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Get our new book: Double Bind: The Muslim RIght, the Anglo-American Left, and Universal Human Rights, by Meredith Tax

In a period of right wing attacks on Muslims – or people thought to be Muslims – how does one respond to human rights violations by the Muslim Right without feeding hate campaigns?
 
When US diplomats invoke the oppression of Muslim women to sanctify war, how do we practice feminist solidarity without strengthening Orientalism and neocolonialism?
 
When the US targets jihadis for assassination by drone, should human rights defenders worry about violations perpetrated by those same jihadis or focus on violations by the state?
 
These are some of the questions raised in Double Bind: the Muslim Right, the Anglo-American Left, and Universal Human Rights, a book just published by the Centre for Secular Space.  It can be ordered through your local bookstores or purchased online at lulu.com.
 
Taking the UK organization Cageprisoners as an example, it shows how to distinguish between organizations that stand for universal and inseparable human rights, and those that use the language of human rights for other purposes. It discusses “five wrong ideas about the Muslim Right”: that it is anti-imperialist; that “defence of Muslim lands” is comparable to national liberation struggles; that the problem is “Islamphobia”; that terrorism is justified by revolutionary necessity; and that any feminist who criticises the Muslim Right is an Orientalist ally of US imperialism. 
 
Double Bind will be launched in the UK on Feb. 11 and in the US on March 1.  For more information, contact admin [at] centreforsecularspace.org. 

Support independent publishing: Buy this book on Lulu.

Quotes from supporters

It seems crystal clear that cultural "fundamentalist" revivals are centrally about the loss of patriarchal power, privilege and identity and that turning back the clock on gender relations is at the heart of their programmatic obsessions.  I am very excited to see where you're headed with this, as it brings together a number of threads to knit together a much needed theoretical and practical coherence to a rights-driven approach to global events.

Dan Connell, Journalist, founder of Grassroots International, senior lecturer in journalism and African Studies at Simmons College

It is a relief to sense that there are people out there willing to recognise the need for looking at all aspects of how human rights are or are not addressing terrorism, fundamentalisms and women's rights.

Ariane Brunet, former coordinator of Women's Rights Program at Rights and Democracy, Montreal; cofounder of Urgent Action Fund

Only one person sees a vision. Only a few people recognise the value of the vision and buy into it. It is the responsibility of those few to convince others. Now this is our task.

Dorothy Aken'Ova, director, International Center for Reproductive Health and Sexual Rights, Niger State, Nigeria

It seems crystal clear that cultural "fundamentalist" revivals are centrally about the loss of patriarchal power, privilege and identity and that turning back the clock on gender relations is at the heart of their programmatic obsessions.  I am very excited to see where you're headed with this, as it brings together a number of threads to knit together a much needed theoretical and practical coherence to a rights-driven approach to global events.

Dan Connell, Journalist, founder of Grassroots International, senior lecturer in journalism and African Studies at Simmons College

It is a relief to sense that there are people out there willing to recognise the need for looking at all aspects of how human rights are or are not addressing terrorism, fundamentalisms and women's rights.

Ariane Brunet, former coordinator of Women's Rights Program at Rights and Democracy, Montreal; cofounder of Urgent Action Fund

Only one person sees a vision. Only a few people recognise the value of the vision and buy into it. It is the responsibility of those few to convince others. Now this is our task.

Dorothy Aken'Ova, director, International Center for Reproductive Health and Sexual Rights, Niger State, Nigeria

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