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Criticism of the Concept

There is a rather bullshit part under the paragraph 'Criticism of the Concept' which basically alledges those who criticize Islam are going to organize another holocaust, or something to that effect, this does not belong under 'Criticism of the Concept' paragraph, it is not relevant, and it is not criticism, it seems to have just been added for effect. --86.137.173.9 18:14, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

The above user was being crude, but I basically agree that the following paragraph:

"Wolfram Richter, professor of economics in the University of Dortmund believes that what is seen as Islamophobia is essentially just another form of racism, an "extension of ‘ein Volk’". He claims that his "main fear is that what we did to Jews we may now do to Muslims. The next holocaust would be against Muslims.""


belongs elsewhere in the article, at the very least. I would say just take it out, because it's unsubstantiated, and anyhow why would a professor of economics have any authority to predict the next Holocaust? And isn't using that language really sensationalistic? Chris 64.131.157.221 19:19, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Jihadwatch.org

I re-added some links posted by Yuber that CltFn deleted, and because I had added Yuber's, I felt I ought also to keep the one CltFn had added, which was this. However, I had only looked at the article at the top, and didn't realize there were comments underneath it, some of which are unacceptable, so I'm going to delete it again.

I also did a copy edit, slight restructuring, expanded the intro, and added an image. SlimVirgin (talk) 15:58, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

I've briefly protected this against the anon IP's vandalism. If we've edited an article, we're not meant to protect it in a content dispute, but we're allowed to if it's vandalism, and the addition of the VfD tag clearly was. I'll unlock it again soon. SlimVirgin (talk) 02:31, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Hello, I'm new here.

A question: if somebody takes the intellectual stance that Islam is a Nazi-like ideology, and Muslims the victims of religious/cultural brainwashing in their upbringing, isn't it natural that such a person might be phobic towards Islam? Nobody ever accused the anti-Nazis of being Naziophobic, for instance. I just wonder if the term Islamophobia isn't just a way of preventing any criticism from atheists about the religion itself. I bet that soon Christian fundamentalists will start calling all atheists Christianophobic to silence anyone who criticises or pokes fun at parts of Christianity...

Well, I think if someone thinks that Islam is a unified, Nazi-like ideology, and all Muslims are brainwashed into following it - then of course it would be natural for that person to fear Islam. It would also be natural for others to regard this person and ignorant or delusional. Michael Voytinsky

(This message was deleted, with the claim that it was not revelvant to the previous discussions Islamophobia - a idiotic claim - and that I am "not new". I am new here. My IP address may have been set to this, but I am totally new to wikipedia. I have made none of the other edits attributed in the history page to this IP address, so I can only assume this portal is used by a vast amount of other internet users...)

AnonymousEditor wrote: “stop adding this material before you get another page protected.” Is that a threat dear AnonymousEditor? You don’t like Ali Sina and I don’t like Bin Laden, nonetheless we can’t censor the views of people we don’t like. This page is not about Ali Sina. This page is about Islamophobia. I have quoted several sources on this subject Ali Sina is one of them. “Faith Freedom International” returns 200,000 entries in Google search. What is your criterion for notability? [20:52 23 October 2005 OceanSplash)

But only 121 unique hits. [1] I'm not sure that Ali Sina can be used as a source for this article. He runs a personal website as an anonymous person, which means we can use him as a source about himself (and even then with caution), but we can't use him as a secondary source on anything else. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources. However, if Ali Sina were to be quoted by a newspaper saying these things, then we could use him. SlimVirgin (talk) 20:58, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
No that is not a threat dear OceanSplash. That is a warning and you should be smart enough to listen to it before engaging in revert wars with other editors. SV is right about it being a non-notable source. A google search will only give you a few unique hits, other hits could be from any other site containing the words: freedom, faith and international. I don't know why you want to add a promotion to your site in every article anyways. Wikipedia is not an advertisement site. Also I don't see how implying that I "like bin Laden" is going to help your case. --a.n.o.n.y.m t 21:05, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Dear SlimVirgin.I requested you to intervene and stop their war of revert. I said I keep adding and changing the site and all these Muslim do is revert with no explanation. I requested you to protect the page and said (this time please protect my version) last time you protected the Muslims’ version. This time you did the same. But checking your page I see you are Iranian. Are you a Muslim? Please restore my trust in Wikipedia. Are you sure that you are not also motivated by religious fervor? Can you explain why you always protect the site against me editing it and not the other way round? Is that by design? (OceanSplash 22:17 23 October 2005)

Ocean, could you please sign your posts to make the talk page easier to read? You generate your sig and date/time by typing four tildes, like this ~~~~ See Wikipedia:Sign your posts on talk pages. In response to your earlier message, I left a note on your talk page [2] explaining about the need for good sources, so perhaps you could let me know your views on that. In fairness to you, I do think that some of the material you've added here is correctly sourced and should be allowed to stay, but that's just my opinion, and I'm not allowed to get involved in editing now that I've protected. I can make suggestions, but no one has to pay any attention. And I can assure you that I'm not motivated by religious fervor. ;-) SlimVirgin (talk) 22:26, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
Excuse me, but all of us "evil Muslims" gave edit summaries and reasons for reverts. However, ofcourse, you didn't [3] Mr. Sina. Also you might want to realize that administrators can't carry out personal favors and protect the version you want them to. Thanks,-a.n.o.n.y.m t 22:28, 23 October 2005 (UTC) - Also don't delete my message next time; it is considered vandalism.
Thank you Slim for acknowledging that some of the material I posted have good sources. Can you please tell me which ones do not have good sources and why? You also did not tell me why you always protect the page favoring the Muslims. It is good to know you are not motivated by religious fervor. If you show that in action, I would be even more convinced. Thanks User:OceanSplash 22:24 23 October 2005)
I'd like to unprotect this, so it would be good if an agreement could be reached. In my own view, the material from Ali Sina should be deleted because he publishes on his own website. The Kenan Malik material was published in Prospect, and seems relevant, and Robert Spencer is a published author and the material is also relevant. Bahram Soroush seems like a notable source. The website No to political Islam seems a bit borderline to me. [4] However, Ocean, this is just my opinon, and because I've protected the page, I can't edit it; I can only make suggestions with a view to resolving the dispute. SlimVirgin (talk) 22:40, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
I'm going to unprotect this page because OceanSplash has alleged that I'm abusing my admin powers by having protected the page and then having nominated Anonymous editor for adminship. He feels there's a conflict of interest because I'm currently "mediating" between AE and Ocean. [5] I'm not mediating here at all, of course, but because the allegation has been made, I'm going to unprotect. I'll ask another admin to keep an eye on the page. SlimVirgin (talk) 01:52, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

I would like to get some feedback on my impression of Islam. Every time I got a detailed explanation of Islam, whether from individual Muslims, or Islamic orgaizations, the theme that "Islam is a complete way of life" emerged to some extent or another. Specifically, the idea that in Islam there is no separation of Church and State seems to be intrinsic to Islam. I may have been badly informed, of course. But if that is true of Islam, surely we are justified in viewing Islam in the same light as we would any religion that seeks temporal power as part of its doctrine? (Which is to say, negative light.)

In other words, would this not make "Islamophobia" justified? Michael Voytinsky

NPOV'd

Added question to this articles neutrality, as I am sure is very well warranted.

Those who argue Islamophobia is not a trend are ducking responsibility or are Islamophobes themselves not wanting to be exposed.

Islamophobia and the irrational fear of Islam is not a new world concept. Since the onset of the religion of Islam and its subsequent metoric rise, Christian Europeans have always felt threatened by Islam and Muslims. Books appeared in Europe on the "demented Prophet" "Satanic Prophet" who was described as the anti-Christ.

This subsequent brain-washing and irrational fear found a willing audience in the Crusades. The very people who blamed all Jews for the death of Christ found another religion to scapegoat as "demonic" and non-Christian.

Subsequent Inquisitions, death, and expulsions of Muslims took place all over Europe motivated by this Islamophobia. It wasn't until late in the 18th Century with many historians actually visiting the colonized Muslim lands of the Middle East by the European powers such as France, England, and Spain that some in-depth and unbiased unanalysis of Islam acutally occurred.

Now after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the world has witnessed another rise of Islamophobia, where the Islamophobes are quick to point out the religion and motivation of the Sept 11. hijackers while dismissing their political reasons of US foreign policy, Israeli oppression in Palestine, and support of other dictators by Western Powers in Iraq, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia as their catalysts for the attacks.

The Islamophobes tend to be 1) apologists for the state of Israel 2) Recent Gallup poll (March 2006) shows that 46% of Americans hold unfavorable view of the world's 2nd largest faith, with 25% holding outright incindiary and hostile anti-Muslim views. Of which the Evangelical Protestant groups are on top. 3) Political right-wing Hindu-supremacists.

So Islamophobia is the unjust, unreasonable hatred of Islam and Muslims. It is not a new world event, but has existed since the advent of Islam.

Restructuring

It occurs to me that the preamble to the article is probably one of the least NPoV sections. I think the cited quotations should be moved elsewhere in the article and the definition of of Islamophobia expanded. How about something along the lines of:

Islamophobia is a neologism used to refer to an irrational fear or prejudice towards Muslims and the religion of Islam.

Of the term Secretary-General Kofi Annan told a December 7, 2004 UN conference on the emergence of Islamophobia that "(when) the world is compelled to coin a new term to take account of increasingly widespread bigotry — that is a sad and troubling development. Such is the case with 'Islamophobia'." [6]

American journalist Stephen Schwartz has defined Islamophobia as the condemnation of the entirety of Islam and its history as extremist, denying the existence of a moderate Muslim majority, regarding Islam as a problem for the world, treating conflicts involving Muslims as necessarily their own fault, insisting that Muslims make changes to their religion, and inciting war against Islam as a whole. [7]

There is concern that the term Islamophobia is being used to stifle legitmate comment and criticism of Islam, by linked genuine commentators with the more extreme elements the term usually refers to.

is it a phobia?

is it irrational to be afraid of a sect of a religion (120 million people) that preach hate and violence? i know its not ALL muslims but it is A LOT of people nonetheless. there are 1.2 billion muslims in the world. if only 10% subscribe to this thinking, then thats 120 million people!! thats a lot of damn people going around preaching/supporting/teaching/condoning violence and terrorism. thats scary to me. and very real.

Well my friend you are entitled to your opinon but wikipedia is not a political forum. If want to vent against muslim, I am sure you can find many other forums on the internet.
This is absurd. Can one comment about KKK saying it preaches hate, or is it disallowed? If KKK can be critiqued, why not Islam or any ideology for that matter? Fallacious opinions have no place in an encyclopaedia but we can’t censor factual comments about a certain doctrine just because the followers of that doctrine feel offended. OceanSplash 12 Dec. 2005, 17:22


If something is based on facts, it should be included. There are other forums for "political opinions"

Oddly, a phobia need not be irrational. Check dictionary.com - it needs only to be intense fear.... --Habap 23:02, 12 December 2005 (UTC

Have you (whoever you are) even been to the middle east? If you haven't I highly advise you no to speak on things you have no experience of. Angrynight 03:57, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

If you haven't I strongly advise you to stay away from that craphole. Unless of course you're looking forward to having your head sawn off with a dull knife...--LordRahl 16:26, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Oh and, Please Sign your comments!!! Angrynight 03:57, 10 February 2006 (UTC)


(Edit) It seems to me that comparing the KKK (an Organization) and Islam (a Religion) is about as relevent an anology as comparing Christianity and Hamas. Yes, a person can comment about a religion preaching hate, but when that goes to the point of saying that all followers of said religion believe and preach that hate than we have reached a level of 'phobia'. There are things in the Bible that are hate, there are Christian organizations (SBC, 700 Club, AFA, Focus on the Family) that preach hate, and Christians that act on that hate (Eric Rudolph). BUT...I would not go so far as saying that all members apply their individual belief systems toward hatred, and the same is true for my views on Islam.

Oh, and I speak the language and have been the the region, and many that I have met there don't have a hatred for the U.S. anymore than most Christians I meet have a hatred for Islam.

Unfortunately, your personal perspective on the feelings of Muslims towards the United States is not a sufficient basis for changes to the article. Bibigon 10:18, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Anti-semitism

THIS STATEMENT IS HIGHLY CONTENTIOUS AND WOULD SEEM TO EVIDENCE A RATHER ODIOUS ANTI SEMTISM. ONE COMMENTATOR OF JEWISH FAITH IN FRANCE CAN NOT POSSIBLY BE USED TO EVIDENCE JEWISH OPINION WORLDWIDE, UNLESS HE IS ONE OF THE ELDERS OF ZION OF COURSE. THE FOLLWING STATEMENT IS OPINION AND THE PRODUCT OF A DISEASED MIND. THE RIOTERS IN FRANCE WERE MAINLY ARAB / MUSLIM IN ORIGIN. IS IT ISLAMOPHOBIA FOR JEWS TO CRITIQUE EVENTS IN THEIR OWN SOCIETIES?

Jews can certainly "CRITIQUE" anything they wish but I am sure you would categorize as "anti-semitism" if a white superamist writes "jewish hollywood" is promoting immoral behavior instead of just "hollywood". Same goes for Islamophobia. I am not sure where elder of zion came into picture here. Finkielkraut was criticized by Movement Against Racism in France. Disuss it honestly before editing the article.

