St. Olaf College is a private liberal arts college in Northfield, Minnesota. Charles Taliaferro is a reliably far-Left member of its faculty: he “has been a member of St. Olaf’s Department of Philosophy since 1985. Like other professors around the world, and not just at St. Olaf, who promote inclusion and confront white supremacy and racial inequality, Taliaferro has argued for justice in terms of race, economics, gender not just in the class and seminar room, but in three books, a series of articles, newspaper interviews (mostly in Minneapolis and in Iran), and in lectures at Oxford University, Manchester University, and at Middlebury College where he advocated Black Lives Matter.”
What would be St. Olaf’s reaction if one of its professors had given an interview to a publication that is opposed to jihad violence and Sharia oppression of women, rather than to an organ of the regime that routinely chants “Death to America”? What would be the reaction at St. Olaf’s if a professor spoke as disparagingly of the Ayatollah Khamenei as Charles Taliaferro does of Trump here? That professor would be denounced, reprimanded, and possibly fired. But no one at St. Olaf College will have any problem with Charles Taliaferro’s flacking for the Islamic Republic.
Meanwhile, Taliaferro’s claim that “Islamophobia” in the West is a result of the “public media,” which is “notoriously unreliable as television outlets such as Fox News traffic in a combination of fear and entertainment,” is ridiculous. If anyone in the United States has a negative view of Islam, it certainly isn’t because of the watery soup of half-truth and Islamic apologetics that Fox generally presents; it is because of the constant drumbeat of jihad violence carried out in the name of Islam and in accord with its teachings, such as the recent beheading of Samuel Paty in France for the crime of showing his class a cartoon of Muhammad. That jihad violence is the reason for everything to which Taliaferro objects here; Trump took effective counterterror measures because of a genuine jihad terror threat, and it is telling that Taliaferro and the Mehr News Agency take for granted that doing this was simply arousing “fear of Muslims” and spreading “Islamophobia and hatred against Muslims.” Islamic advocacy groups in the U.S. such as the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations have for years claimed that virtually any counterterror measure was unacceptable in spreading “hate” of Muslims. This spurious claim of victimhood, combined with a refusal to work to root out jihadis and those holding jihadi sentiments from Muslim communities, led more people to be suspicious of Islam, which in turn enabled CAIR and its allies to further their claims of “Islamophobia.” They’ve got quite a racket worked out.
“Unreliable media are info source for people in West on Islam,” Mehr News Agency, January 13, 2021:
…We discussed the issue of Islamophobia in the west with Charles Taliaferro, a professor of philosophy at St. Olaf College in the US.
Why has the old policy of Islamophobia and hatred against Muslims been intensified in recent years?
Even before he was elected, Donald Trump aroused the fear of Muslims as a way to solidify his America-first political base. This, of course, flies in the face of the roughly three and a half million Muslims who are citizens in the United States, let alone those who have distinguished positions in the government; my representative in the House of Representatives is Muslim, as is our Attorney General. Trump fueled resentment over American soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, accused his opponents of supporting ISIS, and portrayed the Islamic Republic of Iran as not to be trusted in the use of nuclear power.
Does the public opinion of the west have a real knowledge of Islam? and from what source do they get this knowledge?
I suspect that the primary source of information in the west about Islam is from public media, which is notoriously unreliable as television outlets such as Fox News traffic in a combination of fear and entertainment. This is slowly changing as educators and leaders of different faith communities seek solidarity. There has been a national movement in many Christian churches to establish relations with the different branches of Islam. American Muslims have joined Christians in condemning recent police killings of unarmed Black men. Education in the USA is also slowly shifting to Global history. In my own field, philosophy, the history of philosophy is becoming less centered on Euro-American affairs. This is partly due to the evident fact that “the west” has been profoundly impacted by Islamic thought and culture.
Why does the west introduce terrorists like ISIL as the representative of the Islamic world?
Fear, even terror of an enemy can motivate citizens to vote for those, like Trump, who vowed a little over four years ago to ban Muslims from immigrating to America. A close advisor to Hillary Clinton was accused of having ties to Muslim extremists. You can sell more newspapers and charge more for advertising on television on fear rather than informing the public of the greatness of Islamic culture and thought. How many in the west know that the oldest university in the world is the University of al-Qarawiyyin, founded by a woman, long before the founding of the University of Paris or Oxford or Harvard?…
mortimer says
Did Charles Taliaferro read the Koran? The Sira? Bukhari? The canonical tafsirs of al-Tabari or Ibn Kathir or Ibn Taimiyya? Any manual of Sharia law?
No? No? No? No? and No?
Then how does Charles Taliaferro understand Islam well enough to comment on the subject?
Answer: He doesn’t know enough to comment on Islam. He is guessing. Some scholar!
Pray Hard says
Attention whoring like most of his ilk.
