Mick Hartley

We're back to the old "Islamophobia" debate, with Kemi Badenoch pointing out to Labour's Anneliese Dodds that the correct term should be "anti-Muslim hatred", and that "the definition of “Islamophobia” she uses creates a blasphemy law via the back door if adopted." 

Jo Bartosch at The Critic:

Badenoch is correct. Islam is not a race, but a faith. It is fair to say that the garments worn by religious people can mark them out. And predictably, it’s generally women who bear the brunt of this; too often shamed for not covering-up from within faith communities and targeted by bullies in wider community. But such prejudice will not be lessened by pretending that religion is an intrinsic, immutable characteristic. Indeed, part of what makes us human is that we can choose to believe.

Part of the power of the term "Islamophobia", surely, is that it reinforces the doctrine that Islam is not a choice but on the contrary is a central and inalienable feature of each and every Muslim. It cannot be changed or discarded. Witness the widespread teaching that apostasy is punishable by death.

Islamophobia is an insidious word, and it is often used dishonestly. As with its cousins “transphobia” and “whorephobia”, “Islamophobia” is wielded by ideologues hoping to slyly elide criticism of an ideology with irrational hatred of individuals. 

In a functioning, healthy democracy it is not just acceptable to critique religious doctrines, it should be encouraged. As the think tank Civitas observed in an open letter from 2019, the accusation of Islamophobia “has already been used against those opposing religious and gender segregation in education, the hijab, halal slaughter on the grounds of animal welfare, LGBT rights campaigners opposing Muslim views on homosexuality, ex-Muslims and feminists opposing Islamic views and practices relating to women, as well as those concerned about the issue of grooming gangs.” …

While many British Muslims are appalled by the behaviour and beliefs of Islamists, we can no longer pretend that there isn’t a threat from political Islam — an inhumane ideology, with violent implications in its most militant forms. This international scourge is a problem for every British citizen, regardless of their faith. And to tackle Islamism it is necessary, to borrow the words of Anneliese Dodds, to name it. Any definition of anti-Muslim hate that includes a prohibition on expressing distaste for aspects of the Islamic faith is a gag. Islamists are democracyphobes, humanrightsphobes and libertyphobes. Given this, anyone with a conscience or a brain free from the rot of hateful ideologies ought to be proud to call themselves Islamistophobe, if not an Islamophobe.

Christopher Hitchens – "A stupid term—Islamophobia—has been put into circulation to try and suggest that a foul prejudice lurks behind any misgivings about Islam's infallible "message""

Melanie Phillips:

Several scholars have claimed that this hitherto little-known term was weaponised in the 1990s by the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood to stigmatise any criticism of the Islamic world by casting it as delusional. Abdur-Rahman Muhammad, a former Islamist, has said he was present early in that decade when members of the Brotherhood-linked International Institute for Islamic Thought decided to adopt the term Islamophobia to halt attacks as effectively as “homophobia” had done for gay people. He wrote in 2010 of Islamophobia: “This loathsome term is nothing more than a thought-terminating cliché conceived in the bowels of Muslim think tanks for the purpose of beating down critics.”