Ed Bates
Sensationalist warnings on the Internet - particularly in social media - about 'those scary Muslims' appear frequently. The latest one is the SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM. An example of this was posted on Facebook over Christmas by one of the EDL Divisons.
Being social media, this gets shared. In this case, 15 times.
Also, given the nature of social media it gets commented on.
The SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM! post makes people angry. It also frightens them.
Fear and anger fed by a healthy dose of paranoia, all from one post on the internet. The SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM is having the desired effect.
But before you start stockpiling weapons and food for the coming civil war (or nuking people), it's worth digging deeper into where the SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM post comes from. It's easier and better all round for the planet. It's certainly much less frightening, people's blood needn't boil and those nukes can stay in their silos. Everyone's a winner, baby, as Errol Brown once sang.
The date this appeared on the EDL pages was the 30th December 2011. However, it appeared roughly a month earlier (28th November 2011) on the ironically titled The Real Truth blog by Bradley Ortloff
Ortloff credits Davis Vic who in turn writes that "Judi Randolph Gardner Read this warning from a former Muslim..(.website: Islam Rules!)"
Notice that the 'SCARY AS HELL' part of the 'SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM' is missing? Someone, somewhere added the 'SCARY AS HELL' part between November and December 2011. In the world of conspiracy theories details like this are important. Conspiracy theories are built on rumours. The sum really is greater than the parts.
Trying to trace verifiable facts on the Internet is often a thankless task. The Islam Rules website where Judi Randolph Gardner claims she found the SCARY AS HELL WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM being a case in point. Gardner herself is fairly easy to find. She's a believer in causes such as
and
Unsurpringly, she also supports - and gets her information from -
Given that she herself didn't give the website address, it was necessary to try another tack...
The earliest mention of this SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM occurs in August 2006 on Daniel Pipes' blog. This comment is on an article about profiling airline passengers. the comment is submitted by 'Abdul Rahman'
Compare the text between Rahaman's post: "I, Abdul Rahman, was born and raised as Muslim. My whole family is still Muslim. I know every genetic code of Muslim. I know Islamic brain. I know every blood cell of Moslem. I live and breathe with them. I am an insider. I left Islam when I understood that Islam is a sick and evil religion."
with that of the EDL's post: "I was born and raised as Muslim. My whole family is still Muslim. I know every genetic code of Muslim. I know Islamic brain. I live and breath with them. I am an insider. I left Islam when I understood that Islam is a sick and evil religion. The following are the Islamic message to the West."
Variations: Rahman's name is missing as is the every blood cell line. Psychologically, excluding Rahman's name also has an interesting effect. It's no longer one Muslim named Rahman; it's any Muslim. Frightening stuff...
One important aspect of Rahman's post is that there's no mention anywhere of it being a SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM It's not even a WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM. In 2006 the SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM! didn't exist. It was SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM Both the SCARY AS HELL: part and the WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM part were added later. Another little teaspoon of paranoia and fear-mongering to add to the conspiracy theory.
Pipes himself is well-known in the anti-Islamophobe world. Here he is on Islamophobia Watch
And here he is on Loonwatch
But the really interesting person in all this is Abdul Rahman. If Abdul Rahman is the originator of this post, then who is he? Could it be this Abdul Rahman?
Perhaps, perhaps not. On the 29th March 2006 Rahman was in Italy. He was still there awaiting asylum a month later
So unless the Abdul Rahman who wrote in a comment on Pipes' blog (writing from America) was fast-tracked to America between the end of April 2006 and the end of August 2006 - of which there's absolutely no evidence - it's highly unlikely that it's the same person. Why would he be writing to Pipes' blog? Especially just to a comments section? Additionally, in 2006 Abdul Rahman was the cause celebre; Pope Benedict XVI himself interposed on Rahman's behalf, which is why Rahman ended up in Italy.
But, like all good conspiracy theories, this doesn't stop people believing...
Fast forward to August 2011. The modern version of the SCARY AS HELL: WARNING FROM A FORMER MUSLIM makes an appearance. This time it's published on the Citizen Warrior blog, renamed Warning to the West. (Which is also the name it appears under in the blog cited by Judi Randolph Gardner 3 months later in November.) It's given more gravitas by Citizen Warrior claiming "The following is an email we received from a former Muslim. We are reprinting it with his permission" It seems that Abdul Rahman (who isn't really Abdul Rahman the Afghani convert) is still writing the same(ish) email 5 years later.
Which is odd.
Compare the original Pipes' blog text here from August 2006: http://www.danielpipes.org/comments/53707
With this here from July 2011: http://www.citizenwarrior.com/2007/07/warning-to-west.html
Notice how the text has changed? The original Rahman text from the Pipes' blog (written by the fake Rahman) is still there, but this time it's a lot more threatening. And a lot fuller. It presents the full agenda of 'those evil Muslims'.
And this, in essence, is how conspiracy theories are born and snowball until they become both threatening and dangerous. One person pretending to be another posts a comment in a relatively minor Islamophobe's blog. That post is picked up by another Islamaphobe and embellished. That is picked up and embellished further by another Islamophobe's blog. And so on, and so on, and so on...
Until you end up with blood boiling and calls for nuclear attacks.
As Rod Serling once said "You're travelling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That's the signpost up ahead - your next stop, the Twilight Zone!"
Conspiracy theorists - bringing the Twilight Zone alive.