The appointment of Humza Yousaf as First Minister of Scotland is a clear example of how assimilation works in politics. The fact that he chose to deny Islamic sexual ethics and instead promote liberal sexual ethics is the clearest example one can see in recent times. Yet the defence of Yousaf by some Muslims – or relative silence regarding his obvious shortcomings – suggests that they do not understand the implications of the assimilation agenda in political life, or that they, too, have become assimilated to a degree.
My concern is that this applies to some of the Ulama, as well as the ‘Awām (common folk). For it is the same agenda that is forced on Muslim schoolchildren, or on mosques and madrasas – albeit being played out in different ways, but potentially more dangerously.
In this article, I hope to clarify how these matters are linked, and the dangers for our community if we do not grasp the challenge that is right under our noses.
For the purposes of clarity, ‘assimilation’ in this article is NOT about Muslims living side-by-side with others and having good relations – that is something that every Muslim should welcome, knowing that our Islam should bring goodness for everyone around us. Rather, ’assimilation’ means leaving those beliefs and values that conflict with the dominant beliefs and values in society, and assuming the latter in our lives.
A recent background on assimilation
“It is not enough for the vast majority of decent, peaceful, law-abiding Muslims to renounce terror in principle, including September 11 and similar events … If they choose to live in Western liberal democratic societies, they must accept the values of liberal democracy – as Jews, Sikhs, Hindus, and others have done for many years.”
This is the challenge put forward by the thinktank, Civitas, in their 2003 paper titled The West, Islam and Islamism.
The challenge is nothing less than a demand to Muslims that they need to leave any Islamic values, beliefs, and practices that contradict liberal democracy.
This would mean that Muslims should accept…
- secular governance – i.e. religion having no place in political life;
- the capitalist, riba– (usury) based economy;
- liberal social values, including zina, LGBTQ+ relationships, and the freedom to insult whoever you want, including Allah and His Messengers;
- belief in, and loyalty to the nation-state – which would include supporting the nation-state’s foreign policy objects, like the occupation of Palestine or wars in the Muslim world;
- and the global world order as it exists today, including the idea of international law under the UN and international courts.
Each of these issues contradicts Islam clearly. To explain why is important, but this would be beyond the scope of this short article.
Sufficed to say, it is a demand that Muslims SUBMIT. Not to Allah, the Most High, but to the values of liberal democracy. Our Islam would then be confined to the narrow areas that liberal democracies permit: prayer, fasting, charity, marriage, etc. And even then, it would not be safe if liberal democracies decided to encroach on these, like demanding female imams or gay marriages.
Some might dismiss this by saying that this was just one thinktank, but it was not. It was one of the frankest statements written by one of many thinktanks that have been looking at how to curtail Islamic revival across the world.
Others like the Policy Exchange, Project for the New American Century, Heritage Foundation, and more could be argued to have had a direct impact on policymakers in the UK and US. The RAND corporation wrote the most famous report arguing that the world needed a ‘Civil, Democratic Islam’ that conformed to Western values, and even set about explaining how that should be achieved: by empowering secularists, pushing traditionalists towards a more reformist and secular direction, and isolating the most fundamentalist and ‘extreme’ viewpoints.
When one looks at the events of the past 20 years or more, we can see the policies that states have implemented across the world to realise these aims – though usually masked through the guise of trying to prevent ‘terror attacks’, despite going way beyond violent crime. On the one hand, policies like Prevent and education policies delve into the microcosm of Muslim communities. On the other hand, foreign policy has justified invasions and occupation to change regimes or further manipulate Muslim countries aiming for a major Westernisation across the whole Muslim world.
What’s the relevance of this to Humza Yousaf?
Humza Yousaf’s victory in the recent SNP (Scottish National Party) leadership election polarised discussion amongst Muslims.
Some condemned him because of the fact that he compromised Islamic values on many issues in contrast to his main rival, Kate Forbes, who held onto her Christian values on the same issues.
Others congratulated him on his victory, as they would do any new leader. But others gave a more nuanced approach, acknowledging that this had broken another glass ceiling for a Muslim, and warning Muslims not to treat a politician like an Imam by taking him as a moral role model.
