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The basic question to ask the supporters of the contentious anti-Islamophobic motion is has it any utility? Will it do anything? Will it change attitudes for the better? If there is a stock of genuine Islamophobia in Canada, will recording this motion decrease it, or move to decrease it?

That, I presume, was the priority consideration in the minds that brought it forth. Obviously, they must have thought it would, for otherwise there would be no point in issuing it, arguing for it, and stirring the quite considerable debate it already has.

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For the motion itself, and the politics that attended it, have not been without contention. The questions raised on its wording were legitimate. Why the particular focus on Islam? Why not a motion, as some have suggested, speaking out against prejudice against all religions?

There is also concern that the motion will, in some manner, chill valid criticism of Islamist terror, or will not make allowance for legitimate criticism or analysis of Islam. Such criticism would now be forced to wear the degrading mantle of Islamophobia. Given this welter of mixed impressions and varied understandings of the very point of the motion, how effective can it be?