Sociology of Identity and Difference - Essay Example

Sociology of Identity and Difference: “Islamophobia is the last acceptable form of racism” Discuss Introduction The early 21st centuries is characterized by the upsurge of Islamic civilization that is influencing world affairs. A belief in Islam of collective civilizational community or a cross-cultural umma, has taken hold in reaction to the professed cultural danger of modernity together with the forces of the structural globalization. The recent Islamic civilization and Islamophobia has politicized religion and culture; consequently, the politicization has caused certain form of conflict-saturated discourse of the Islamic civilization which brings tensions amongst the Muslims themselves as well as between non-Muslim and Muslims. Islamophobia is discrimination against, fear of or hatred towards Muslims or some ethnic groups professed to be Muslim. While the word is widely acknowledged and used, both the word and its underlying idea have been criticized. In contemporary Islam, fresh forms of identity politics, ‘imagined community’, selective restoration of cultural heritage, invention of tradition, and construction of the collective memories, all which serve to strengthen the line drawn amongst the self and others. There is need for a worldwide democratic peace that accepts religious pluralism and modernity. Our world is shaken by chaos, evident in the consistent “wars” which goes on in several regions predominantly within the third world (Husain, 2009, p. 58). This “war” manifests itself in terms of Islamophobia, a form of racism: Of course, the fact is that Islamophobia, as a form of last acceptable racism, is promoted by the White nations and the corporate media. There are uncountable examples of anti-Muslim racism that continue to these days. In the immediate aftereffects of 9/11, several individuals were attacked and even murdered simply for being of Islamic faith or even “looking like” Islamist or wearing turbans. Mosques across the world have been put on fire, Quran has ever been burned, and Muslims have been compelled out of planes with no clear justification. Moreover, Muslim people have been blamed of being terrorists, and this list is endless. One victim of Islamophobia one reveals that when he worked for Census in 2009, he had to go to individuals` doors and ask them some questions. In some instances, they refused to talk to him because he didn’t look “the Whites.” Others thought he was selling his religion and some even made more aggressive comments. This is racism at its highest peak in form of Islamophobia. Most Islamic habitats, like Afghanistan, have been attacked by the White nations, like US and the propaganda line justifying the attacks is that the demonized Islamic people do not fairly recognize the value of democracy, self-governance, and human rights so the White government has to assist these lesser individuals by bombing their own cities, towns and villages. The White state and their corporate media have always continued to catalyze this last acceptable form of racism. The government and media manipulated by those individuals in power have a specific interest in maintaining the fear and hatred toward the Muslims. An example of this is anti-Shari’a laws being established in more than two dozen states. The notion that the Whites require being protected against imposition of Sheria law is just ludicrous. In a case calling for distinguishing between the state and the church, an effort should be made to shield us from legitimate imposition of the extremist values of Christians enshrined in the law (Mcternan, 2010, p.56). Nevertheless, the movement for the anti-Sharia law is being fronted by obvious racist elements. In respect to the survey conducted in 2010 on Muslin youths of the age bracket between 11-18 years old by an advocacy group based in Washington of Muslim Mothers Against Violence, showed that all the respondents said that they were being by a named inclined in their line of faith. Further, 80% of the respondents disclosed that they had once been called “terrorist.” A different result of pervasiveness about Islamophobia happened in Europe. About 68 people who were in a youth camp of Labor Party in Norway were massacred on July 22, when Anders Behring Breivik detonated a car bomb. Breivik wrote a manifesto of 1500 –page clarifying on his conservative perspective and anti-immigrant Islamophobic philosophy. Breivik in his blog placed fault play by the Labor Party of Norway, the progressive pro-capitalist party for consenting to “Islamofication” and “muliticulturalism” in Europe. In his perspective the “Marxist-Islamic alliance” was a deadly threat to the “European Christendom.” Apart from the act itself that amounted to racism but rather also the response to such acts by the business media and the officials of the land. The UN Rapporteur on matters of religion and the freedom of belief, Heiner Bielefeldt, on July 27th, stated that