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The Guardian view on combating extremism: beginning to get it right The Guardian view on combating extremism: beginning to get it right
(about 1 hour later)
The first thing to say about David Cameron’s speech on radicalisation is that perhaps he shouldn’t have made it at all. This is a subject that is far too important and urgent for headlines. What’s needed is quiet, untiring, localised action well away from the spotlight. There is a deep and natural confluence of interest between the British state, British Muslim communities and wider British society on preventing radicalisation among Muslim young people, but the dynamics of the situation mean that almost anything the government says can make the situation worse and obscure the real commonalities of interest. This is emphatically not an argument for doing nothing. The policies that Mr Cameron suggested, and those few concrete ones he announced, are for the most part sensible and politically shrewd. His speech could have been a great deal worse.The first thing to say about David Cameron’s speech on radicalisation is that perhaps he shouldn’t have made it at all. This is a subject that is far too important and urgent for headlines. What’s needed is quiet, untiring, localised action well away from the spotlight. There is a deep and natural confluence of interest between the British state, British Muslim communities and wider British society on preventing radicalisation among Muslim young people, but the dynamics of the situation mean that almost anything the government says can make the situation worse and obscure the real commonalities of interest. This is emphatically not an argument for doing nothing. The policies that Mr Cameron suggested, and those few concrete ones he announced, are for the most part sensible and politically shrewd. His speech could have been a great deal worse.
But any rhetoric on this subject has to tread delicately. Muslim and non-Muslim Britons alike are rightly concerned about safety and demand reassurance that potential killers will be stopped. But no government can honestly promise complete safety. And Muslims who see “Muslims” in a headline about terrorism will feel a twinge of insecurity to which government should be attentive. If the supply of potential violent jihadis is to be stemmed, it is the families and communities from which they are drawn who must play a great part. Hectoring them won’t help anyone. And the rhetorical parts of the speech were by far the weakest ones.But any rhetoric on this subject has to tread delicately. Muslim and non-Muslim Britons alike are rightly concerned about safety and demand reassurance that potential killers will be stopped. But no government can honestly promise complete safety. And Muslims who see “Muslims” in a headline about terrorism will feel a twinge of insecurity to which government should be attentive. If the supply of potential violent jihadis is to be stemmed, it is the families and communities from which they are drawn who must play a great part. Hectoring them won’t help anyone. And the rhetorical parts of the speech were by far the weakest ones.
You cannot convincingly claim, as Mr Cameron did, that free speech is a core British value, if you then go on to explain that you are going to “put out of action the key extremist influencers who are careful to operate inside the law but who clearly detest British society and everything we stand for … and stop them peddling their hatred.” Again, it might be a defensible policy, assuming it were technically feasible, to strengthen the powers of Ofcom to censor foreign channels that “broadcast hate preachers and extremist content”, but it can’t be sold as a defence of free speech.You cannot convincingly claim, as Mr Cameron did, that free speech is a core British value, if you then go on to explain that you are going to “put out of action the key extremist influencers who are careful to operate inside the law but who clearly detest British society and everything we stand for … and stop them peddling their hatred.” Again, it might be a defensible policy, assuming it were technically feasible, to strengthen the powers of Ofcom to censor foreign channels that “broadcast hate preachers and extremist content”, but it can’t be sold as a defence of free speech.
The other great rhetorical weakness of the Cameron approach is the claim that it is only the extremists who divide people into good Muslims and bad ones, when the whole thrust of the government’s policy is to make this distinction itself and to encourage those it thinks of as good Muslims with “practical help, funding, campaigns, protection and political representation”. These encouragements need to be made, but advertising them may actually diminish their effectiveness. Mr Cameron sets out a programme of action against forced marriage, FGM and a review of sharia courts. All these policies are good in themselves, but it is ludicrous to pretend that they don’t involve the government in discriminating between good and bad interpretations of Islam.The other great rhetorical weakness of the Cameron approach is the claim that it is only the extremists who divide people into good Muslims and bad ones, when the whole thrust of the government’s policy is to make this distinction itself and to encourage those it thinks of as good Muslims with “practical help, funding, campaigns, protection and political representation”. These encouragements need to be made, but advertising them may actually diminish their effectiveness. Mr Cameron sets out a programme of action against forced marriage, FGM and a review of sharia courts. All these policies are good in themselves, but it is ludicrous to pretend that they don’t involve the government in discriminating between good and bad interpretations of Islam.
With all that said, the speech gets the central point entirely right. We are engaged here in a great ideological and even spiritual struggle with violent jihadism: a battle of ideas and values, which will be fought in the imagination as much as by police work or military force.With all that said, the speech gets the central point entirely right. We are engaged here in a great ideological and even spiritual struggle with violent jihadism: a battle of ideas and values, which will be fought in the imagination as much as by police work or military force.
There are two parts to the Islamist narrative which give it its power and which must be fought separately. The first is the glorification of violence almost for its own sake and the imagery of young men – “lions” – fighting heroically against the almost overwhelming forces of injustice. This is something that, paradoxically, some of the media most opposed to Islamic State do much to spread by reprinting the graphic details of its atrocities. Theatrical cruelty is attractive to weak minds, and shocking pictures on the front pages of some newspapers’ websites do more – and worse – than attract clicks. The way to fight that is with realism, which is much more truly horrifying. The young women rescued from Isis who testified in Birmingham schools last week about their dreadful suffering show the way to make such propaganda truly effective. They also, incidentally, show one of the ways in which taking in more refugees from Syria would make this country a better place, as well as serving the demands of compassion. There are two parts to the jihadist narrative which give it its power and which must be fought separately. The first is the glorification of violence almost for its own sake and the imagery of young men – “lions” – fighting heroically against the almost overwhelming forces of injustice. This is something that, paradoxically, some of the media most opposed to Islamic State do much to spread by reprinting the graphic details of its atrocities. Theatrical cruelty is attractive to weak minds, and shocking pictures on the front pages of some newspapers’ websites do more – and worse – than attract clicks. The way to fight that is with realism, which is much more truly horrifying. The young women rescued from Isis who testified in Birmingham schools last week about their dreadful suffering show the way to make such propaganda truly effective. They also, incidentally, show one of the ways in which taking in more refugees from Syria would make this country a better place, as well as serving the demands of compassion.
The second sort of justification for violent jihadism is more ideological. This is a narrative about the pernicious wickedness of western foreign policy, and specifically the influence of Israel and of Jews. The grotesque violence of Isis can thus be presented inside a worldview where it appears that its aims are just, even when the means are abhorrent. That narrative must also be fought, and Mr Cameron is right to try.The second sort of justification for violent jihadism is more ideological. This is a narrative about the pernicious wickedness of western foreign policy, and specifically the influence of Israel and of Jews. The grotesque violence of Isis can thus be presented inside a worldview where it appears that its aims are just, even when the means are abhorrent. That narrative must also be fought, and Mr Cameron is right to try.