"Islamo-Fascists"

[SHRED]

"Islamo-Fascists" is such an asinine descriptor that makes zero sense at all.
The phrase is used by people that haven't a clue.
The words just sound 'scary' together, so they use them not knowing the meanings...if "Islamo" even has one.

[Union Thug]

1. I've always thought that, as well. IMO, Fascism, without its corporate infrastructure is an

empty concept.

The so called 'islamo-fascists' are just religious extremists with poliical objectives.

[Clark2008]

8. Which would be a theocracy.

But the wingnuts don't want to use that term since they're similar in their opinion about religion as political objectives.

They'd rather use a term that most people know is "bad," but that most people also don't know the true meaning of.

[Sinistrous]

2. Agree with what you have said, however,

"Islamo-Fascists" is a very effective meme: it reduces the humanness of Muslims. It makes them "bogeymen" and therefore, "bad guys" who have to be killed in order to keep the homeland secure. Also, the incessant repetition of the term dilutes the impact and import of the word "fascist" when applied to the current abominations being perpetrated by the Cheney/Bush administration.

It serves the republiclowns well.

Sinistrous

[baldguy]

3. It also distracts people from the real fascists who run this country.

[ftr23532]

4. On top of all that, the one group that might accurately be labeled "Islami-fascist"

is in league with the GOP and the west in the general. The Muslim Brotherhood is both the granddaddy of today's Sunni Islamist groups, but it's also has asn ideology with a lot of overlap to corporatism. It was started in 1929 by Hassan al-Banna, who was apparently quit enamored with Mussolini's corporatist state, but it also rooted in the religious fraternities in Egypt that have have a powerful socio-economic role there since the 15th century. The Muslim Brotherhood is very pro-private enterprise that's one of the reasons the US has been more than happy to work with them as anti-Communist "Freedom fighters" over the decades and one reason we don't hear too much railing about capitalism from the web of Islamist groups affiliated with it. Their US-based SAAR network - a Saudi/Muslim Brotherhood-backed network of businesses, charities, and institutions http://fortherecordessays.blogspot.com/2006/11/part-4-american-brotherhood-we-just_11.html">that was busted after 9/11 for terrorist-financing - was closely affiliated with uber-corporatist Grover Norquist. Norquist and Abramoff-buddy set up the "http://www.islamicinstitute.org/">Islamic Institute" (whose full name was the "Islamic Free-Market Institute") with Muslim Brotherhood members back in 1999 as basically a Muslim GOTV group for the GOP. All this is part of what makes the WOT so dark: the "Islamo-fascists" are the allies of our own fascists.

[independentpiney]

5. That's interesting

I knew about Hassan al-Banna's admiration for Mussolini's early corporatism moves, but not of their recent western affiliations. It makes it ironic that Tariq Ramadan is often accused of being an Iqwqan trojan horse considering his views on corporate globalization.

[ftr23532]

7. Yep, they've been working with the US since the 50's

Here's an excerpt from great http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2006/01/holy_warrior.html">MoJo article by Robert Dreyfuss about Tariq's father, Said Ramadan, highlighting the far-Right nature of the group at large:

...
In Pakistan, Ramadan worked closely with a young Islamist named Abul-Ala Mawdudi, who had founded a Muslim Brotherhood-style movement called the Islamic Society. Just as he had recruited angry young Muslims to take up arms in Palestine, so Ramadan helped Mawdudi mold a muscular phalanx of fanatical Islamic students into a battering ram against Pakistan's left. Known by its Urdu initials as the IJT and modeled on Mussolini's fascist squadristi, the group deployed its often-armed thugs to do battle with left-wing students on campus. "Egg tossing gradually gave way to more serious clashes, especially in Karachi," writes Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr, a leading expert on the movement. In the process, the IJT trained the generation of radicals who seized control of Pakistan in 1977 under the far-right dictator General Zia ul-Haq, sponsored the jihad in Afghanistan, sheltered Al Qaeda, and even today represents a threat to General Pervez Musharraf's shaky regime.
...

For an interesting story involving Tariq that indicates a possible split he had with the larger Muslim Brotherhood (or possibly a split between the Egyptian wing and the international wing or European wing), go http://fortherecordessays.blogspot.com/2006/11/part-8-charitable-brotherhood_11.html">here and skip down to the part titled "Mr Qassem’s early arrival and mysterious departure". It's rather convoluted but still interesting.

For some of their affiliations with US and European far-Rightists, go http://fortherecordessays.blogspot.com/2006/11/part-3-down-al-taqwa-rabbit-hole-so_11.html">here and read about the al-Taqwa group. They have some seriously high-level contacts. And for an interesting overview of the Brotherhood's ability to project moderation, check out this Dave Emory http://wfmu.org/listen.ram?show=18362">show.

Another interesting thing to note is that the main Sunni party in Iraq that seems to be willing to work with the Iraqi government is the Iraqi Islamic Part, which is a wing of the Brotherhood. The Neocons http://robertdreyfuss.com/blog/2006/01/the_neocon_brotherhood.html">knew they were going to be empowering these guys, which, I suspect, was part of the plan.

Maybe we should call them "Islamo-friends-of-fascists". Heh.

[JunkYardAngel]

6. The problem is that those who use the term...

don't actually understand what fascism really means. It's not interchangeable with fundamentalism or even violent extremism. Fascism is a very specific ideology like communism is. If someone used the term Islamo-communist, it would rightly be regarded as absurd and anachronistic. Yet conflating an ancient religion with a twentieth century right-wing collectivist ideology to describe the philosophy of violent fundamentalist Muslims seems to have taken hold in the current political lexicon.

And you're absolutely correct, it makes no sense and is being used for nothing more than fear mongering.