Ardern’s post-massacre symbolic gestures reversed the War on Terror’s coded meanings

Evidence

In the aftermath of New Zealand’s deadliest terror attack, Ardern turned away from this global Islamophobic tide. Instead, she embraced everything that the War on Terror branded as “uncivilized” and embodied what it marked as terroristic: she wore the hijab, read from Islamic scripture, and paid tribute to Islam and its final messenger and prophet by reciting the ancient Arabic greeting followed by Islamic scripture. That display, in and of itself, was revolutionary, and the strides she made before and after it stand as a beacon of possibility. The possibility of transformative leadership that could combat Islamophobic populism and counter the standing model of toxic control embedded by male presidents and prime ministers. — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 1041

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Iftikhar’s global-synthesis view: Ardern models a national counter-template to the Islamophobic populism other leaders export.