Editing Martin Amis (section)

=== Islam and Islamism ===
On the day after the [[2006 transatlantic aircraft plot]] came to light, Amis was interviewed by ''[[The Times Magazine]]'' about community relations in Britain and the alleged threat from [[Muslims]]; he was quoted as saying: "What can we do to raise the price of them doing this? There's a definite urge – don't you have it? – to say, 'The Muslim community will have to suffer until it gets its house in order.' What sort of suffering? Not letting them travel. Deportation – further down the road. Curtailing of freedoms. Strip-searching people who look like they're from the Middle East or from Pakistan ... Discriminatory stuff, until it hurts the whole community and they start getting tough with their children ... It's a huge dereliction on their part."<ref>[http://www.ginnydougary.co.uk/2006/09/17/the-voice-of-experience/ Martin Amis interviewed by Ginny Dougary] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070119084405/http://www.ginnydougary.co.uk/2006/09/17/the-voice-of-experience/ |date=19 January 2007 }}, originally published in ''The Times Magazine'', 9 September 2006.</ref>

The interview provoked immediate controversy, much of it played out in the pages of ''[[The Guardian]]'' newspaper.<ref name="Morey 2018">{{cite book | last=Morey | first=P. | title=Islamophobia and the Novel | publisher=Columbia University Press | series=Literature Now | year=2018 | isbn=978-0-231-54133-6 | page=136}}</ref> The [[Marxist]] critic [[Terry Eagleton]], in the 2007 introduction to his work ''Ideology'', singled out and attacked Amis for this particular quote, saying that this view is "[n]ot the ramblings of a [[British National Party]] thug, ... but the reflections of Martin Amis, leading luminary of the English metropolitan literary world". In a highly critical ''Guardian'' article, entitled "The absurd world of Martin Amis", satirist [[Chris Morris (satirist)|Chris Morris]] likened Amis to the Muslim cleric [[Abu Hamza al-Masri|Abu Hamza]] (who was jailed for [[inciting racial hatred]] in 2006), suggesting that both men employed "mock erudition, vitriol and decontextualised quotes from the [[Koran]]" to incite hatred.<ref>{{cite news |last=Morris |first=Chris |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/nov/25/bookscomment.religion |title=The absurd world of Martin Amis |newspaper=The Observer |date=25 November 2007 |access-date=22 June 2008 |quote=Last week Amis was called a racist. I saw him speak at the [[Institute of Contemporary Arts|ICA]] last month. Was his negativity about Islam technically racist? I don't know. What I can tell you is that Martin Amis is the new Abu Hamza. ... Like Hamza, Amis could only make his nonsense stand up with mock erudition, vitriol and decontextualised quotes from the Koran. |location=London |archive-date=1 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130901021653/http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/nov/25/bookscomment.religion |url-status=live }}</ref>

Elsewhere, Amis was especially careful to distinguish between Islam and radical [[Islamism]], stating: "We can begin by saying, not only that we respect [[Muhammad]], but that no serious person could fail to respect Muhammad – a unique and luminous historical being ... Judged by the continuities he was able to set in motion, Muhammad has strong claims to being the most extraordinary man who ever lived... But Islamism? No, we can hardly be asked to respect a creedal wave that calls for our own elimination ... Naturally we respect Islam. But we do not respect Islamism, just as we respect Muhammad and do not respect [[Mohamed Atta]]."<ref name="No Racist">{{Cite news|last=Amis|first=Martin|date=2007-12-01|title=No, I am not a racist|work=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/dec/01/race.islam|access-date=2023-12-31|issn=0261-3077}}</ref>

On terrorism, Amis wrote that he suspected "there exists on our planet a kind of human being who will become a Muslim in order to pursue suicide-mass murder", and added: "I will never forget the look on the gatekeeper's face, at the [[Dome of the Rock]] in Jerusalem, when I suggested, perhaps rather airily, that he skip some calendric prohibition and let me in anyway. His expression, previously cordial and cold, became a mask; and the mask was saying that killing me, my wife, and my children was something for which he now had warrant."<ref name=horrorism2006>Amis, Martin (23 February 2007). [http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/politicsphilosophyandsociety/story/0,,1868839,00.html "The Age of Horrorism"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071113163114/http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/politicsphilosophyandsociety/story/0,,1868839,00.html |date=13 November 2007 }}, ''The Observer''.</ref>

His views on radical Islamism earned him the contentious sobriquet "Blitcon" (British literary [[neoconservative]]) from [[Ziauddin Sardar]], who labelled Amis as such in the ''[[New Statesman]]''.<ref name="Sardar2006">{{cite news |last=Sardar |first=Ziauddin |title=Welcome to Planet Blitcon |url=https://www.newstatesman.com/200612110045 |access-date=21 May 2023 |date=11 December 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080804044028/http://www.newstatesman.com/200612110045 |archive-date=4 August 2008}}</ref>{{refn|group=n|The ''New Statesman'' article also assigned the "Blitcon" label to [[Salman Rushdie]] and [[Ian McEwan]].<ref name="Sardar2006"/>}}