How opaque is the head of the British Tory Party?
Well here's the answer...from his web journal....
it’s hard to over-emphasise the importance of language. I know it sounds like a side issue, but it isn’t. We are just not getting this right. Every time the BBC or a politician talks about “Islamist terrorists” they are doing immense harm (and yes I am sure I have done this too, despite trying hard to get this right.) Think of Northern Ireland – “IRA terrorist” was fine because it marked them out as part of a terrorist group, Catholic terrorists would have been a disaster. Yet that is the equivalent of what we are doing now..
When they hear and see this kind of language, Muslims simply think – “they mean us.” Of course it’s impossible every single time to say “terrorists who are following a perverted strain of the true religion of Islam” but if we’re going to use shorthand we have got to do better.
That the fact that the IRA is secular, socialist organization dedicated to unifying all of Ireland under one government, and never ever used theological arguments to justify any of their actions seems to have escaped the head of one the two leading parties in the British Isles strikes me rather odd.
To add to the rich current of humor present in his writing he goes on in the same post to criticize the "deeply depressing and totally unacceptable" local schooling.
So on which subject is David Cameron more glaringly ignorant, 20th Century Irish Republicanism or our current batch of "Islamist", oops I'm sorry, I mean.... well I guess I mean " " terrorism.
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