Why leftists support islam

When one of the commentators suggested that they should be neutral, the coordination committee replied, "We are not neutral, we were told to vote for the liberals! Furthermore, for the first time in two decades, evidence of ballot manipulation surfaced.

According to the High Commission for Planning , two-thirds of registered voters are residents of villages and desert towns, while the proportion of the rural population of the age group eligible to vote does not exceed Many are left wondering why would the Ministry of Interior go through the trouble of registering the residents of the desert towns, raising their percentage to 94 percent of the total eligible voters?

The clear answer is that the administration undertook a tremendous effort in coaxing and coercing villagers simply because they are more submissive to authority and more adamant on preserving legitimacy. As for urban residents, they have a history of voting for the opposition parties, be it leftist or Islamist, depending on the circumstances.

Additionally, for the first time since the beginning of this century, the records of the election offices in major cities were not shared with party representatives, especially the PJD.

This clearly violates the law and gives way to doubts concerning the integrity of the elections results especially as the public still recalls the legislative elections scandal when the JDP announced the results before the Ministry of Interior, causing a huge uproar that practically ended the political career of a former minister.

There are other significant issues at play here, including the fact that most parties that have a large social base lose much of their popularity when they lead the government because they cannot carry out promised reforms because the government in Morocco does not have any real power to bring about significant change. Also, when they become part of the regime, they lose the moral glow opposition usually enjoys being the defenders and protectors of civil society in its sectoral battles.

Another possible reason is the new electoral law that was passed in order to allow smaller parties to be represented in the parliament. Now that weeks have passed since the elections and the appointment of the new government, we can say that the palace's hope of Aziz Akhannouch turning the page on the rule of Islamists and projecting a better image of the government may not go far. Social media was ablaze when he was appointed and several attacks were directed at the billionaire businessman, who, to many, represents the rentier economy and the illegal marriage between power and wealth ; a concept which the Moroccan Spring rebelled against.

Akhannouch, however, is no stranger to public wrath. In , his fuel distribution company was targeted by a boycott, which prompted the parliament to launch an investigation into competition in the fuel market. As minister of agriculture in the previous government, Akhannouch allowed farmers to make extensive use of butane gas for irrigation. This was viewed as irresponsible behaviour since Butane was subsidized with public money for domestic uses to preserve forest wealth and support families with limited resources.

The term Islamism therefore acts as tokenism, i. As a result, Islamo-leftism contributes to stifling legitimate voices within minority groups and spreading the wrong message — that those who defend their fundamental rights are subversive members of these groups.

Therefore, being visible and demanding equal rights and treatment are also interpreted as an attack on a body of power where the dominated are expected to know their place and remain invisible and submissive. Otherwise, they will be accused of creating a breeding ground for terrorism. The line between legitimate participation in democratic life and colluding in acts of violence has also become more and more blurred. The only way of not being accused is to remain silent.

The term also stigmatises all those who are fighting against Islamophobia, including many organisations facing accusations which are unsubstantiated, but enough to have consequences, as we saw with the dissolution of the Collective Against Islamophobia in France last winter. Islamo-leftism has also resulted in political disqualification by making organisations appear toxic, even dangerous, to society. Islamo-leftism silences any constructive criticism of state policies and legislative initiatives.

It creates a climate of conflict, disqualifying whoever raises their voice in opposition. It also aims to create internal enemies to fight against, who will ultimately be anyone who criticises or opposes. As a result, holding healthy discussions that would benefit society is made impossible by the ruling powers, who refuse to be challenged.

It also makes it possible to discredit all political, community and intellectual actors who, on the basis of common values equal rights, criticism of power, etc. They are portrayed as enemies to be defeated for the good of the nation and public order. Firstly, the term exploits the Islamophobic climate to stir up reluctance, even opposition, to the left and to some strands of social science.

Finally, by the same token, it provides leverage to people against social sciences, arguing that they support Islamism and leftism. Islamo-leftism also serves as a distraction technique from the real problems facing society. Finally, this term and ideology will continue to serve as a reference point for extreme right-wing reactionary groups and theories, including Eric Zemmour or even Michel Onfray who use the word as propaganda to fuel social conflict.

Using the term contributes towards normalising the ideas of the far right, but also grants them the means with which to pursue their political ambitions. The word Judeo-Bolshevism was coined in Russia by anti-revolutionary Tsarist movements who exploited the prevailing antisemitism of the time to spread anti-communist ideas. It therefore stigmatises Jewish populations who are members of communist parties.

