As a “follow up” to this, I read through the whole post from Cooper, and ... as is usual for CAIR ... they are providing “cover” for ISLAMISTS and in so doing that, they want reporters to cease using the term “Islamist” — which is nothing more than making it impossible to talk about the true issue in the news.
I could “deconstruct” the whole thing, as CAIR is good at confusing and clouding the issue - but I don’t want to waste my time with it.
The bottom line is that the term is valid and is a useful term ... and it should be defined and used by the press. I use “ISLAMIST” all the time, and it applies to certain figures here in the USA, too. I’ve always said that CAIR is an Islamist cover organization. In fact several of the founders were Muslim Brotherhood members and a few have been convicted and jailed. Now CAIR seems to be operating with “clean” figures with no baggage to carry forward ... which actually makes it worse.
That’s why ... by the way ... that CAIR is dead-set against the Muslim organization — “American Islamic Forum for Democracy” headed by Dr. Zuhdi Jasser.
As noted above, AIFD is for America and the U.S. Comstitution.
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The American Islamic Forum for Democracy’s (AIFD) mission is to advocate for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state.
AIFD is the most prominent American Muslim organization directly confronting the ideologies of political Islam and openly countering the common belief that the Muslim faith is inextricably rooted to the concept of the Islamic State (Islamism). Founded by Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, AIFD looks to build the future of Islam through the concepts of liberty and freedom.
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“Political Islam” is another term that CAIR doesn’t like but which you’ll find AIFD using, and I use it, too ... along with many others critical of Islamists and Islamic Terrorists.
I would hope you are correct about the AIFD. But I have my doubts.
Some want to cite the Founders and then disregard everything they inherently recognized religion and our country to be, even sequestering religion itself. That’s a typical distortion and a deliberate abuse of the Founders intent. The Founders are not theirs to manipulate in the grave.
In this country the 1st Amendment guarantees that religion not be established or limited by the state. The reason being is that religion can be used to dictate and coerce and should have no direct affiliation with our government. This is not to say that the individual members of government cannot be religious or are prohibited from personally referencing religion.
Islam is essentially and inherently incongruous with this country’s principles.
First, I will begin stating that Islam is not a bona fide religion. When I make this very un-”PC” statement I am using the phrase “bona fide” as its literal meaning, that being “good faith”. Islam is not a bona fide (good faith) religion because it does not allow the freedom of faith, even within its own religion, with apostasy often being viewed as a greater crime than even non-belief. Often religion is referenced to be synonymous with the term “faith”, but if one’s faith is not freely given and free to be withdrawn, then it can accurately be said to be no real “faith” at all, for it is merely both a tool and a result of coercion. Our founders were dead set against religion being used as a tool of coercion, as well as being coerced by the state, or even being the state itself (a Caliphate being the goal of Islamic society).
Beyond that, Islam’s primary text praises, extols, institutionalizes, and gives its highest honor (entry into heaven) to acts of terrorism and varying degrees of coercion. Unlike evidence of violence in the Bible where it is describing historic details and events, those admonitions and promotions in Islamic text are not temporally or situationally limited.
Given these and other considerations, I do believe it is a falsehood to extend to Islam the blind belief its benefice is on par with Judaism and Christianity, however it is still entitled to the same freedoms we extend all religion in this country. That we extend this freedom to Islam when Islamists and Islam’s most central texts themselves openly define themselves to be enemies of what this country stands for, shows we have no realistic sense of self preservation. Our founders clearly erred more toward giving more freedom rather than to elevating judgments of what is a threat.
Quite obviously not every Islamist has acted as a terrorist, indeed the vast majority are not, nor should they be condemned and held accountable for the actions of others in their religion. However it is unreasonable to hold blameless these non-terrorist pacifists when the religion they subscribe to so definitively commands acts of terrorism. The fact remains that the very fundamental tenets of Islam are not only just incongruous with our society, but an anathema, openly hostile to, and incompatible with, our every freedom and liberty