[lbo-talk] Tariq Ramadan and Islamic Socialism

Yoshie Furuhashi critical.montages at gmail.com
Sun Feb 18 17:27:39 PST 2007


On 2/18/07, BklynMagus <magcomm at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
> > The way I look at it, not only Muslim but also GLBT, feminist, and
> other predominantly secular activists have to change. The former
> have to change their ideas about families, gender roles, sexuality
> outside marriage, etc., for instance, and the latter have to change
> their view of Islam and Muslims (e.g., the views that Islam is a
> religion alien to Europe in particular and the West in general, that
> Muslim women, unlike women of other faiths, cannot but be victims
> unless they renounce their faith, etc. -- the views that some hold
> explicitly and many others subscribe to implicitly). So, quid pro quo,
> indeed.
>
> Buit I have never felt that Islam is alien to Europe (or anywhere else)
> of that women have to renounce their faith.

If every leftist felt that way, there would be no problem, but that's hardly the case.

<http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:65Cn96fIPDYJ:www.radicalphilosophy.com/default.asp%3Fchannel_id%3D2187%26editorial_id%3D20931+Why+did+the+banlieues+burn%3F&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us> Radical Philosophy Why did the banlieues burn? Colin Falconer

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The Left's response [to the November 2005 uprising in banlieues in France] has a fundamental political weakness. When the government introduced emergency powers under a 1955 law passed to deal with the Algerian liberation movement, there were few objections from the 'official' Socialist opposition. Although most Left-controlled local authorities did not impose curfews, arguing that the car-burnings were by then diminishing, they did not challenge the central thrust of government policy – the need to 'restore the authority of the state'. Some Socialists laid the blame on 'irresponsible' parents. There was sympathy for withdrawing family allowances from parents of 'guilty' children, cracking down on fake marriages and lowering the age of apprenticeship to fourteen. Within the Socialist Party, there is support for immigration quotas tailored to labour shortages.

Sticking to traditional working-class demands such as better social services and an attack on unemployment (goals which social-democratic governments have singularly failed to meet in the past), while touting France's official ideology of a single and undivided republic in which 'all citizens are equal', leads to 'downplaying' minority groups' specific needs. So does simply calling for a united response to policies like privatization and pensions 'reform'. Worse still, when activists from minority groups raise awkward questions, they are often accused of creating divisions in the working class. The reality is one of massive alienation from trade-union and political organizations – and not only among ethnic minority groups. If only 'they' would get involved and join trade unions and left-wing parties, activists seem to say, we could all get on with the job of working towards a bright socialist future (or at least helping to elect a Socialist president in 2007). Such attitudes put the onus of integrating on immigrants and the children of immigrants, and fail to provide an adequate response to racism and discrimination. When integration is seen to fail, the victims themselves can be held responsible for not making sufficient efforts or clinging to outdated traditions.

Left-wing parties have left an enormous political vacuum by refusing to take up Muslims' legitimate feelings of exclusion and diabolization. Indeed, the Left often seems obsessed with a largely imaginary threat to 'secularism' or laïcité. Such knee-jerk reactions have their roots in republican anti-clericalism; coincidentally, 2005 saw the centenary of the separation of church and state. They also reflect a strong 'libertarian' (anarchist) trend for which religion as such is an enemy – sometimes the main enemy. Finally, feminists tend to treat Muslims as if they were a reactionary bloc. Confrontations took place earlier in the year, when attempts were made to exclude more open-minded feminists, joined by Muslim girls wearing the headscarf, from commemorations of International Women's Day and the 1975 law legalizing abortion. Two organizations representing the dominant republican, 'integrationist' (some would say 'assimilationist') trend are SOS Racisme, originally a broad-based anti-racist group but subsequently hijacked by a section of the Socialist Party, and Ni Putes Ni Soumises ('Neither Whores Nor Submissives'), which tends to place the blame for violence against young women on the housing estates exclusively on the subculture of young Arab and black men. Both benefit from an inordinate degree of support in the media.


> > In general, though, we won't find out the outcome of collaboration
> unless we begin it, and even if little of substance, in terms of political
> results, comes out of it in the short term, opportunities for debates and
> exchanges among secular and religious leftists are to be welcomed for
> their own sake.
>
> I have never been fond of talk for talk's sake. If you are not on the same
> page as I am, what is the use (just as if I am not on the same page with
> you what use is there in you collaborating with me)?

Well, how many people can I or you line up if I am or you are to work with only people who are already on the same page as I am on every issue?

-- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>



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