Well said mil-observer. I obviously watch too much of the ABC and assumed the article to be 'left-wing' by the title. Just goes to show - don't skim.

Anyway, I think that the terms Islamophobia and homophobia have their valid uses. Some people do take their dislikes to an irrational level. And this is evidenced by 'gay bashings' and the nasty vilification of any women wearing a hijab.

However, the ideology of Islam deserves most of the literary criticism it cops from its detrators. Social liberals have a right to be sceptical of such a totalitarian and spiteful religion, or should I say political movement.

BTW I do like the writing of Christopher Hitchens. A genius no doubt. But I much prefer AC Grayling.

Oh Boy, this article is so full of non facts, where do I begin?

The only thing Nick Haslam got right in this whole article was the fact that people are acccused of being phobics to shut off debate. Name calling has always been used as a weapon to shut your opponent down even in the school grounds, you don't need a pychology degree to know that.

Non facts in Nicks article.
1. prejudices are more common among less rather than educated people. Fact-: The Germans were a very educated advanced society, leading the world at that time in some advanced inventions. Didn't stop them slaughtering 6million people though.

The Japanese have always been an educated civilised race, didn't stop them slaughtering 15million chinese though and that was only about 70years ago.

Gerry Adams from Sinn Fein, the IRA leader looked very intellectual and educated to me.

2. Fear reflects a perception of danger not transgression.
Why does a dog attack when you come on to it's owners property? It feels a sense of FEAR that your transgression may prove dangerous.

Honestly I could question a lot more of the validity of statements made in this article but it is past midnight and I can't be bothered so I think I will go to bed.

Mill Observer- Irrational fear, alarm, hostility, loathing and prejudice that gets a Brazilian man shot dead in London, and Haneef detained.

Is it irrational after a train full of people has just been blown to pieces on the London underground, to shoot someone who runs and tries to board a train when called out to by guards who are trying to protect the public. What if he had, had a bomb and the guards didn,t fire and another hundred people were killed? They did the right thing in the circumstances. What if your family had been on that train and the guards didn't shoot. Then you'd be blaming them. Fair go.

As for Dr. Haneef, his sim card was found to have been used by terrorists should the authorities have not investigated? Of course they had to hold him for a period of time because if he had been involved, the first thing he would have done when they let him go is flee the country. You can't investigate things in one day it can take weeks to verify evidence especially when you are trying to get it from overseas authorities.

What's the beef? They did their job found there was no evidence to directly convict him and let him go. Job done, innocence proven. Public once more protected from possible threat, that includes you and your family as well as mine and everybody elses.

If you were in charge of protecting the public what would you have done? Not have acted at aLL.

Dear Mil Observer...I assure you... the reason 'we' missionaries/evangelists/general Christians don't adopt thuggish attitudes and approaches is definitely not the lack of 'guts'.

It is the lack of carnality. Our message is a spiritual one..it is about souls being saved from eternal oblivion.. being brought FROM the kingdom of darkness INTO the kingdom of Light.

The early China Inland Mission workers buried more of their own children than they could count in converts... it was very hard slog against disease and sometimes violent opposition.

I cannot imagine trying to drag someone kicking and screaming into that kingdom of love.

"Yes.. (punch) you WILL! (kick kick) become 'Christian' NOWWWWW (baton thrust to the groin)"

It's so laughable Mil... in the case of Malaysia (sarawak) the people I worked with came TO the Missionaries and requested they come and teach them about Christ. It was a word of mouth thing..their relatives in Indonesia had early contact with missionaries and they could see the changed lives..... they wanted what their relatives had.

I think some posters expect too much of any one article - there are more than one reasons for any set of behaviours and beliefs that look similar, and Nick Haslam is trying to put together an explanation.
Although I like this article, one aspect I don't like is that Haslam has no room for a conclusion which is not either a phobia or a prejudice. He then explains that 'phobia' is inappropriate, as the behaviours and beliefs don't fit the clinical definitions.
The implication then is that prejudices are the only other option. To be prejudiced is to have pre-judged a situation, object or, more commonly, a person on limited or no direct evidence. But what of those who have had direct experience, and have come to a conclusion from that evidence?
The so-called progressive left was the loudest in condemning those who were sick of the behaviour of the (mostly) Lebanese at Cronulla, and called for a protest against it. (A protest which was to be unarmed, against a group which they often found to be armed, and was armed when they carried out reprisal attacks.) Many from the Cronulla crowd loudly said, "It's not about race. It's about behaviour."
For comparison, look for the article published in the Australian a short time afterwards. It was written by a policeman who spent 4 years responding to Lebanese males' offensive behaviour at Bondi beach. (Sorry I don't have a link.) After 4 years of being arrested for offensive behaviour, they moved elsewhere - to Cronulla. Their behaviour appears not to have changed.
A reasonable person can come to a reasonable conclusion once direct experience has been had. And it can be a negative conclusion, based on negative experience. It might look like prejudice to the uninformed, or to those who think they have all the answers and won't listen

No TR: Somehow you caught the epidemic “Islamophobia”. And if you want “totalitarian and spiteful”, you can hardly beat Christopher Hitchens. After the latest 1-million+dead Iraq crime that he backed, he could almost qualify as a warmonger too, except he's a Chickenhawk like the neocons who pushed it officially, or its ideological tour guides like the very recently dead Islam-hater SP Huntington.

I should add “snake oil salesmen” to the disparaging terms for missionary-neocolonialists, but that would be sexist.

My Malaysian friends are all non-Malay and non-Muslim (most Catholic, a few Buddhist-Taoist). I have known Malaysian Muslim acquaintances in the past, but only temporarily through work. They were good people too. My Malaysian friends have no serious problems with the ethnic and religious situation in their homeland; most have kept their citizenship and homes back in Malaysia too. They are constantly appalled by the fear and general ignorance in this country not only about Islam and Muslims in particular, but towards Asia in general. They find it kinda funny though, so we always get a good laugh out of it. Have to laugh really! And no, in anticipation of your next prejudiced guess: they don't work for the Malaysian Govt – never have – they're all in private sector firms, several western-based.

Malaysia's ethnic and religious patchwork is a success story precisely because it has functioned out of a post-colonial wreck which was itself built out of anti-communist counterinsurgency war. That war had its own serious ethnic components: the Bumiputera system has many flaws and local critics, but it is interesting to see where much of its policy resembles more recent official treatment of indigenous Australians here.

One obvious flaw in the Malay-Bumiputera legacy is the official indulgence towards missionaries through much of Malaysia's existence. Such disruptive snake oil is simply a continuation of colonial practice. It is as though Dayaks have been encroached on and exploited from two sides: Malay and Chinese opportunists on the one hand, and western Christian missionaries on the other.

A race riot in 1969 eh?