John Cleese has issued a few tweets over recent weeks suggesting that a better word for what is often called Islamophobia should be called Islamosceptic.
Dr Cleese has had a few bad takes in his time but a look at his feed shows he’s mostly on the right side. I can respect anyone whose opinion on any given subject isn’t instantly predictable based on their other opinions, and I wish to take him up on his point in the intellectual spirit it was offered in.
I accept Dr Cleese’s definition of a phobia as an “irrational over-reaction, as with spiders.”
Here’s the problem:
We are not always rational about what makes something rational or irrational.
I have two major phobias – heights, and large bodies of water.
I have argued (albeit facetiously) that being afraid of falling to my doom from a great height or drowning in the ocean are perfectly rational fears.
However, history has shown us that so long as the risks are respected and proper safety procedures followed, there is no rational reason to be afraid of either. That doesn’t stop my balls from shrinking up towards my intestines any time I’m in such a situation – or even when I see such a situation on television. In fact, media induced trauma has a lot to do with what we’re talking about and we’ll get to that a little later.
Perhaps I should call myself an acrosceptic.
I’m none too
fond of spiders either, but where-ever possible I live and let live.
So while John’s points about ‘phobia’ being an emotive term which implies irrationality, and scepticism being a indispensable part of scientific method are well taken, it doesn’t tell the whole story.
For example: there are people who disagree with the interpretation of scientific data on human induced climate change which is accepted by 97% of climate scientists.
While I may butt up against the appeal to authority fallacy here, this is not a rational position for anyone who is not a climate scientist to take. Yet those who adopt it get to call themselves “climate sceptics.”
To be a climate ‘sceptic’ today is not to hold a rational doubt in pursuit of the truth. This is shown in the way most of their arguments are non-scientific, from conspiracy theories to “it was cold where I live last week.”
None of this fits a valid definition of ‘sceptic.’ But it would be wrong to call them sciencephobes. They are not scared of science per se. They happily accept air travel, pain killers, plastics, the internet. Some even accept vaccines.
No, they only fear science when the science is inconvenient to them. Or not even to them, but to those they have been listening to. For, what is there to fear from mitigating climate change? Renewable energy sources? Cleaner air and water? New industries and employment opportunities?
To find a rational fear of reducing climate change, we have to look to who has the most to lose from it. That is, of course, those who profit the most from the fossil fuel industry. And it turns out, a lot of them own media companies too. Those who don’t directly own media companies make large contributions to those who do.
I’m not saying it’s only the fat cats who benefit from the fossil fuels industry. There are thousands, if not millions of oil rig workers and miners who will have to retrain and find other jobs if we do this properly. Just as there were thousands of workers in the photographic film industry whose jobs evaporated in a space of about five years. Unless you thought for five seconds about their plight before ditching your instamatic for a digicam and then an iPhone, I respectfully ask that you pipe down about job losses.
Now that we have discussed phobia vs scepticism on a less emotive example than religion, let’s return to whether we should be saying Islamophobe or Islamosceptic.
The problem with both terms is they treat Islam as a monolith, which is it not, any more than Christianity, conservatism, or Collingwood supporters.
To question the teachings of the Prophet Mohammad, and the tenets of the Quran is to be sceptical. It is not just part of scientific thinking but also theological thinking.
To fear for your safety because you saw someone on public transport in religious garb is irrational and can correctly be described as a phobia. The same goes for assuming a mosque is a terrorist hub for no other reason than that it is a mosque.
We all know (well, most of us do) that the antics of the Westboro Baptist Church (Hey! They call it a church!) is not broadly representative of Christianity, despite the disproportionate amount of media coverage they receive. To assume it is would be phobic, not sceptic.
Dr Cleese makes the very valid point that Life of Brian is in no way Christophobic. But based on his own explanation, he would be right to take umbrage at the film being called Christosceptic too. As he says, it is not sceptical of Christianity, just certain types of Christians.
Valid criticism of Westboro has nothing to with criticising Christianity. This much is obvious. What apparently isn’t so obvious is that criticism Islam as a whole is a long way from criticising how certain adherents practice particular facets of their faith.
It’s a pity that no one seems to be able to tell the difference.