the manner in which particular public commentators with swift effect associated the mysterious mass murder last Friday in Norway with Islamic terrorism is an act revealing and indeed full of embarrassing example due to the powerful effect of prejudices and their capability to enshrine stereotypes. Basically, his Islamophobia, as was fueled by the vibrant world media, is the basis on which Breivik had for killing these innocent people. As once written by the great scholar Mazda Majidi for the liberation on the Norway massacre: “The ideology of the right-wing racist movements don’t just develop out of vacuum. This is one of the several ways that the capitalist ruling class put into practice to ensure the subjects are divided. It is noted that such movements like the Tea Party of the US advertised itself as spontaneous and grassroots is an example of a right-wing movement having been funded through a direct or an indirect way by the great capitalists, for instance the Koch Brothers.” At particular specific political scenarios that the capitalists ruling classes have been on the side of direct rise of the fascists into the political control, though, those were circumstances when there were extreme crises, and it was of question to survive to survive in such a system. Nevertheless, the extreme right-wing movements and parties were determined to serve their class functions on other occasions as well. The right-wing movements are specifically significant especially to the ruling class at times of the capitalist economic crisis, low living standards accompanied with high rate of unemployment (Masroor, 2007, p. 78). The ideologies of the fascists lay a false explanation of what the root causes of the crisis could be. They fuel hatred and racism towards the immigrants, people of color and the countries which are oppressed to ensure that they curb any formation of unity within the working class and the groups that are oppressed, who are the victims and targets of the capitalist system. The by-product of the ideology of the right-wing are individuals like Brievik. It is not spontaneous that as long as the capitalist class still reign in power there will always exist the act of racism- that the ruling promote and support. Yes, racism can be fought, but through working-class solidarity and unity along the lines to actively fight such vices. A properly organized working-class which is class-conscious will curtail the forces of capitalist system, as well as the inevitable disease, for instance racism. Among the many different forms of this racism is Islamophobia. Islamophobia get fueled and promoted within communities as well as other forms of racism such as bigotry against African American and immigrants are promoted (Malik, 2008, p. 158). Racism promotes a false logic of unity within the oppressed and the oppressors basing their ideology on commonality of language and race. Majidi makes the conclusion of this article by saying that; “at that moment when the system of the capitalist shall be overthrown, there will be no longer promotion of racism by the state in mission to safeguard its interests. Instead the fight against racism will be spearheaded by the working-class of the community. ” The Afghanistan war marks it 10-year of anniversary on October 7. Is it known that about 92% of the Afghans have no idea about the 9/11 attacks? This is known as War on Terror-which has always been a disgrace causing immeasurable number of death, destruction and devastation around the world (Mcternan, 2010, p.294). That is a sign on itself to show opposition towards this war. To add to the point, money channeled towards this war was a clear meaning of that money that was withdrawn from education and health in the United States. This has terribly caused a lot of suffering to relatives of working class in US. I plead with you all to come out to the Protest and Die-In on 7th October for the 10th Anniversary of the Afghanistan War. Transform remembrance into! Silent….do not be! All of us are brothers and sisters. Though, we are not connected at heart-which is just a beating organ-but by a virtual umbilical cord. Any form of pain that one of us suffer from this world should be empathized by all of us. We need not to look at afar distance to witness suffering and pain, and again we shouldn’t just identify with the victims of the United States Empire in other countries only because we have it just exactly here in US. It was resolved among participants of the international panel of discussion hosted in Istanbul over the weekend that like any other form of racism Islamophobia should be condemned just the same way anti-Semitism is. The panel further argued that the term “phobia” doesn’t exactly represent the right perception of the Muslims. There was a claim further by the participants of the panel “Islamophobia from the Young Journalists” that it isn’t fear but hatred that precisely shows the attitude of the Western Media’s coverage of the Islam and