The silly and stupid Washington Post piece on Pamela Geller and me that I discussed here was originally entitled “In flap over mosque near Ground Zero, conservative writers gaining influence.” Now it is called “The pens of anti-Muslim conservatives impact N.Y.C. mosque debate mightily.”
“Anti-Muslim” is a term that Islamic supremacists and their Leftist enablers like to use of people who are fighting for human rights against Sharia — and it’s easy to see why: it frames their opponents as “bigots” and “haters,” takes the focus away from their anti-woman, anti-free speech, anti-free thought, anti-equality of rights agenda, and has the added bonus of stirring up their more bloody-minded coreligionists to violence.
And above all, despite the promiscuous Goebbels-style Big-Lie application of the term to me by the likes of Honest Ibe Hooper of Hamas-linked CAIR and his tool Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs, it simply isn’t true. I am not “anti-Muslim.” I am anti-Sharia, anti-jihad, anti-oppression, anti-terror, and so should be every free person. Several years ago I had a memorable exchange with Islamic supremacist blogger Yusuf Smith, a.k.a. “Indigo Jo,” here. I said: “I would like nothing better than a flowering, a renaissance, in the Muslim world, including full equality of rights for women and non-Muslims in Islamic societies: freedom of conscience, equality in laws regarding legal testimony, equal employment opportunities, etc.” Yusuf Smith responded: “So, you would like to see us ditch much of our religion and, thereby, become non-Muslims.” In other words, he saw a call for equality of rights for women and non-Muslims in Islamic societies, including freedom of conscience, equality in laws regarding legal testimony, and equal employment opportunities, as a challenge to his religion.
Well, if that’s being “anti-Muslim,” Michelle Boorstein of the Washington Post, if she had a modicum of commitment to human rights, would be “anti-Muslim” also.