Minorities within Islam, identity politics and the false allure of white supremacy.

One of the things I'm seeing a lot since Orlando is the intersection of identity politics and Islam, be it directly via allyship in the social justice world, or with the reluctance of left media, social media and politicians to discuss Islam in a critical manner.

I was going to start by linking a bookmarked reddit post from a girl in the Middle East whose depression was diagnosed as jinn possession and was beaten to exorcise it but when I checked has since been deleted. I also had some other apostate and LGBT horror stories too but decided it was best to leave them as private as Ex-Muslims often delete their reddit histories. All sorts can be found on reddit though, go look for the advice/help tag. I know these stories are emulated in the West, Christianity breeds its monsters too, but not many places where the legal system and society is against the victim, and with a complete absence of a support network.

For many Ex-Muslims and LGBTs across the Middle East, North Africa, if outed the risk the following: their family will kill them, their teachers or co-workers will kill them, their neighbours will kill them, the police and authorities will kill them, and most importantly all may be in accordance with the law of the land. If it ever reached courts that is, as its mostly recorded as domestic, honour killings or just as missing. 

I can't really say that this top to bottom, institutional, cultural and societal sanctioned hate and murder is the oft argued "small percentage of extremists" either, can anyone else?

How many Christian-atheists have to use Tor and proxies just to talk to each other? Or Christian LGBTs? How many Western governments monitor and arrest relating to atheism or LGBT causes? I follow Frank Mugisha on Twitter, an out LGBT activist in one of the most anti-gay Christian countries on Earth, Uganda. Even though he is genuinely at risk of his life, other than perhaps in Turkey, Jordan, or Lebanon he does not have an analogue in the Middle East or North Africa. Surely this must underline how pervasive this is, and how intrinsic to religion and culture this is?

Politically I'm moderate and way to the left as far as some ex-Muslims go. I've pulled back from some ex-Muslim communities as some were allying not just with alt-right but with genuine white supremacists and nationalists. Some of this is driven by left support of Islamism. 

You can imagine what Somalis, Saudis, and others feel when they finally leave Sharia lands and are faced with unwavering left wing support and allyship with the Islamists who oppressed them and the mind-boggling insanity of white Westerners and other non-Muslims actually joining in with shunning and engaging in verbal attacks on apostasy. Or LGBT Muslims facing the LGBT societies allied with the Islamist organisations and whites playing dress-up in hijabs in solidarity with the "empowered" burka brigade. All this whilst being endlessly lectured on how the hell-hole they left is a product of "beautiful religion". How must it feel when all of a sudden they are lower on the progressive stack than the cleric invited into their communities to speak at an event on killing gays?

The non-Western ex-Muslims will ally with the far right as the supremacists are the only ones who are listening and "supporting" them. As they haven't lived in the West for long, they just don't realise the far right dont care about if they've given up god or not, they are just brown people and to be used for their advantage, and they are hated as much as Muslims. Even those born in the West are younger and have probably never experienced the open racism that was common in the 70s and 80s and just don't understand white supremacism. 

They hate you for the colour of your skin, or what food you eat, or what language you speak, or the spelling of your name, or for what you accent sounds like. It was never just about religion, and never will be.

I cannot stress this hard enough, the far right and white supremacists have never been or will never be an ally of ex-Muslims or any non-whites. They do not regard us as human, they plan to exterminate, deport or enslave us all. To enable and empower them is to doom our own future.

A short note on paternal racism in 2016

I've recently seen reference to paternal racism, where whites assume the role of white saviour or parent for non-whites. This was originally framed with the ugly concept of non-whites being child-like, or less intelligent and cultured and born in the days of colonialism.

In 2016 paternal racism has evolved, it is now part of the argument against cultural appropriation and other arguments at the intersection of race, but with the racist (or subconsciously racist) aspect of non-whites as children being joined by social media battles for personal karma and for control and dominance over their peers, or as amusingly noticed on social media, the lone white male acting as a gallant white knight for female affections.

The numbers appear to support this. The native appropriation website related to the Washington Redskins logo controversy critiques the results of a survey that showed that only 10% of those interviewed were offended by the term and logo. The outcry was based on an assumption that offense of the logo was universal, but it showed essentially that this was a white on white issue. The website, although a creation of Native Americans is phrased in the language of the educated white middle class, and the majority of the protagonists and antagonists are white. This does raise some interesting questions, what would be the personal motivations of those engaged in the cultural appropriation game? Are they doing it for themselves or for the greater good?