Talibanization

Talibanization (or Talibanisation) is a neologism coined following the rise of the Taliban movement in Afghanistan referring to the process were other religious groups or movements come to follow or imitate the strict practices of the Taliban. In its original usage, Talibanization referred to groups who followed Taliban practices such as:
*usually strict regulation of women, including forbidding of most employment or schooling for women;
*the banning of long lists of activities generally tolerated by other Muslims -- movies, television, videos, music, dancing, hanging pictures in homes, clapping during sports events;
*the banning of activities (especially hairstyles and clothing) generally tolerated by other Muslims on the grounds that the activities are Western;
*oppression of Shia, including takfir threats that they convert to Sunni Islam or be prepared to be killed;
*aggressive enforcement of its regulations, particularly the use of armed "religious police";
*the destruction of non-Muslim artifacts, especially carvings and statues such as Buddhas of Bamyan, generally tolerated by other Muslims, on the grounds that the artifacts are idolatrous or Shirk (polytheism)
*harboring of Al Qaeda or other Islamic militia operatives;
*a discriminatory attitude towards non-Muslims such as sumptuary laws against Afghan Hindus the Taliban regime enacted, requiring them to wear yellow badges, a practice that reminded some of Nazi Germany's anti-Semitic policies [ [http://archives.cnn.com/2001/fyi/news/05/22/taleban.hindus/index.html Taliban to mark Afghan Hindus] ,"CNN"] . [ [http://english.people.com.cn/english/200105/23/eng20010523_70812.html Taliban: Hindus Must Wear Identity Labels] ,"People's Daily"] [http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewPrint.asp?Page=%5CForeignBureaus%5Carchive%5C200106%5CFor20010615b.html US Lawmakers Condemn Taliban Treatment Of Hindus] ,"CNSnews.com"]

The term pre-dates the Islamic terrorist attacks of 9/11. It was first used to describe areas or groups outside of Afghanistan which came under the influence of the Taliban, such as the areas of Waziristan in Pakistancite news
title=Border Backlash
url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13990130/site/newsweek/
publisher=MSNBC
date=2006-07-31
accessdate=2007-01-13 ] ,cite web
title=Terrorism Monitor: Afghanistan and Pakistan Face Threat of Talibanization
url=http://jamestown.org/terrorism/news/article.php?articleid=2370000
publisher=Jamestown Foundation
date=2006-05-18
accessdate=2007-01-13 ] cite news
title=Reading the Musharraf-Bush Summit - Seven Clues to What Lies Ahead
url=http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=61f944ac683dc563997e27f05b5c798d
publisher=Indo-Asian News Service
date=2006-09-26
accessdate=2007-01-13 ] or situations analogous to the Taliban-Al-Qaeda relationship, such as the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) in Somalia and its harboring of Al Qaeda members,Fact|date=May 2008 or similar harboring of Islamic extremists in Nigeria,cite web
title=Sharia Law Threatens Nigeria's Stability
url=http://www.freedomhouse.org/religion/news/bn2002/bn-2002-03-27.htm
publisher=Center for Religious Freedom
date=2002-03-27
accessdate=2006-01-13] Malaysia,cite web
title=Talibanization of Malaysia: It destroys 100 year old Hindu temple
url=http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/24242.html
publisher=History News Network
date=2006-04-16
accessdate=2007-01-13 ] or Kashmircite web
title=Talibanization of Kashmir
url=http://soulinexile.blogspot.com/2006/08/talibanization-of-kashmir.html
date=2006-08-13
publisher=A Soul in Exile (blog)
accessdate=2007-01-13] and elsewhere around the world, such as Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, the current regime of the country, has been accused of "Talibanizing" the country, especially in their persecution of the Hindu minorityBangladesh: The Next Afghanistan? by Hiranmay Karlekar. New Delhi: Sage, January 2006. ISBN 0-7619-3401-4] [http://www.thenation.com/doc/20020527/baldwin20020517] [http://www.metransparent.com/texts/abdullah_elmadani/abdullah_elmadani_talibanization_of_bengladesh_english.htm] .