The term also means that anti-communism and antisemitism have become interchangeable, meaning antisemitism could become anti-communism and vice-versa. The term spread within Europe in the ss to fuel other far-right antisemitic and anti-communist movements, such as Nazism and fascism.

Islamo-leftism uses the same strategy to bring together the anti-religious left, individuals fighting against social sciences and the far right.

Ironically, this strategy is also about pitting one religious minority against another. It is important to remember that the real danger remains the far right and their deadly ideologies, as well as the re-appropriation of its ideas and rhetoric in the rest of the political arena. While, contrary to France, French-speaking Belgium has been able to maintain its cordon sanitaire rule to keep the far right out of Parliament , using their concepts beyond this cordon makes it more acceptable.

In the long term, it normalises the actors previously excluded from public debate. Get the Trolls Out! For more see this link. The study allows in a unique way to analyse religion, religiosity and religious attitudes in relation to three forms of extremist attitudes. The results show that religion is an important influencing factor of extremism, but religious affiliation and religiosity are less important than specific religious attitudes such as religious tolerance and religious exclusivity.

Findings of a Swiss youth study. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. Criminological theories and research have addressed the relationship of religion and religiosity to deviant behaviour and extreme attitudes, particularly in relation to delinquency.

However, the authors of this hypothesis did not find any significant relationship between religiosity and self-reported delinquency. After their study was published, several other studies reported that religiosity is related to lower self-reported delinquency [for example 2 — 4 ] and also deviant behaviour, especially concerning drug use [e.

In the past, the relationship between religion and delinquent or deviant behaviour was tested mainly for the Christian faith. It is therefore unclear whether findings regarding Christian faith can be transferred to other affiliations. For example, Baier [ 7 ] found for juveniles with an Islamic religious affiliation no significant bivariate correlation between religiosity and violent behaviour; multivariate analyses, however, indicated that Islamic religiosity increases violent behaviour, especially after controlling for alcohol consumption.

Religiosity in this study was measured by visiting a place of worship as well as by the frequency of praying and the subjective importance of religiosity in everyday life. Brettfeld [ 8 ], on the other hand, reported a similar delinquency reducing effect of religiosity for Christians as well as Muslims regarding violent behaviour. In the case of Muslims, however, the effect was less pronounced and not significant.

In this respect, this study also draws attention to the fact that for Islamic religiosity no protective effect comparable to Christian religiosity seems to exist. It can therefore be concluded that religiosity is not a protective factor for violent or delinquent behaviour in general; instead differences regarding religion e.

Violent and delinquent behaviour patterns, as well as associated attitudes, can also manifest themselves in various forms of extremism.

Regarding the topic of extremism, the influence of individual religiosity was analysed to a much lower degree than delinquency. If one looks at the religious ties, this is examined in particular with Islamist extremism and is interwoven by the dimensions of the attitudes of this form. Fundamentalism is not just a phenomenon among Muslims, but also among Christians, Hindus and so on [cf. Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the relationships between different religions and different forms of extremism.

This article focusses on the types of extremism which are relevant for the European Context: Islamist extremism, right-wing extremism and left-wing extremism. According to public statistics, in Regarding to young people, it can be assumed that the proportion of the Muslim population is even higher than in the total population due to demographic trends immigration from Turkey, former Yugoslavia, Arab countries and a higher birth rate among Muslims [ 12 ].

Does religious affiliation has an influence on three types of extremism? Is the strength of the religious attachment religiosity related to the support of extremist attitudes? Do other religious attitudes influence the acceptance of any form of extremism? Regarding these other attitudes, the influence of religious exclusivity as well as of religious tolerance are considered.

Findings on religion and Islamist extremism. Especially in relation to Islamist extremism it is discussed whether religiosity represents a risk factor of radicalisation.

The empirical findings are contradictory. However, their results also showed that the personal significance of religion lowers the support of extremist attitudes see e. In addition, it should be kept in mind that extremists are sometimes religious illiterates or converts who were not influenced by Islamic religious socialization [ 16 ]; thus, they may not be fully familiar with Islam, but they can still be strongly religious.

These findings indicate that different correlations between Islamic religion and Islamist extremism may depend on the operationalisation of religiosity.

