Under the headline “Stephen Fry hits back at accusations of Islamophobia”, the Independent on Sunday reported yesterday on the controversy over Stephen Fry’s endorsement of Nick Cohen’s “superb” defence of their fellow atheist Richard Dawkins and his position on Islam.
In a Twitter exchange on 22 August, responding to the criticism that Dawkins has described the Islamic faith as the greatest force for evil in the world and “clearly targets Islam in particular”, Fry sneered: “Wonder why. Oh, have a look around the world and see them slaughtering each other, let alone others. So charming to women too…”
You’ll note how, in Fry’s formulation, Islam the faith becomes “them”, the Muslims. And Muslims are then equated with murder and misogyny. A clearer expression of mindless bigotry would be difficult to find.
When his critic persisted in arguing that Dawkins was “entitled to call a small religious minority evil but branding an entire religion as ‘evil’ is beyond ignorant”, Fry didn’t have an answer. Eventually he just dismissed his opponents as “dickheads” and told them to “fuck off”.
Continue reading →
