Skip to search
Skip to main content
Catalog
Help
Feedback
Your Account
Library Account
Bookmarks
(
0
)
Search History
Search in
Keyword
Title (keyword)
Author (keyword)
Subject (keyword)
Title starts with
Subject (browse)
Author (browse)
Author (sorted by title)
Call number (browse)
search for
Search
Advanced Search
Bookmarks
(
0
)
Princeton University Library Catalog
Start over
Cite
Send
to
SMS
Email
EndNote
RefWorks
RIS
Printer
Bookmark
Hate spin : the manufacture of religious offense and its threat to democracy / Cherian George.
Author
George, Cherian
[Browse]
Format
Book
Language
English
Published/Created
Cambridge, Massachusetts : The MIT Press, [2016]
Description
xviii, 308 pages ; 24 cm.
Availability
Copies in the Library
Location
Call Number
Status
Location Service
Notes
Firestone Library - Stacks
K5305 .G46 2016
Browse related items
Request
Details
Subject(s)
Offenses against religion
—
Law and legislation
[Browse]
Offenses against religion
—
Political aspects
[Browse]
Freedom of speech
[Browse]
Political persecution
[Browse]
Hate speech
—
Law and legislation
[Browse]
Series
Information policy series
[More in this series]
Summary note
In the United States, elements of the religious right fuel fears of an existential Islamic threat, spreading anti-Muslim rhetoric into mainstream politics. In Indonesia, Muslim absolutists urge suppression of churches and minority sects, fostering a climate of rising intolerance. In India, Narendra Modi's radical supporters instigate communal riots and academic censorship in pursuit of their Hindu nationalist vision. Outbreaks of religious intolerance are usually assumed to be visceral and spontaneous. But in this book, the author shows that they often involve sophisticated campaigns manufactured by political opportunists to mobilize supporters and marginalize opponents. Right-wing networks orchestrate the giving of offense and the taking of offense as instruments of identity politics, exploiting democratic space to promote agendas that undermine democratic values. The author calls this strategy "hate spin" - a double-sided technique that combines hate speech (incitement through vilification) with manufactured offense-taking (the performing of righteous indignation). It is deployed in societies as diverse as Buddhist Myanmar and Orthodox Christian Russia. Here, the author looks at the world's three largest democracies, where intolerant groups within India's Hindu right, America's Christian right, and Indonesia's Muslim right are all accomplished users of hate spin. He also shows how the Internet and Google have opened up new opportunities for cross-border hate spin. The author argues that governments must protect vulnerable communities by prohibiting calls to action that lead directly to discrimination and violence. But laws that try to protect believers' feelings against all provocative expression invariably backfire. They arm hate spin agents' offense-taking campaigns with legal ammunition. Anti-discrimination laws and a commitment to religious equality will protect communities more meaningfully than misguided attempts to insulate them from insult.
Bibliographic references
Includes bibliographical references (pages 219-292) and index.
Contents
Hate spin as politics by other means
By what rules? : human rights and religious authority
God, Google, and the globalization of offendedness
India : Narendra Modi and the harnessing of hate
Indonesia : Democracy tested amid rising religious intolerance
United States : exceptional freedoms, fabricated fears
Pushing back, through media and civil society
Assertive pluralism for a world of irreducible diversity.
Show 5 more Contents items
ISBN
9780262035309 ((hardcover ; : alk. paper))
0262035308 ((hardcover ; : alk. paper))
LCCN
2016014335
OCLC
946159852
Statement on language in description
Princeton University Library aims to describe library materials in a manner that is respectful to the individuals and communities who create, use, and are represented in the collections we manage.
Read more...
Other views
Staff view
Ask a Question
Suggest a Correction
Report Harmful Language
Supplementary Information