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Driven By Bigotry.


This morning, I was faced with the awkward situation of my favourite taxi driver going all Daily Mail on my ass. 

We were minutes into our trip to the station when the conversation turned to current affairs, including the recent suspected attempted terrorist attack in France and the destruction of the ancient temple of Baalshamin in Syria by IS. It was then that the driver (who I always liken to Tommy Saxondale) stated, "Say what you like, but most terrorists are Muslim". 

It was at this point that I felt I couldn't say what I liked, despite the fact he'd just told me I could. While I disagreed completely, and knew that he’d made a massively sweeping statement that presented a hugely blinkered view, I was also aware of the fact that he was providing me a service - and it's hard to lay into someone for being narrow-minded and then ask for a receipt.

I hate this assumption of collusion by default, particularly in a one-on-one situation like a taxi journey. It's like suddenly being confronted with a dark underbelly of society that only shows its face behind closed doors and being presumed to be a part of it. He may as well have said, “Well, we’re all white here”.

How was he to know I wasn’t a Muslim myself? I didn't have to be to still be offended. When I attempted to diffuse the atmosphere by saying “It's hard to fight terrorists as they only need to get it right once”, he responded with “And they all look the same, with their moustaches and that”.

There are 1.57 billion Muslims in the world, of which a tiny fraction are extremists (a pattern repeated in almost every religion). A recent Europol survey states that 99.6% of terrorist attacks in Europe were by non-Muslim groups. The Oklahoma City bombing in ’95, the Centennial Olympic Park bombing in ’96 and the many assaults on abortion clinics and shootings in schools and shopping malls in the US are just a few examples non-Muslim motivated ‘terror’ attacks – and yet the misconception still persists. I blame constant misinformation from the right-leaning media; that, and the taxi drivers of Hitchin. Next time, I think I’ll walk.
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