Anti-Sexism as Weaponized Discourse Against Muslim Immigration: A View from Social Psychology

Abstract

For fifty years, the Western world has witnessed a noticeable decrease in overt expressions of prejudice, reflecting evolving social norms, whereby racism is perceived as something immoral and is often illegal. At the same time, it is clear that racist prejudice persists, largely rooted in historical and cultural legacies like colonialism. Because our egalitarian norms make prejudice undesirable, prejudice is predominantly conveyed in subtle ways, and tends to be rationalized (Crandall & Eshleman, 2003). In this context, gender equality ideology has been brought to the debate to legitimize a racist discourse against Muslims across different European countries. Politicians who hardly ever showed any sympathy for or even blatantly opposed gender-rights movements are found to profess gender-based arguments to support an anti-Muslim agenda. Threatened by purportedly sexist and illiberal Islam, these leaders argue that the ‘European egalitarian culture’ must be protected and reasserted. This opportunistic support for the gender movement on behalf of politicians has been pointed out by several authors (e.g., Delphy, 2006; Farris, 2017). In the present chapter, we explore social psychological perspectives that have been developed to tackle this paradox. In particular, we focus on the concept of ‘ideological malleability’, as introduced by Knowles and colleagues in 2009.