because of it. But it still has its purpose. It will go some way to making terrorists acknowledge that they don’t have the support of the people they claim to represent, which might make them rethink. And it will put non-Muslims at ease with the knowledge that our Muslim neighbors are just as shocked and horrified as we are at what is happening. It will reduce the suspicion on Muslims from non-Muslims. Again, most Muslims are doing what needs to be done in condemning this terrorism. But this refusal to do so is why some non-Muslims have concerns about Islamic attitudes to terrorism that, while not always fair or accurate, are often (but not always) rational and understandable. Terrorism is never borne of innocent Muslims, but today, it is, far too often and far more than other religions, borne of Islam.
But these calls for condemnation serve only zealots who will never be satisfied. They thrive and profit off of the fear-mongering, hate and violence generated by othering and silencing an entire community who has lived and contributed to our nation since its founding. The first Muslims in the United States were brought over bound as slaves, not immigrants. Muslims fought in every war starting with the American Revolution and have contributed to every facet of society — law, education, medicine, government, fashion, music, architecture and sports. And while some American Muslims have prospered, many face challenges — poverty, unemployment and undereducation — often overshadowed by foreign policy and compounded by pervasive discrimination in our country.
This is more excuse making. Yes, many Muslims have contributed to America, and that’s great. Yes, many Muslims live in poverty, and that’s horrible. But it doesn’t change anything about the responsibility to condemn terrorism.
But I believe in a freedom that is true, that is real and that is unapologetically principled. I will always do my part and fight for justice.
But terrorism is not mine. I will not claim it, not even through an apology.
I don’t want you to apologize, Rana. I want you condemn. You’re not doing your part if you don’t.
To reform Islam, Muslims must be on board. If you act as if any effort to talk about Islam’s problems makes you a victim, you’re not on board.