Islamophobia among Jews

I've removed this section because it attributes opinions of individuals to "the Jews". The fact that some Islamophobes happen to be Jewish does not warrant labeling thier opinion as being "among Jews". If the anonymous editor that added this section can provide evidence that these opinions are prevalent among Jews, that's a different story. Until then, the section is out.--Doron 07:16, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

You're right, the section is NPOV and individuals NOT groups should be talked about. Yuber(talk) 11:20, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Also with the rise of anti Semitism and attacks on Jews in Europe mainly by Muslim immigrants, and the alliance between Muslims and neo Nazis, I wonder whether fearing the Muslims can be classified as Islamophobia. Phobia is unfounded fear. When you are attacked, your synagogues are rampaged and your people are harassed constantly is it still phobia if you fear your attackers? OceanSplash13 Dec. 2005 07:42
Ya wha' ? The Neo Nazi Groupings of Europe have long since turned their attention to Muslims. In France, le Pen, leader of the National Front attacks Muslims, not Jews. In the UK the BNP no longer seems to care about Jews and goes after Muslims, along with the remnants of the C18 and Stormfront. The attacks of Muslims, Mosques and things associtaed with Muslims has been far more volumous than Attacks against Jews, Synagouges and things associated with Jews. Though, attacks on Black people, irrespective of religion, still remain the largest hate-crime attacks seen in Europe. --Irishpunktom\talk 12:00, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Please stop trying to rationalize fear of an entire community as you are beginning to sound like a racist. Yuber(talk) 11:23, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
OceanSplash, please note that a phobia need not be "irrational". The term, in its political sense, may mean a dislike or fear of a group of people, rational or otherwise (see Phobia#Non-clinical_uses_of_the_term).--Doron 11:42, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Alain Finkielkraut is absolutely not racist. Don't believe this intellectual blackmail campaign which is the hearth of this islamophobia campaign. Jmfayard 00:15, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
I am afraid there is much more to neo-Nazi/Islam cooperation than you would like to admit. Daveed Gartenstein-Ross in The Peculiar Alliance quotes both prominent Nazi and Islamists who have clearly stated that they are fighting for a common cause and must cooperate. The article also mentions that some Nazis in Europe have remained anti Islamists. In is an unbiased article and very well documented.
I am afraid phobia is always irrational and unfounded fear. According to dictionary definition phobia is a persistent, abnormal, and irrational fear. If the fear is legitimate and justifiable then it is not called phobia. For example, it is erroneous to say one is “phobic” of AIDS, Chicken flue or scorpions. Any sane person must be afraid of these dangers. If you are standing on a balcony from the 30th floor and you are afraid to look down, that is phobia, because you are safe and there is no need to be afraid, but you would be fool if you defy the gravity and jump from that high claiming you are not phobic. In many instances the fear of Muslim is well justified and it is all based on bitter experiences. There is nothing phobic about fearing Islam. It is a danger that threatens mankind. We might see a nuclear war very soon and all because a portion of humanity believes in Islam. This hatred is inspired by Islam and the Quran. Are you telling us that Islam has nothing to do with this hate and these terrorist acts? How do you explain this and this?
Don't call me racist. I was a leftwinger all my life and then Muslim for five years until I woke up after 9/11. Maybe it is time that you too wake up.OceanSplash 14 Dec. 2005 01:00
Jmfayard: I have been bullied since the day I put my foot in Wikipedia (see Ali Sina page. And they want us to believe Islamifascism is fairytale. I found SIIEG I am happy to see I am not alone. This place was quite depressing before seeing SIIEG. Maybe you want to join too. Wikipedia is gaining respectability and we can’t allow a certain group bully others to use is as a propaganda tool for their own faith. If it is called encyclopedia, it must be neutral. This place should not be used by Muslims to deceive the reader. Period. That is not negociable. I admit that had I known all the facts I would have not wasted five years of my life in Islam. I lost a lot during these years. Now I want to make sure facts are stated clearly so no one falls into that trap unknowingly, like I did. If they want to join with knowlege, that is their business. But everyone has the right to know the facts even if facts can be offensive to some. OceanSplash 14 Dec. 2005 01:24

From the American Heritage Dictionary ([8]):

pho·bi·a (fō'bē-ə)
n.
1. A persistent, abnormal, and irrational fear of a specific thing or situation that compels one to avoid it, despite the awareness and reassurance that it is not dangerous.
2. A strong fear, dislike, or aversion.

From Wikipedia article on phobia:

A number of neologisms have appeared with the suffix -phobia, in which "phobia" is understood as a negative attitude towards certain categories of people or other things, used in an analogy with the medical usage of the term. Usually these kinds of "phobia" are described as fear, dislike, disapproval, prejudice, hatred, discrimination, or hostility towards the object of the "phobia". Often this attitude is based on prejudices and is a particular case of general xenophobia.
A fear or hatred is not always considered a phobia in the clinical sense because it is believed to be only a symptom of other psychological problems, or the result of ignorance, or of political or social beliefs. In other words, unlike clinical phobias, which are usually qualified with the word "irrational", phobias of attitude usually have roots in social relations.

Thus, even if you think you can rationalize your disapproval of Islam, it is a phobia nonetheless.--Doron 06:12, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

So any disapproval of Islam is Islamophobia!? Michael Voytinsky 13:03, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Damned Voltaire, Kant, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Bertrand Russel, Taslima Nasreen, Salman Rushdie are all racists then ?
Thank you for pointing for us the danger of the use of this term
Jmfayard


Ok, this section should be added back again. At this time in history, Islamophobia among Jews is most intensive because of israeli/Palestinian conflict. This is not aimed at any ehtnicity but fear drived form a conflict/social situation as described in the definition of phobia.

I agree, there should not be a section pointing at a specific Jewish Islamophobia. This would equate to say that Jews are more islamophobic than others. That's just like saying that Muslims are more antisemite than others. Stupid. However I am appalled by the arguments put forward by some people here. Sad, sad, sad! Just put things in perspective, in the mid 20's century kind of the same was said about Jews. Interesting that some people here are so willing to accept and justify prejudice.

Solal

Misconceptions About Islam

I just saw the following the article:

"Aside from this many Islamic organizations in the west have taken step forwards to correct certain misconceptions about Islam that have become more prevalent in the post-9/11 world."

Perhaps it might be helpful to clarify what the misconceptions in question are. For example, I have been told I am racist when I said that Islam supports death penalty for adultery, and in general holds that sexual behaviour between consenting adults is a proper concern for the state. I have also been told by Muslims that that is, in fact, Islamic view. Which one is the misconception here? Michael Voytinsky

Don't worry Michael; these muslims who call you racist are most likely very radical muslims or jihadists themselves. A woman will be sentenced to death for adultery by stoning, a man gets no such punishment according to Sharia. If a muslim or a left-wing nutjob calls you a racist when you question the motives of Islam (not a race), they are trying to suppress your criticism.--Absent 13:45, 14 December 2005 (UTC) + It depends on which Muslims you ask. It certainly isn't an inherent view - it isn't one of the Pillars of Islam/Roots of Religion.
Actually, Muslims never accused me of Islamophobia. However, I am curious about your claim that man gets no punishment for adultery according to the sharia. Could you provide a reference to primary sources that would backup this claim? Michael Voytinsky + In Islam, there are different schools (Madhhab) of interpretation of the Koran and associated "collected sayings" (Hadith). Some interpretation schools are more liberal than others. The least liberal claim that Islam supports the death penalty, and gives this in its view of what Sharia Law should be. Other schools, however, dispute this. Liberal interpreters, for example, don't. See also Fiqh.
Factually, the Sharia prescribes 100 lashes for rape if unmarried, death by stoning if married for both males and females. However, in real life, this never works. A truth is that if a woman is raped (the case of adultery) both parties must acknowledge the crime if the woman reports it; if this doesnt happen (man does not aqcuit) then the female has to name four male witnesses. This leads to the fact that women are often stoned to death IF THEY ARE RAPED.--Absent 14:28, 14 December 2005 (UTC) + It's a bit like claiming that Fred Phelps speaks for all christians on every subject, because he is the most noticable christian in the media. This would be somewhat prejudiced against Christianity. This is the "view all Muslims as a monolithic block" criteria of Islamophobia - you view there as being only one view, and ask what it is, when in reality there are many shades. --Victim of signature fascism vote for the arb com 17:18, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

What is the above hog wash? 1-quote:"A woman will be sentenced to death for adultery by stoning, a man gets no such punishment according to Sharia." FALSE. In sharia, if unmarried, both male and female get 100 lashes, if married BOTH MAN AND WOMAN get killed but NOT by stoning. Stoning HAS been used by governments but it is not islamic.

2-quote:"the Sharia prescribes 100 lashes for rape if unmarried, death by stoning if married for both males and females. However, in real life, this never works. A truth is that if a woman is raped (the case of adultery) both parties must acknowledge the crime if the woman reports it; if this doesnt happen (man does not aqcuit) then the female has to name four male witnesses. This leads to the fact that women are often stoned to death IF THEY ARE RAPED.--" Again PURELY false. First off 100 lashes for ADULTERY not rape, a rapist is condemned to death. The female does NOT have to submit four witnesses to prove rape, rather anyone accusing a man or a woman of ADULTERY must provide four witnesses. Stop using fake propaganda as fact. 196.204.227.95


They really know how to treat their women. Lets not forget the millions of women who have their clitoris chopped off to diminish their sexual desire and pleasure. Nice. Really nice.

It depends on which Muslims you ask. It certainly isn't an inherent view - it isn't one of the Pillars of Islam/Roots of Religion.

In Islam, there are different schools (Madhhab) of interpretation of the Koran and associated "collected sayings" (Hadith). Some interpretation schools are more liberal than others. The least liberal claim that Islam supports the death penalty, and gives this in its view of what Sharia Law should be. Other schools, however, dispute this. Liberal interpreters, for example, don't. See also Fiqh.

It's a bit like claiming that Fred Phelps speaks for all christians on every subject, because he is the most noticable christian in the media. This would be somewhat prejudiced against Christianity. This is the "view all Muslims as a monolithic block" criteria of Islamophobia - you view there as being only one view, and ask what it is, when in reality there are many shades. --Victim of signature fascism vote for the arb com 17:18, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

In traditional jurisprudence (& I can only say about hanafi), for the case of adultary , the accuser ( either male & female ) has to bring four sane adults of good reputation who have seen the penis going into vagina , for any kind of death penalty . If the person cant bring four witnesses , the punishment for false accusation/defaming is 80 lashes ( same for both male & female ) .In the case of rape , a thing that is always reported by female , she has to bring four witnesses , if she cant , then both parties have to take an oath (saying may I be cursed , destroyed , die in the most painfull manner , all my siblings/offsprings die , if I tell a lie ) . If both parties do it , then there is no penalty on either side , since usually in mulim culture , women usually dont claim to be raped for no reason , so there is a great possibility that she is telling the truth , but since there is no evidence to back her up, the state cant punish the man . The conditions change if there is a track record of accusations (on female side) or of being accused ( on male side) . THis isnt from any primary text, although you can find in Quran that Islam doesnt want extra marital sexual affairs to occur , and also 100 lashes punishment, in the hadith you can find death penalty for adultary . The rest is a part of Islamic jurisprudence , not Islam the faith, so you can only find it in jurisprudence books , not in primary texts . Islam considers sexual behaviour between consenting adults as a proper concern for the state only when its is taken to the state officials , otherwise nobody is gonna invade your bedroom for it . In the current western culture , adultary might not be considered such a big crime , but in Islam & more or less every other religion it is seen in this way .
This kind of jurisprudence seems crude from current standards , but it needs to be understood that after the destruction of Baghdad & Persia by Mongols , & massacare of Muslims in Spain , days of Islamic intellectualism were over . There wasent much work done in science, philosophy or jurisprudence afterwards . So all these laws are alleast 800 years old . Then came the colonialists , who further destroyed the remains . At the moment all Islamic countries are averagely 50 years old , facing a lot of bullying from America . But slowly & gradually, in countries like Malaysia & Pakistan, there are discussions on restarting of Ijtihad , to update jurisprudence that is 800-1200 years old , created at a time when there was no electricity , CCTV , DNA tests , chemical analysis e.t.c. Hopefuly within 5 years , we will see modern forensic science incorporated Islamic jurisprudence . F.a.y.تبادله خيال /c 20:24, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Fay - I will provide more detailed comments later, but for now I have a short question - one that I many Muslims refuse to answer in a coherent manner. In a properly run Islamic society, what freedoms that are taken for granted in the West, will not exist? The answers I get tend to be of the following categories:
1) None.
2) Some.
3) Most
4) Incoherent Rambling.
5) A lengthy rant on why Western freedoms are bad.
And -Ril- - as to your point - Fred Phelps is obviously fringe - even the likes of Falwell have described him as "a nut". Muslims who think that criminalizing adultery and fornication is reasonable - to the point of death penalty for the former - are not fringe. I do not know how many Muslims believe this - I am not aware of any polls - but this opinion is certainly much more common among Muslims than among Christians. Michael Voytinsky 21:31, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
How can you claim it is more common amongst X than Y when you aren't aware of any evidence for it? that's just plain bias and bigotry. --Victim of signature fascism 20:26, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Increasing the reliability of Wikipedia

We can safely assume that only the preamble is free from bias as the rest is routinely modified. For this reason I would like to propose that the preamble is kept short and concise. The disputed uses I have put under the heading "Use of the term" in order to keep Wikipedia quality as high as possible.

You what?

Problems, just a few.

  1. "It is mostly used to negatively characterize criticism directed at Islam whether legimate or not." That in the opneing paragraph is POV gibberish. It replaced the more accurate NPOV and Sourced statement: "The concept of Islamophobia has been questioned, with some commentators arguing that the term can also be used to censor legitimate criticism of Islam and of Muslim individuals. [9]. They believe that is used to negatively characterize criticism directed at Islam."
  2. Kenan Malik is described as Muslim. He is not.[10]
  3. Kenan Malik's Criticisms of the term are placed in a section Hate crimes against Muslims. This is obvioulsy wrong.
  4. The Kenan Malik link is bad.

Thats it. These need fixing. --Irishpunktom\talk 12:21, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

When the word arose

I have never believed that the word "Islamophobia" dates from the early 1990s like this article claims, since creating it from Islam+phobia is all too easy. So I searched in an academic archive and found these usages:

  • International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 7, No. 1 (Jan., 1976), page 124.
  • Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Jan., 1982), pages 6 and 7.
  • Cultural Critique, No. 1 (Autumn, 1985), page 99. (This is an article of Edward Said. I suggest looking at Orientalism (1978) for earlier uses.)