Furthermore, it can be concluded that Islamic religiosity does not seem to be a strong preventive factor of Islamist extremism. Findings on religion and Right-wing extremism. Although the connections between Christian religion and right-wing extremism have certainly gained attention, yet only few empirical studies exist on this topic [ 17 , 18 ].

Here, religion is used to mark the difference to other religions, especially the Islam see [ 17 , 19 , 20 ]. The fact that the radical right takes up the subject can be explained rather as a reaction to the pluralization of society than to the actual turn of people towards religious faith [ 18 ]. In the case of right-wing extremism, the criteria for exclusion can be justified ethnically, but also culturally and thus also religiously. Hoyningen-Huene [ 21 ] distinguishes between three types of right-wing extremist youth: traditionally right-conservative youth, evangelical-fundamentalistic youth and youth who have been socialized in a Christian church.

This typology illustrates that there is an overlap between Christian religiosity and right-wing extremism. This conclusion is also supported by an analysis of song lyrics of bands classified as right-wing music groups [ 21 , 22 ]. Hoyning-Huene [ 21 ] identifies even eight groups showing relationships between new religious and pagan movements and right-wing extremism cf.

Pauwels and De Waele [ 24 ] have investigated the relationship between religious authoritarianism and right-wing extremism.

They found that especially for Christian fundamentalism there is a link with right-wing extremist attitudes and also violence. Findings on religiosity and Left-wing-extremism. Left-wing extremism is defined as a political orientation whose ideological goal is—among others—the establishment of communism or anarchy.

A characteristic of this thinking is the rejection of any religious views and leaders a-religiosity. This suggests that there should be no direct relationship between religion or religiosity and left-wing extremism. Looking at the literature, nearly no empirical study on the relationship between religiosity and left-wing extremism is available.

Deutz-Schroeder and Schroeder [ 25 ], based on a representative survey of the German population, diagnosed that left-wing extremists are less likely to belong to a religious community. Ramiro [ 26 ] finds comparable results for several Western European countries.

Left-wing extremist groups, however, are characterised by a great diversity, so perhaps religious-socialist orientations exist e. In the following, the relationship between these factors will therefore be examined in an exploratory manner. Religion has different dimensions and this paper looks at three of them: belonging to a religious group affiliation , the strength of religious bonding religiosity , and religious attitudes e.

Sunnis, Shiites, Alevis and persons without religious affiliation. Right-wing, left-wing and Islamist extremism will be analysed as types of extremism, with attitudes, not behaviour, being examined in each case.

Regarding religious affiliation, it is expected that an affiliation alone does not yet have a formative effect on attitudes and behaviour. In Western societies, membership is becoming less and less important, i.

At the same time, people who do not belong to a religious community often show a certain degree of faith. Thus, it can be assumed that the degree of religiosity is related to extremist attitudes, not affiliation per se: Hypothesis H 1 : Persons affiliated to a religion do not agree more frequently with extremist attitudes than persons without religious affiliation; however, the degree of religiosity is correlated with extremist attitudes. Considering the research results reported above, it can be assumed that Muslim religiosity may be a risk factor for Islamist extremism.

Christian religiosity, on the other hand, should predominantly have a protective effect regarding extremist attitudes, whereby with regard to right-wing extremist attitudes it can also be assumed that a strong Christian religiosity correlates with a higher approval: Hypothesis H 2 : A stronger Christian religiosity reduces agreement with left-wing extremist and Islamist extremist attitudes; on the other hand, the more religious Christian respondents are, the more likely they agree with right-wing extremist attitudes.

Hypothesis H 3 : The stronger the Muslim religiosity, the higher is the agreement with Islamist extremist attitude. If it is assumed that religiosity correlates with a higher approval of extremist attitudes, then this should be the case not solely due to religious feelings and orientations, but to a certain interpretation of a religion. If religiosity is accompanied by humanistic, universalist values that are at the core of every world religion, then a violence and extremism reducing effect should be found for every form of religiosity.

There are some empirical studies showing an association between religious behaviour and prejudice, demonstrating that religious affiliation and religiosity as such are not the problem, but that religious views serve the individual to provide orientation and identity- stability see already [ 27 , 28 ]. Religiosity as well as prejudice can be a useful means for gaining a stable identity. However, the question of which kind of relationship, if any, exists between religious intolerance and exclusivity and extremism still waits for an answer.

