What's in a name?

Author’s note: sincere apologies for the long absence, at the moment I am undergoing a bit of hullabaloo in my personal life. Hopefully things will even out in a month or two, but until then please enjoy this belated update.
Within the mass media there exists a popular taxonomy within which to classify members of the Islamic religion. Basically, one is either

1. Liberal/Secular/Reformist
2. Moderate

Or

3. Conservative/fundamentalist

Although such a classification may be politically convenient and easy for the masses to digest, it reflects reality poorly and generates more questions than answers. For instance, if a Muslim man refuses to shake the hands of women but constantly misses his prayers, where does that leave him? Being people, Muslims possess the complexity which goes hand in hand with the possession of humanity. Such reductionism, consciously or not, thus also serves to lessen the humanity of the subject.

We should also keep in mind that these terms have developed in a Western social context. The word ‘fundamentalism’ only came into being in the early 20th century when certain American Protestants took issue with what they perceived to be the abandonment of tradition by their cooreligionists. They thus decribed themselves as ‘fundamentalists’, in order to imply that they alone had any real grasp of the fundamentals of Chirstanity. However, this term became pejorative after the Stokes Trial of 1925, when the teaching of evolutionary biology in schools was legally challenged. So what is an Islamic fundamentalist then? In the West we usually use this term to describe members of such organizations like al-Qaeda and Hamas. But as may be figured out from previous posts of mine, these organizations are far from traditional. Presumably, this rules them out from being conservative as well – the Taliban may not believe in women’s education, but this makes them repressive rather than conservative.

Let us consider liberal/secular Muslims. Popular discourse would regard them as the polar opposite of the individuals which we discussed in the last paragraph. But rather, they are two sides of the same coin. Both liberals and so-called ‘fundamentalists’ are at best indifferent and at worst disdainful of traditional scholarship and practices. They share a revolutionary mentality, oppose ‘superstition’ and are obsessed with modern sciences and technologies and political institutions which they deem as useful for achieving their goals. They differ in form but are essentially the same in content.

In popular terminology, we are also led to believe in the existence of ‘moderate’ Muslims, who, if not the desirable standard, are at least the second best thing to having liberal Muslims. This term is problematic as it implies the inherent inferiority of the Islamic religion, and that to be an acceptable member of society one has to water down one’s religion – “Oh, don’t worry, he’s just a moderate Muslim!” “Islam eh? Oh, I suppose it’s alright in moderation!”. Actually, the use of the entire liberal-moderate-conservative spectrum itself reinforces this insinuation.

Recent news reports about the attempted bombing of an airliner by a Nigerian man, in profiling him made special effort to mention his, quoting one newspaper “increasingly religious beliefs”. The newspaper itself was no tabloid, being a historically respected publication which prided itself on the quality of its journalism. However, such thoughtless use of emotion-baiting language like this which establishes a causal link between a Muslim’s orthodoxy and extremist practices, is detrimental to media objectivity. It additionally has harmful real-world implications in that Islam itself is framed as the culprit, contributing to poor policy which punishes the innocent and ignores the fundamental causes of terrorism. Language frames how we see the world. We must make and effort to make sure it is reflective of what is actually going on in the world.