Rob Porter says
mortimer – It doesn’t matter what he’s read, he’s just another incredibly stupid, politically correct American with no values and a malfunctioning brain. Despite this he’s teaching impressionable youg minds. That is some mess.
mortimer says
Stuff and nonsense from a universitarian who one would expect to make reasonable distinctions. He conflates a religious seminary into a ‘university’.
The present-day University of al-Qarawiyyin STARTED as a mosque founded by Fatima al-Fihri in 859.
It was NEVER a ‘UNIVERSITY’ in any sense until very recently, as Taliaferro wrongly and pompously insists.
Scholars consider that the Qarawiyyin was effectively RUN AS A MADRASSA (i.e. an Islamic school for any age group or a ‘seminary’ where the Koran is memorized and studied) until AFTER WORLD WAR II, and they distinguish this PREVIOUS madrassa status of Qarawiyyin from its modern status of “UNIVERSITY” (similar to how Christian seminaries are NOT classified as a UNIVERSITY, but as a SEMINARY), which most view as a distinctly EUROPEAN invention.
Harvard was also founded as a SEMINARY. It would also be ridiculous to call the first Harvard seminary a ‘university’ in the modern sense.
Boulogna, in fact, has the OLDEST UNIVERSITY in the world, founded in 1088 and chartered in 1158.
The university is a EUROPEAN institution created in the late middle ages, and indeed, it is the European institution par excellence.
A ‘madrassa’ or a mosque is NOT the same as a university to any reasonable person.
Mica Garrett says
Most university professors are leftist. They write articles and books using research that supports their agenda. There is no real critical thinking going on at universities. Period. Now, especially, conservative professors like myself are rejected and shun upon. We’re not able to move up in the ‘business’ because we don’t have the correct views. What we have are the ‘right’ views.
gregbeetham says
I’m afraid the professor is out of touch, ‘inclusion’ when if concerns Islam works in one direction only.
Westman says
Ah, the masked marvels who just left the inaugural stage will keep the US and Israel safe from the “extremists” of Islam; those lost souls who mis-understand the proper reading of Islam’s sacred works which prescribe chopping off fingers, hands, feet, killing the apostate, subduing, fleecing, and avoiding the unbeliever, and the final days killing of unbelievers with special fondness for the annihilation of all Jews.
Well, probably not. On the bright side, their education by Iran is inevitable
Charles Taliaferro likely does not know the last commandments of Allah are in the 9th Surah of the Quran. The deceitful ordering, non historical, of the Quran was done by men, not Allah. The argument that the Quran is perfect falls flat on its face for the deceitful ordering, let alone that it was compiled from competing, different, “Qurans”; the final content being determined by men.
If someone comes along spouting dawa there are three questions that should stop it: What Surah was given last by Allah? If it contradicts instructions of a previous Surah, which is the final commandment of Allah? Does the Quran say a Muslim man may beat his wife even if he only fears she is becoming disobedient?
One must, of course, have the Quranic quotes from Surah 9 and 4 at hand because the first typical response will be ignorant denial or a lie.
mortimer says
“The masked marvels who just left the inaugural stage” know practically nothing about the canonical doctrines of warfare against disbelievers.
Their complete NAIVETY about Islam and lack of interest to learn is CULPABLE NEGLIGENCE … like a person who sits down to drive an 18-wheeler truck without ever taking a driver’s course or studying anything about auto mechanics.
gregbeetham says
I don’t think they want to learn the truth in case it interferes with the idyllic notions they have awarded to the cult of Satan despite overwhelming associative evidence to the contrary.
The denial and cover up is probably due in part to protecting reputations of professionals who are going to be held responsible for getting things massively wrong at some point. They are just staving off the inevitable day of reckoning.
James Lincoln says
mortimer,
As Frank Anderson would say “Deliberate ignorance constitutes knowledge of the truth.”
Pray Hard says
He has that pedophile aura.
Infidel says
Wasn’t St Olaf’s the butt of jokes in the ‘Golden Girls’ TV series on Lifetime? (I used to watch it years ago when I was newly married, since it was the wife’s favorite)
OLD GUY says
A typical over educated read all the books went to college for 12 yrs. and never held a real job in his life professor. He’s a turtle living in the shell of academia. Once again if he thinks islam is so wonderful, why not move to Iran or any of the other wonderful civilized islamic countries that he wishes to support. What a shame he’s white, he must really be pissed at his parents for bringing him into the world as a white supremest.
tgusa says
A picture is worth a thousand words. US colleges could make a ton of money by converting classrooms in to glass enclosures, purchasing some tour buses and selling tickets to their attractions in the same way it is done at wild animal parks. They really are missing their calling.
gravenimage says
In interview with state-run Iranian news agency, Leftist American professor denounces Trump, ‘Islamophobia’
………………….
Just appalling. Here’s more from Charles Taliaferro, schmoozing with another mouthpiece of the vicious Mullahs:
“The world does well to remember gift of Islam to civilization: philosopher”
“https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/416107/The-world-does-well-to-remember-gift-of-Islam-to-civilization