When is a Muslim not a Muslim?

He's not a Muslim! I’m quite sure that other people have covered this better than I will, or they will do shortly. I’m also quite sure this isn’t anything terribly new, however if I read one more comment saying:
“They’re not a Muslim”
I think I shall possibly have to at the very least have a very stiff Gin no matter what the time of day. I thought that in this day of identity politics we have to respect how people self identify, and an awful lot of people going round beheading people, burning people and doing other not very nice things seem to self identify as Muslim. Now you may argue that they don’t represent the majority of Muslims – fair enough. You might argue that they are a tiny minority – fair enough. You may even argue that they are utter maroons who use Islam as an excuse for the evil that they do – fine we can have that argument. However please could you stop saying they’re not Muslims. They think they’re Muslims, they claim they are carrying out their actions in the name of Islam – they self identify as Muslims. they are not dead parrots, they are not pining for the Fjords they are bloody Muslims! They may or may not be very good Muslims, they may not be very nice Muslims, they may not be following a version of Islam that you agree with – but they are most definitely Muslims. Unless of course you want to claim it’s all part of some huge false-flag operation, in which case we really probably don’t have much to talk about – although I do a nice line in tin foil hats you might be interested in.

Just because they’ve done something not very nice doesn’t instantly cause them to cease being Muslims. They may be a “very naughty boy” but they are also still a Muslim. Responding to every unpleasantness with the refrain “they’re not a Muslim” is ludicrous. It makes as much sense as claiming:

  • The IRA weren’t Irish
  • Westboro Baptists aren’t Christian
  • Child abusing priests aren’t Catholic
  • The Khmer Rouge weren’t Cambodian
  • The Nazi’s weren’t German

I could go on but I hope you get the idea. In all of these cases it may not be the majority, it may not have popular support but that doesn’t magically remove them from the groups they are members of. So could we stop declaring people to be “not Muslims” just because we’d rather they weren’t when they quite clearly think they are? Or you could of course just keep doing this:
Bury your head in the sand

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