Racism? eh.

I just read about the incident at George Washington University. Apparently, a conservative student group is hosting something called "Islamo-Fascist Awareness Week," (nice, huh?) featuring a bunch of speakers who have written widely on How Much Muslims Suck. Monday morning, a bunch of totally over-the-top posters were plastered all over campus that said, "Hate Muslims? So Do we!!" along with a diagram of a "typical Muslim" mentioning features such as "hatred of women," "suicide vest," and "hidden AK-47." Much backlash occurred because of this, and the conservative student group in question denied all involvement, saying "We neither endorse nor support any form of hate speech," (Oh?) "rather we promote freedom and liberty."

It turned out the culprits were seven students OPPOSING the "Islamo-Fascist Awareness Week," and if you look at the fine print on the poster, it says it was " brought to you by Students for Conservativo-Fascism Awareness." It also refers to a BBC documentary called "The Power of Nightmares," which notes strong similarities between the rise of the American Neo-Conservative movement and that of the radical Islamist movement. Following the backlash, the students released this statement, taking responsibility for the incident and explaining that the whole point of their actions was to expose the absurdity and racism of "Islamo-Fascist Awareness Week."

I'm not going to comment on the incident itself, but I wanted to point out something I see a lot in the Muslim community, that really gets on my nerves--why do people keep saying anti-Muslim bigotry is "racist?" Yes, I understand, that most Muslims are people of color, but not all are. If someone (presumably a white person) directed an Islamophobic slur in my direction, for instance, that wouldn't be racist, because I'm white! You could argue that Judaism is a race, but Islam... not so much. Islamophobes are often racist also, but I don't think that makes Islamophobia the same as racism. Islam is a religion, folks! And when we call anti-Muslim bigots racist, I believe this weakens the argument against them. Or makes it look like maybe we don't speak English so well... All throughout the aforementioned letter, the word "racist" is tossed about freely. I really wish they had just said "bigoted" instead. I think the statement would be taken more seriously, and it would be more accurate, and more powerful. That's all.