Therefore it is not true that the word was invented in the 1990s even though it seems to be true that it became a lot more popular during the 1990s. The reason for that might have been more to do with the growth of awareness of the subject than with greater acceptance of the word, since it is the obvious word to use. Further research into the origins of the word could be done in newspaper archives. --Zero 23:51, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

You should add one of those 1970s citations in the history of the term section. To me, that's one of the most interesting parts of the article (and one of the parts most relevant to an encyclopedia).

Has anyone checked an OED? 64.131.157.221 19:26, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

OED does not have it at all. --Zero 00:34, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Unprotected

Been a week since any talk has taken place. If problems come back, let us know at RfP. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 07:33, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Reverting User:Lajjadda's edits.

I've reverted User:Lajjadda's edits to this article because I don't think he added anything new to the article -- as a matter of fact, he actually made it POV. -- T-Boy 02:41, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Citations needed.

I'm putting back the citation needed tag that Jasonblake removed, because frankly that tagged statement needs it. Who're these "Some people"? Where did they say this? No point putting in statements that cannot be attributed to a documented source. — T-Boy: (complain bitterly) (laugh contemptuously) 15:06, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Here is an article from Reuters that discusses the rise in Muslim hatred since Sept. 11th. If you do a Google search for these sorts of things, it's amazing what you find.

Hate Crimes.

im going to remove this short list, because i dont see how it helps ones understanding of thae astual subject and, well its not really a definitve list of hate crimes commited against muslims.

COMPLETELY Biased

Must be edited immediately, this article has some serious issues of bias

Yeah, it's pretty bad. Rampant fact picking. Full of weasel words like "some believe" (are two people required for "some" or is one guy sufficient?), "frequently" (is twice a year frequently?). An article on a conspiracy theory, written by the conspiracy theorists. Weregerbil 21:05, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Bias

I am not responsible for the previous comment, but this article is indeed biased. Where is the segment regarding the rational justification of "Islamophobia?" The article jumps from the history/definition of the word, then it jumps to criticism. Don't even act like it isn't biased. Haizum 12:15, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Dictionary.com: Phobia; "A persistent, abnormal, and irrational fear of a specific thing or situation that compels one to avoid it, despite the awareness and reassurance that it is not dangerous."

Unless you can change the article title and convince me that it never said "Islamophobia", then you won't be able to deny the slant of the article. Haizum 12:18, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I tagged the article with {{POV}}. Hopefully somebody could write a more neutral article. --Maitch 22:07, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
Golf Clap Thanks! Haizum 03:50, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
I made some small changes where I thought a turn of phrase was slightly POV. But I honestly couldn't see much bias one way or the other in this article. There should be even less now. I see no reason to keep the tag, but I'll await further discussion. Metamagician3000 08:36, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

There's always scope for fiddling around the edges of an article to try to improve it, which I have been doing myself (along with others) since I made the comment above. But I still can't see what is so terribly biased about the article as to deserve the tag. Metamagician3000 09:37, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

How about the raional justification(s) for "Islamophobia," where is that section? Self-preservationists have a say too. Haizum 05:58, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Can anyone add anything to this article about Islamophobia spreading as a result of the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy?

i. e. The growing perception that Muslims are arrogant, naïve, ignorant, hypocritical, racist, and violent. Greasysteve13 10:44, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

We can only add what we have sources for. -Will Beback 11:17, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
Numerous internet bloggers from around the world are proof enough aren't they?--Greasysteve13 11:34, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
Bloggers are not a Wikipedia:reliable source. Newspapers are. -Will Beback 11:50, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
Salam Pax, Anyone? Besides the following was found on "Opinions on the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy" --Greasysteve13 00:22, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Commentators that characterize the Muslim reaction as hypocritical [11] point to several inconsistencies. First, the numerous anti-Semitic and anti-Christian publications in Arab media. [12][13] One website, Filibuster Cartoons pointed out this criticism in a political cartoon [14]. Also countries like Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Lybia where demonstrations are tightly controlled, have been accused of allowing violent riots as a distraction. In the case of Syria protests would not be inconvenient in light of the current Hariri investigation. [15][16] Also, aniconism is not limited to Islam, yet violent outcry like this seems to be more frequent in Muslim society. Furthermore, they believe it is odd that cartoons are considered blasphemous when terrorist attacks in the name of Islam are not equally condemned by Muslims.[17][18]

Some Westerners are puzzled that Muslims would threaten all members of a given nationality as a result of the actions of a few of its members or that of a small, private company. According to that logic, not only would the entire Western world be held "hostage" to the strictures of Islam, but the entire Western world (or at least all Scandanavians) would bear the consquences for the actions of individuals they cannot control (George Friedman, Stratfor, Feb 7, 2006). This view leads to the unfortunate conclusion that violent conflict between the West and jihadist elements is both inevitable and uncontrollable. Others prefer to view the massively disproportionate Muslim response as simply a form of "arm flexing" or intimidation by violent Muslim factions [19]. According to this view, the violence is not so much inevitable as much as it is opportunistic.

Some Westerners associated with the political Right view the Muslim reaction to the cartoons, be it the violence, or the non-violent justification for the violence, as evidence of a so-called Clash of Civilizations.

Daniel Pipes claims that the pattern of events shows Muslim hypocrisy and supremacism: "...will Westerners accede to a double standard by which Muslims are free to insult Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism and Buddhism, while Muhammad, Islam and Muslims enjoy immunity from insults? Muslims routinely publish cartoons far more offensive than the Danish ones... .... .... The deeper issue here, however, is not Muslim hypocrisy but Islamic supremacism." [20]

According to some on the political Left, the widespread Muslim reaction proves that greater sensitivity is required in dealing with the Muslim world, and that neither side benefits from incitement to violence, including the perceived incitement that comes in the form of cartoons. [citation needed]

Is it noted that the above sources that claim muslim hypocricy are indeed biased? however, i'll point one thing in specific out, yes there are and may be cartoons in the arab and muslim world that make fun of jews and christians, but you will not find ONE cartoon making fun of moses or jesus in these newspapers.196.204.227.95

Are you familiar with why the cartoons were published in the first place? There was a reason to publish Mohammed cartoons, there is no similar reason to publish other cartoons. Bibigon 18:42, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

POV/Sourcing/Factual Inaccuracy Edits and the EUMC Report

I've made some somewhat substantial edits to the article, regarding style, POV, sourcing, and just factually inaccurate statements. Realistically, this entire article probably needs a complete rewrite, but I’m not brave enough to attempt that. The problem is that even after my changes, it’s almost entirely speculative, without much in the way of real substance regarding what’s actually Islamophobic, and what’s not.

Regarding the EUMC report, I was wondering if anyone could find a copy of it. Because right now, the article has 6 citations to it which don’t go anywhere besides this guy Chris Allen’s homepage… Not that I don’t love neon yellow, but it’s not particularly helpful in terms of figure out what’s actually going on. Bibigon 20:11, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Linking to the Cartoons.

Hi

This is my first ever post..so whatch out! ...noob!

anyway Is it possible to link this article with the cartoon artcle:

I feel the cartoons may or may not have been a product of islamophobia and I believe that it is possible to make an argument either way

....thanks

The two are already linked. Or did you mean something else? Bibigon 01:37, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Wolfram Richter quote

I removed the Richter quote, as I don't feel it adds anything to the idea of Islamophobia. Richter's relevance to the article in general is pretty questionable, but I left him in as he provided a slightly different interpretation on the issue(that it's simple racism.) However, the quote adds little to Islamophobia itself, and is just a generic scary consequence of what may happen. It doesn't elaborate on his point, nor does it convey any critical new concept either. It's not really related to the idea of Islamophobia being racism, so it doesn't really belong, as the racism angle in the only reason he's in the article to begin with.

Thoughts?

Bibigon 04:30, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Suggestion for new section

How about adding a new section "Islamophobia and the GOP"? I think you could find a lot of examples of Islamphobia among Republicans (including the Religious Right obviously). Just check out this very recent example (from today actually) of Republican Islamophobia. --Inahet 07:22, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The issue with doing this sort of thing is that this incident, nor comperable other incidents can be safely labled Islamophobia. All these people would argue that they were voicing valid criticisms rather than practicing Islamophobia. That's without even getting into the whole issue of associating the GOP with Islamophobia. Without the incidents being inherently Islamophobic in nature, bringing them up is either original research or POV, depending on how you look at it. Bibigon 03:22, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

NPOV

I wanted to know if there was any objection to removing the NPOV warning on this article. I think many of the concerns have been addressed, and while it's still a weak article, that's from a POV aspect anymore it seems.

Thoughts? Bibigon 11:06, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

New section

Why don't we add a new section, where we list all relevant islamophobic incidents (sorted chronologicaly or by country)?

There's a POV issue here in terms of classifying what is Islamophobic, and what's not. The reason this issue is so controversial is because Islamophobic motivations are very difficult to establish from a NPOV perspective. Maybe there's a way, but I can't think of what it would be... Do you have any ideas? Bibigon 02:20, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
What about discrimination against Muslims? It's easy to find out, whether Muslims are treated in a discriminatory way. I can't see any other motivation than Islamophobia to do so. Compare it to Homophobic. Raphael1 03:30, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
Do you have some specific examples that you could cite? Documented incidents of discrimination against Muslims would fit, but I suspect it might have NPOV issues as well. I think it's a good idea to try however. This article could use a little more concrete evidence. Bibigon 03:58, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
I did try that, if you go thought the history, but, it was removed by more than one editor, and so I saw that at that time consensus was against me. I fully support the idea.--Irishpunktom\talk 00:29, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Here are some examples:

  • In August 2002 Dr. Krenn, a bishop in Austria, said "Islam is an agressive religion. It doesn't make sense, if one talks nice to a Muslim. I think, we have to deal firmly with him. There have been two turkish sieges already, now we have the third."
  • In November 2003 a representative of the Danish People’s Party said, that "consideration of religious minorities should not be prioritized over consideration of animals" referring to the controversy regarding halal slaughter (ritual slaughter without pre-stunning the animals).
  • In December 2003 a danish Court dismissed a complaint by a Muslim woman, who was fired from her job as a supermarket cashier in 2001, because she insisted on wearing the headscarf.

-- Raphael1 23:19, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

The first one has elements of Islamophobia, but is kinda pushing the notability factor. A member of the clergy of one faith doesn't like the tenets of another faith? If we started considering statements like that Islamophobic, then the anti-semitism article would also have the explode in size. It's just pretty non-notable since there aren't any actions associated with his words there.
The second and third ones however are just not Islamophobic, at least not to a provable extent. One was in support of animal rights, which isn't an Islamophobic concept inherently, and the other one was a cashier being fired for not conforming to the dress code requirements of her job. You can be fired for that regardless of what dress code requirements you are breaking, Islamic in nature or not. Neither one would qualify as Islamphobic incidents, or cases of discrimination against Muslims. Bibigon 00:27, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
  1. Excuse me, but even your question "A member of the clergy of one faith doesn't like the tenets of another faith?" seems to be islamophobic itself. Do you want to imply, that "being agressive" is a tenet of Islam?
  2. The comment "consideration of religious minorities should not be prioritized over consideration of animals" is not islamophobic? Sorry, but I think you are just too biased to judge that. It seems a blind person wants to do vision-tests.
  3. The dress code requirements of the supermarket are already motivated by islamophobia. And the company used the islamophobic tendencies of their customers as an excuse by saying, its customers consider the headscarf “provocative.” Raphael1 01:49, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
Do I want to imply that being agressive is a tenet of Islam? No. Do I want to imply that denying the validity of what the Bishop said is POV however? Yes. He clearly believes that, and there are a great many others who sympathize. An article taking a stance against that is POV in nature. Regardless, it is still a pretty non-notable incident.
Allegations of bias aside, no, that comment is not Islamophobic. For one thing, it doesn't mention Islam. It was said to convery that they viewed the rights of those animals as being more important than the rules of halal. How is that Islamophobic? Is it "fear, and accompanying hostility" of Islam?
We don't know what the dress code requirements were motivated by, at least you haven't given us any indication of the motivations. A headscarf could be pretty disconcerting to a customer, as could wearing a Viking helmet. It's not Islamophobic to want your employees to conform to the norms of society, including those of attire. It's perhaps culturally insensitive, and places a great emphasis on profits than on individualism, but it's not Islamophobic. Unless you have evidence to indicate that the dress code was only directed against Islamic symbols, what you have doesn't show much. Bibigon 02:18, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
  1. Do you think, that if a great many others (or even the majority) are islamophobic, it invalidates the islamophobic claim?
  2. Do you think, that being anti-semitic as well, makes it less islamophobic? Would you think, that I'm hostile, if I regard your rights less important than the rights of an animal?
  3. I just told you the motivations of the dress code. The company said, that its customers consider the headscarf “provocative.”. The demanded conformation to a cultural "norm" is used as an excuse for religious discrimination. Raphael1 04:07, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
1. I don't see the relevance of this question. My point with the bishop is that Islamophobic or not, it's a pretty trivial incident. A member of clergy disparaged another religion. It's not notable without some more weight behind it.
2. No, I would not consider you to be hostile to me if believed that one of my rights was less important than the rights of an animal. I would think you're perhaps too fixated on animal rights, but I wouldn't take it as hostility against me.
3. Was the company's statement factually untrue? I don't see that we can dismiss the explanation on its merits without violating NPOV. It's pretty reasonable to believe a headscarf is provacative to your customers without you yourself being an Islamophobe. It's about this company going out its way not to "provoke" others, even at the expense of its employees. That's not Islamophobia. Bibigon 04:22, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
  1. Being trivial or not, it's an islamophobic incident. Whether the culprit is a member of a clergy is irrelevant.
  2. What about your right for security? What if I'd say, that my rather dangerous dog has a right to walk the streets without leash. Wouldn't you take that as hostility against you?
  3. It's quite probable, that you yourself believe a headscarf is provacative, if you think, that your customers consider the headscarf provocative. Furthermore the customers, who consider the headscarf provocative, are islamophobic themselves. Raphael1 15:50, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
1. It may well be an Islamophobic incident(although I'm sure the Bishop would dispute even that), however the issue I have with it is that it's pretty non-notable.
2. No, I wouldn't take that as hostility against me. I'd take that as you perhaps being too concerned with the rights of your animal, but it's not directly hostile towards me. If you somehow ordered the animal to attack me, then that would another matter. However, at that point your analogy breaks down.
3. It may be probable, however it is not verifiable fact. As for the customers, we don't actually know if they consider the headscarf provocative, merely that the store owner believes they do. I think most voters are stupid, that doesn't make it so. Bibigon 03:40, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
  1. I noticed it, just like many others. You can see that on the Austrian secession rates from the Church.
  2. You would take that as hostility against you, if you'd know what dog I'm talking about.
  3. You made a good point here. Nevertheless is the issue a case of religious discrimination respectivly a restriction of religious freedom. Raphael1 04:28, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Smearing a Qur'an with feces doesn't qualify as Islamophobia?