Keeping in mind that radicalization also involves an exclusionary attitude and the conviction of being in possession of a certain and only truth, these all could be based on religion [ 29 ]. Thus, extremist attitudes and religious exclusivity and intolerance may reinforce each other: Hypothesis H 4 : Religious attitudes like intolerance and claims of exclusivity increase the agreement with extremist attitudes. If only religion-related variables are considered in the analyses, the influence of religion on extremist attitudes may be overestimated.

For this reason, we consider several control variables with evidence of influencing both extremist attitudes and religiosity. Looking first at socio-demographic variables, gender should be included in the analyses. Numerous studies have reported correlations between male gender and right-wing extremism.

This finding is interpreted as a socialisation effect [ 30 ]. However, there are mixed findings regarding gender differences in left-wing extremism. Schroeder and Deutz-Schroeder [ 31 ] found no differences in all dimensions of left-wing extremism they analysed, while Baier and Pfeiffer [ 32 ] demonstrated that boys agreed stronger with left-wing extremist attitudes than girls.

In relation to Islamist extremism, e. Eser Davolio et al. However, Eser Daviolio and Lenzo [ 34 ] also note that women play a relevant role, but mostly one that is less perceived by the public and usually takes other forms of support than fighting cf. Another control variable is migration background. The assumption here is that more young people without a migration background favour right-wing extremist attitudes; on the other hand, people with a migration background are more likely to accept Islamist extremist attitudes if they are muslims, e.

Additionally, a higher education is classified as a protective factor especially for right-wing extremism [ 36 , 37 ].

For left-wing extremism, Baier and Pfeiffer [ 32 ] showed the same effect: Students who attend a lower type of school have higher levels of extremism than students who attend a higher type of school. Also, for Islamist extremism there is empirical evidence that a high education is a protective factor e. Beside this, it is assumed that right-wing extremism is a result of the threat to personal prosperity, to so-called deprivation experiences e. People with a low social status and stronger experiences of deprivation therefore agree more frequently with right-wing extremist attitudes.

No research results are available on the influence of deprivation on left-wing extremism. Regarding Islamist extremism, it is also assumed that deprivation can have a negative impact. El-Mafaalani [ 42 ] also stated that disadvantaged young people with experiences of exclusion are more likely to become Islamist extremists. Beyond demographic variables and deprivation, the influence of different socialisation and personality factors should be taken into account.

First, it can be assumed that parenting styles play a role. According to Baumrind [ 43 ], two dimensions are particularly important: parental attention and parental control. Previous empirical research has shown that children of controlling parents are more likely to be protected from becoming delinquent e. Second, self-control can be classified as a relevant influencing factor of extremism [ 24 ]—and higher level of self-control is also associated with greater religiosity [ 47 ].

High self-control is perceived as a protective factor, whereas a person with low self-control is not able to resist current needs, prefers simple tasks as well as risk-taking behaviour and is impulsive and self-centred [ 48 ] and therefore more prone to engage in extremism. Pauwels and De Waele [ 24 ], for example, found that political violence is related to lower levels of self-control. Third, moral values may have an impact on extremist attitudes.

The importance of these moral values for explaining delinquent behaviour was confirmed, for example, by Schepers and Reinecke [ 50 ]. Pauwels and Schilds [ 51 ] assume that a relationship should also exist with extremism. Fourth, as with almost all forms of deviance in adolescence, the peer group has to be considered. A lot of studies showed that having contact with delinquent peers enhances own delinquent behaviour e.

An extremist radicalisation is also a group process that can be described as de-individuation, shift from individual normative standards to group standards, social identity formation, polarisation and so on see e. With regard to their friendship networks, it should be noted that young people in particular are heavily dependent on what is available in their immediate environment; they do not consciously select specific extremist groups to which they would like to belong, but rather fall into extremist right-wing, left-wing or Islamist extremist groups as a result of what is in their environment cf.

A sample of young people living in Switzerland is used to test the hypotheses. The Cantonal Ethics Committee of the Canton of Zurich has determined that the study is ethically unproblematic and does not fall under the Human Research Act. The aim of the study was to determine the prevalence and influencing factors of various forms of extremism in Switzerland.