In 1998 Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid described groups "along the Pashtun belt" who were banning TV and videos, imposing Sharia punishments "such as stoning and amputation in defiance of the legal system, killing Pakistani Shia and forcing people, particularly women to adapt to the Taliban dress code and way of life." [Rashid,"Taliban," (2000), p.93] In December 1998 the Tehrik-i-Tuleba or Movement of Taliban in the Orakzai Agency ignored Pakistan’s legal process and publicly executed a murderer in front of 2000 spectators Taliban-style. They also promised to implement Taliban-style justice and ban TV, music and videos [Source: Yousufzai, Rahimyllah, "Pakistani Taliban at work," The News, 18 December 1998. See also AFP, "Murder convict executed Taliban style in Pakistan", 14 December 1998 ] In Quetta, Pashtun pro-Taliban groups "burned down cinema houses, shot video shop owners, smashed satellite dishes and drove women off the streets". [Rashid,"Taliban," (2000), p.194] In Kashmir Afghan Arabs from Afghanistan attempted to impose a "Wahhabi style dress code" banning jeans and jackets. "On 15 February 1999, they shot and wounded three Kashmiri cable television operators for relaying Western satellite broadcasts." ["Agence France Presse", "Kashmir militant group issues Islamic dress order," 21 February 1999. ]

The term was used in a Boston Globe editorial published on November 6, 1999, warning of the emerging threat of the Taliban regime almost two years before the attacks of September 11, 2001.cite web
title=The threat of Talibanization
url=http://www.indianembassy.org/policy/Terrorism/news_us/talibanization_nov_06_99.htm
publisher=Boston Globe
date=1999-11-06
accessdate=2007-01-13 ]

Reference to non-Muslims

The term is also used non-literally, and is applied to non-Islamic bodies and organizations by those who allege them to hold "repressive policies" based on their respective religions.

In addition, members of the left in the United States often use it as a political attack against the Republican Party and the Christian Right in their allegations of the right wing implementing policies based on Fundamentalist Christianity. [Blaker, Kimberly, The Fundamentals of Extremism: The Christian Right in America, New Boston, Mich, 2003, ISBN 0972549617]

Sometimes, different analogous neologisms are used by the accusers, such as allegations of "saffronization" used to describe or critique right-wing policies related to Hindu nationalismcite web
title=INDIA: Righting or rewriting Hindu history
url=http://www.sacw.net/India_History/ann022000.html
publisher=Inter Press Service
date=February 2000
accessdate=2007-01-13 ] or as a slur used by far left [Ethnic and Racial Studies Volume 23 Number 3 May 2000 pp. 407–441 ISSN 0141-9870 print/ISSN 1466-4356] [ [http://www.saag.org/%5Cpapers3%5Cpaper299.html The Politics of Education in India] ,R. Upadhyay, South Asia Analysis Group] and anti-Hindu groups.cite web
title=The Pitfalls of Pluralism: Talibanization and Saffronization in India
url=http://hir.harvard.edu/articles/1183/1/
date=Winter, 2004
accessdate=2007-01-13] [ [http://www.infinityfoundation.com/mandala/s_es/s_es_rosse_puzzle.htm Puzzling Dimensions and Theoretical Knots in my Graduate School Research] , Yvette Rosser] Radicalized Muslims often exploit the resonance with this term to attack Hindu Nationalists as Kaffirs (infidels) and "Hindu Talibs". [ [http://www.milligazette.com/Archives/15102002/1510200233.htm, milligazette interview] ]

Like any highly politicized term, it may also be used hyperbolically or in an alarmist manner, to make a slippery slope argument, such as in the invocation of the phrase "Talibanization of Bradford" to discuss a gamut of common racial problems and tensions which fall far short of the imposition of sharia law and terrorist attacks.cite news
title=Beheading Nations: The Islamization of Europe’s Cities
url=http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1183
date=2006-07-13
author=Fjordman
publisher=The Brussels Journal
accessdate=2007-01-13 ] It may also be applied unfairly by those who do not understand Islamic culture and the basis of sharia law, or who fail to distinguish between moderate Islamic and extremist Islamist states, or misapplied to perceived threats which are not true or have yet to be proven.cite web
title=Crushed between the two extremes
url=http://icssa.org/article_detail_parse.php?a_id=628&rel=&pg=&m_link=0&slink=9&m_id=14
date=2003-06-14
publisher=Independent Centre for Strategic Studies and Analysis
accessdate=2007-01-13]

ee also

* Al-Qaedaism
* Islamofascism
* Puritan

References