Racializing Muslims as political ideologues neutralizes religious freedom protections

Evidence

Dobson’s fallacious claims that Muslims are under an obligation to replace the US Constitution with Sharia law fueled a movement seeking to exclude Muslims from religious accommodation. Tony Perkins, president of the Christian conservative Family Research Council and a member of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, bluntly articulated the commonly held belief in 2015 among some within the Christian Right that “only 16 percent of Islam is a religion—the rest is a combination of military, judicial, economic, and political system. Christianity, by comparison, isn’t a judicial or economic code—but a faith… . ​Sharia is not a religion in the context of the First Amendment.” According to this logic, banning mosques and targeting Muslims through surveillance, prosecution, and war do not contradict American ideals of religious freedom; rather, such actions keep America safe and preserve its White Judeo-Christian identity. — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 743 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

This prompts the question that runs throughout this book, Why is a religious group adversely racialized in the first place, as opposed to safeguarded by religious freedom norms? This chapter explains how the ideological expulsion of Islam from religion is integral to the social construction of the Racial Muslim. The media, politicians, and a well-funded Islamophobia industry position Islam as a national security threat within a global clash of civilizations. — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 872 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Sacralized politics racializes others to make their rights violatable — Nadim N. Rouhana and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, When Politics Are Sacralized:…, 107; Co-opting gay rights rhetoric into national identity racialized Muslims as civilizational others.; Liberal rejection of open Islamophobia masks the same racializing policies — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 622 (+14 more)

Broader Connections

• Denying Islam religious status legitimizes anti-Muslim state action as religious-freedom protection #corroborates (0.95) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 743
• Islam is ideologically expelled from religion itself in its racialization #expands (0.92) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 872