Nysin, please explain why smearing a Qur'an with feces doesn't qualify as Islamophobia. Raphael1 15:59, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not Nysin but still: is fear of Islam a verifiable reason for the event? If this is a presumed example who is doing the presuming (just so that we do WP:V instead of WP:OR)? Weregerbil 16:50, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
Can you verify, that drawing a swastika on jewish graves has something to do with anti-semitism? Raphael1 17:00, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
A quick googling for swastika jewish graves anti-semitism seems to bring up sites such as major news services that suggest so. So yes, I think I would state that saying such a thing is not a personal invention of mine. I wouldn't say (unless further evidence was found) that fear of jews (jewphobia) was involved, as I can't find evidence to support that right now (just two non-notable blog/chat google hits). Weregerbil 17:59, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
Try to google on "quran desecration Islamophobia", if you need a google "proof". Raphael1 18:19, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
You are twisting Weregerbil's words. He did not say that Google results are proof. He said that using google you can easily find reliable sources to make his case. A search for "quran desecration Islamophobia" seems to turn up primarily Islamic websites and blogs, which are clearly not. jacoplane 04:38, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
Do you think, that there have been reports on anti-semitism in Nazi germanys mainstream media?
There has been one similar report in the US Newsweek magazine about Qur'an abuses in the Guantanamo prison, but for various reasons (who knows the thruth?) they had to withdraw that report. Europe is different in that respect. There are still various independent NGOs who monitor islamophobic incidents, i.e. Eurolegal, F.A.I.R, IHF-HR and the EUMC. Raphael1 23:04, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
Raphael1, there is a big difference between the freedom of speech that the press had in Nazi Germany and the freedom that the modern western press has. It seems to me that you are trying to discredit all western media in order to claim that any facts you find in POV islamic media are just as acceptable. You will need to convince the Wikipedia community as a whole to change it's policies before anyone can accept this. I live in a liberal western European country, and I can assure you that the issue of Islamophobia (and the question of whether it exists in the first place) is widely discussed in the media. There is no censorship here. 00:08, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
I've already said, that Europe is different to the US. Patriot Act Freedom of Expression US Constitution post 9/11 Center for National Security Studies What's Wrong With the News Raphael1 02:58, 17 March 2006 (UTC)


The article dicusses two definitions of Islamophobia, that of Stephen Schwartz and that of the Runnymede Trust. Feces smearing doesn't consist of "attacking the entire religion of Islam as a problem for the world"; "condemning all of Islam and its history as extremist"; "denying the active existence, in the contemporary world, of a moderate Muslim majority"; "insisting that Muslims accede to the demands of non-Muslims for theological changes in their religion"; "treating all conflicts involving Muslims as the fault of Muslims themselves" or "inciting war against Islam as a whole", and as such does not quality under Schwartz's definition. The Runnymede trust, according to the article, requires that Islam is seen as "a monolithic bloc, static and unresponsive to change"; "separate and “other”. It does not have values in common with other cultures, is not affected by them and does not influence them"; "inferior to the West. It is seen as barbaric, irrational, primitive, and sexist"; "violent, aggressive, threatening, supportive of terrorism, and engaged in a clash of civilizations"; "a political ideology and is used for political or military advantage"; making criticism of the West "rejected out of hand"; the a justification for "discriminatory practices towards Muslims and exclusion of Muslims from mainstream society" or a "natural or normal" target of hostility, and as such does not qualify as Islamophobia either. Nysin 18:28, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
How can anyone deny something so apparent as this? Of course it was Islamophobic to smear the Qur'an with feces because the perpetrator obviously has an aversion, hatred, dislike, and hostility towards Islam and Muslims to do something so groteque and so hateful. Just because it is not considered Islamophobic by these two limited definitions doesn't mean that it is to be excluded from the article. --Inahet 19:51, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
Feel free to suggest a different definition, but with such a contentious topic having external, objective standards by which to judge seems appropriate. That you find it grotesque and hateful doesn't meet such an external, objective standard. Further, the perpetrator does not "obviously" have an aversion, hatred, dislike and hostility towards Islam. The linked article does not suggest the creator stated his intentions; in lieu of such a statement, one can speculate about many intended messages, none of them obviously right. Nysin 20:25, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
"Further, the perpetrator does not "obviously" have an aversion, hatred, dislike and hostility towards Islam." Yeah, uh-huh, that's because smearing the Qur'an with feces is a harmless pastime and is not necessarily hostile towards Islam and Muslims unless the player declares that it is before he smears it. Also, a person burning the flag of another country doesn't mean that that person has any ill-feelings towards that country whatsoever, actually in some cultures flag-burning is a way of welcoming vistors from that respective country... What do you think, we're born yesterday? No offense, but there is line between objectivity (which I welcome) and disingenuity, and quite frankly I feel that some here are being disingenuous when they dismiss Islamphobic incidents. --Inahet 21:58, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
Your sarcasm is appreciated. Have you a more reasoned response? Nysin 22:15, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
The response of Inahet is very reasonable. You are rationalizing your wrong view, which is totally absurd. Raphael1 00:47, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
His only argument, as such, exists in the form of an analogy not incontrovertible itself. It doesn't address the specific situation at hand at all. Your response does even less. No substantiated objection has thus far been raised. Nysin 01:08, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
You are the one who is objecting. Why don't you explain, why anyone would smear a Qur'an with feces? Do you want to tell us, that they ran out of toilet paper or what? Raphael1 03:14, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
(1) You added the link. It's yours to justify if someone objects (and I do). (2) One justification for the Piss Christ I saw seems to plausibly apply here, with minor changes. Of course, I don't know that it did, but it's unclear how one can know it doesn't too: "Serrano made the work to comment on the contrarian nature of Christians, those who claim to be followers of Christ and then use a religion based on 'turning the other cheek'and 'forgiveness' to legitimize things like the death penalty, Crusades, and general retribution against those who they precieve to wrong them, essentially saying they are "pissing on Christ and his teachings". Serrano himself actually grew up a strict Roman Catholic." Even if that's not his actual motivation, someone dipping the Qur'an in feces could be interpreted to say that some Muslims have, so to speak, deposited feces on the teachings of Islam. This would not be islamophobic. Nysin 03:57, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
If it was displayed in an art gallery, then one would assume that there is a deeper and broader reason, but this defaced Qur'an was found on the steps of an apartment building, not the appropiate platform to make a point. There is no point in bickering over whether this incident is Islamophobic or not because you're going to keep rationalizing your view with ridiculous reasons. So this is my last word on this issue. Good luck on convincing the others. --Inahet 01:31, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
Please read the article before discussing it. We are not talking about a piece of art. Raphael1 04:20, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
You still haven't shown why this is Islamophobic except by assuming it such. Further, it doesn't matter whether you see this as art or not; for all we can know from that article, the person who placed feces on the Qur'an might have intended this meaning, as you have not presented any evidence of this person's stating why they did this. Nysin 04:59, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

alleged vs presumable

Why should we write about "alleged" examples of Islamophobia? Islamophobic incidences are a fact, just like anti-semitic acts. Nobody would call the drawing of swastikas on jewish graves an "alleged example of anti-semitism". This is hypocritical. Raphael1 03:22, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Two issues with this line of argument. First, claims of hypocracy are irrelevant here, as I've never edited the anti-semitism article, and I make no claims to the legitimacy of what's on that page.
Second, the existence of Islamophobia may well be a fact, but establishing that these specific cases were instances of Islamophobia is not a fact. That's one point of view, but there are others, and Wikipedia has a policy regarding representing only one point of view. You're going to make the case that everything linked there is clearly and undeniably Islamophobic? If you'd like to make that case, then please go ahead. Until you do however, then these instances remain merely cases of alleged Islamophobia, and nothing more. Bibigon 03:35, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
I make the case, that everything linked there are presubable examples of Islamophobia. Raphael1 03:42, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
I think Bibigon was asking you to make a case based on evidence, not merely stating that you make the case. jacoplane 04:35, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
As long as I need to proof the culprits reasoning, every islamophobic incident can be denied. There is no way anyone can look in the culprits head. Since there is no need to proof the motivations behind an anti-semitic act, I can't see, why it should be necessary for hate-crimes against another religion. Raphael1 23:18, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
No this is not acceptable. Anti-semitic acts we cover in Wikipedia need to be verifiable just as much as Islamophobic acts are. There is no double standard here. 00:10, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
Two problems here. To be "Alleged" someone must have made the allegation, which is not always the case here. presumable, however, is a POV perspective, What one person presumes from experience may not be what the other presumes. I would suggest "apparent". Further, any Attacks on Jews or Judaism solely for being jews is considered Anti-Semetic, if that is the same standard for Islamophobia, then they must stay. The Criticism of the concept is already noted, so re-adding it in another context makes no sense. --Irishpunktom\talk 00:28, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
Not that I'm bothered by the use of the term "Perceived"(what is currently in the article), but I want to point out that Perceived is no less reliant on someone else making the perception than alleged is on someone making an allegation. Either way however, I'm satisfied with the current wording. bibigon 05:44, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
Ah, I missed this response during my last edit to the article. Not only do Raphael1's examples that I removed still do not qualify, because he does not demonstrate state of mind or intent, but even if they did, and would thus fall under your suggestion of "any attacks on Jews or Judaism soly for being Jews is considered ...", they should be consistent with the definitions section within the same article. They are not. Nysin 00:16, 20 March 2006 (UTC)


The only even alleged fact in the Airplane article (they're pretty much the same, as both are the AP one): ""They were essentially told, "You can't take this flight because the flight attendant is uncomfortable," Sinnar said." Islamophobia that makes not. Maybe they'll get a court appearance and present more evidence, but it's laughably short of such currently.
The University of Toronto incident, "A female Muslim student was assaulted in a washroom March 7 by a non-Muslim woman who was campaigning in favour of the controversial anti-Islam cartoons published recently in a Danish newspaper, the Canadian Islamic Congress said. / The incident was followed by another the next day when a group of Muslim women, passing out flyers for International Women's Day, were pelted with eggs on the downtown campus", is also inadequate because as has been pointed out elsewhere, an attack on a person or people who happen(s) to be Muslim is not tantamount to Islamophobia. That at least one of said attacks seems to have been done by someone involved with the Danish cartoons is immaterial towards establishing that.
I've addressed the feces smearing, and as far as I can tell no one's added anything new to that since I last did so. I've briefly described the issues with the Australian Mosque attack in the article history, but: That "two Molotov cocktails were thrown at the building" alone doesn't imply the motivation was islamophobic. Readers might make that inference, but the article doesn't support it with evidence. It also doesn't establish any backlash, which would seem to be a prerequisite for Islamophobia's existence, but rather fear of such: "growing fears of a backlash"; this is not equivalent to such a backlash. "Islamic groups have reported that a bus filled with Muslim schoolchildren was stoned in Melbourne." needs much more documentation (for example, an article of its own with detail on when, where, and who) before it even approaches being evidence of Islamophobia. "A mosque in Western Australia has reportedly been smeared with excrement" similarly. "Members of the Sikh community - whose males traditionally wear turbans and long flowing beards - have been spat on and verbally abused", finally, concerns Sikhism and only by supposition (by sometimes similar appearance) Islam, and for that reason doesn't support Islamophobic claims.
The basic issue behind all these objections is that both definitions in the article, according to which I'm editing, focus on speech, not acts. One can argue this is inadequate, but those who feel that way should, rather than ignore them and create fallacious analogies with the anti-semitism article, address the issues in this article's definitions. Nysin 17:30, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Muslim Men dressed in traditional Muslim Garb, with Long beards and Kufis were forced off a plane because an Air Attendent refused to work with them. It's as clear cut as it gets. Your assertion that Islamophobia is a mere "backlash" is a POV OR. The pieces should stay.--Irishpunktom\talk 17:37, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
If and only if said attendent has suggested it's due to some of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia#Definitions can one soundly make that inference. Further, have you specific responses to my objections to the other incidents? Nysin 17:47, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Deal with them one at a time shall we? The men were removed from the plane because of their Muslim appearance.. all sources state as such... how could you have a problem with that? --Irishpunktom\talk 18:00, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Cite for that. The sources you've added to this article don't support that assertion. It state two separate and, as far as the AP article's concerned, independent facts: (1) that the father and son have what's widely regarded as a Muslim appearance and (2) that they were not allowed on a plane because allegedly ("essentially", according to their lawyer - not sure how much to trust that one, but giving him the benefit of the doubt for the moment) an air attendent was uncomfortable. Those two events might well be linked, but this particular AP article doesn't allow one to validly derive that conclusion. Nysin 18:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
If you can't find a source, that says the air attendent was uncomfortable for another reason, it's a case of Islamophobia. Raphael1 15:00, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
Um. No. Argument from ignorance. Nysin 10:41, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Another non-sense slanted Wiki article on Islam