Assimilation in political life
Assimilation in political life occurs because politicians entering the system have to accept the ‘rules of the game’ – the secular political system; the liberal values that have come to dominate the state; and the non-negotiable policies, particularly in relation to other states. E.g. occupation of Palestine or, more recently, the war in Ukraine.
There are a variety of checks and balances in place to curtail the rise of anyone who violates these norms. They range from the mechanisms within the party-political system to full-blown media campaigns undermining the views of politicians who differ from the rules.
Jeremy Corbyn was the most high-profile politician to fall afoul of these checks and balances. After he unexpectedly became leader of the Labour party, it was his own parliamentary party members in conjunction with a media campaign that led to his removal as leader and subsequent expulsion from the party.
Other politicians have been chastised to a similar degree. Even the leader of the NUS was ousted from her position in a possibly unlawful way, because she did not and does not conform to the dominant view of the British state on Palestine, on the basis of a ‘breach of policy’.
If these are the sticks, then we should also look at the carrots. When politicians abandon Islamic views on Palestine (e.g. making ‘educational visits’ at the invitation of the Zionist occupiers), or Islamic sexual ethics (e.g. propagating LGBTQ+ ideology), they can expect to have an easier ride in the media as a minimum – and endorsement as cabinet ministers, mayors of big cities, and even first ministers of devolved governments.
Assimilation in schools, mosques, & madrasas
In schools, the process of assimilation is conducted through the education curriculum. The most obvious areas have been RSE (Relationship and Sex Education), but also in other areas – whether through the History or English curriculum, but also in extra-curricular ways like assemblies and other activities during ‘Democracy Week’, ‘Pride Month’, and so on.
Schools that do not promote ‘diversity’ in the manner that is expected are downgraded when they are policed by Ofsted (the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills). Moreover, the statutory Prevent duty in schools has targeted Muslim children who refuse to accept LGBTQ+ values, or who make pro-Palestine statements.
The ‘Trojan Hoax’ scandal was the most aggressive example of direct government intervention, but there have been other cases in Muslim areas where governing bodies have been replaced by governors from communities unrepresentative of the students in the school.
Madrasas may find themselves subject to Ofsted inspections in future. But for now, most are affiliated with mosques, and like the mosque, they are subject to rules regulated by the Charity Commission. These people have powers to intervene if they feel mosques or madrasas are violating their codes – which are, in turn, based on the secular liberal values of the state.
Assimilation of Imams and Ulama
This might take various forms.
There are Imams who endorse the armed forces – including their actions in Muslim countries. There are Imams who celebrate royal jubilees, births, and deaths in a more patriotic way than the average Englishman. There are Imams who have attended ‘educational visits’ to occupied Palestine as the guests of the Zionist occupiers. There are Imams who are very liberal on engagement with riba-based contracts.
But, in the current context of Humza Yousaf’s election, there has been a more subtle form of assimilation.
It is first and foremost the acceptance that Muslim politicians will engage in secular politics, regardless of how much it conflicts with Islamic teachings. Not only do most political parties (certainly all the main ones) play within the political rules of the state (as mentioned above), all have their own sub-creeds and manifestos which candidates and members are expected to campaign on and endorse (or else not be selected, not be promoted, and occasionally be expelled). Yet most Imams and Ulama are silent on their secular politics.
Regarding Humza Yousaf, but before him Sadiq Khan as Mayor of London, it is rare to hear an Imam or ‘Alim comment on their secular rule; their active promotion of liberal sexual ethics; their acts of worship in Hindu temples or Sikh gurdwaras; or Khan’s endorsement of the Tel Aviv festival in London (Yousaf probably has an easier climate regarding Palestine in Scotland); or from such actions from any Muslim politicians. Some may even excuse these, arguing that every politician has to make compromises (not to mention how serious these matters are in terms of their violation of Islamic beliefs or rules).
By contrast, the same politicians say or do one vaguely Islamic thing, and they will be praised as practising Muslims, without questioning whether or not it was a political stunt to win support – even though many of these politicians have made themselves fāsiq by enjoining munkar (evil actions) upon people and in some cases forbidding ma’rūf (what is right)!
