Unmasking the Creation of ‘Islamophobia’

American Thinker/Pamela Geller: Conservative individuals and groups frequently report that they are banned, blocked, or shadowbanned from social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Many of these people frequently complain that they are labelled “far right” when in fact, they are not even right-wing, let alone “far right.” It is increasingly being realized that there is a serious problem here. So let’s look at some details of how this is achieved, and how deep the problem goes. Many in academia are fully in collusion with this.

An article published this month demonstrates without a shadow of a doubt how deeply embedded the lazy and erroneous ideological assumptions of many academics are. “The transnationalisation of far right discourse on Twitter: Issues and actors that cross borders in Western European democracies“ is typical of many such articles. It could well pass unnoticed by all but a few scholars, especially since it’s locked behind an expensive paywall, written in academic gobbledygook, and littered with mysterious diagrams reminiscent of the work of the alchemists. Yet this article is worth scrutiny, for it’s one piece of the puzzle of how the trick of labelling people as “far right” and as “Islamophobic” is pulled off by the “intelligentsia” and the establishment. It’s easy to assume “academics are locked in their Ivory Towers doing little other than talking to each other, so let’s ignore them.” But not all are. Some are talking to governments and some are talking to tech companies, and there are consequences.

There is a network of linked actors promoting this “far right/Islamophobia” discourse. The paper was peer reviewed. The journal claims that it is “firmly established as one of the leading interdisciplinary humanities and cultural studies journals in universities and other academic institutions.” The authors both hold positions at a research centre at Oxford University. One author also holds positions at the University of Oslo, Sciences Po Paris, and the European School of Political and Social Sciences. The other author’s webpage tells us that he was until recently a researcher at “Tell MAMA, a national project dedicated to mapping and monitoring anti-Muslim hate in the United Kingdom. He has given evidence in the Houses of Parliament on governance, extremism, gender, and hate crime and authored a number of reports in this area. He has been a guest on BBC News, Radio 4, and other national media outlets.” He is also listed as a Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Analysis of the Radical Right, whose partners include the widely-discredited Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC.) The research was part funded by Vox-Pol, which is funded by the European Union and which researches “violent online political extremism.”  MORE