In order to obtain the sample, the following procedure was followed: The survey did not claim to be representative for whole Switzerland, as this would have been very difficult to achieve for a total of 26 cantons. Gallen, Ticino, Valais and Zurich representing both rural and urban regions, as well as the three dominant language regions. The survey was aimed at young people aged between 17 and 18 years on average, because it could be assumed that extremist attitudes have a higher prevalence in this group in comparison to younger adolescents.

In the cantons, a random drawing of schools or school classes was then carried out, in which surveys were to be conducted. Students were interviewed with an online questionnaire during one school lesson 45 minutes ; the interviews were administered by trained interviewers or teachers.

During the survey, a class work atmosphere was created, i. Anonymity and confidentiality were guaranteed. The survey was voluntary, and the young people had the opportunity to decide for themselves whether to participate in the survey or to stop it at any time.

The respondents were informed about this in the classes and in the primary text of the survey. The parents of the students were informed with a letter before the survey. However, the parents had the opportunity to indicate that they did not want their child to participate in the survey. In total, classes with all in all students took part in the survey. The total response rate of the survey was This is a relatively low rate because many schools refused to take part in the survey.

If schools and classes agreed to participate, nine out of ten pupils took part in the survey. With The gender ratio of the survey is balanced male youths Of all respondents, Less than half of the students Therefore, the proportion of young people with a migration background is quite high with In this article, three types of extremism are analysed: right-wing extremism, left-wing extremism and Islamist extremism.

The items used for measuring these types of extremism can be found in S1 — S3 Tables which base in part on the instruments of e. Right-wing extremism was defined as an orientation that advocates nationalism and divides people into groups of different values social darwinism , whereby the members of the own group are whites racism and the members of the foreign group are mainly foreigners, Muslims and Jews, among others, which is why xenophobia, Islamophobia and antisemitism represent further core dimensions of right-wing attitudes.

Extremism, however, is not only characterized by the agreement to certain ideological goals, but also by a willingness to carry out violence against groups of persons defined as enemy groups, which is why the willingness to exercise verbal or physical violence against foreigners and left-wing extremists was also measured. As the mean values of the individual items presented in S1 — S3 Tables show, the items are only approved of to a small extent.

The items were combined into a mean scale the same applies to the other extremism scales. Left-wing extremism was defined as an orientation whose ideological goal is the establishment of communism or anarchy. The enemies of this orientation are on the one hand the capitalist economy hostility towards capitalism , on the other hand the state and its organs classified as repressive, especially the police hostility towards police and state.

Again, additionally the willingness to carry out violence against groups of persons defined as enemy groups was integrated in the instrument. Because of that there are four items measuring the willingness to exercise physical violence against capitalists, police officers and right-wing extremists. The approval of the items is sometimes significantly higher than the approval of the right-wing extremism items.

The main ideological goal of Islamist extremism is the introduction of a theocracy based on the Koran and Sharia. The own group of orthodox Muslims is upvalued superiority of Islam ; the West in general and non-traditional Muslims are regarded as enemy groups devaluation of western societies, hostility towards non-traditional Muslims.

In addition, inhabitants of the western country in which the Muslims live are classified as enemies, in Switzerland accordingly the Swiss hostility towards Swiss. The willingness to use violence is directed against non-Muslims on the one hand. On the other hand, terrorist attacks are a central mean of achieving the goals of Islamist extremism. The approval of the items is rather low. The means of the three scales are 1. All scales are right-skewed high values, i.

For this reason, a robust estimator is used in the following analyses MLR. In order to ascertain religious affiliation , the young people were asked to which religious community they belong. Here it was possible to report a variety of different types of religious affiliations.

Four groups were distinguished for the analyses: Respondents with Christian affiliation majority Catholic, but also Protestants, Protestant Free Churches, Orthodox , respondents with Muslim affiliation majority Sunnis , respondents with other affiliations and respondents without religious affiliation.

The sample comprises of Christians To measure religiosity , the following five items of an instrument developed by Huber [ 60 ] were used: 1. How often did you think about religious topics in the last 12 months? How often did you attend church services, fellowship prayers or the like in the past 12 months? How often did you pray in the last 12 months? How often did you experience situations in the last 12 months in which you had the feeling that God or something divine intervened in your life?

I believe that there is God or something divine. Every single item stands for one dimension of religiosity distinguished by Huber [ 58 ]; these are intellect, public practice, private practice, experience and ideology. The wording of the items has been changed in part compared to the original instrument. To determine an individual value of religiosity, in a first step the response categories were transformed to the same range from 1 to 7.