moreover the perception of the Muslims. The same condemnation raised against the anti-Semitism is the similar one that should be reject Islamophobia as a crime against humanity. It was noticed that the government has worked on mechanisms to recognize Islamophobia as a crime against humanity and has made a call on the improvement of awareness on such an issue. Presently, there is lots of responsibility on the side of the media as per to the fact that relates to eradication of hatred against the Muslims (Ruthven, 2004, p. 219). Much of this can be achieved through publications in the English language which to a greater extent has been the lingua franca of the modern times of ours- since it has a huge responsibility in terms of accessibility to a global audience. Further, Mehdi Hasan of the Huffington post United Kingdom pronounced that, “British media is these days institutionally Islamophobic,” giving examples of headings from the British media. Moreover, he claimed that Islamophobia predates September 11. In contradiction to Mehdi Hasan’s stance, Jerome Taylor, the correspondent of the religious affairs of the Independent, argued that media is “predominantly” Islamophobic This is a modest effort to label this conflict to reveal a new method to what might look like a “clash of identity and differences.” It is a re-structuring of certain theories of the conflict which narrows down to the religion and cultural differences, to answer the fundamental question “Why do some people rebel?” I admit that a huge part of this answer depends on the subject of sociological identity and differences, whose basic reference is the social location. From every indication, these conflicts are resulting from ethnic, religious, political, and cultural differences; causing a form of the politics of identity in which a sidelined group in a society or members of their community are besieged to re-affirm their distinctive identity. Stated in another simple way, it`s the tussle over claims to culturally and politically reinforce the sensitive categories of becoming political and religious identities. Muslims react to modernity in several forms one of which is to adopt the ideas of the reformist or modernist. Islamic reformists believe in the merging of universal ethics and Islamic beliefs and are eager to introduce this into the Islamic societies. Therefore, as opposed to the fundamentalists, the modernists do not dislike or fear Western concepts and practices. In the contrary, they buy to non-Islamic concepts and practices which they consider useful to the prosperity of the Muslim societies. They artistically synthesize Western and Islamic ideas to yield a sensible and relevant reinterpretation of the Islamic concepts with open-minded, liberal, cosmopolitan, and realistic perspectives. Islamic modernists admit that tolerance for diversity together with willingness to adapt rapidly to a non-static environment contributes to the liberation of individual Muslim as well as to the growth of Muslim societies. Conclusion The unfortunate predicament of modernizing, and secularizing the Muslim world has resulted to certain crisis, troubling the flimsy Muslim oriented nation states in the developing world. Handling Islamophobia as an issue of the Muslims is not in its right context. In, fact Islamophobia is an issue beyond the national boundaries to the global perspective. The debate on Islamophobia should be based on the global arena perspective lest no positive results shall be obtained. Communism and most Western nations are at war with the Islamic believers, they believe Islam preach different ideologies which serve threaten the peace of the world and they have already brainwashed several non-Muslim nations to believe this claim. However, the Islamists believe all they are advocating for are driven by the urge to foster social cohesion among its followers, as a sense of identity and to re-establish the power and influence of Muslim nations in the political arena. References List ASLAN, R. (2009) How to Win a Cosmic War, London: Arrow Books. HUSAIN, E. (2007) The Islamist, London: Penguin Books. KUNDNANI, A. (2002) ‘The death of multiculturalism’, The Institute of Race Relations , Available at: http://www.irr.org.uk/2002/april/ak000001.html LAMBERT, R. AND GITHENS-MAZER, J. (2010) ‘A hatred exposed’, The Guardian, Tuesday 1 June. MALIK, K. (2008). Strange Fruit: Why Both Sides are Wrong in the Race Debate, Oxford: Oneworld Press. MANZOOR, S. (2005). ‘Weve ditched race for religion’ The Guardian January 11th. MASROOR, A. (2007) ‘A plan to radicalise Muslims’, The Guardian, April 11th. MCGHEE, D. (2008). The End Of Multiculturalism? Open University Press. MCTERNAN, O. (2010). ‘Prevent: a dangerous policy failure’, The Guardian, May 10th. RUTHVEN, M. (2004). Fundamentalism: The Search for Meaning. Oxford: Oxford University Press. TAYLOR, J. (2010). ‘Are efforts to tackle home-grown Muslim extremism backfiring?’ The Independent, March 31st. Read More