Member-only story
Anti-Theism Is a Lame Excuse to Undermine Accusations of Islamophobia
Islamophobia is quite the particular beast when it comes to online harassment. As in it does seem to come from just about everywhere. From people who you think are your allies, and from those who are your sworn enemies.
I remember having to conceal my identity from wherever I go, and right up until 2016 when election season was kicking into high gear, I never truly confessed my religious allegiance on social media because I saw what it can do on Reddit, on YouTube, and several other corners of the internet where moderation is nigh-on absent. People get more scrutinized for the fact they believe in a God, and they are presumed by many to be less intelligent, and more prone to radicalization as a result, but that’s not who I am — that’s never who I was meant to be.
When ISIS first rose to prominence, I was repeatedly and constantly mocked in the public. Mostly by teenagers who are still well into their edgy phase. The fact I still have to see the shit I’m about to show online is deeply demoralizing, and it’s become a trigger for me, that whenever I stumble upon anything even remotely similar, I experience racial trauma on what only could be described as PTSD-adjacent. I’m momentarily thrust back into that feeling I have whenever my guard is down, and I’m expected to conform a notion that makes me a killer, a rapist, a leech on society, and so much of what is thought to be universal to Muslims…
