3 - Allaying Suspicions

Summary

Obtaining French citizenship is not enough to secure social acceptance, and terror attacks committed in the name of Islam have critically impaired Muslims’ claims to national membership. Beginning with a discussion of how the construction of Muslims as a “suspect community” has impacted their daily lives, the chapter explores Muslim leaders’ efforts to display exemplary conduct to reassure majority members and circumvent the terrorist stigma. Their actions, such as organizing guided tours and open days in mosques, are emblematic of this endeavor, as well as of the asymmetrical burden of mutual understanding that characterizes postcolonial European societies. Moreover, embodying exemplariness involves cultivating Islamically justified dispositions for approachability and gentleness in daily interactions. Efforts to allay suspicions can also lead Muslim leaders of the UOIF to establish taboo forms of cooperation with intelligence officers, which highlights the ways in which the securitization of Islam relies partly on the involvement of certain community members. Overall, through their practice of disidentification from “Salafi,” “literalist,” and other “extremist” worshippers, French Muslim leaders tend to reinforce the distinction made by state authorities between “good Muslims” and “bad Muslims,” thereby deflecting the fundamentalist stigma onto some coreligionists.