‘Islamist’ Term Is Useful
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While I wholeheartedly agree with the general tack of Howard Rosenberg’s critique of “The Blurred Lines of Today’s ‘Reality’ ” (June 10), his criticism of the use of the word “Islamist” is misinformed.
Rather than a TV-news neologism, this well-established term among academic circles and international-affairs experts--dating back at least to the Iranian revolution of the 1970s--draws a useful distinction between the various fundamentalist groups on Islam’s periphery and the overwhelming majority of the world’s billion-strong Muslims, whose beliefs on religion and politics are far less extreme from a modern, Western point of view.
Indeed, the problem isn’t that TV commentators such as Lou Dobbs recently incorporated this term in their speech. Instead, the problem lies in the media-fed American public’s general ignorance of Islamic places and peoples, and its consequent inability to see beyond the simplest of stereotypes.
That one such distinction in the form of the label “Islamist” should now be entering the vernacular is a much-needed step in the right direction.
PETER S. MORRIS
Santa Monica
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