The advertisement sponsored by
SIOA (Stop Islamization of America), which appeared on the Edmonton Transit
System for a week was designed by a key ‘Islamophobia’, Pamela Geller. These
ads first appeared in the cities where key republican strongholds in US are
present. One of the slogans ‘Is there a fatwa on your head?’ depicts religious
bigotry.
It is important for
the readers to know about the architect of this campaign, Pamela Geller. She is
a blogger, an author, political activist, and commentator. She is known
primarily for her criticism of Islam and opposition to Islamic activities and
causes, such as the proposed construction of Islamic community center. Her
critics have described her viewpoints as Islamophobic.
Together with Robert Spencer she co-founded the Freedom Defense Initiative
and Stop Islamization of America. These organizations were
classified as "hate groups”. Rabbi Michael White and Jerome Davidson, has
denounced Geller as an anti-Muslim bigot, and opposed her presentation at a
Long Island Synagogue. In 2008, Geller co-wrote an editorial for an Israeli
magazine, expressing her distaste for fellow Jews who are not politically
conservative.
This essay is
written to shed light on the rising tide of Islamophobia, its ideologues and
briefly go through the pages of history to capture the mindset of Western
scholars and their inherent prejudices against the colored people. It was
Lothrop Stoddard’s book “The Rising Tide of Color against White
World -Supremacy,” written in 1914,became the reflection of his times. The racial climate of
the early 20th century was on the rise, in which the Yellow Peril seemed real;
the Ku Klux Klan had re-emerged. With this backdrop, American President
Theodore Roosevelt worried loudly about ‘race-suicide’. In 1917, justifying his
reluctance to involve the United States in the European war, Woodrow Wilson
told his secretary of state that ‘white civilization and its domination over the world rested largely on our ability to keep this
country intact.’ Pankaj Mishra, a brilliant South Asian scholar, while
commenting on Niall Ferguson’s famous book’ Civilization-West and the Rest’,
commented the following, ‘Stoddard proposed a straightforward division of the
world into white and coloured races. He also invested early in Islamophobia,
arguing in The New World of Islam (1921) that Muslims posed a sinister threat
to a hopelessly fractious and confused west’. Mishra further comments on his
book ‘ Pity of War” that ‘Ferguson ignored the growing strength of
anti-colonial movements across Asia, which, whatever happened in Europe, would
have undermined Britain’s dwindling capacity to manage its vast overseas
holdings. At the time, however, The Pity of War seemed boyishly and engagingly
revisionist and it established Ferguson’s reputation: he was opinionated,
‘provocative’ and amusing.
Another eminent South Asian scholar and political activist
have raised concerns over the Imperial hubris of the West and against the rise
tide of Islamophobia. In her book ‘War Talk ‘, she highlights the global rise of religious and racial violence.
From the horrific pogroms against Muslims in Gujarat, India, to U.S. war in
Iraq, Roy confronts the call to militarism. Desperately working against the
backdrop of the nuclear recklessness between her homeland and Pakistan, she
calls into question the equation of nation and ethnicity. And throughout her
essays, Roy interrogates her own roles as "writer" and "activist."
Roy’s collection of essays, Power Politics, is another masterpiece.
The Imperial hubris
strengthened in the 21st century after Prof. Samuel Huntington
penned his famous thesis ’Clash of Civilization’. This manuscript now serves as
a key guideline for American foreign policy and a tool to spread
‘Islamophobia’. South Asian scholars
like Tariq Ali to confront this tide of religious inferno stemmed after 9/11
has written several manuscripts. His book ‘Clash of Fundamentalism’ and ‘Bush
in Babylon’ is a reflection of imperial myth practiced by the West.
There are several
books, which have been published on the topic ‘Islamophobia’, by acclaimed
academics in the West. The Indian-born Deepa Kumar, an Associate Prof at
Rutgers and author of ‘Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire’ has long
been debunking western lies about Islam, Muslims and Arabs, through books,
articles and lectures, which have earned her the wrath of the Zionist mafia.
She visited Edmonton in June 2012 to give her perspective to the Canadian
audience. The Islamophobia Industry authored by Nathan Lean, reflects
the rising tide of anti-Muslim feeling sweeping through the United States and
Europe. Lean takes readers inside the minds of the manufacturers of
Islamophobia – a highly-organized enterprise of pro-Israel bloggers, right-wing
talk show hosts, evangelical religious leaders, and politicians, united in
their quest to exhume the ghosts of 9/11 and convince their compatriots that Islam
is the enemy. Lean uncovers their scare tactics, reveals their motives, and
exposes the ideologies that drive their propaganda machine.
Leslie Hazleton, an agnostic Jew analyses the present
political scenario present in the West and the Muslim world in a book ‘The First Muslim: The Story of Muhammad’, where she draws her conclusion that
‘Islamophobia’ in the West and the Islamists in the Muslim world are misquoting
‘Quran’ to keep the world divided.
The Muslims of
Edmonton are thankful to our new Mayor Don Iveson and Councilor Amarjeet Sohi
to stop the advertisements and to nip this tide of racial bigotry at the
budding state. Is there a hope that the citizens of
the world will ever come out from this blaze of religiosity? Or will we succumb
to the dictates of political psychopaths across the globe that is dehumanizing
mankind in the name of immoral ideologies? The world we live in has to reject
teachings that violate the sanctity of human life and freedom of religion, and
end discrimination.
The author is a free-lance columnist whose opinions have been published in local newspapers like Edmonton Journal and international magazines and newspapers like Al-Ahram, Al Hayat, Gulf Daily, Viewpoint and Friday Times-Pakistan. He is the President of South Asian Canadian Forum for Peace called DEEP (Defy Enmity Encourage Peace) and can be reached at