The NPOV tag needs to stay on this article until every person here with an anti-Islamic agenda comes clean. The very first sentence is reason enough to question the authority of the authors behind this aritlce where it says: The neologism is disputed. A quick examination of other "phobia" articles clearly shows no one disputing Afrophobia or even Anti-Semitism. This entire article has a slant just like the rest of the Wikipedia articles on Islam rooted in the post-9/11 smear-Islam-at-all-costs campaign. The concepts outlined in the section "Criticism of the concept" can be applied to ANY -phobia article on Wikipedia with a few word substituions and examples from the largest proponents of that -phobia. Either amend this article to voice the realities of Islamophobia or add sections of criticism to articles on afrophobia, anti-semitism, etc. The Wikipedia community needs to start having a very serious discussion on these systematic biases before it will ever be considered anything more than a wasteland of non-sense perpetuated by "the loudest group wins" mentality instead of "the most correct group wins" mentality. 24.7.141.159 22:27, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Do you have any specific suggestions? Bibigon 01:11, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Yes I do actually. The first thing I suggest is a total rewrite of this article. The easiest way to achieve this is to take the current article and separate out pro versus anti Islamophobic stances. There have been sections that have been removed in the history for various reasons on both sides of the fence that need to be reintegrated. Once these two drafts are ready then all of us need to sit down and compare this article to other -phobia articles concerning racist/xenophobic movements on both wikipedia and actual encyclopedias. Lastly, we need to address the systematic biases of just about every Islam-related article on wikipedia citing the same bunch of characters. Daniel Pipes, Steven Emerson, David Horowitz, Robert Spencer, etc. are all part of the most vocal voices preaching one thing or another against Muslims or Islam. Yet, we seem to find next to no scholarly works on these topics from sources spanning from Morocco to Indonesia. Islam wasn't born yesterday and there are libraries full of works on these sorts of topics for the last 1,400 years that Wikipedia seems to not include. I don't blame wikipedia because most of these works are not digitized nor are they in English but neither of those limitations means the viewpoints expressed are any less valid. These two articles here can sum up very well what many Muslims see as a systematic bias in Wikipedia. Article 1 and Article 2. Both should be read by the major contributors so we can make Wikipedia are balanced and authentic source of information. As it stands, for now I would like to see some discussion on these topics and also ask you what you think can be done to facilitate fixing this problem. Once the discussion is done, I have no problem writing articles. 24.7.141.159 02:55, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
I read both those articles, and neither one had a great deal of substance to them, other than lableling people Islamophobes. There are some definitional questions he raises, but he doesn't substantiate them particularly well, other than complaining that his POV was underrepresented, and other POVs were overrepresented.
In general, a total rewrite of this article would be a great idea I believe. It is currently little more than vague insinuations and doesn't have much substance behind it. Could you point to specific sections that has been removed and should be reintegrated in some way? Could you provide some specific suggestions for this article?
Regarding the generic biases of Islam related articles, while there is perhaps an issue there, I have heard those complains from both sides of the issue, which to me sounds like a pretty good sign that Wikipedia is doing something right, namely being NPOV, which of course ends up bothering everyone. While other sources would be nice, as you noted, many of them aren't digitized, and many of them aren't in English, thus limiting their usefulness to Wikipedia. Dealing with that particular issue is a very large and difficult one, and while worthwhile, I don't see any practical way to handle it. Do you have any ideas? I'd also like to ask again for some specific suggestions as to what content we should remove or take out with regards to this article. Bibigon 03:14, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
As usual, I appreciate the dialog. Firstly, you said his POV was underrepresented, and other POVs were overrepresented but that issue is the very same I am having trouble with. I think my responses are far too wordy and I need to cut them down because I can see us going in circles.
1) Why must Islamophobia's existance and definition have a "criticisms" section when other specific xenophobic articles do not?
2) You stated: While other sources would be nice, as you noted, many of them aren't digitized, and many of them aren't in English, thus limiting their usefulness to Wikipedia. In essence what you've done is proven the existance of a systematic bias against Muslims/Islam because 99.9% of the scholarly works on Islam over the 1,500 years are in the form of books while the biggest proponents of anti-Islamic stances are largely centered in the West. Most of the sources of these articles were written by people who are no older than I am with very clear Pro-Western political and ideological stances using the power of the Internet to disseminate their ideas. Although it is a well known fact that the winning side writes the history, I am not going to buy that excuse when it comes to Wikipedia. How can you justify talking about Islam or Islamic issues without focusing on those sources?
I am more than willing to rewrite this article with the help of scholars of Islam using sources dating from around 700 AD until 2006 AD. Actually it would be very issue because of the volumes of work out there to stitch together an article almost totally composed of citations. I know you keep asking for specifics on what to change in this article but I want to work on question #1 and #2 first before actually getting my hands dirty. 24.7.141.159 01:50, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

(Alleged) examples of islamophobia

Please show evidence that the following three events are examples of islamophobia

  1. French law on secularity and conspicuous religious symbols in schools
  2. Submission (movie)
  3. Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy

The first item is just a law enforcing the laicité principe in France and is directed against all religious symbols, not only those of islams, and concerns only government-operated primary and secondary schools. The items two and three are examples of blasphemy.

But maybe the "Islamophobia" concept is just the newspeak translation of blasphemy, as discussed by many authors ?

Jmfayard 17:20, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

  • The French law was designed to counter-act the rise in Muslim Girls attending Schools in France wearing hijab.. no one questioned it to any degree as being anything else. It was designed to specifically remove the clothing of Muslim Girls. Likewise, two and three were also designed solely to attack Muslims, while, yes, they are also considered to be blasphemy. blasphemy does not equal Islamopobia, but there are occassions when the pair correlate.--Irishpunktom\talk 17:30, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Hmm, why should they be neutral... ever heard of a thing called WP:NPOV? Of course the citations you've used are going to claim Islamophobia.. they are biased. Can't you find examples that unbiased sources state as being Islamophobic? There's absolutely nothing wrong with muslim sources! But if you're trying to demonstrate NPOV on this subject then I would suggest a secular source. Of course! Netscott 23:16, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • We have NPOV.. we have plenty disputing that Islamophobia exists. If Islamophobia does not exist, then none of these are, are they? - Are you able to produce a source that says Islamophobia exists but these examples are not it? --Irishpunktom\talk 23:20, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • As an editor I'm not arguing whether Islamophobia exists (I'm strongly inclined to think that it does a fear of Islam does exist ) but to demonstrate it I would want to cite an unbiased source so that my citation couldn't be refuted. Ok, a perfect example (which I'm 100% you could find unbiased sources for) would be the 1995 Bombing of the FBI Murrah buidling by Timothy McVeigh. After the bombing there were a number of news sources that immediately jumped to the conclusion that it was the work of Islamic Terrorists. Theses Islamophobic news reports are directly citable by unbiased sources as such. Netscott 23:28, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • To be honest I'm not inclined to add it (despite the fact that I'm 100% correct) due simply to the fact that many of the examples cited are truly laughable and would never be taken seriously by an intelligent and well-informed reader. It would be like a jewel amongst stones. Netscott 23:39, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Irishpunktom, it appears that your religious fervor renders you logically challenged. It's a pity as well because you seem like an intelligent person but just can't seem to seperate logic from faith. Netscott 23:48, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Even in your half-way decent citation of Al-Jazeera the only mention of Islamophobia is a quote by "the head of the Party of France's Muslims, Muhammad Latreche", yeah that's really neutral. Netscott 18:22, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  • You are welcome to provide sources of comparable reputability, which state a different POV. Remember that a source has strong views is not necessarily a reason not to use it. The core of the NPOV policy is to let competing approaches of the same topic exist on the same page. Raphael1 21:21, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Here you go : http://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/textes/constit.htm
French constitution of the 5th republic. Article 1.
La France est une République indivisible, laïque, démocratique et sociale. Elle assure l'égalité devant la loi de tous les citoyens sans distinction d'origine, de race ou de religion. Elle respecte toutes les croyances.
This is what the French law on secularity and conspicuous religious symbols in schools is all about.
PS : english traduction here http://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/langues/anglais/cst1.pdf
Jmfayard 11:11, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • That translates into: "France is an indivisible secular republic, democratic and social. It assures equality before the law for all citizens without discrimination against origins, race, or religion. It respects all beliefs." Netscott 11:44, 21 March 2006 (UTC)


Even from Al Jazeera:
"The bill makes it illegal to wear clothes or signs that "conspicuously" display affiliation to a faith. Though it does not specify the items that would be barred, an experts' report listed the Jewish skullcap and "large" Christian crosses in addition to the Islamic headscarf. Sikh turbans are also likely to be included and Education Minister Luc Ferry has said bandanas and even beards could be barred if worn with the wrong intent."
That's not particularly specific to Islam, and thus dubiously Islamophobia. Nysin 02:42, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
I've already tried to add a report from Amnesty International, that says "the law could have a disproportionate and particular impact on Muslim girls if applied strictly". Netscott removed it because it is out of date, which is rediculous since the law has been put in place 2004. Anyway - there are plenty of sources stating the law has passed on the basis of prejudice towards muslims:
Raphael1 19:42, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
I didn't see the interaction between you and Netscott regarding the AI report, so I won't comment on thet. As far as the others:
  • I can't view https://ssl.tnr.com/p/docsub.mhtml?i=dispatch&s=wildman021304 because not a subscriber. For the same reason, it's not an optimal Wikipedia source.
  • libertysecurity makes no mention of "islamophobia" by name, only xenophobia, and migrationinformation not even that.
  • migrationinformation seems to only say about criticism of the 2004 law: "Some critics have argued that such a decision is a political statement designed to allay public concerns. They view the decision as profoundly anti-Islam rather than pro-secularism. It has also been interpreted as an indirect legitimization of anti-Arab stereotypes, fostering rather than preventing racism.". "Some critics"? "It has also been interpreted"? Being rather unverifiable, Those are weak nonconfirmations. Not being able to read French, I can't follow most of the sources at the end, so I can't discern from where those statements come.
I'll look at the libertysecurity article later, but the other two aren't particularly convincing. Nysin

I asked you for a rationale, not a url link. I'm very aware that there are a lot of idiots or militants around on the internet, and they probably don't know that the laicité concept has since its beginning been openly directed against the catholic church which was thought to be way too much powerful at that time (1905). The law about religious symbols in school, although badly written (the proposal was to ban *all* religious symbols in primary and secondary schools) is a direct application of this one century-old philosophy as written in the constitution, so this neologism is just not adequate to describe it. This law that you call the French Hijab ban neither concerns only the Hijab, nor is a ban of the Hijab in general, I see Hijab every day when I go back to France. Also the other lies about muslim girls who would not be able to receive an education have now proven to be false, or very rare.

So it's law on secularism, and an alleged example of islamophobia for some islamic militants/multcularism proponents in the US/UK, and does absolutely not match the sentance above : Islamophobic incidences are a fact, just like anti-semitic acts

For the point 2) and 3), I appreciate your POV, but it's only that.

