BrianGarst.com

The European Union has solved the problem of Islamic terrorism! How did they accomplish this amazing feat? Quite literally by wishing it out of existence.

The European Union has drawn up guidelines advising government spokesmen to refrain from linking Islam and terrorism in their statements.

Brussels officials have confirmed the existence of a classified handbook which offers “non-offensive” phrases to use when announcing anti-terrorist operations or dealing with terrorist attacks.

Banned terms are said to include “jihad”, “Islamic” or “fundamentalist”.

The word “jihad” is to be avoided altogether, according to some sources, because for Muslims the word can mean a personal struggle to live a moral life.

One alternative, suggested publicly last year, is for the term “Islamic terrorism” to be replaced by “terrorists who abusively invoke Islam”.

I know what you’re thinking. No, this is not satire.

It is amazing how arrogant these people are in assuming that non-Muslims have any say whatsoever in deciding which interpretation of Islam is “abusive” and which is the true Islam. That is only for Muslims to decide.

Why do we assume the Jihadist’s interpretation is wrong? The people who need to make that argument are the Muslims who disagree with it, and we need to pressure them to do so. But this accomplishes exactly the opposite because it sends a signal that we believe the “moderate” Muslims have won by defaut, relieving them of any pressure to actually attempt to do so.

Don’t want jihad associated with terrorists? There are only two ways to do that. 1) Defeat those who invoke jihad for the sake of terrorism. 2) Convince them not to do so. And there’s every reason to believe option 2 is impractical, leaving only victory. What is not an option (listen up EU) is attempting an Orwellian redefinition of verbiage with some odd hope that what you call a thing will have an impact on the reality of the thing.

Hat tip: Hot Air

Europe