Maajid Nawaz Quotes
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The best revolutions are unplanned, and the most democratic are leaderless.
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The British state already invests in early intervention campaigns in drug abuse and sexual health. Challenging extremism should be no less of a priority.
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Liberalism will beat totalitarianism by killing it softly, not by mimicking it.
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America did not invade Iraq because Iraqis are Muslims. Oil, money, economic interests. Who knows? But it was not because Iraqis are Muslims.
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The truth is that just as the 'West' is not a homogenous entity with one view on foreign and domestic policy, nor are Muslims.
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De-radicalisation begins by breaking down the logic which once seemed unassailable and rethinking what you are fighting for and why. That is hard to do when Islamists and Islamophobes feed off each other's hateful cliches.
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For years, Islamists and other extremists have taken advantage of grievances of Muslims in Britain and have successfully identified ways to integrate them under one 'Islamic' banner.
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There has been a failure to grasp how competing narratives fight for the attention of angry young Muslims, and we have grossly underestimated the appeal of the jihadist brand.
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There were people who had sampled my voice from speeches when I was an Islamist and made them the chorus of pro-Islamist rap songs who then began talking about me as an apostate.
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The fact is that there is a serious problem of extremism with minority groups within Muslim communities.
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I’m a Muslim, we come from a Muslim community and we are very critical of western or American foreign policy. So if I’ve got the right and if other Muslims have got the right to criticize… likewise everyone else has also got the right to criticize everything else.
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Rather than allowing jihadists to shut down debate, it must proliferate so much that they simply cannot kill us all.
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There are no globalized, youth-led, grassroots social movements advocating for democratic culture across Muslim-majority societies. There is no equivalent of Al-Qaeda without the terrorism.
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I became, suddenly, not just a Muslim in faith. I became a Muslim in politics. Somebody whose politics were pre-defined by one interpretation of Islam.
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Non-violent extremism is essentially the increase of intolerant and bigoted demands made by groups seeking to dominate society.
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The only certainty we have is that those who are certain of a way to arrive at worldly salvation, are committed enough to organize around this, and seek power to enforce it, will invariably descend into a bloody totalitarian fascism.
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There are members - very, very close and dear members - of my family - I'm talking immediate family - who simply don't speak to me anymore and haven't done so for years. My marriage fell apart.
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Any item of clothing that covers the face and makes it impossible to identify individuals is open to abuse.
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When I returned to the United Kingdom, I found that I could no longer justify Islamist extremism as the antidote.
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Expressing myself through language was always something that I had had to learn to do more so than others.
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I was filled with hate and anger. But during my trial, something decisive happened: Amnesty International adopted me as a prisoner of conscience, and it was an unbelievable feeling to know that there is someone fighting for you on the outside. Amnesty's 'soft' approach made me seriously consider alternatives to revenge.
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In an open society, no idea can be above scrutiny, just as no people should be beneath dignity.
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I used to MC a bit when I was young - 14 or 15 years old.
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Being veterans of the struggle to push back against fundamentalist Christians, American liberals are well acquainted with the pitfalls of the neoconservative flirtation with the religious-right.