The problem with words like "Islamofascist" is that it make it seem that Islamic fundamentalists are different in their beliefs than other Muslims. They are not. More fervent perhaps.but they all must believe in the same KORAN or they are NOT Muslims. It creates a false dichotomy. Islam is totalitarian and fascist. Period. Those who support it are also. Call them what they are.
Bruce http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/opinion_columnists/article/0,2777,DRMN _23972_5011681,00.html Defending 'Islamofascist' What I like the best about the term Islamofascism is that it calls a spade a spade. It's not some wishy-washy euphemism. It pinpoints and accurately describes this century's greatest threat to humanity. It combines intolerant religious zealotry, that's the "Islamo" part, with ruthless totalitarianism, that's the "fascist" part. The enemy isn't terrorism, per se. That's a tactic, not a cause, and a universal one at that. Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber, was a terrorist, but he wasn't an Islamofascist. Klebold and Harris, the Columbine killers, were terrorists, but not Islamofascists. A Rocky Mountain News letter to the editor from a Boulderite (where else?) took issue with my defense of the term in a recent column. I'll stand by it. The letter writer argued that fascism is best used to describe Hitler's brand of "authoritarianism" and his "support" of "private enterprise" ("aka corporatism" as the Boulderite termed it, a buzz word for anti-capitalist lefties with an affection for socialism). I'd say that Hitler was more of a totalitarian than an authoritarian, and that he wasn't content to "support" private enterprise, he wanted to control it - along with everything else. Intellectually lazy leftists tend to throw around the term "fascist" gratuitously. They use it childishly as an epithet for people or policies they just don't like. Ronald Reagan was an advocate of limited government. He said government was the problem, not the solution. He didn't want to control business; he wanted to decontrol it. Nonetheless, irrational leftists called him a fascist. Perhaps reserving the term fascist for American conservatives that he doesn't like, the aforementioned letter writer offered his personal preference for the term "theocracy" rather than Islamofascism. He then went on to outrageously equate the likes of Osama bin Laden with James Dobson and conservative Christians. James Dobson never flew an airplane into the World Trade Center. And his Focus on the Family organization doesn't train suicide bombers to kill innocent Muslim women and children. I've never heard Dobson call for the death of non-Christians, simply because they're non-Christians, nor does he want to outlaw other religions in this country or change the Constitution to make the president subservient to the church. The comparison is absurd. Christian missionaries seek to convert others through persuasion and good deeds. Islamofascists force conversion at the point of a sword. Theocracy is a legitimate term in some contexts, but an insufficient one to describe Islamofascists. The Vatican, for example, is a theocracy, but a benign one, not an intolerant, militant, aggressive force. Christians may believe that those who don't accept Jesus will be denied entrance to heaven, but they don't also want to kill them - not these days anyway. The current generation of Islamofascists are wholesale murderers. Along with 9/11, examples of Islamofascist acts include the murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh, attacks on Danish embassies in response to newspaper cartoons of Muhammad, the ritual slaughter of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan, and the recent calls for the assassination of Pope Benedict XVI because of remarks he made at a scholarly conference in Germany to which some Muslims took offense. In the 21st century, civilized people don't murder others for what they say. Islamofascists do. President Bush and others have made it abundantly clear on repeated occasions that Islamofascism is not synonymous with Islam. Islamofascism is a radical subset of Islam. Just as Earth First! terrorists are a radical subset of environmentalists. Not all Muslims are Islamofascists, but all Islamofascists are Muslims. Al-Qaida is Islamofascist, as are the Taliban and the extremist Wahhabi sect. An essential question is just how widespread is Islamofascism within the Muslim world of more than a billion followers? Is it 500 million? Is it 100 million? Is it only a small minority, but one that has intimidated and cowed the Muslim "silent majority" into submission or acquiescence? If so, that "minority" may be large enough, and committed and destructive enough to instigate a world war. Which takes us to the other essential question: What, if anything, is the respectable Islamic world going to do about cleaning up its own house? Where's the modern-day Martin Luther of Islam? Who will lead the Islamic Reformation and avert a worldwide confrontation that could kill tens of millions? If there are any prominent, powerful candidates, they've certainly been keeping a low profile for the last couple of decades. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, [EMAIL PROTECTED] -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.intellnet.org Post message: osint@yahoogroups.com Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. OSINT, as a part of The Intelligence Network, is making it available without profit to OSINT YahooGroups members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of intelligence and law enforcement organizations, their activities, methods, techniques, human rights, civil liberties, social justice and other intelligence related issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
