Targeted?

Last month, the pressure group Student Rights published a report claiming that ‘Islamic Extremism’ is active on University campuses and they ‘enforce’ gender segregation. The report has been condemned by Muslim student associations as part of an attempt to ‘demonise’ them. The National Union of Students (NUS) has also condemned the report as a ‘witch-hunt’.

A London School of Economics student union executive, Mohammed Harrath told the Huffington Post UK that the pressure group was trying to ‘ramp up’ the effects of Islamophobia on Muslim students.

“Organisations such as Student Rights, supposedly a "non-partisan" group, have continuously sought to ramp up fears of 'extremism' having a detrimental impact on the welfare of Muslim students. [The groups] feed into a pernicious campaign which increasingly demonises [Muslim Students], contributing to a climate of fear and suspicion of Britain's 100,000 Muslim students who work tirelessly to build more inclusive and respectful campuses. There is only one voice that is speaking about extremism on campus and it completely distorts everything. Other voices must be heard."

The report was inspired by media reports of ‘segregation’ at Muslim society events- the most famous of which was at Leicester University. Claims were made that there were signs instructing male and female students where to sit, however a spokesperson from the University of Leicester denied these claims.

He said,

Islamic Society did hold a philosophical discussion, Does God Exist? on 20 February. Just over 100 people attended and sat together in the same hall. The choice of where people sat was left to those attending. No enforced segregation took place. Where there is a public event and individuals attending wish, by their own free choice, to sit separately in the same hall, then that is a matter for them. People were also free to sit alongside each other if they chose to do so. The University will not intervene over their freedom of where to sit."

He went on to say,

To our knowledge, no-one was forced to sit in any particular seat. If there is evidence of enforced segregation that would be a matter over which the University and Union would investigate."

Another incident occurred at University College London, where Professor Lawrence Krauss walked out of a debate hosted by an Islamic society. Professor Krauss claimed that the debate was segregated and on learning this refused to partake. However, Zayd Tutton of Islamic Education and Research Academy claimed that the seating plan was pre-agreed with all parties. No forced segregation occurred- a seating plan was drawn up to create three separate spaces. One seating area would be mixed gender for those who wanted to sit together, and the other two for those who did not wish to mix.

It is clear that Muslim students feel targeted by groups such as Student Rights group, whose report led to stories in mainstream newspapers like the Daily Telegraph, which claimed that a quarter of events held by various Islamic and Muslim societies were ‘segregated’ between 2012-2013. The trouble with this is the statistics used give a misleading impression. Firstly, only 180 events were ‘screened’ by the report’s authors and within a year, the number of University events across the country would reach into the thousands. Muslim student groups account for many hundreds of those events, thus the figure of over 25% of Muslim and Islamic society events being segregated is not accurate.

Secondly, the only events screened were ones in-which one speaker was a ‘known’ extremist, which is not that common, but does happen for two reasons. The main reason why most Muslim student societies do not invite ‘extremist’ speakers is because their ‘radical’ beliefs are abhorrent to most Muslim students. Secondly, to invite ‘extremists’ in would mean that all Muslim students would be tarred with the same brush as the ‘extremist’ speaker. Some Muslim student societies do invite ‘known extremists’ mostly in order to debate with them- however, the number of societies that do this is incredibly small.

In other words, not only is the 25% figure problematic, but within the rules which govern science and social science research, this study is flawed. The nature in which Student Rights picked their sample was highly selective. In academia it is known as biased sampling- which means they chose samples (events) which already conformed to what they had already decided the results should be. In other words, the report was a foregone conclusion and any material which might contradict their findings was excluded from the report. It is simply bad science. Student Right’s director Raheem Kassam is a former member of the Henry Jackson society which helped form and fund Student Rights. The organisation is famed for its many appearances on the BBC and is described as Britain’s only Neo-Conservative organisation. Neo-Conservativism is an ideological movement from America, who famously, came to prominence under President Bush. Many of Bush’s top aides and advisors were neo-Conservatives, who envisioned a new world-order based on American military supremacy. They founded the ‘project for the new America century’ which calls for unilateralism (American global dominance) and the destruction of any country which challenges or tries to rival American dominance. The Neo-Con’s are credited as being the architects of the ‘War on Terror’ and the Iraq war.

Furthemore, in the past, Kassam has been accused of feeding false information to the BBC about alleged ‘anti-Semitism’ at SOAS at a Palestine solidarity event. He is also accused of editing his own Wikipedia page-which has now been deleted. Former members of the Henry Jackson Society, of which Kassam is from, have been accused it of having an anti-Muslim agenda.

Groups like Student Rights serve on one purpose. They wish to divide society and roll back the clock on British social tolerance. It is imperative that we do not succumb to the ‘suit and tie’ islamophobia and xenophobia that we would not entertain if the ones producing the report had jack boots and shaved heads. Islamophobia is wrong whoever does it.