Don’t die, nor do they fade away, it seems.
Members of the Conservative party believe in deeply Islamophobic myths, taint the entire Muslim community with responsibility for terrorism, and among other things say they would prefer not to have a Muslim as Britain’s prime minister. So what was Theresa May’s response at this week’s prime minister’s questions? To flippantly turn a question about this stain on her party’s moral standing into a political attack on the Labour party.
What myths? That Islam is a deeply conservative, misogynistic, patriarchal belief system that is rooted in violence against the unbeliever and the apostate? These are not myths, they are the teachings from the Quran. Disliking this belief system is perfectly okay. It is the rational stance to take when faced with something that should have died out centuries ago. It is not Islamophobic, because there is no such thing as Islamophobia. A phobia is a mental condition that creates physiological reactions in the sufferer. A strong dislike is not phobia and a strong dislike is perfectly acceptable in a liberal society that allows freedom of – and from – religion along with freedom of speech. Islam is not so special that it should be shielded from criticism. Islamophobia is, like the other phobias created by the regressive left, an artificial construct designed to stifle dissent. If members of the Conservative Party are openly hostile to Islam, then that’s absolutely fine. Are they indulging in violence? No? Are they inciting violence? No? Nothing wrong then.
The Conservative party is facing a crisis, as the latest YouGov polling for Hope Not Hate revealed, but it is turning its face away from the reality of that crisis, hoping against hope that the problem will go away.
Ah. Right. Hope not Hate. A far left hate group on the extreme fringes that seems, somehow, to have wormed its way into the establishment. It is a group that vociferously opposes free speech, preferring to label criticism of Islam as hate speech and getting people de-platformed from social media platforms for daring to voice dissent on the subject (See – Tommy Robinson, Sargon of Akkad and so on…). They are a nasty bunch of authoritarian, censorious activists funded, apparently, by the equally evil George Soros. Hope not Hate, like the rest of the regressive left is the very thing it claims to oppose. Why is anyone taking any notice of these nasty authoritarians?
Jeremy Hunt and Boris Johnson have a stark choice: do they go against the grain of members who express quite shocking views, potentially harming their chances of winning the leadership, or do they keep quiet because they’re too scared to say anything – or even because they agree with these disgraceful viewpoints?
See what they did there? These views are awful, shocking, even. People may not be allowed to hold them. They are disgraceful. What are these views, then?
The views expressed by Tory members aren’t the views of a mainstream party. Members have bought into Islamophobic myths: 67% believe the lie that “there are areas in Britain that operate under sharia law”, as opposed to just 18% who do not believe this to be the case. Almost half (45%) believe the lie that “there are areas in Britain in which non-Muslims are not able to enter”, as opposed to just 34% who do not believe this to be the case. Members taint the whole Muslim community for the actions of a tiny, tiny minority, with 39% of members believing that “Islamist terrorists reflect a widespread hostility to Britain among the Muslim community”.
Ah… Right. But there are Sharia courts operating in the UK, just as they are in other European countries. Sure, like the Jewish Beth Din courts, they have no weight under English Law, which takes precedence. However, Sharia does exist in this country and it is a lie to deny it.
As for no-go areas, there are plenty of video clips online and cases in the news where people have been harassed because they are in a “Muslim area” and these areas have been patrolled by Muslim vigilantes. Again, this is not a myth, it is an undeniable fact. As for the terrorism thing, well, I don’t think that anyone seriously believes that all Muslims are latent terrorists, but the belief system itself is a violent one. Contrary to the oft-repeated claim, it is not a religion of peace – it is a religion of conquest. That’s how it spread in the first place. Also the failure to assimilate into the host culture, creating ghettos doesn’t exactly help, now, does it?
Members of the party, who are currently choosing Britain’s next prime minister, don’t want Britain to have a Muslim prime minister. Just 8% agreed with the statement, “I would be proud of Britain if we were to elect a Muslim as our prime minister”, while 43% agreed that “I would prefer to not have the country led by a Muslim”.
And? We are still a majority Anglo-Saxon Judaeo Christian country. Islam is not a compatible system, believing as it does in the law of God. And, believing as it does, that democracy is fundamentally opposed to the law of God. So, no, I would not want to see a practising Muslim in No 10 Downing Street. I see this objection as perfectly reasonable and rational. Come back to me when Islam has gone through an enlightenment and embraces enlightenment values and ask me again. Until then, absolutely not.
Given these quite shocking numbers, it perhaps shouldn’t be a surprise that only 15% of members think the Conservatives should be doing more to combat Islamophobia within their party. Over three-quarters (76%) think the party is “already doing all it reasonably can to combat Islamophobia and other racism within the party”.
Nice bit of newspeak going on there. Firstly, I repeat, Islamophobia is an artificial construct. Dislike of Islam is just fine as is dislike of any religious belief system. It is not racism and to conflate the two is the standard disingenuous argument we see from the regressive left. There is nothing to combat. Britain is a tolerant nation – probably one of the most tolerant on the planet and this is a good thing.
There are party members who have more in common with Katie Hopkins than Rory Stewart.
Yeah? So? Political parties tend to be a broad church. So what?
That should alarm potential leaders.
