We reject hostility towards Muslims just as we reject every other form of group-focused enmity. In order to be able to counter this intolerable attitude appropriately, we consider the right choice of words to be an important precondition. We have therefore co-signed this joint statement:
Statement on the planned establishment of a registration office at the Berlin interior administration
Hostility towards Muslims instead of „anti-Muslim racism“
In March 2020, following the events in Hanau, Senator of the Interior Mr Andreas Geisel presented a comprehensive package of measures for the protection of Muslims. This also includes a registration office to which victims of racism are to report, so that the extent of the problem can be better recorded. According to press reports, this is to be a registration office for „anti-Muslim racism“.[1]
As much as we welcome the establishment of registration offices for recording hate crimes and racism, and as much as we reject racism and discrimination, we nevertheless have misgivings that the concept and the associated term „anti-Muslim racism“ is receiving support and recognition from the administrations and ministries.
The use of terms is in each case bound up with different scholarly and political concepts, which often become apparent only on closer inspection. This is also the case with „anti-Muslim racism“ and with the term we favour, „hostility towards Muslims“.
By racism we understand ideologies of inequality that invoke biology in order to categorise people. First, they assume the existence of clearly identifiable groups of people as „races“, and second, racism justifies the discrimination of those affected by their assignment to a „race“. „What is significant is that a biological category is regarded as fundamental and that in this respect there is no changeability.“ (after Armin Pfahl-Traughber, 2019 and 2020)[2]. Islam is a religion and not a „race“. The term „anti-Muslim racism“ blurs the clarity of the term „racism“, with far-reaching consequences: if all manner of discriminatory manifestations count as „racist“, then the specific potential danger of racism is disregarded and relativised. Moreover, the division of humanity into „races“ on the pattern of the outdated „racial doctrines“ is scientifically untenable. Religions and cultures, by contrast, can and must be able to be measured and criticised against the standard of democracy and human rights. If cultures and religion are equated with „race“, however, then criticism of the ideologisation of culture and religion that is motivated by human rights and democracy also runs the risk of being dismissed as „racist“.
Criticism of notions of – religious and cultural – identity that regard the individual person less as an individual with individual human rights than primarily as a member of the collective must, however, remain fundamentally possible. Especially where such notions of identity relativise human rights as the rights of each individual person in a worrying way. This requires a differentiation between the irrational distinction and evaluation of people according to the category „race“ (racism) and discrimination on the basis of the generalisation and overvaluation of cultural and religious differences.
We therefore propose that in the public debate and for the public administrations and ministries the term „hostility towards Muslims“ continue to be used instead of the term „anti-Muslim racism“. Following the recognised Leipziger Mitte-Studien, which used this term, the phenomena meant can thus be captured more unambiguously: it is about hostility towards Muslims as Muslims and about people being discriminated against because of their being Muslim. On the other hand, the term „hostility towards Muslims“ permits the necessary democratic and human rights criticism (cf. Armin Pfahl-Traughber, 2019 and 2020).
We appeal to Berlin’s Senator of the Interior Mr Andreas Geisel and to the interior administration to review the naming of the planned registration office and to use the term „hostility towards Muslims“ for it. We also ask other administrations, such as the Berliner Landesantidiskriminierungsstelle, to review their use of terms, so as not to discredit and impede, by mistake, attitudes motivated by democracy and human rights. In our view this is necessary in order to advance and promote the discussion about cohesion, democracy and human rights in Berlin.
AG SPDqueer Neukölln (board) (Ramin Rachel, Svenja-Michell Felgentreu, Christian Riemer, Henri Vogel, Bettina Oehlert)
Humanistischer Verband Berlin-Brandenburg (presidium)
Antonio Leonhardt (DIE LINKE, BVV-Lichtenberg)
Carl Chung (head of political education & projects „Jehi Or“ Jüdisches Bildungswerk für Demokratie – gegen Antisemitismus)
C. S. (deputy spokeswoman Landesarbeitsgemeinschaft Säkulare Grüne Berlin / abbreviated subsequently at the signatory’s request)
Detlef Wagner (district councillor for social affairs and health, BA Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf)
Dr. Fritz Felgentreu (SPD, member of the Deutscher Bundestag)
Dr. Elio Adler (chairman of WerteInitiative – jüdisch-deutsche Positionen e.V.)
Herbert Nebel (spokesman Landesarbeitsgemeinschaft Säkulare Grüne Berlin)
Jan Buschbom (educationalist)
Lala Süsskind (managing shareholder „Jehi Or“ Jüdisches Bildungswerk für Demokratie – gegen Antisemitismus)
Markus Wollina (DIE LINKE, Berlin-Mitte)
Michael Hammerbacher (head of DEVI e.V, Verein für Demokratie und Vielfalt in Schule und beruflicher Bildung)
Naila Chikhi (independent consultant for integration and women’s policy, author)
Roman Veressov (DIE LINKE, district councillor Lichtenberg)
Seyran Ates (lawyer, Ibn Rushd Goethe Moschee)
Walter Otte (spokesman Bundesarbeitsgemeinschaft Säkulare Grüne)
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[1] Tagesspiegel, So will Berlin seine Muslime besser schützen, 6.3.2020
[2] https://hpd.de/artikel/antimuslimischer-rassismus-analytische-kategorie-oder-polemisches-schlagwort-16906, 14.6.2019;
