Between Islam and Islamophobia

It is official, Muslim bashing is racist. Islam bashing is not.

The former is racist because it assumes things about people where we wouldn't ordinarily make assumptions; it bunches over one billion human beings into one monolith, when everyone knows each human being is individually unique; it interprets what is in someone's heart based on what they're wearing on their body; it insists that people choose their religion, culture and way of life, when in fact no one really does: everyone adopts the norms of the society that surrounds them (if the islamophobes were born into Muslim families, for instance, they would probably be extremists: same narrow mindedness, different cultural context).

But a lot of people paint Islam bashing as Muslim bashing and thus stamp out room for important debate by exploiting the sensitive issue racism. It is very important to draw the line here, to protect both free speech and, when things move to the other extreme, to ensure innocent people's safety.