Jmfayard 18:55, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Raphael1, are http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,805518,00.html, http://observer.guardian.co.uk/magazine/story/0,11913,1364732,00.html, and http://www.turkishweekly.net/news.php?id=15115 as examples of alleged Islamophobia attributable to Submission intentionally jokes? The Andrew Osborn article doesn't mention the movie or van Gogh at all, but is about Ayaan Hirsi Ali in a separate context. Amsterdamned suggests, contrary to the association you create, that van Gogh was generally controversial and offensive but not specifically Islamophobic: "'He was not against Islam,' insisted van de Westelaken. 'Everybody to his own faith. He was not against headscarves: if someone wants to put on a scarf, go ahead. He aimed at the extremist side of Islam, and of course the big problem with Islam is that they take themselves so bloody seriously.'". The Turkish Weekly article notes with regard to Islamophobia only such things as "declared war against extremist Islam after the death of van Gogh", which deals with extremist Islam only, appears to ask the read to infer from such sentences as "The name of the prophet of Islam has been constantly pronounced when talking about the brutal act". Sure; the van Gogh killer pinned a five page note justifying the murder based on Islam according to one of the Guardian articles you linked, so that rhetorical association seems reasonable. "van Gogh’s racist and anti-immigrant thoughts" do not Islamophobia imply, but again suggest something more general. I keep reading through those articles, and find nothing Islamophobic. Removing, since they're ridiculous. Nysin 15:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,805518,00.html states:
Barely six months have elapsed since his murder but the Islamophobia openly espoused by anti-immigration politician Pim Fortuyn is now being voiced by a female immigrant whose words are outraging Dutch Muslims.
The article goes on to explain the female immigrant is Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who wrote the script of Submission.
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/magazine/story/0,11913,1364732,00.html states:
A number of reports have implicitly, or even explicitly, referred to van Gogh's 'Islamophobia' and 'racism'.
http://www.turkishweekly.net/news.php?id=15115 states:
Especially with the rising of anti-Islam trend after the 11th September, van Gogh began to seriously insult the Muslim groups, living in the country. Theo van Gogh not only used to insult religious communities, but also used a really abusive language against Allah, the prophet of the Islam, the leader of the Muslim Association of the Netherlands and all the other Muslims in his weekly columns and vindicated all these actions under the right of “freedom of expression”.
Raphael1 16:23, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
From (1) Ali now voicing "Islamophobia openly espoused by anti-immigration politician Pim Fortuyn" and (2) Ali wrote the submission script, no logical step exists to reach the conclusion that "Submission" exhibits Islamophobia unless one assumes additionally such things as every word Ali uttering or writing about Islam exhibiting such Islamophobia.
Seriously insulting Muslim groups and using really abusive language against Allah, Muhammad, and others is not Islamophobic. See the same exercise of running through http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia#Definitions and noticing that none of them apply.
Finally, a report (by the Guardian) that a "number of reports have implicitly, or even explicitly, referred to van Gogh's 'Islamophobia' and 'racism'"? What's an implicit report of islamophobia? How many reports? By whom? Where? What reports? Nysin
Seriously insulting jews in germany in the year of 1938 was no anti-semitism either? Raphael1 17:10, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
First: analogies don't make solid arguments. However: not necessarily (you're phrasing it vaguely enough that I'm not willing to be more specific). If the Nazis had merely been "seriously insulting", I doubt they'd have been viewed quite as they are. Further, that they also performed other more destructive actions in an organized manner publicly and explicitly targeted at Jews, still doesn't render insults necessarily anti-semitic. That said, please stay on-topic and respond to my other statements without resort to flimsy historical analogy. Nysin 22:14, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
I suggest, that you go to the Anti-Semitism article, because you probably want to change a whole lot there. You even oppose the first sentence that states "Anti-Semitism is hostility toward or prejudice against Jews as a religious, ethnic, or racial group, which can range from individual hatred to institutionalized, violent persecution." Raphael1 22:30, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
(1) This is why I inserted "(you're phrasing it vaguely enough that I'm not willing to be more specific)". Depending on the nature of the insult and threats associated with it, it may be more or less hostile (and it'd seem to be hard to argue the prejudice side given Ali's background). Either an insult is not automatically hostile in the sense the Anti-semitism article refers to, though, or all insults are seemingly x-phobic/x-ist/etc cetera according to your apparent standards. The former seems more plausible, especially in light of the Antisemitism article going on to provide some rather more detailed criteria that insults tend not to satisfy. Nysin 22:46, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
To assert, that Mrs. Ali is immune less vulnerable to prejudice because of her parentage background, is very dangerous and wrong. The stories of cruel events during her childhood give many reasons to believe, that a trauma made her fight the originators of her past. The problem is, that the originator is not Islam or a billion believers, but barbaric cultural traditions in her "homeland" Somalia. Raphael1 20:05, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
That's nice. Is this merely irrelevant, a Strawman, or can you point out where I "assert, that Mrs. Ali is immune to prejudice because of her parentage"? Nysin 22:01, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Well, you've written "it'd seem to be hard to argue the prejudice side given Ali's background". It's in brackets, but IMHO still a big mistake.Raphael1 22:34, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
From which you managed to infer "assert", "immune", and "her parentage". Nysin 23:06, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Do you want me to repeat your words?.... see above .... Do I interpret you correctly now? What did you mean? Raphael1 23:51, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Yes, to the extent that prejudice "implies coming to a judgment on a subject before learning where the preponderance of evidence actually lies, or forming a judgment without direct experience", yes, her background, in terms of parentage, politics, book-writing, and other facets, does seem to render her likely less vulnerable to prejudice. The knowledge and experience she has precludes judging certain situations "without direct experience" and reduces the extent to which she doesn't know "where the preponderance of the evidence actually lies".
This whole sub-thread is a sideshow and tangent, though. You still haven't responded to:
From (1) Ali now voicing "Islamophobia openly espoused by anti-immigration politician Pim Fortuyn" and (2) Ali wrote the submission script, no logical step exists to reach the conclusion that "Submission" exhibits Islamophobia unless one assumes additionally such things as every word Ali uttering or writing about Islam exhibiting such Islamophobia.
(3) Finally, a report (by the Guardian) that a "number of reports have implicitly, or even explicitly, referred to van Gogh's 'Islamophobia' and 'racism'"? What's an implicit report of islamophobia? How many reports? By whom? Where? What reports? Nysin 14:11, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
You say, that her knowledge and experience reduces the extent to which she doesn't know where the preponderance of the evidence actually lies. For the reasons I stated above, the opposit is much more likely. IMHO she makes the mistake of gerneralizing. The culprits of her cruel parantage are not representative for Islam. But this preconceived opinion leads her to "irrational suspicion or hatred of this particular religion" (which is another definition of prejudice). Reg. (2) That's one of the symptoms of an islamophobic person, that every statement about Islam is hostile. She doesn't seem to see Islam as diverse with internal differences. Can you prove the opposit? Reg. (1) What do you want me to respond to? The article clearly says, that Ayaan Hirsi Ali openly espouses resp. voices Islamophobia just like Pim Fortuyn did. Reg. (3) You will have to ask that questions the editor of the Guardian article. I consider it a secondary source. Raphael1 15:09, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  • "That's one of the symptoms of an islamophobic person, that every statement about Islam is hostile." That's a rather grand claim. As a necessary condition, it seems to suggest one needs to know every statement of a person before claiming they're Islamophobic. Since you (likely) don't know every statement of Ali's, that can't be your standard. As a sufficient condition? Well, now it's just relatively useless. It doesn't prevent you from calling someone islamophobic, but it doesn't seem to help much either. As a consequence of Islamophobia derived from other visible, somewhat less stringent standards? Support that if that's what you're getting at.
  • "She doesn't seem to see Islam as diverse with internal differences. Can you prove the opposit?" Argument from ignorance again. You're making the assertion about her not seeming to see Islam as diverse with internal differences. I might be able to find sources to support an alternate view or I might not, as I've not particularly looked, but given that you've not supported yours to begin with, there's no argument to respond to yet.
As such, the conclusion you draw about Submission's being islamophobic due to Ali's alleged islamophobia is still unjustified. Nysin 11:06, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  • "That's one of the symptoms of an islamophobic person, that every statement about Islam is hostile." is not a claim, but rather a combination of point 1 and 8 of Runnymede Trusts definition.
  • It is true, that it is impossible to know every statement of a person. Therefore it is you, who is making the Argument from ignorance by asserting, that not every statement of her is hostile toward Islam, and wanting me to prove the opposit. Think about the Weapons of Mass Destruction problematic. It is impossible to prove, that there are no WMDs in a country, but if there are some, it has to be possible to show them. So if you assert, that Ali is not Islamophobic, you must be able to easily prove it. Raphael1 01:53, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  • "That's one of the symptoms of an islamophobic person, that every statement about Islam is hostile." does not follow from a combination of points 1 and 8, as in particular point 8 creates a standard of "natural and normal". This is not tantamount to stating that "every statement about Islam is hostile".
  • I have not asserted "that not every statement of her is hostile toward Islam", and as such have not fallen afoul of this myself. By constrast, I stated explicitly that "I might be able to find sources to support an alternate view or I might not, as I've not particularly looked, but given that you've not supported yours to begin with, there's no argument to respond to yet". My arguments in this thread have been that you've not supported your claims (and that they thus don't belong in a Wikipedia article), not that they're incorrect per se.
Finally, to point out the obvious: trying to reflect this back towards me doesn't suggest that your statement doesn't run afoul of fallacy I pointed out. Nysin 02:15, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  • You're right, it might be possible, that even if she did utter something neutral about Islam, she still sees even unfair critique as natural and normal. But if every statement about Islam is hostile, she obviously sees critique on Islam as normal. Don't you agree on that?
  • Well, all comments I brought up from Ali are definetly hostile (all places I looked, there are no WMDs). So if you want to prove that Ali is not islamophobic, you better look for non-hostile statements from Ali (show me some WMDs) so we can end that discussion. Raphael1 08:58, 27 March 2006 (UTC)


first link: does not prove Ayaan Hirsi Ali being Islamophobic, only links Hiyaan to Fortuyn's ideas. (which is a tad off by itself.) second link: implications, not proof. third link: only "proof" to Van Gogh's actions, not to the movie being Islamophobic in nature. Intinn 16:43, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

(1) Read my quote again. It says that Ayaan Hirsi Ali (the writer of Submission) openly espouses resp. voices Islamophobia just like Pim Fortuyn did. (2) It is a secondary source. (3) The article goes on saying "Van Gogh’s last film, Submission, was not an exception of his familiar insulting style." Raphael1 17:03, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Whilst the Christian leaders quoted/cited in this section disparage Islam in a way much more akin to what the article definitions propose (which is why I've left them alone), they seem to be based on Islam's not being Christianity more than anything specific to the former, and as such dubious overall. Nysin 23:58, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Irishpunktom, that someone cites an article in support for a claim doesn't imply that the article actually supports a claim. I've disputed both the feces citation and the mosque article; in the latter case what I wrote was called "hypocritical and therefore most likely full of hate" and associated with Nazis. (Whilst this doesn't seem to suggest rational dialogue is likely with some Wikipedia users, I'm trying anyway.) Raphael1 could in neither case show a causation between the event in question and Islamophobia beyond one he assumed, thus my edit comment. As such, the mere presence of an external link doesn't render an alleged example of Islamophobia supported. Nysin 12:29, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

It is included in a section called "Possible examples of Islamophobia" - I really don't see how you could dispute this was a "Possible example of Islamophobia" --Irishpunktom\talk 12:31, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
Nysin only seems to see Islamophobia, if one confesses to be islamophobic. At one point (s)he said "If the Nazis had merely been "seriously insulting", I doubt they'd have been viewed quite as they are." But even if people are burning mosques, (s)he doesn't see the obvious. Raphael1 05:32, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Just a note

I just want to say that I am neither muslim nor do I really care about whether or not this article is vandalized, deleted or whatnot. I just want to say that the blatant hate for muslims as shown here by certain users is sickening. I can understanding a hatred toward fundamentalist crazies and terrorists...but all this talk of muslims (as a whole) being naive and racist and barbaric etc....it's disheartening. The human race is a sad thing indeed. Madangry 03:55, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

All this talk? Where is all this talk of "muslims (as a whole) being naive and racist and barbaric etc"? Bibigon 04:10, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
"All this talk" is on this talk page...and just to clear up confusion I was talking about this talk page and not the article in question. I feel no need to point out specific examples because if you don't already see the apparent hate in the discussions above then I certainly won't be able to convince you of such. I wasn't attempting to push your buttons or spark a debate. It was simply an observation. Madangry 20:05, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
You can read that right here on the talk page. For example: "That two Molotov cocktails were thrown at a mosque alone doesn't imply the motivation was islamophobic." This sentence is hypocritical and therefore most likely full of hate. Nobody, who is not anti-semitic himself, would ever say that "burning a synagoge alone doesn't imply the motivation was anti-semitic". In 1938 when people accused the Nazis for burning synagoges, they could have replied: "No, I don't have anything agains jews, I just don't want them to pray here." Raphael1 14:56, 21 March 2006 (UTC)


Hostility

Could someone please direct me to where the consensus was made to include "hostility" in the definition of Islamophobia? I have seen several articles referring to "Islamophobic hostility", but since here the word hostility is included in the word "Islamophobic", then "Islamophobic hostility" becomes a Tautology.DanielDemaret 14:50, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Please take a look at point 8 of the Runnymede Trust definition. If hostility towards Islam is seen as natural and normal, it is a clear sign for a closed resp. islamophobic view. It basically means that even inaccurate and unfair critique will not be criticized by an islamophobic person. Still "Islamophobic hostility" is not a Tautology, because there is "Islamophobic violence" and "Islamophobic discrimination" too. Raphael1 02:08, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
You seem to be implying that there is a consensus in wikipedia that the Rynnymede Trust definition is the only proper definition. If this is so, then why is do I not see anyone else supporting it? I am curious: Is your definition of "consensus" that you support it, regardless of what anyone else thinks? Because that is what you are implying here.DanielDemaret 15:48, 25 March 2006 (UTC) My question was on consensus, and you answered that I should read the Runnymede definition.DanielDemaret 15:50, 25 March 2006 (UTC) And Raphael, if you answer, I would take it as kindness if you do not split my text, so that it appears for all that you are changing what I write. Again.DanielDemaret 15:55, 25 March 2006 (UTC) I would also appreciate it if you could try and refrain from using words like "stupid" or the like when referring to other editors text, and if you could try and avoid writing that other editors do not "read the papers" or that they need to "think" or that they have not read the discussion text. If it all possible. DanielDemaret 16:01, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
If you doubt, that there is a thing called Islamophobia, go ahead and start a VfD. You will probably be even successful, since a lot of people here think, that hostility towards Islam is normal and not even burning mosques has something to do with Islamophobia. Raphael1 16:44, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  • No, none of us doubt that there is such a thing. What in the world makes you suggest that? Oh, and thank you for signing here to make it possible for me to insert my answer here. That was very kind of you :) DanielDemaret 16:53, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  • As for the idea that burning mosques has something to do with Islamophobia, when I read that statement in the discussion above by Nysin, what I saw him suggesting was that there was not a necessary connection. In the particular event mentioned above, Molotovs thrown on a Mosque in Australia, then Islamophobia seems to be a prime suspect motive, i e a most probable connection. But if one where to state that all Mosque explosions have to have Islamophobic origins, then one would rule out all other motive possibilies. Clearly, this motive is doubtful in the Al Askari Mosque bombing case. It is not at all certain that Al Askari Mosque was bombed out of Islamophobia. DanielDemaret 17:45, 25 March 2006 (UTC) However, if you think that the Al Askari Mosque bombing was certainly from Islamophobia, and all other bombings of this kind also Islamophobic, i e , that it was bombed because the bomber was afraid of Islam, then I shall not argue against you. You are entitled to your evaluation of that bombing and I really do not know any more than what the media write. DanielDemaret 17:48, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Come on ... you don't have to bring up the Al Askari Mosque bombing to prove me wrong. I'm not talking about the War in Iraq. I'm talking about islamophobic acts in the "West". There's no point in discussing anything that happens in Iraq, because in a war truth dies first. Raphael1 02:51, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  • You are right. I do not have to bring up that particular Mosque. There are plenty of Mosques outside Iraq that seem to have been damaged by other muslims. I was merely using a simple example to illustrate a piece of simple Aristotelian logic to try and make it easier for you to understand. Since it did not work, I withdraw the example. The rest of the argument is just as valid without it. DanielDemaret 19:07, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
As you already seemed to know, I never intentionally made your text look changed. I only remember using the word "stupid" on one occasion, referring to a poll about the rights of a minority. And why should I refrain from asking people to read something or to think about a certain issue? Is that offensive for you? Raphael1 16:44, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Well, what I thought was offensive was the suggestion in another article that other people did not think. I may have over-reacted and over-interpreted there. :) DanielDemaret 16:55, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
We both agree that there is both fear and hostility against muslims and that there is widespread Islamophobia all over. I am merely arguing that the word Islamophobia should be interpreted as fear, not necessarily hostility for Linguistic reasons, unless there is a consensus here that every single editor thinks that the word should also include the connotation of hostility.DanielDemaret 16:59, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
As you said below, hostility is often a natural consequence of fear. There is indeed a strong connection between fear and hostility. Raphael1 17:34, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
Absolutely. Fear very often leads to Hostility. And Hostility very often leads to Aggression. And Aggression very often leads to Violence. And Violence very often leads to Death. But in the english language is it important to keep the words separate, or language loses meaning.DanielDemaret 17:38, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Phobia