No it shouldn’t. Not if you believe in diversity of thought and opinion.
We’ve called on the Conservatives (and repeatedly asked the party chairman, Brandon Lewis) to hold an independent, external investigation into the state of Islamophobia in the party, but the response so far has been a deafening silence.
Good. And let’s hope it stays that way. An extreme far-left fake charity making demands such as this need to be vigorously opposed. I’d probably have responded, but it would have been along the lines of go forth and multiply. The Guardian is probably the most poisonous media outlet in this country. The level of sanctimonious hypocrisy and self-righteous posturing is only matched by their ability to get just about everything wrong all of the time. The Conservative Party is not answerable to the unelected extremists in Hope not Hate, nor the Guardian.
Step one is to actually acknowledge the problem exists.
There isn’t one. Next?
But we also need to know the definition of Islamophobia the party uses in making judgments during disciplinary processes.
There is no such thing. Next?
Who decides whether to refer a member for disciplinary consideration? To whom are members referred to have their cases decided? Who sits on that committee or body? Who decides who sits on that committee or body? How many of the cases were found to be proven? How many of those members were expelled from the party? These are simple questions, but the Conservative party seems to have no answers.
I’m sure they do, it’s just that the internal disciplinary process is no business of Hope not Hate and they have no rights whatsoever to expect any answers.
Racism in any party is appalling, and must be tackled.
Dislike of Islam is not racism.
Hope Not Hate was founded in the fires of the fight against the far-right British National party, but we will call out hate if it rears its head in any mainstream party, as it has in the Labour party with its failure to rigorously chase antisemitism out of its ranks.
And the BNP is about as representative of Britain as Hope not Hate is. Both are on the fringes, the outer extremes.
It’s depressingly predictable that Johnson has now started to backtrack on promises that all the leadership candidates made during their TV hustings last week to hold an inquiry. His response to the revelation that many party members held deeply Islamophobic views has been to pander to them, instead of showing that he wants to lead the whole country. Given his own history, this perhaps isn’t surprising, but it should still shock.
Actually, I was pleased to hear that he had decided not to pander to the Islamic lobby. There are far more important matters waiting for the new leader. As for the piccaninnies and watermelon smiles… Must we really spell it out for this cretin? I guess so, given that he is peddling it yet again.
The Telegraph article was a scathing attack on the then prime minister Tony Blair and his jet-setting about the world supposedly putting right all their wrongs. Johnson was using satire and heavy sarcasm to attack what could best be described as an imperialistic attitude. Johnson is a master of language – far better than the hacks at the Guardian, for example. The language he used was clearly deliberately archaic and offensive – because he was making a point, you disingenuous piece of shit! Only by taking the words out of context can you make a case for racism and that is what these evil people are doing here. Read Johnson’s words in context and there is nothing to see here.
May’s dismissal of concerns about Islamophobia in her party was embarrassing. The views of party members, and her inaction in the face of these facts, will be part of her legacy. It remains to be seen if these shocking views will be a stain on her successor too, or if they will provide them with the spur to take action.
There is one piece of action he can take and that is to immediately de-fund all of the fake charities that infest our country. The other is to enshrine freedom of speech by repealing all the hate speech legislation. In the meantime, treat Hate not Hope (see what I did there?) with all of the contempt they clearly deserve…
It’s all just a smokescreen, a pathetic attempt to direct things away from the vile bigots in the Corbyn led Labour party and their for the many, not the Jew evil.
Wankers every last one of them.
I would never vote for a Muslim. The fact that they revere a slave owning, slave trading, slave rape condoning, caravan robbing, enemy beheading, pedophile is all I need to know about their pathologically twisted mindset.
Taqiya. That’s all I’ll say… 😉
The part where they demand to know the Tory party’s internal rules, who decides what, on what basis, etc, is drawn directly from (((Saul Alinsky’s))) 1971 book “Rules for Radicals”. Rule #4 states: “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.”
While I can understand the temptation to tell the enemy to eff off, maintaining radio silence is better as it avoids revealing anything at all about internal operations.
Since the very definition of “phobias” is that they are IRRATIONAL, whereas the fear that most people like myself have is that Islam believes and practices exactly what it says on the tin. This has been demonstrated by its followers time and again, up-to-and-including the murder of 35 people in Mali on June 9th.
List of Islamist terrorist attacks (Wikipedia)
Which will never happen, since the Qur’an is meant to be the literal word of Allah as transcribed by the prophet Mohammed and unlike the bible cannot be subject to revision, substantial reinterpretation or selective exclusion.
Given that this is an often repeated part of the Islamic “religion” (actually just a death cult of Arab conquest), I personally think we should ascribe its followers to the consequences of signing up to this, just like we prosecute people for membership of terrorist organisations.
If Western civilisation based upon the enlightenment is going to survive then the Islamic menace will need to pushed back into its box once again as has been done in ages past.
It’s not about fake Islamophobia, it’s an existential threat. It always has been.
Note to Boris
I’m perfectly willing to mount a deep and thorough review of the Tory membership and, as soon as I have received my knighthood, report to the Graunuiad that there is no trace of anti-Muslim feeling among the Tory members