Russell Brand defends stereotyped Muslims

Comedian asks people not to subject all Muslims to hatred after Woolwich attack.

While most celebs prefer to stay silent, Russell Brand has made an effort to stand up against the negative, preconceived notions regarding the Muslim community.

Actor-comedian and author Russell, Katy Perry’s ex-husband, wrote a piece for The Sun on the recent Woolwich murder case. Below is an excerpt from his article:

I caught up with the sad malice in Woolwich and felt compelled to tweet in casual defense of the Muslim community who were being haphazardly condemned by a few people on my time line.

Perhaps a bit glibly (but what isn’t glib in 140 characters) I posted: “That bloke is a nut. A nut who happens to be Muslim. Blaming Muslims for this is like blaming Hitler’s moustache for the Holocaust.”

As an analogy it is imperfect but I was frightened by how negative and incendiary the mood felt and I rushed…

… After my Hitler tweet I got involved in a bit of back and forth with a few people who said stuff like: “The murderer  said himself he did it for Islam.”

Although I wouldn’t dismiss what he’s saying entirely, I think he forfeited the right to have his views received unthinkingly when he murdered a stranger in the street. Someone else regarding my tweet said: “Hitler’s moustache didn’t invent an ideology that sanctions murder.”

That is thankfully true but Islam, when practised by normal people, is not an advocacy for violence.

“People all over the world are killing in the name of Islam,” someone added. But this is the trickiest bit to understand.

What I think is that all over our country, all over our planet, there are huge numbers of people who feel alienated and sometimes victimised by the privileged and the powerful, whether that’s rich people, powerful corporations or occupying nations.

They feel their interests are not being represented and, in many cases, know their friends and families are being murdered by foreign soldiers. I suppose people like that may look to their indigenous theology for validation and to sanctify their — to some degree understandable — feelings of rage.

Comparable, I suppose, to the way that homophobes feel a prejudicial pang in their tummies then look to the Bible to see if there is anything in there to justify it. There is — a piddling little bit in Leviticus.

The main narrative thrust of The Bible though, like most spiritual texts including the (Holy) Quran is: Be nice to each other because we’re all the same.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 28^th, 2013.                    

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