Phobia denotes fear, not hostility. Also, Agoraphobia, Arachnophobia, Xenophobia are defined as fear of squares, spiders and foreigners, not hostility towards them, even if hostility is often a natural consequence. Words should be interpreted as people intend them to mean, but in most articles I have read, the meaning has clearly been "fear". DanielDemaret 16:51, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

That's IMHO a valid critique on the term "Islamophobia". Mr. Aboulmagd, Vice-President of the Egyptian Council for Human Rights and Professor of Public Law at Cairo University, stated that the term “anti-Semitism” focused on the agony of the victim, but that “Islamophobia” focused on the subjective state of mind of the individual who felt threatened. He and Mr. Esposito (professor of the Georgetown University) suggested the better term "Anti-Islamism". Anyway - I don't think it's necessary to dispute about words. Everybody who wants to realize Islamophobia, can easily do so. And everybody who wants to play down Islamophobia, can just as well play down Anti-Islamism. Raphael1 17:27, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
What does this sentence mean? " Everybody who wants to realize Islamophobia, can easily do so."? DanielDemaret 17:40, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
It means that people, who are not islamophobic themself, usually have no problem to see, that burning a mosque is without doubt an act motivated by Islamophobia. Neither will they doubt that smearing a Qu'ran with feces is an islamophobic act, etc. There is always room for speculation, if you desperately want to speculate. I.e. you can speculate whether 9/11 was an attack by terrorists or the holocaust really happened, etc. Raphael1 18:03, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
The term is indeed what I am concerned with. It is important that the term is correctly defined and properly used. I think that if there are people who say that there is no Islamophobia, it is because they have misunderstood the term. It is one of wikipedias missions to make the terms clear and understandable, to help people avoid misunderstandings. Misunderstandings also lead to hostility and aggressions. The examples and allegations of events that are caused from Islamophobia is a completely different matter, and I may take an interest in that later. At the moment, I merely want to make sure that the term is correctly defined, if possible. DanielDemaret 18:00, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Other apparent problems with Runnymede's definitions

My reading of http://www.runnymedetrust.org/publications/pdfs/islamophobia.pdf suggests that Runnymede sees "Closed views" (which it states are "equated" with Islamophobia) and "Open views" of Islam as mutually exclusive, and in fact, several of their items are close to negations of each other (#2 for example). Others, however, seem to be more orthogonal, so that one can coherently believe both or neither. The latter isn't so much a problem as the former, so I'll concentrate on false choices.

    1. 4: to the extent that "Islam" is, in fact, diverse, different parts of Islam can be seen as both "violent, aggressive, threatening, supportive of terrorism" and an "actual or potential partner in joint cooperative enterprises and in the solution of shared problems". Granted, it seems unlikely the same Muslim will act both roles that often, but Muslims differ, as #1-open helpfully points out.
    2. 5: Islam can't be seen as both "a political ideology, used for political or military advantage" and "a genuine religious faith, practiced sincerely by its adherents" by the practicing Muslim at the same time? They don't look mutually exclusive to me, and I'm not sure why it'd necessarily be seen as bad for one's religion to be seen as helpful politically, even if, and perhaps especially if one believes in it sincerely.
    3. 8: Accepting an idea as "natural and normal" doesn't and shouldn't preclude it from being "subjected to critique, let they [it] be inaccurate and unfair". Science can operate like that, for example.

(The sort of side issue I've otherwise ignored is that some of their "Open" views are phrased rather is if Islam were, in fact, a "single monolithic bloc". See, well, all of them virtually, which to "Islam" ascribe some positive-sounding characteristic: #s 1, 4, and 5 in particular. That said, I'd suggest that's merely concise phrasing and not genuine Islamophobia on the part of Runnymede.)

Either one can hold Runnymede's "closed" and "open" views without contradiction, undermining the case for pointing out some closed view of Islam listed by Runnymede as a cade for "Islamophobia" or one cannot, in which case a "closed view" does seem to preclude an "open view", making for a stronger case, but which imposes certain requirements on their characterization. In the latter case, one might prefer definitions more internally self-consistent than, in fact, occur. In this light, how usable is Runnymede's definition? (A hint: I'm not necessarily part of a consensus which approves of this definition, but I've been using it because it's been the best presented thus far.) Nysin 01:49, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

  • reg. #4 If you see Islam as diverse, you cannot see the whole Islam as violent or aggressive, if Islam can be seen as potential partner. Nobody would say you are islamophobic, if you regard certain groups of Muslims as violent. But I'd say you are islamophobic, if you think those people are aggressive because they are Muslim, as that would imply Islam is the reason for their violence, terror, etc.
  • reg. #5 Insted describes #5 "manipulative, devious and self-righteous" which is actually a negation of genuine. #5 reminds me to Anti-Semitic conspiracy theories
  • reg. #8 What is inaccurate and unfair critique in science? IMHO #8 means, that an islamophobic person would not complain about inaccurate or unfair critique on Islam. Raphael1 03:35, 26 March 2006 (UTC)


Reading the Runnymede report, I do not actually see any definition. I have no trouble at all with this well written report. It recognizes that Islamophobia exists, and it connects the phenomenom with a number of related views. If we were to ask the writers of the report, my guess is that they would concur with the definition of Islamophobia itself as akin to "fear of Islam". Hostility and the view of it being normal is taken to be an clear indicator of Islamophobia, not as being a part itself. DanielDemaret 19:21, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't see your point. Islamophobia can become manifest in verbal abuse, physical assaults, prejudice, etc. I see the Runnymede definition primarily as a guide to differentiate between legitimate critizism and hatred. Raphael1 09:19, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
Since you see it as a guide, then we all see it the same way. It is a guide, not a defintion. I think that the authors of the Runnymede report would strongly oppose it being called a definition. DanielDemaret 11:47, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Properly defining the term "Islamophobia" (Continued from previous section of talk)

I'd define Islamophobia analog to Anti-semitism as such "Islamophobia is a fear of Islam which leads to hostility toward or prejudice against Muslims as a religious, ethnic or racial group, which can range from individual hatred to institutionalized, violent persecution." But I still see Runnymedes guide very helpful for deciding what is legitimate critizism in contrast to Islamophobia (hatred, hostility, prejudice). Raphael1 12:14, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
I support this :) DanielDemaret 12:21, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
I don't support this... for a non-Muslim like Raphael1 to be unilaterally determining (without unbiased supporting citations like [21]) what the term "Islamophobia" means borders on the inane. According to Ahmed Kamal Aboulmagd (a well known and respected PhD holding muslim thinker), Islamophobia is a misnomer [22] (he went so far as to refer to the term as derogatory). Got a better idea Raphael1? Netscott 13:53, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
I note you use the same source twice within the same paragraph, not really needed. Also, that the Islamophobia exists is not universally shared, and that is well documented within the article, Dr. Aboulmagd is just another of that persuasion. That you feel the need to link to Wikitionary is insulting; Are you suggesting that we cannot understand English, or that we are too stupid to realise how to look up words we are unfamiliar with in a Dictionary?. Further, Dr. Aboulmagd is not a Scholar of Islam, he's a Lawyar and former Member of Sadats government. --Irishpunktom\talk 14:06, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Hmmm, I've been having difficulty finding an unbiased source for the definition of the actual word "Islamophobia" perhaps one of you gentlemen can bring such a thing to the discussion? Netscott 14:12, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Irishpunktom your comments regarding my citing word definition demonstrate a simpleton view of my comments. Why consider merely one's self when considering whose going to be reading this? Beside I know that for Raphael1, English is a second language. And a number of your posts have demonstrated a lack of English mastery. Netscott 14:16, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • How can I respect anything you say when you go around calling people simpletons and idiots? - Stop defining words, stop insulting others' use of English, if you can understand them, then can understand you - if you cannot understand, ask for clarification, likewise for others. --Irishpunktom\talk 14:20, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

And back to definitions again. We have Netscotts previous definition from dictionary.com and we have the linguistic way of joining islam and phobia.

Netscott, you now say you can not find an unbiased source. Dictionary.com's no good then?

And if we do not find an unbiased source, what is wrong with deriving the meaning from islam and phobia in accordance with all other phobias? It would be a consistent way of defining the word which therefore should make it easier for all to agree on.DanielDemaret 14:32, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

  • Daniel, my only problem with the dictionary.com cite is that it's just one citation and I think Muslims could potentially argue that it might be biased. That is the most unbiased definition I could come up with without doing a very profound search. Netscott 14:41, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • As far as your comments regarding the commonly accepted norm of combining word "A" and attaching "phobia" that makes perfect sense to me. Netscott 14:54, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • As an editor trying to instill quality in a given WikiPedia article there's one thing that is unacceptable and this is a conflict in terms. From the "history" section of this article there is this line:
"It(Islamophobia) is formed with the Greek suffix -phobia 'fear of -' in a similar way to xenophobia or homophobia.

Follow the Wikipedia entry on -phobia and one can see that this is in direct contradiction to the notion of Islamophobia equating with "hostility". This in effect logically nullifies the article if the term "hostility" is left in. Netscott 15:07, 27 March 2006 (UTC)


If we can not reach a concensus between "prejudice of" and "fear of" perhaps both proposed definitions should be included? Something in the line of "Some use the word as meaning "prejucide towards Islam" and some use it as meaming "fear of Islam". DanielDemaret 15:50, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand why Islamophobia should be defined as "prejudice towards Islam", when other forms of racism like antisemitism or sectarianism have much "stronger" definitions.

Raphael1 16:52, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

The concept of what this article is about is not disputed but the terminology is. During his speech Dr. Aboulmagd made a very valid point about this. I strongly recommend that other editors better familiarize themselves with what he actually said. Netscott 19:32, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
I've seen the UN conference where Dr. Aboulmagd talked about Islamophobia. Still the "Commission on British Muslims and Islamophobia" describes islamophobia as another form of racism in this report. Raphael1 08:39, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Ahmed Kamal Aboulmagd

Ok, so can I ask the purpose of his quote being in the intro? It doesn't seem to serve any purpose, as it doesn't serve to introduce the topic, but rather add more commentary to it. Can someone mount a defense of it being in the intro? Bibigon 20:53, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, it doesn't cover this. At least not as far as I can tell. I'm not wondering why he's in the article, I'm wondering why his quote is in the intro. Maybe his quote is worth throwing into the definitions section, and summarizing in the intro, but in the current form, it's just out of place and giving his view undue primacy over other definitions and interpretations. Bibigon 21:24, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Well, that is the whole point, the definition is anything but clear... in the version of the article prior to my citation of his quote there was simply the statement: "the neologism is disputed." with no support of that statement. I merely edited in a very valid example of this dipute to correspond to that statement. I've been trying to find a source for the definition of the acutual word "Islamophobia", particularly one with as little bias as possible and so far I've not found much. I've checked 3 or 4 major online dictionaries and only one (dictionary.com) even had a definition. All of the other dictionaries had zilch. Do you know of a good source for the definition? Netscott 21:30, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
This isn't about defining terms, it's about summarizing other's definitions. We have a section for that here on this article, and the current revision gives undue primacy to one particular definition. Bibigon 22:18, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • None of the previous 'definitions' (ie: including the term "hostility") has been supported with any sort of citations. Have you had a chance to find an unbiased source for an actual definition of the actual word "Islamophobia"? It's not unreasonable to add Dr. Ahmed Kamal Aboulmagd's view about it in the intro, he in fact was one of the first speakers (of a large number) to have expressed himself at the U.N. sponsored seminar entitled "Confronting Islamophobia: Education for Tolerance and Understanding”. Amazingly enough after having familiarized myself with that seminar I have yet to find an instance anywhere in it where the definition of the term was actually spelled out (which is very surprising to say the least). Netscott 22:38, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • It must have been a bit of an embarassment for the organizers of that conference because Dr. Ahmed Kamal Aboulmagd even took issue with the word "tolerance". Netscott 22:41, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
All that does is make a case for removing some previously unsourced assertions in the intro, not for introducing the good Dr's definition as the primary one. I agree with your general point that much, perhaps most of this article is original research. I gutted about half of it a few months back when I came upon it, but it's still in pretty bad shape with regards to that, even after my edits to try and fix the problem. Unless Ahmed Kamal Aboulmagd was the origin of the term however, or was the only guy with a definition of it out there, then his quote does not belong in the introduction, but rather in the section on Characterizations. Then his view, along with the two others given, should be summarized and that's the introductory paragraph. Bibigon 02:18, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
By all means do some editing... but leave him there as he is related to the "this neologism is disputed." statement (perhaps remove the quotes to a later section of the article)...Please know that in light of my concerns expressed below I'm probably going to submit this article for AfD. Netscott 02:45, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

This article is seriously in danger of violating WP:NOR

We as editors are not treading on solid ground working on this article. As the following 6 top online dictionaries would seem to indicate, the term "Islamophobia" hasn't even properly entered into the lexicon of the English language.

