Muslims were viewed as inferior when Muslim states were weak, not when strong

Evidence

Kumar is not a Critical Race Theorist like myself, but race is central to her argument and analysis. She writes, “My key argument is that notions of race and Muslims as inferior beings could come to the fore in a context where European nations were in a position to actually challenge and eventually dominate once-powerful Muslim empires” (p. 20), evoking the modernity of Islamophobia and its roots in longstanding Crusades-era narratives (which in part inspired the title of my book). Kumar’s book is a foundational interdisciplinary academic text, steeped in her area of research, media studies. It remains the most important text on Islamophobia as a transnational project, leveraged to advance American empire, today. — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 1826 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

With nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Orientalism, increasing numbers of scholars, authors, and artists were convinced that Muslims belonged to a once great but now separate and intrinsically inferior civilization, one that not only lacked complexity and diversity but also offered little to benefit Western civilization. The fact that the tendency to essentialize Muslims in this way emerged at a time of significant European colonial expansion suggests that Orientalism was neither a disinterested enterprise nor an objective quest for knowledge of non-Western cultures and religions. — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 201 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

As far as missionaries were concerned what was at stake in winning the argument was the rescue of the souls of the benighted from the flames of Hell. The Muslims, of course, regarded Christian missions in a much less benign light. From the seventeenth-century Christian perspective, Muslims were inferior, not because of their race or culture, but because they professed a faith that was not true and thereby they faced damnation. — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing, 153 (#qualifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Muslims’ perceived inferiority in Spain tracked the geopolitical power of Muslim states; Muslims were constructed as equals only while their empires could not be dominated; European superiority over Muslim empires enabled racial notions of Muslim inferiority — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 1826 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• European superiority over Muslim empires enabled racial notions of Muslim inferiority #corroborates (0.90) — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 1826
• Early modern Christians ranked Muslims inferior by faith, not by race #qualifies (0.80) — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing, 153
• Nineteenth-century Orientalism essentialized Muslims as intrinsically inferior during colonial expansion. #exemplifies (0.80) — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 201
• Orientalist decline theories explain Muslim failure via a fixed inner flaw #corroborates (0.75)