The problem is arguably more advanced in the United States, where Muslim communities are more assimilated than in Britain and Europe – not only the politicians who support Palestine one day and LGBTQ+ rights the next – but also some of the scholars who make excuses for these politicians.
These same scholars will support Muslim parents in schools, whose children are threatened by secular liberal values. Yet with politicians, they have a liberal and lax approach: either silent, or making excuses, or actively supporting.
However, they seem to omit the fact that the politician has far more power to corrupt the youth than schools. When it comes to Humza Yousaf, if he is successful with what he proposes, he will be responsible for destroying the lives of many families in the future.
To hear some of these scholars speak, it is as if they view ‘politics’ and ‘governance’ as an ideologically-neutral, technical matter – like engineering or architecture – that we should judge a person on doing well, or badly!
The challenge for the Muslim community
Muslims have lived in the UK in significant numbers for several decades. The early generation, who built the mosques and established businesses, might sometimes have entered local politics to try and further the benefit of the community on specific issues.
But these actions have morphed into an out-of-control phenomenon which will not merely assimilate the participants in the political system, but also harm the victims of the policies they endorse.
It is vital that Muslims recognise this and discuss how we find a way of having a political voice, as well as a political cause, outside the secular establishment process. A way which does not mean we commit ‘ākhira-suicide’ by assimilation over a just few generations.
Source: Islam21c
I agree with the author’s views. The idea that we should judge politicians and imams in a different manner perhaps demonstrates that some have unwittingly accepted the secular paradigm.
The shariah does not provide such latitude. In fact, the ulema and imara are judged very strictly in the shariah. The imara are certainly not judged by a lesser standard. Allah swt will account the imara strictly for any betrayal.
The Muslim community must realise that becoming rulers in the West will be at the expense of our imaan and we must not sell our deen for scraps in this world. We must resist assimilation and promote the beauty of our deen, Islam.
I firmly believe that many ulema sadly do not understand politics in liberal secular societies.
Societies such as in the United Kingdom or other European countries do not just allow any Tom, Dick or Abdul to hold political office.
They are meticulously in selectively filtering out specific individuals whose values do not accord with dominant secular liberal capitalist values the state upholds.
This is why Kate Forbes, the other nominee lost because she held conservative Christian values which she was not willing to compromise in order to appease the liberal secular establishment.
She was asked whether she believes homosexual acts are a sin and she held firm and held her ground and affirm it was a sin according to her religious beliefs even if she doesn’t oppose their right to marry etc.
However, Humza Yousaf unashamedly did the opposite and consistently stated (over 25 times he claims) he did not see it as a sin. He saw homosexual sex and marriages equal to heterosexual marriages.
That they are normal. Humza Yousaf backed his master Nicola Sturgeon’s (SNP previous leader) position on same-sex marriage, abortion clinic buffer zones, banning conversion practices and on gender recognition, confirming he would “absolutely” challenge Westminster’s use of a section 35 to prevent the bill.
The gender reform bill that Humza supports is about making it easier for people to legally transition to another gender from that which they were assigned at birth by our Creator Allah سبحانه و تعالى
They will also reduce the age from 18 to 16 to allow this change to occur.
The point is Humza Yousaf has to compromise on these issues like abortion, homosexual acts, transgenderism because he had to affirm his loyalty to a liberal secular ideology that prevails over him which he had embedded himself within. We see this with Sadiq Khan too in his role as London Mayor as well as every Muslim parliamentarian ever to walk the corridors of power.
This is politics in the west. Either you hold values and principles that lie outside of the secular liberal ideology and thus be barred from office or you succumb to these values and adopt them and thus be welcomed as a liberal secular capitalist and given the ability to run for high offices.
This then has an impact on Muslims particularly the our younger generation “the youth” who are told that these are our Muslim role models to emulate.
These are Muslims who are moderate, tolerant and labelled as not extreme.
Furthermore, the policies these Muslims parliamentarians pass in the name of liberalism will affect every single Muslim child in the Scotland and elsewhere so to think this is something small and that it’s not important is the height of naïveté.
Lastly to state that Muslims are going to extremes in condemning him is just nonsense and an excuse and shows you modern day ulema lack understanding of the nature of the problem Muslims face in the west.