Content warning: this article contains discussion of child sexual abuse and exploitation.
On 16 June, Rupert Lowe – leader of the extreme-right Restore Britain announced the publication of his ‘Rape Gang Inquiry Report’.
Predictably, it ignored the basic methodological foundations necessary for such a study. Instead, it exploited victims’ narratives and deployed Islamophobic conjecture to arrive at a foregone conclusion, which Lowe posted to social media:
Our inquiry report proves that without doubt there is an undeniable link between religion and the rape gangs.
Islam.
As a country, we need to find the courage to finally say so.
Though Lowe used the official language of an ‘inquiry’, his endeavour was completely crowdfunded. It was subject to no oversight – parliamentary or otherwise – and completely lacks any of the methodological rigor expected of an inquiry. In spite of the report now being published, Lowe is still collecting donations.
Likewise, it also lacked the powers of an official inquiry. Being unable to compel testimony, it relied wholly on publicly available data, partisan speculation, and reportedly cherry-picked testimony from witnesses and whistleblowers.
Lowe report full of conjecture and fabrication
Before even reaching the introduction, the ‘report’ quotes Rupert Lowe, Albert Einstein, and Friedrich Nietzsche, in that order. In its executive summary, it states that:
The scale of the crimes committed is staggering. It has been previously established that, at the very least, 250,000 young white girls have been subjected to repeated rape, gang rape, trafficking, torture, pregnancy, forced Islamic conversion, and lifelong trauma.
That ‘250,000’ figure is a complete and utter fabrication. It links to a May 2019 parliamentary debate in which Malcolm Pearson of UKIP cited the figure without support. This, in turn, obscures the fact that Pearson was referring to his own extrapolation from an October 2018 debate:
My Lords, do the Government accept that if we extrapolate nationally the Jay report on Rotherham and other reports from Telford and Oxford, there appear to have been upwards of 250,000 young white girls raped in this century, very largely by Muslim men
So, Lowe’s “at the very least” is based on one UKIP politician’s estimate, and the assumption that every town in the UK failed as tragically as Rotherham.
Opinions and the far-right
The report goes on with the same utter lack of methodological rigor. It states that:
In court records and official inquiries, around 87% of those convicted in these group-based child sexual exploitation (‘CSE’) cases bore distinctively Muslim names.
Here, the report cited an article by Christian Concern, which in turn cited author Peter McLoughlin. Christian concern helped found the Alliance Defending Freedom, a US pressure group dedicated to attacking LGBTQ+ and abortion rights.
McLoughlin wrote a book on the group-based CSA scandal titled *Easy Meat.*He also happens to be the co-author of notorious white-supremacist Tommy Robinson’s Manifesto.
However, even if a far-right Christian group and a fascist-friendly author were reliable sources, “distinctively Muslim names” is hardly a high bar for evidence.
In the same vein, the report also states that:
Dr. Taj Hargey, an imam with the Oxford Islamic Congregation, believes the true proportion of gang members who are Muslims to be around 95%.
Again, the report states outright that it’s basing its figure on the belief of one individual. This is not science, it is opinion. Beyond this, Hargey is well-known for his contrarian opinions. He has campaigned both to ban the burqa and for the identification of UK politicians with familial links to Israel.
Narrative-building
Beyond conjecture on the number and background of the perpetrators, the report goes so far as to speculate openly on why Islam would – by its nature – be linked to the scandal. It reads:
At least eight theological aspects of Islam may contribute to cultural patterns that enable or normalise the sexual abuse of non-Muslim girls. These include (1) the doctrine of Muslim superiority, (2) the principle of loyalty and disavowal (al-walā’ wa-l-barā’), (3) male dominance over women, (4) enforced seclusion and veiling of women, (5) forced marriage combined with the absence of a fixed minimum age of consent, (6) the perception of female sexuality as inherently dangerous or fitna, (7) the historical sharia institution of slavery, (8) and the system of dhimmitude.
On this instance, watchdog group IslamophobiaUK highlighted the fact that:
That framework was written by Mark Durie — an Anglican priest. Published by Christian Concern a month before Lowe cited it.
Durie’s field is linguistics. His book argues Islam gives non-Muslims three choices: convert, submit, or the sword.
He didn’t study the gangs and find Islam. He’s argued Islam is a threat for twenty years, then applied it.
Beyond this, if we’re going to talk about a religion that has a strong association with sexual predation against minors, how on earth are we not even mentioning Christianity? As recently as 2022, the report of the Independent Inquiry Into Child Sexual Abuse stated that:
The investigation into the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales revealed a sorry history of child sexual abuse where abusive priests and members of religious orders and institutions preyed on children for prolonged periods of time. Between 1970 and 2015, the Church received more than 3,000 complaints against more than 900 individuals connected to the Church. In the same period, there were 177 prosecutions, resulting in 133 convictions. […] Since 2016, there have been more than 100 reported allegations of recent and non-recent child sexual abuse every year. The true scale of abuse over a 50-year period is likely to be much greater.
The same report also makes clear the widespread institutional protection that swept victims’ allegations under the carpet – just as Lowe is claiming for Islam. So why exactly doesn’t he draw this obvious comparison?
(We know why – it’s because predominantly-white Christian men don’t fit his narrative).
‘Question the men profiting from them’
In its reaction to Lowe’s report, IslamophobiaUK cut the the center of the ‘findings’ lies and obfustication:
Strip out the advocacy group, the one imam’s guess, and the priest with a fixed thesis.
What’s left?
No mechanism linking the faith to the crime. Only the ethnicity pattern the Government’s own audit found locally — and said could not be applied nationally, because the data doesn’t exist.
His own report admits the scale is “impossible to quantify.”
Then names a faith of two billion people. Beyond doubt.
Alongside blatantly biased, Islamophobic guesswork, the report included pages and pages of accounts from the victims themselves. Lowe’s partisan points-scoring exercise with the UK’s extreme right rode roughshod over what can only have been a supreme effort for the survivors to recount what happened to them.
We’ll finish with IslamophobiaUK’s words – they put it better than we could:
That isn’t a finding. It’s an advocacy paper. Broadcast by an MP as proof.
Stand with the victims. Question the men profiting from them.
Featured image via the Canary
By Grace
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