Islamophobia and incoherent political posturing

Otto von Bismarck's wise words, "politics is the art of the possible", are lost in the wind when it comes to their application to the coexistence of Muslims in Europe.

The European Union adopts policies that are efficient or less so, but the political class generally oscillates between two positions:

The first stance labels any criticism of Islam and Muslims as "Islamophobia".

The second views Islam and Muslims as a danger.

These two positions are highly damaging, both for Europe and for Muslims. With regard to the first position, it is clear that Islamophobia exists and is suffered by part of the Muslim community, and it is logical and necessary for the institutions of European states to subsidise public and private entities to eradicate it, however, I must point out that this concept is partly subjective and paternalistic, which when used excessively could have the opposite results.

It should be taken into account that a large part of the new generations of European Muslims deny being alluded to by Islamophobia since their members are integrated in European societies and most of them hold positions of responsibility in public and private institutions due to their university education and qualifications in different disciplines, and therefore firmly reject labels, and do not accept the paternalistic discourse that encourages self-discrimination.

This rejection builds a real story that is quietly commented in the European public sphere, and leads us to think about a necessary and acceptable hypothesis, which is that we are facing a latent conflict among Muslims themselves, which can sustain a dangerous disaggregation (Spain alluded to).

This disaggregation manifests itself in the emergence of two opposing groups: one, more tied to religion and Muslim tradition, and the other more open to secularism and modernity, in this case the burden of repulsion is borne more by the second group and, as a consequence, it begins to reveal its rejection of Islam and the mandates of the Sharia (Islamic Law).

The example is evidenced by the emergence of bloggers who publicly express their departure from Islam and also of associations called "Ex-Muslims", which are led by young people of both sexes, and take place in Spain, Germany, Belgium and other European countries. It is a phenomenon that responds to multiple reasons, among them: the confusion in the Islamic religious discourse, the iron control that parents place on their children, and also the contempt that rebellious young people suffer from the Muslim community for not being submissive. They are currently accused of Islamophobia and branded as apostates by their own community.

In parallel, there are thousands of associations of Muslim denomination that represent the most religiously and tradition-bound collective that seeks to preserve the Islamic religious entity: focus on human rights in Islam, the role of women in Islam, etc.

In relation to women and Islam, the most striking aspect is the existence of women's associations that reaffirm their Islam with the Islamic veil. They position themselves as the guardians of women's Islam with an irrational subjective discourse, organised among themselves, and in their circles there are hardly any women or girls without the veil. This attitude is a clear allusion to the disaggregation of women, which is unfortunately blessed by the press and institutions, I mention the press because it often focuses on women wearing veils, while there are millions of women who do not wear veils and are therefore not alien to Islam.

Another aspect of disaggregation can be seen in what happens with the LGTBIQ+ Muslim people who arrive in Europe through asylum applications fleeing from the reprisals they suffer in their countries of origin; once they are in the host societies, there is no Muslim association that preaches human rights and Islam, offering this group attention and shelter.

These clear signs of disaggregation make us think that there is a moral and physical ghetto imposed from equals to equals (from Muslims to other Muslims), and the question is: what kind of Islamophobia are we talking about?

The second negative point of the Islamophobia concept is that it leads to slowing down the processes of change favourable to Muslims in Europe, and it is worrying when intellectuals put off touching on Islam in order to avoid being misunderstood and accused of Islamophobia, or subjected to reprisals from extremist groups.

Likewise, when the voices of rational criticism are muzzled, there will be no intellectual enrichment in religious aspects, nor will there be openness to new alternatives that break with the autocracy of Islamic thought, thus maintaining European Muslims' ignorance of their own faith, and the new generations of Muslims will be immersed in obscurantism and sacred ignorance, which the Salafist current seeks to preserve.

As for the second political stance, which considers Islam and Muslims to be a danger, this is a generalisation that demonstrates the denial of the obvious, since the data show that in Europe the number of Muslims is around 25 million, The majority of this percentage confess to the Muslim cult with its diversity and variants, and reject the Islam of ISIS and Al-Qaeda (except for a very small extremist minority). Continuing to maintain the fallacy that Islam and Muslims are a danger does not help, because the reality is that they are here to stay, their social and economic power is on the rise and will increase year by year.

Faced with this scenario marked by these two political positions, it is urgent to give solemnity to a third political position, called to be a precursor of the new policies concerning Muslims in Europe, and to make real the wise words of Otto von Bismarck, "politics is the art of the possible".

This art in politics must not be exclusive to politicians, but also to intellectuals and actors in the European public sphere, Muslim or not, who must stop looking the other way and become involved in their own disciplines so that everyone can participate in articulating a series of political, educational and social strategies that are geared towards reconciliation with the enlightened history of the Islamic world and embrace the thought of Averroes, Ibn Sina, Al-Farabi and others who will undoubtedly bring about the flourishing of rational critical thinking that will know how to differentiate between Islamophobia and objective criticism, that will break with all that nourishes tensions between Muslims and their European environment, and also between Muslims themselves, and while this is emerging, Europe needs to accept that Islam is part of its history and culture, and is not alien to it.

Without this acceptance there will be no effective strategies for a brilliant coexistence of Muslims on the European continent.