CLOWN WORLD
The police have been asked to drop the terms ‘Islamist terrorism’ and ‘jihadis’ for fear they harm ‘community relations’
The Metropolitan Police are now considering dropping the terms ‘Islamist terrorism’ and ‘jihadis’ when describing attacks committed by 'Islamist terrorists' or 'jihadists', reports today's Times Newspaper.
According to the National Association of Muslim Police these words are problematic because they can stir up ‘Islamophobia’. They have asked for a change in terminology because, it says, those terms currently used "do not help community relations and public confidence".
Alternatives suggested include. "Faith-claimed terrorism" and "adherents of Osama bin Laden’s ideology" and ‘"terrorists abusing religious motivations". Rather surprisingly the term "Brave Freedom Fighter" was not among those offered up by the faith based pressure group.
The fact that UK Police are even entertaining the idea proves how far down the rabbit hole we've gone. Increasingly, we are expected (no, forced) to pretend that Islamist terror is not Islamist terror. In fact, any suggestion Islamist extremism has anything to do with the religion of Islam itself is now met with denial not only from Islamic groups but from the authorities too. You're now more likely to have the police knock on your door for suggesting such things than those sharing the same ideologies as the terrorist.
Despite the fact that ‘Islamist extremism’ is a term used by counter-terror experts, the National Association of Muslim Police want the police to abandon any terms ‘which have a direct link to Islam’. They're not daft, they know that controlling the language is half the battle. Outlawing words that describe something reduces the impact. And once the Police have agreed to stop using one term, they are less likely to refuse another. The always-present threat of civil unrest is never far away; with use of these words likely to "stir up islamophobia, and do not help community relations" say the pressure group, always the vailed threat that comes with any such demands.
If the Metropolitan Police start using these terms then the BBC will quickly follow. An organisation that already avoids making any reference to Islamic Terrorism as it is. Take, for instance, the Islamic terrorist Khairi Saadallah, who shouted "Allah u Akbar" before murdering 3 gay men in Reading last month. He was reported, repeatedly, as "an asylum seeker with mental health problems" by the BBC and not an islamic terrorist which is definitely what he was.
There are not the same right-wing pressure-groups set up to push-back on this nonsense and so the direction of travel is very much towards that Orwellian future where language is used as a tool of oppression. Perhaps the Society for Plain English needs to up its game.