The More Accurate Term for 'Extremist' We Should All Consider Adopting | Alternet
We say that it's important to distinguish Muslims from Muslim extremists, but we don’t say how to make that distinction. “Extreme” is a relative term and as such, easily abused. One can call anyone who falls to either side of one’s position an extremist. Maybe “extremist” is the kind of term we can’t define except intuitively. I doubt that. I think it means something specific and definable.
An extremist is someone who insists on the unerring infallibility of some belief that they embrace – no doubts or questions remaining, no receptivity to challenging evidence or argument and no compromises tolerated. A more accurate term is absolutist. The word originally meant “set free, make separate, loosened away.” Absolutists hold their beliefs separate or away from all challenging influences. Absolutism is an ideological tax haven, a place to harbor your beliefs free from the taxing challenge of learning new things and refining them.
Absolutists dish out their belief but never take in other people’s beliefs. They already know everything they think they need to know and if you don’t agree with them, then you’re the problem. They’re self-absolved. They already have the absolute solution.
