Asalamu Alaikum.
The New Anti-Capitalist Party (NPA, by its French initials) made headlines when they agreed to run a hijabi candidate.
As a Muslim and a socialist I was absolutely elated to see this. All too often militant atheism is portrayed as being part of the criteria for being a leftist. As a person of faith, this leaves me really pissed off at people.
That made this story all the more important. Finally, here was a Muslim operating as a leftist. Not just that, but she was in France: one of the most bigoted countries in the world against Muslims. Finally, here was a leftist that had faith and she wasn’t afraid to show it. Moreover, here was a leftist organization that wanted to overthrow capitalism and it wasn’t bigoted against people of faith!
I was so happy. I saw it as an example that there is hope. That it is possible for the left to work with people of faith in general and Muslims in particular.
http://socialistworker.org/2010/12/15/islamophobia-and-the-npa
Then this story came out a few days ago. Ugh. SubhanAllah. I couldn’t believe it. I was heart broken. I really was. The NPA was my ray of hope and all of a sudden I read about how members of the NPA had exposed themselves as Islamophobes, sexists, and militant atheists. The Islamophobia and sexism is obvious in this story. But the most crucial point comes at the end of the interview with the comrade in France:
But old French traditions of left-wingers mocking or hating those who believe in God, and more recent trends toward demonizing Muslims since 9/11 and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan seem to be blinding comrades, and they are falling for old divide-and-rule tactics. (emphasis added)
There we have it. Militant atheism plays an important role in this story. But its not just true because this guy says it. Its true because I see it all the time. When my wife and I were both getting pitched the book The Meek and the Militant (a supposed Marxist analysis of religion), things seemed a bit fishy. Afterwards, when a comrade told my wife she’d eventually stop being religious simply because “thats what happens to socialists,” it became a bit clearer. Put more bruskly, I remember comrades talking about burning bibles at a protest and a particular comrade mentioning that she hated all religions and wanting them all to die. She’s quite blunt.
I point all of this out because I think its important to have a complete and sober analysis of the political situation here. Ilham Moussaid and her comrades were pushed out of the NPA for a variety of reasons. Some of them are more obvious: Islamophobia and sexism. But the last one is hardly, if ever, mentioned: militant atheism. Whether or not current members of the left like it, the reality is that major sections of the international working class consider themselves (to one degree or another) people of faith. Whether or not the current left likes that is irrelevant.
The fact is that current economic and political conditions internationally are making it more and more crucial to rebuild an organized and fighting left. This means recruiting members of the international working class, which means recruiting people of faith. To try and sidestep this reality or try and bully people out of their faith is simply insane.
The fact is that at the end of the day it doesn’t matter what faith someone identifies with, if any. What matters is what politics a person supports and is willing to fight for or defend. All atheists aren’t progressives and all people of faith aren’t reactionaries (though these are the stereotypes). All people are political and its along the political lines that we figure out who are our (i.e. socialists) allies, who are our enemies, and who is standing in the middle still waiting to be won over to the dictatorship of the proletariat.