1. Cambridge dictionary for "Islamophobia"

2. Merriam Webster's for "Islamophobia"

3. MSN Encarta for "Islamophobia"

4. Newbury House of American English for "Islamophobia"

5. Infoplease for "Islamophobia"

6. Factmonster for "Islamophobia"

Due to this fact there is a strong need to properly surveil what goes into this article for if we do not then this article has the potential to violate Wikipedia:No Original Research and actually become cited for defining what Islamophobia is. This is extremely counter to ethic of WikiPedia. Netscott 23:47, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I'll add that the online version of the Oxford English Dictionary doesn't have it either, but only "Islam", "Islamic", "Islamism", "Islamite", "Islamitic", "Islamitish", and ... "island". Nysin 00:38, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Nothing on Britannica either. In fact, a search for islamophobia definition seems to be pretty much limited to Wikipedia mirrors. jacoplane 01:34, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Wow, Jacoplane.... that is some serious confirmation of my concerns! I'd almost go so far as to say that this article should be outright DELETED to prevent it becoming a major "newsworthy" case of WikiPedia violating it's own ethic (just what WikiPedia needs..). Netscott 01:45, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
So what do you think are "Human Rights Watch", "Forum Against Islamophobia and Racism", "International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights", "The Runnymede Trust", "European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia", the United Nations and just about every university with Middle-East, Arabic or Islam faculties doing? They all do research about Islamophobia. Do you really mean that Islamophobia doesn't exist, because it's not in Merriam Webster's or MSN Encarta? Raphael1 09:18, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Rapheal1, please keep your arguments relative to WP:NOR. WikiPedia is not to be used for defining terms (which you've been attempting to do yourself on this article). This is one of the tenets of WP:NOR. Your editorial comments on this edit give me additional cause for concern: "Netscott, please stop adding the facts template all over the place. If you doubt any statement, please cite sources on the talk page, which state the opposite.". I've illustrated how this article is in jeopardy of violating WP:NOR and in that regard this article needs MORE citations not less. Netscott 09:28, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
This article has a lot more sources than many Good Articles on Wikipedia. Deleting it? That is ridiculous! You know as well as anyone it would survive an AFD. --Irishpunktom\talk 09:31, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Well if you think, that the article needs more citations, go for it. I've given you some pointers where to look for research on Islamophobia in my previous post. Raphael1 10:12, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Then perhaps the best way to go is to simply state in the heading that the word is so recent that no consensus has been reached on its definition yet? A definition on our part would be speculative. DanielDemaret

Tried it. --Irishpunktom\talk 10:10, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
What's there is quite good but I think it might be better to reverse the order and say something like "Islamophobia refers to a fear of Islam which leads to hostility toward or prejudice against Muslims as a religious, ethnic or racial group. The word is a neologism that has yet to have one clear and explicit definition. The effects of Islamophobia range from individual hatred to institutionalized, violent persecution." David | Talk 10:26, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Agreed--Irishpunktom\talk 10:34, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
That's very good indeed. Raphael1 11:26, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Possible examples of Islamophobia relative to WP:NOR

It is false for this article to be generally characterizing events/places/views as examples of possible examples of "Islamophobia" when the very term is not clearly defined.

If these examples are to remain they must be CLEARLY DEFINED as example of "Islamophobia" according to... and the individual's / organization's name who's doing the characterization. To do anything else is to be contravening WP:NOR. Netscott 11:05, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

  • TOTALLY AGREE so it's time to get to work in citing (and NAMING IN THE ARTICLE) who or what organization is doing the characterization! Netscott 11:08, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Hmm, I do think that having a section of "possible" cases of Islamophobia amounts to original research. At the least it is quite POV in the selection of sources. I mean, the Jyllands-Posten has publicly stated that their aim had nothing to do with Islamophobia or offending Muslims, but with experimenting with the boundaries of freedom of speech. Yet it is included here and the source seems to be one opinion by Doudou Diene. I'm Dutch and I find it interesting that Fortuijn is included in the list but Theo van Gogh isn't. Surely van Gogh was much more offensive to Muslims. In fact there are many Dutch academics and politicians who are openly critical of Islamic culture, including Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Geert Wilders, Ashif Ellian and many others. This article seems to be suggesting that the whole of Dutch political debate has taken an Islamophobic turn, yet I have many Muslim friends (half the city I live in, Amsterdam, is Muslim) that have no problem with the debate. They actually feel liberated to be able to talk without the multicultural cliches that we used to talk in and feel we need to say exactly what we feel so that we can get on with the more pressing issue of getting our problems solved so we can peacefully live alongside each other. Apologies for the rant. jacoplane 18:25, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Minimally, for Wikipedia to avoid establishing a definition itself by example, it should probably avoid citing anything as an example, even a weasel-word "possible" example, if it doesn't explicitly name the incident as Islamophobic itself. Nysin 22:29, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I tried many times to include the film Submission to the list, because both Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Theo can Gogh have been accused of being islamophobic by the british Guardian newspaper. Raphael1 08:49, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Yes. Your conclusion (Submission's islamophobic) didn't follow from your premises (the people involved in creating it are islamophic), regardless of the truth or not of the antecedent. Nysin 09:01, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

TIME OUT!

  • Blowing hard into the whistle*

Guys, you are starting to let this get out of hand. Warnings WILL be handed out if this continues. Calm down, take a step back and think things through. --OrbitOne [Talk|Babel] 11:24, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

I have calmly initiated an AfD (second nomination) for this article due to my concerns. Netscott 11:33, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Wow, netscott (talk · contribs) is a role account created specifically to edit this page and of course the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy, edit war only role accounts, that's a rather good idea, you should meet some of my sockpuppets, one is a british office supply clerk, the other is from canada and is the worlds youngest practicing attorney (9 years old), one of them is a cowboy, he lives in mexico and ropes steers although he's considering retiring, not as young as he used to be, and they all feel very strongly about things i feel strongly about too, I love my sockpuppets, they're such nice people with such interesting lives--64.12.116.67 00:03, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree with Netscott here, the debate has remained civil, if heated. This is a good thing if we're going to reach consensus here. jacoplane 18:26, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Dictionary Definition from Oxford Dictionary

It seems like Tangotango has a definition from: The Oxford Dictionary of English (ODE) (copyrighted 2003), included on his Casio XD-H9200 electronic dictionary which says: "Islamophobia > noun [mass noun] a hatred or fear of Islam or Muslims, especially as a political force." Since it is the only reference we have to a definition, and it sounds good to me, we should use that in the article and refer to the oxford dictionary edition. DanielDemaret 14:44, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

To avoid edit wars, I am not going to change it until there is consensus on this.DanielDemaret 14:46, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Is there anyone who has access to http://www.oed.com/ who can confirm this? jacoplane 19:19, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
I have access to oed.com, but cannot confirm that definition. I'm curious where Tangotango's Oxford Dictionary comes from. [Image:Oed_islamophobia.png] (As far as I can tell, that's acceptable copyright-wise, especially as it doesn't show any OED definitions, but I've never uploaded an image before.) Nysin 20:26, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
The definition is NOT from The Oxford English Dictionary (OED), which does not have an entry on Islamophobia. In fact, if you re-read his post, he actually says that it is from The Oxford Dictionary of English, not the OED.--Tim4christ17 10:36, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Is there a distinction though? Anyway, I think the "ODE" can be downloaded from ZDNet. I'll try it out later. jacoplane 10:39, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Hi there, yes there is a distinction between the two dictionaries. The Oxford Dictionary of English (ODE) I'm quoting is a complete rewrite of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), and focuses on English suitable for use in today's modern world, rather than including tons of etymological information as does the OED. You may see more information about the ODE here [38]. As for the image Nysin's quoted, I believe that's the one I posted at Image:Islamophobia-ODE-def.jpg. Please take a look. Thank you. - Tangotango 13:53, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, I misread the timestamp. I wasn't aware that Nysin had posted a different image before I had posted mine. As you can see from his image, the OED doesn't have this definition - I actually went to the local library and checked that. My photo (Image:Islamophobia-ODE-def.jpg) is, as you can probably guess, of my electronic dictionary displaying the ODE definition for Islamophobia. Thanks, and sorry for the mixup. - Tangotango 14:27, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Though this is something of a tangent, I'll point out that the online version is more up-to-date, and for example has a section on words with new etymologies and definitions from the BBC programme Boulderdash and Piffle. Thus, while if it's not in the online version it certainly shouldn't be in the library's physical (1989, probably, last full update) copy, the converse isn't true. I guess this is fairly obvious, but it could be important that they're not actually the same. Nysin 14:41, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Nysin, your previous comment aside, I've just downloaded the software version of the ODE that Jacoplane suggested (see above), and I can confirm that this version (the second (and latest) edition of the ODE) too includes Islamophobia as a word. I've uploaded a screenshot here. I suggest you download the software too. - Tangotango 15:03, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Okay, it seems pretty clear that the ODE lists it, making it the only non-dictionary.com reference so far. I'll agree with DanielDemaret's suggestion, then, to place it in the article. Nysin 16:03, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

When the word emerged

I find a scant 7 references before 1996 on Google Groups, and nearly all the new references for the next year or two appear in the same articles as references to CAIR. Not only am I deeply skeptical of the ostensible 1970 origins, but question the term's widespread validity before it caught on beyond CAIR's purview. Nysin 20:45, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I actually linked to the Google groups archive of the CAIR press release, but I can't find a copy of it on their website or anywhere else. I strongly suspect it's not a WP:Reliable source, so if someone objects and wants to move it to the talk page or replace it with another citation, I'd be fine with that. The 1970s claim had to go though. Nysin 21:03, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Irishpunktom edits

This user seems intent on unilaterally dictating the contents of the article. Can you at least explain what you think you are doing in the edit summary? Saying "few changes" in the summary and then reverting a lot of changes without any discussion is just not acceptable. How are we ever supposed to reach consensus on the content of this article with that kind of behaviour? I refuse to edit war with you since I follow a 1RR for myself. Also, it would be nice if you explained why exactly you find it a good idea to move back to the old referencing system. Wikipedia:Footnotes is the new accepted way of doing inline references. jacoplane 10:19, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

I reverted his definition change, as it was more POV than the previous version. I also deleted both Jacoplane and Irishpunktom's comment directly following the definition, as neither reflected a NPOV (I get the point(s) you two were trying to express, but perhaps you can express the point(s) without the use of loaded words? --Tim4christ17 10:47, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
- Yeah, fair enough. --Irishpunktom\talk 10:53, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
So, if I change back to the new footnotes system would you mind that? jacoplane 11:01, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Ok forget it, now Raphael1 reverted, again without any explanation. I give up on this article, these editors are impossible to work with. jacoplane 11:04, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Irishpunktom, do you have a particular distaste for the converted references? [39] That edit was made 7 minutes after Jacoplane's. Nysin 14:50, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

My "vandalism"

Raphael1, care to explain (1) why my edits constituted vandalism and (2) whether you can actually justify the [citation needed] statements you added back? "Netscott, please stop adding the facts template all over the place. If you doubt any statement, please cite sources on the talk page, which state the opposite." is an instance of the logical fallacy I pointed out to you before. Refrain from violating tht fallacy in the future, please. Nysin 16:14, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Deleting 7 alleged examples of Islamophobia is vandalism. Esp. if you are deleting such obvious hate crimes as the 2005 Cronulla race riots and the burning of a mosque in Brisbane. Raphael1 20:41, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Find a reliable source to say they're islamophobic, then. Especially the mosque isn't "obvious" (we discussed this before), and simply stating this isn't a children's encyclopedia doesn't exempt you from providing verifiable sources of the claims you're making. Given the rather uncertain status and meaning of "islamophobia" made clear by the recent discussion of dictionary definitions and how Runnymede apparently doesn't actually provide one, more evidence is needed. Nysin 21:13, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
It doesn't matter what we think is obvious "islamophobia". Without a sources its original research, and it cant be allowed to stay. -- Karl Meier 07:20, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
If you remove them, please don't forget to remove all "synagoge burning" and "swastika paintings on jewish graves" from the anti-semitism article too. Raphael1 08:58, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
If you want to include the opinion that the views of politicians such as Pim Fortuyn are "islamophobic" then find a noteable source that say that. It's not relevant to Wikipedia that you think it is "obvious", based on your own original research. -- Karl Meier 10:09, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
I know I said I would recluse myself from the article, but I had something to add. The Pim Fortuyn article clearly references the following quotes: "I am also in favour of a cold war with Islam. I see Islam as an extraordinary threat, as a hostile religion." and "I don't hate Islam. I consider it a backward culture. I have travelled much in the world. And wherever Islam rules, it's just terrible. All the hypocrisy. It's a bit like those old Reformed Protestants. The Reformed lie all the time. And why is that? Because they have norms and values that are so high that you can't humanly maintain them. You also see that in that Muslim culture. Then look at the Netherlands. In what country could an electoral leader of such a large movement as mine be openly homosexual? How wonderful that that's possible. That's something that one can be proud of. And I'd like to keep it that way, thank you very much." Now, in my book you can not get much clearer without explicitly saying "I am an Islamophobe". It is possible to agree or disagree with his opinions, and every person should decide for themselves what the danger this kind of speech poses, but this is clearly something that qualifies for this article. Since you seem to require explicit references, here is an article from Le Monde (the most respected newspaper in France) that explicitly calls him an Islamophobe. Arab News (scroll to the bottom) explicitly calling him an Islamophobe. Oxford Student newspaper explicitly calling him an Islamophobe. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jacoplane (talk • contribs)
I don't understand a word of that article, but I guess that should do. If Rinke Van den Brink describe his views as "islamophobic" in Le Monde, then we can of course add that view to the "Alleged examples of Islamophobia" section. -- Karl Meier 11:23, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

There should be no need to justify the addition of a {{Fact}} template. Especially in controversial articles like this, a lot of unsourced original research gets dumped here. The burden should be on the adder to provide a source, especially if anyone asks for one in the form of a {{Fact}} template. I find the adding of that template much more constructive than simply deleting material (unless it doesn't meet the minimum threshold for potential verifiability). A quick look at the edit history for this article shows that many users (pardon my own use of weasel words, but I find it more constructive in this instance not to name names) have been one-sided in removing material. If there is ever going to be any progress on an article of this nature, everything must be cited. savidan(talk) (e@) 21:22, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

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