'The strange allure of our exes'

Zia Sardar in the New Statesman, lays bare the current obsession and courting of ‘ex Islamists’ by the media and Government. ‘To stand up and declare that you are an ex-fanatic or an ex-Muslim is now the shortest route to fame and fortune’, he writes.

Why? Because ‘When it comes to Islam we are ready to believe anything and everything. Anything that seems to help us fight fundamentalism is deserving of uncritical support.’

‘The exes also enable us to perform a neat con-trick’, he says. ‘By embracing them and their call for “Islamic reform”, we appear to demonstrate our support for the Muslim community – thus drawing attention away from the fact that we continue to discriminate against, and marginalise, the majority.’

Or, otherwise, a case of the Government seeking quick fix solutions to more pressing problems with the spin doctor’s guarantee that sidling up to the ‘exes’ will look good in the morning papers.